I can totally relate to this as well (I assume I'm also in a roughly similar stage in life). Cash has crept up to approximately 30% for me now - not through selling but rather through significantly reduced buying over the past 6 months and as you say the decline in value of the existing investments. Also sitting here wondering when and how fast to deploy - as they say no-one's going to ring a bell at the bottom...

@thebehavioralinvestor I think it's a brilliant time to be an investor. It's more a matter of when the facts change, I like to think I am prepared to change my mind. Especially as my investing style changes as I learn more and have more time in the market.

The facts for me are that diversification offered some, but not much, protection because I am invested largely in small caps. The reversion to above normal inflation happened a lot faster than I was expecting, so I didn't bail out of the higher risk companies fast enough to have made a difference, and there is a real risk that some of my holdings won't bounce back.

Concentration is something I haven't done because of a lack of confidence, lack of knowledge and that it's what you're repeatedly told not to do when starting out. Now I've been in the market now for 10+ years, I'm comfortable with knowing it will come back, having been there, and am ready to change strategy.

Perhaps another way of putting it is that market conditions have forced me to evolve and revisit my strategy. Which may not be applicable to you or others.

@RobW agree on avoiding industries reliant on discretionary spend, perhaps with the exception of travel. There is so much demand there from two years of a pandemic and the likelihood that the AUD will do very well relative to USD and EUR in a global recession is somewhat protective. We have lots of stuff in the ground that the rest of the world needs.

@suttree I'm still building cash and taking my time. I am conscious of getting two decisions right (sell, and then buy), and not smart enough to think I'll be able to get a third decision right (timing). I also know that when it comes down to it, I'll have a punt on timing as well, so must factor that in as a human error risk.

I am a long term buy and hold investor, willing to put up with short/medium term volatility for longer term outperformance. For most of the last year my focus has been to keep reminding myself why I own the companies in my portfolio, and in the absence of any change in their long term prospects, do nothing. Whilst I have suffered a 30% fall in portfolio value from the high of August '21, I have no need to liquidate any of my investments to put food on the table, so I'm trying very hard to stay in the mindset of 'this too shall pass'.

I did recently decide to divest from 2 REIT ETFs, which I invested in 2 years ago having bought into the idea that you need some boring , low volatility assets in a well balanced portfolio. They certainly haven't been volatile, in fact they have returned nothing at all over those 2 years.

I have reinvested the proceeds in some of my existing holdings, mostly those in the US:

MSFT

NVDA

ADBE

AMZN

VEEV

Whilst these are all in the currently unloved technology sector, they are also all profitable and have a long track record of revenue and profit growth in the high teens or higher each year.

I also added TEAM to my portfolio. Atlassian has been on my watchlist for years, but has always had a stretched valuation. I could no longer resist the discount being offered by the market.

Closer to home I topped up my holdings in WTC and TNE.

As you can see, I am highly (dangerously?) concentrated in the technology sector, but tech is the driving force of innovation and economic growth, and is also the sector where I have spent my working life. Several of my other holdings (21 in total) may not be considered tech companies, but they wouldn't exist without a tech infrastructure to deliver their product to market, for example WEB, JAN, SEK, NFLX.

So long story short my investment strategy is what it always has been. It has served me well for a decade, and I don't have any reason to believe it won't serve me well in the coming decade.

Perhaps the last decade was unlike any other decade in recent history? I don’t believe there has been as long a period with QE plus ridiculously low interest rates.

this would definitely allow hyper growth companies (software, predominantly) to defer profitability for many years to enable that growth.

Will the same structural advantages exist for the next decade? Or maybe that growth would have occurred without such lax monetary policy?

I don’t know, but worth examining perhaps?

I am certainly questioning whether my previous investing philosophy (same as yours pretty much) is the correct one going forwards. Especially as my glasses seem to be getting stronger every time I go to the optometrist. And I can’t touch my toes anymore.

@Chagsy I have no doubt the next decade will be different from the previous one. The pace of change continues to accelerate, enabled by technology.

So I don't mean to imply that buy and hold means set and forget. It means I follow the progress of my companies whenever they report, assess whether the reasons I expect to see enduring growth are still valid, and act accordingly.

For example I sold out of APX when I felt their model of human annotated data for machine learning was broken.

I try to focus on company specifics to guide all my investment decisions. Whilst macro trends are important, how they will pan out is unknowable. And market sentiment is just that, so I do my best to ignore it.

@lankypom

Good choices I think, M$, amazon and nvidia will be around for many years to come, and still be dominating their respective markets.