Rutherford Portfolio Review (Tranche 1): 8 March 2024

Maori Haka (War Dance), New Zealand

US Equities continue their climb towards the 5200 level but slowed down a little this week as they approach this potential resistance level:

In fact, VTI (representing the US Equity markets) closed down slightly (~-0.2%) on the week and was the poorest performing ETF in the major asset class list:

The rotation algorithm being used to manage the Rutherford Portfolio seems to be a little out of sync right now with the portfolio being heavily weighted towards equities:

having sold out of GLD (Gold) – the week’s top performing asset class – in tranches 3 and 4 over the past 2 weeks. However, in terms of performance relative to the diversified AOR benchmark fund we have not lost too much ground:

So, we check on the rotation graphs to see whether the picture has changed significantly and whether adjustments are called for in Tranche 1 of the portfolio (the focus of this week’s review):

From the above we still see only VTI firmly entrenched in the desirable upper right quadrant, although weakening (decelerating) in terms of relative strength. Checking the detailed recommendations:

we still see global equities showing Buy recommendations with GLD coming back into Buy territory. This is a little scary after the recent surge in GLD, but we’ll stick with the recommendations since each tranche represents only 25% of the total portfolio and we should not get whiplashed too badly should we see a pullback in GLD. The adjustments for next week will look something like this:

where I shall be selling my holdings in AOR (the benchmark fund) and using proceeds to add positions in VWO and GLD. I will not worry about the minor adjustments to VTI and VEA (presently held in this Tranche 1).