Gone Fishin'
Gone Fishin' Portfolio (Alexander Green)
Where it stands today
Our calculation, 1968-04 – 2026-09
Growth of $10,000
Where it came from
Open sources show the author is Alexander Green, an investment analyst and adviser who is Investment Director of The Oxford Club and chairman of Investment U (an online investment-research service). The Permanent Portfolio is a different model.
Green published the book in 2008 with Wiley. Reviewers describe him as someone who retired from a Wall Street career around age 43, who still believes he can beat the market with his own stock picks, but who recommends passive indexing for most people. The book presents a fixed, ten-asset-class portfolio of mostly Vanguard funds that can be managed in under about 20 minutes a year, which is where the 'gone fishin'' name comes from.
Green says his approach rests on institutional asset-allocation ideas from Markowitz, Sharpe and Miller (per a book summary on getAbstract): diversify across uncorrelated asset classes, keep costs low, rebalance on schedule. He lists six drivers of results: savings, compounding time, asset allocation, returns, expenses and taxes, and notes investors control all but returns.
The book appeared in 2008, just before the financial crisis; a later review (July 2012) criticised its bond choices (corporate and high-yield bonds) for exactly that crash year. Green also recommends about 70-75% in stocks and equity-like assets for most investors, citing the long-run record of equities.
What is in it
| US large-cap (broad market) stocks | 15% | Vanguard Total Stock Market-type fund |
| US small-cap stocks | 15% | |
| European stocks | 10% | |
| Pacific Rim stocks | 10% | |
| Emerging-market stocks | 10% | |
| REITs | 5% | |
| Gold-mining stocks | 5% | Vanguard Precious Metals and Mining fund in the book |
| Inflation-protected bonds (TIPS) | 10% | |
| Short-term corporate bonds | 10% | |
| High-yield corporate bonds | 10% |
How we model it
| Developed markets outside the US | 20% |
| US large companies (S&P 500) | 15% |
| US small companies | 15% |
| Emerging markets | 10% |
| Inflation-protected bonds (TIPS) | 10% |
| Short-term government bonds | 10% |
| Corporate bonds | 10% |
| Real estate (REITs) | 5% |
| Gold | 5% |
For a euro investor
How to build it with European funds
| Part | Share | Example funds (ISIN) |
|---|---|---|
| Developed markets outside the US (closest match) | 20% | iShares Core MSCI Europe UCITS ETF EUR (Acc) IE00B4K48X80iShares Core MSCI Japan IMI UCITS ETF IE00B4L5YX21 |
| US large companies (S&P 500) | 15% | iShares Core S&P 500 UCITS ETF USD (Acc) IE00B5BMR087Vanguard S&P 500 UCITS ETF (USD) Distributing IE00B3XXRP09 |
| US small companies | 15% | SPDR Russell 2000 U.S. Small Cap UCITS ETF IE00BJ38QD84iShares MSCI USA Small Cap ESG Enhanced CTB UCITS ETF USD (Acc) IE00B3VWM098 |
| Emerging markets | 10% | iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets IMI UCITS ETF (Acc) IE00BKM4GZ66 |
| Inflation-protected bonds (TIPS) | 10% | iShares USD TIPS UCITS ETF USD (Acc) IE00B1FZSC47 |
| Short-term government bonds | 10% | iShares USD Treasury Bond 1-3yr UCITS ETF (Dist) IE00B14X4S71iShares Euro Government Bond 1-3yr UCITS ETF (Dist) IE00B14X4Q57 |
| Corporate bonds | 10% | iShares USD Corporate Bond UCITS ETF (Dist) IE0032895942 |
| Real estate (REITs) | 5% | iShares US Property Yield UCITS ETF IE00B1FZSF77iShares Developed Markets Property Yield UCITS ETF IE00B1FZS350 |
| Gold | 5% | Invesco Physical Gold ETC IE00B579F325Xetra-Gold DE000A0S9GB0 |
The idea
Spread money across ten broad, low-cost asset classes that are not perfectly correlated, hold a fairly high stock share (about 70-75%) because stocks have been the best liquid long-term asset, and rebalance once a year.
How people buy it
Original: Vanguard index mutual funds (Total Stock Market, Small-Cap Index, European, Pacific, Emerging Markets, REIT Index, Precious Metals and Mining, Inflation-Protected Securities, Short-Term Investment-Grade, High-Yield Corporate), per the book as described in the reviews. The book also has an ETF chapter. No Vanguard high-yield index fund exists, so other equivalents are used in some reconstructions.
Rebalancing as published
Fixed allocation, rebalanced once a year (as described by the White Coat Investor); no glide path.
Variants
- The book also gives the portfolio an age-agnostic fixed mix; no glide path is described.
- Canadian adaptation suggested by a reviewer: 20% each in Canadian, US and international equities (not Green's own).
- MyPlanIQ and other sites publish ETF reconstructions of the same ten weights.
Criticism
- No glide path: the portfolio does not become safer as the investor nears retirement (White Coat Investor).
- Corporate and junk bonds were the wrong choice in 2008: Treasuries gained about 17%, investment-grade corporates lost about 6%, junk lost about 26% (same review).
- Only US small caps are tilted; no international small caps and no explicit value tilt (same review).
- Claims that TIPS are less volatile and rise when other bonds fall are disputed by the reviewer.
- The afterword is partly a promotion of Green's newsletter, and the appendices copy fund prospectuses (White Coat Investor book review).
- Commenters on Canadian Couch Potato say three or four broad funds would be simpler.
Through the eras
| Era | Dates | Total | Per year | Worst drop | S&P 500 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Great Inflation (stagflation) | 1969-01 – 1982-07 | +157.1 % | +7.2 % | −26.0 % | +84.6 % |
| 1973-74 oil shock and bear market | 1973-01 – 1974-12 | −21.2 % | −11.3 % | −26.0 % | −41.7 % |
| Second oil shock and the Volcker disinflation | 1979-01 – 1982-08 | +62.3 % | +14.1 % | −11.6 % | +59.2 % |
| Great bull market in stocks and bonds | 1982-08 – 1999-12 | +846.8 % | +13.8 % | −20.5 % | +2060.4 % |
| Black Monday | 1987-08 – 1987-12 | −14.7 % | — | −20.5 % | −21.8 % |
| Savings-and-loan crisis and 1990 recession | 1990-07 – 1991-03 | +3.5 % | — | −12.9 % | +7.4 % |
| 1994 bond market massacre | 1994-02 – 1994-12 | −3.9 % | — | −4.9 % | −3.2 % |
| Asian and Russian financial crises | 1997-07 – 1998-10 | +1.8 % | +1.3 % | −13.4 % | +22.4 % |
| Dot-com bubble and crash | 2000-03 – 2002-10 | −13.9 % | −5.5 % | −16.2 % | −37.2 % |
| Recovery and housing boom | 2002-11 – 2007-09 | +123.9 % | +17.8 % | −4.4 % | +97.0 % |
| Global financial crisis | 2007-10 – 2009-03 | −31.3 % | −22.2 % | −37.3 % | −44.7 % |
| The decade after the crisis | 2009-04 – 2019-12 | +193.7 % | +10.5 % | −13.4 % | +411.2 % |
| Fourth-quarter 2018 sell-off | 2018-09 – 2018-12 | −9.5 % | — | −9.5 % | −14.4 % |
| Covid crash and stimulus boom | 2020-02 – 2021-12 | +29.0 % | +14.2 % | −15.2 % | +53.6 % |
| Inflation shock and rate hikes | 2022-01 – 2022-12 | −15.0 % | −15.0 % | −20.7 % | −19.9 % |
Calendar years
Any N-year period
| Any N-year period | Worst | 10 % worse than | Median | 10 % better than | Best |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 y (691) | −33.0 % | −5.3 % | +11.0 % | +24.4 % | +57.6 % |
| 3 y (667) | −7.3 % | +2.1 % | +9.8 % | +16.8 % | +25.0 % |
| 5 y (643) | −0.4 % | +4.4 % | +8.9 % | +15.9 % | +23.4 % |
| 10 y (583) | +4.7 % | +6.2 % | +9.4 % | +14.9 % | +17.3 % |
| 15 y (523) | +4.9 % | +7.3 % | +9.5 % | +13.6 % | +16.4 % |
| 20 y (463) | +6.1 % | +7.5 % | +9.8 % | +13.1 % | +14.6 % |
| 30 y (343) | +7.3 % | +8.0 % | +10.3 % | +12.0 % | +12.7 % |
How it behaved in history
- 2008 crisis. Equity share about 75% plus junk and corporate bonds meant it fell hard in 2008; reviewers single out the bond sleeve as poorly suited for that year. www.whitecoatinvestor.com
Published results (by others)
- In 2008 Treasuries rose about 17%, investment-grade corporates fell about 6% and junk bonds fell about 26% (so the portfolio's bond sleeve was weak that year) (2008): +17% / -6% / -26% www.whitecoatinvestor.com
- Third-party backtest of the ten-fund mix: about 8.21% annualized over 10 years and 6.87% over 20 years (to roughly 2020 (start date shown as 31 Dec 2000)): 8.21% / 6.87% www.myplaniq.com
What we could not verify
- We did not see the book itself; weights are from two independent reviews that agree.
- The MyPlanIQ backtest figures are from a third-party calculator; their method and end date are unclear.
- Whether Green's recommendation of 70% stocks includes REITs and miners as stocks was not clarified.
Sources
- www.whitecoatinvestor.com
https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/the-gone-fishin-portfolio-unveiled/ - www.whitecoatinvestor.com
https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/gone-fishin-a-book-review/ - canadiancouchpotato.com
https://canadiancouchpotato.com/2010/07/12/review-the-gone-fishin-portfolio/ - www.getabstract.com
https://www.getabstract.com/en/summary/the-gone-fishin-portfolio/11146 - www.myplaniq.com
https://www.myplaniq.com/invest/port/?ID=20970
Calculated on historical data. Past results do not predict the future. Models before the 1990s use stand-ins for classes that had no index yet; fees, taxes and fund costs are not included. This is mathematics, not an investment recommendation.