Stocks/Bonds 60/40 Portfolio: ETF allocation and returns (2024)

FAQs

Is 60% stocks and 40% bonds a good mix? ›

The 60/40 portfolio is the standard-bearer for investors with a moderate risk tolerance. It gives you about half the volatility of the stock market but tends to provide good returns over the long term. For the past 20 years, it's been a great portfolio for investors to stick with.

It's exposed for 60% on the Stock Market. In the last 30 Years, the Stocks/Bonds 60/40 Portfolio obtained a 8.42% compound annual return, with a 9.60% standard deviation.

Imagine you wish to amass $3000 monthly from your investments, amounting to $36,000 annually. If you park your funds in a savings account offering a 2% annual interest rate, you'd need to inject roughly $1.8 million into the account.

While many analysts and experts predicted the demise of the 60/40 rule at the close of 2022 — a particularly brutal year for both stocks and bonds — this long-term investment strategy is looking favorable once again in 2024 and beyond.

The typical 60% stock/40% bond portfolio declined about 16% in 2022—a painful period for balanced investors that has raised doubts about the viability of this strategy. But it helps to put this in perspective: The annualized return for the 10 years through 2022 was 6.1% for a globally diversified 60/40 portfolio.

According to this principle, individuals should hold a percentage of stocks equal to 100 minus their age. So, for a typical 60-year-old, 40% of the portfolio should be equities. The rest would comprise high-grade bonds, government debt, and other relatively safe assets.

Over their 50 years of marriage, Dave and Kathy Lindenstruth adopted a time-honored Wall Street strategy to safeguard and grow their retirement nest egg: a mix of 60% U.S. stocks and 40% bonds known as the 60-40 portfolio.

Use exchange-traded funds, or ETFs

As an example, Baker suggests allocating 60% of your money to SPDR® S&P 500® ETF Trust (SPY:NYSE Arca) and 40% to iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF (AGG:NYSE Arca) — two ETFs that basically mimic the S&P 500 Index and the Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Index.

The 60/40 budget keeps things simple by focusing on the big picture. The rule splits income into two broad buckets: committed spending and savings/special occasions. You can customize the budget if a 60% commitment isn't realistic for you.

Once you have $1 million in assets, you can look seriously at living entirely off the returns of a portfolio. After all, the S&P 500 alone averages 10% returns per year. Setting aside taxes and down-year investment portfolio management, a $1 million index fund could provide $100,000 annually.

How to invest 100k to make $1 million in 10 years? ›

There are two approaches you could take. The first is increasing the amount you invest monthly. Bumping up your monthly contributions to $200 would put you over the $1 million mark. The other option would be to try to exceed a 7% annual return with your investments.

$100,000 a year is how much a month? If you make $100,000 a year, your monthly salary would be $8,333.87.

While the 60/40 portfolio is a good investing approach to understand, it doesn't account for other asset classes, such as cash and alternative investments. And it also doesn't account for your unique financial situation.

A portfolio is rebalanced at regular intervals, such as annually or quarterly, irrespective of asset price movements. Threshold or price-based rebalancing. A limit is set on how far the portfolio can deviate from your desired target mix, such as a 60/40 stocks-to-bonds mix.

“It's a good proxy because many institutions have historically used this allocation to meet their objectives. Further, if you look at the most popular products for individual investors, such as target-date funds, the average asset allocation is right around 60/40. So it's a good proxy for individual investors as well.

The rule of thumb advisors have traditionally urged investors to use, in terms of the percentage of stocks an investor should have in their portfolio; this equation suggests, for example, that a 30-year-old would hold 70% in stocks and 30% in bonds, while a 60-year-old would have 40% in stocks and 60% in bonds.

One says that the percentage of stocks in your portfolio should equal 100 minus your age. So, if you're 30, such a portfolio would contain 70% stocks and 30% bonds (or other safe investments). If you're 60, it might be 40% stocks and 60% bonds.

The conservative allocation is composed of 15% large-cap stocks, 5% international stocks, 50% bonds and 30% cash investments.

You can consider investing heavily in stocks if you're younger than 50 and saving for retirement. You have plenty of years until you retire and can ride out any current market turbulence. As you reach your 50s, consider allocating 60% of your portfolio to stocks and 40% to bonds.