Retirement Isn't a Time to Retreat
Talk to most financial advisers, and they will tell you that the stock-bond mix you hold in retirement shouldn't be radically different from the mix you held just before quitting the work force.
Yet most retirees sure don't feel that way. Once we retire, we are inclined to become much more conservative, ditching our stocks and stashing much or all of our money in bonds and other income-generating investments.
Here's why we become so conservative -- and why retirees should resist this impulse.
Defending Principal
When we retire, "there is this startling realization that there's no more money coming in," says Meir Statman, a finance professor at Santa Clara University in California. "Now, that nest egg is the only thing that stands between you and starvation."
Faced with this unnerving notion, the temptation is to dump stocks and retreat into bonds. After all, tumbling share prices, which seemed like an opportunity when we were regularly adding new savings to our portfolio, are suddenly nothing but bad news.
But in reality, you still have plenty of time to ride out stock-market declines. Suppose you retire at age 65. The life-expectancy tables suggest you will live until almost age 82 if you are a man and until almost age 85 if you are a woman. And, of course, half of all 65-year-olds will live longer than these averages suggest.
Our rush to bonds doesn't just reflect a new sense of caution. It's also part of an effort to re-create the income from our paycheck and to regulate our spending. Prof. Statman notes that, while in the work force, we use our paycheck as a guide to how much we can reasonably spend.
Once we retire, that guideline disappears. As a substitute, we often fall back on the old rule that says we can spend our portfolio's income, but we should never touch our capital. "People have this worry that, if they start dipping into capital, they won't know when to stop," Prof. Statman says.
Problem is, if we are determined to spend only income, there isn't much incentive to hold stocks, with their miserable 1?% average dividend yield. Instead, we are almost inevitably driven to buy bonds and other investments that generate a fair amount of income.
Combating Inflation
The desire to ditch stocks and load up on bonds is understandable. But it could also prove to be a colossal mistake. The fact is, if you try to live off the income from your bonds, your standard of living will be whittled away by inflation.
Suppose consumer prices climb 2% a year. Even at that modest rate, the spending power of a fixed stream of interest will shrink by 33% over 20 years.
To fend off this threat, you need the higher long-run returns that stocks offer. I often suggest that retirees stash maybe 50% of their portfolio in stock funds, 25% in riskier types of bond funds and 25% in a reserve consisting of short-term bonds and a money-market fund.
Thereafter, you can tap this cash reserve for spending money. Meanwhile, I would aim to sell part of your stocks and riskier bonds each year and use the proceeds to replenish the money you pulled out of your cash reserve.
How much can you reasonably spend? Each year, dip into your cash reserve and withdraw a sum equal to 5% of your portfolio's beginning-of-year value.
For instance, if you start the year with $400,000, you might withdraw $20,000. This $20,000 would include any dividends and interest kicked off by your investments. Keep in mind that you won't be able to spend the entire $20,000, because a portion will likely be owed in taxes.
As many readers will immediately realize, this strategy has one big drawback: There will undoubtedly be years when stocks take a beating and thus you won't want to sell shares to replenish your cash reserve.
A huge threat? With 25% in your cash reserve, you have enough set aside to cover five years of spending money. Thus, you should be in good shape, provided a bear market doesn't drag on for years and years.
Even so, you might suffer a few sleepless nights. Don't like all the uncertainty? You aren't alone. Consider a study by Constantijn Panis, a senior economist at Rand Corp. in Santa Monica, Calif. Mr. Panis found that retirees who had some sort of steady lifetime income, such as a traditional company pension, were typically more satisfied with their retirement.
But that doesn't mean you are destined for unhappiness if you don't have a pension. You could always invest a portion of your nest egg in an immediate fixed annuity that pays lifetime income, thus effectively buying yourself a pension.
With an immediate annuity, you hand over a wad of money to an insurance company, in return for which you get a check every month for the rest of your life. The amount of income received is usually significantly higher than the yield on high-quality corporate and government bonds.
As appealing as that might sound, many retirees balk at buying immediate annuities. The reason: If you buy a life annuity and die soon after, your heirs won't get anything, unless the annuity included some sort of guarantee.
"Lots of people see the purchase of an annuity as a risky thing, rather than as an insurance product," Mr. Panis says. "They are more concerned about the risk of dying early, rather than the risk of living too long."
Still, if folks can overcome these qualms, I think they could end up with a far better retirement strategy. Take the mix of 50% stocks, 25% bonds and 25% cash reserve mentioned above.
You might tweak that mix, by substituting an immediate fixed annuity for the 25% bond position. That would give you the comforting stream of income you crave, while also providing a safety net in case stocks suffer another prolonged rough spell.
退休不等于保守
当你向大多数金融顾问进行咨询的时候，他们都会告诉你，你在退休后持有的股票和债券投资组合不应该与你在退休前持有的投资组合有本质上的差别。
然而，大多数退休者确实感到对此难以苟同。一旦退休以后，人们总是倾向于变得更加保守，往往会抛出股票，并把大部份或全部资金投向债券及其他能带来收益的投资工具。
下文将告诉你为什么我们在退休后会变得更保守，以及为什么退休者应该抵制这种冲动。
保护本金
加利福尼亚州圣克拉拉大学(Santa Clara University)的金融学教授迈尔?斯塔特曼(Meir Statman)认为，当人们退休后，就会意识到一个惊人的事实：以后不会再有进项了。因此，在生存和饿死之间，唯一可依靠的只剩下手中现有的资金了。
一旦心存这种令人胆战心惊的念头，最大的诱惑就是抛出股票，转向债券。我们以前经常把刚刚节省下来的储蓄放入投资组合，买入那些看上去很有潜力的股票，而一旦这些股票的价格下跌，突然间就彷佛一切都完了。
但事实上，你仍然有充足的时间熬过股市的低迷时期。假如你在65岁退休，根据人均寿命表，男性可以活到将近82岁，女性可以活到大约85岁。当然，所有这些在65岁退休的人中，还会有半数寿命能超过平均数。
投资者蜂拥转向债券并不完全是要谨慎从事，他们还想用退休金再生钱，同时节制开销。斯塔特曼教授指出，在退休前，我们通常用薪金的多少来指导合理开销的额度。
而一旦我们退休了，这种参照标准就消失了。人们通常根据老规矩，把投资组合的收益作为确定开销额度的标准，但认为不应该动用本金。斯塔特曼教授表示，人们担心一旦开始使用本金，就控制不住支出了。
问题在于：如果我们决定只使用收益的话，就没有太大的动力去持有股票了，因为股票的平均股息率只有可怜的1.5%。相反，我们几乎不可避免地要去购买债券及其他能带来相当可观收益的投资工具了。
抵消通货膨胀
抛售股票、囤积债券的欲望是可以理解的。但是，这也可能被证明是一个严重的错误。事实是：假如你决定利用债券的收益作为日常开销，你的生活水平将因为通货膨胀而大大下降。
假定每年的消费者价格指数攀升2%。尽管这个比率已经相当温和了，但在20年内，固定的利息收入的购买力会下降33%。
为了消除这种威胁，你需要获得更高的长期回报率，这只有股票才能提供。我通常建议，退休者可以把投资组合的50%用于股票基金，用25%来购买风险略高的债券基金，再把另外25%放进由短期债券和货币市场基金构成的现金储备中。
此后，你就可以从这些现金储备中提取日常开销了。同时，我还建议你每年抛售部份股票和风险略高的债券，用这些交易的所得填补你提取日常开销造成的空缺。
那么，你合理的开销能是多少呢？每年，你可以从这些现金储备中提取相当于你的投资组合年初价值5%的资金。
比如说，如果你的投资组合年初为40万美元，你可以提取2万美元。这2万美元中将包括你的投资产生的所有股息和利息收入。记住，你不能够把这2万美元全部花光，因为其中有一部份可能要缴纳税款。
许多读者可能立即就会想到，这种策略有一个较大的缺陷：毫无疑问，熊市通常会持续多年，那时你可能不愿意抛售股票去填充现金储备。 这是个巨大的威胁吗？由于你是把25%的投资组合放进现金储备中，所以你已经预留了足够的钱来支付5年的开销。因此，只要熊市不是持续很久很久，你都能踏实地过日子。
即便如此，你可能会经历一些失眠的夜晚。不希望有这种不确定的感觉吗？你并不是唯一这样想的人。位于加州圣莫尼卡的Rand Corp.的资深经济学家康斯坦丁?帕尼斯(Constantijn Panis)进行了一项研究，他发现那些有某种稳定收入（比如传统的企业养老金）的退休者通常对退休生活更满意。
但这并不意味著如果你没有养老金的话，你注定会不快乐。你可以一直把你投资组合中的一部份投到某种立即支付的固定收益的年金上，从而实际上为你自己购买了一份养老金。
购买一份立即支付的年金，就是你把一部份钱交给一家保险公司，然后在你此生中的剩余时间内，你每月领取一张支票。这种年金的回报率通常比高质量的公司和政府债券的收益率高很多。
尽管听上去很诱人，但许多退休者不愿意购买立即支付的年金。原因在于：如果你购买了一份终生支付的年金，并在此后很短的时间内去世，你的继承人将不会获得任何东西，除非保险金中包含了某种特别的保证。
帕尼斯表示，很多人把购买年金看作是有风险的投资，而不是把它看作一种保险产品。人们更多的是担心提前去世的风险，而不是担心过于长寿的风险。
然而，如果人们能够打消这些疑虑，我认为他们就能够制定一条更好的退休策略。正如前面所提到的，在投资组合中投资50%的股票，25%的债券和25%的现金储备。
你也可以对投资组合略加改动，以立即支付的固定收益年金取代25%的债券。这可能给你带来你所渴望的生活开销，也能在股市遭遇长期萧条的时候为你提供避风的港湾。
