How to keep up to date with the markets.

[Islander]

Hi everyone.

I understand the philosophy of buying index funds, to set it and forget it, ignore the talking heads etc.

I do open my accounts everyday just because it's interesting and I just started investing, I assume with time I will hopefully one day find myself to realize it's boring and not as exciting to check everyday but for now I find it interesting.

Anyway what I don't understand is reading the market. For example, 1 unit of a tangerine balance fund today is at 14.65 where as last week it was around 14.89. Why is it lower today if stocks went back up today?(Monday)

I know it shouldn't matter what the market does and just to invest like you usually would but Iam curious.

What do investors follow to keep up to date with the current markets? For me, I just go along with the price of the tangerine fund and either think "oh it's up today or oh it's down today."

Is there a specific site or chart? Do investors use a certain benchmark depending on what they are invested in? What Iam I missing here? Please help me to understand.

Thanks!

[Eric]

I don't know what a "tangerine balance fund" is, but my guess is that this is just a timing issue.  Mutual funds update only at the end of the trading day.  Since that was only 40 minutes ago, it's likely that today's gains aren't reflected yet.  Check again late tonight or maybe first thing tomorrow morning.

[CorpRaider]

Bloomberg.com is a pretty good site with lots of data.The above poster is probably right about the lag with mutual funds.  It's probably best not to check it too much, because you are just challenging your willpower over and over not to react.

It looks like the tangerine "balanced portfolio" has 40% allocated to Canadian bonds, 20% Canadian Stocks,  20% U.S. Stocks and 20% International Stocks. I'm seeing a kind of rip-off 1.07% expense ratio too. 

It says, "The Canadian bond component seeks to replicate the FTSE TMX Canada Universe Bond Index; the Canadian equity component seeks to replicate the S&P/TSX 60 Index; the U.S. equity component seeks to replicate the S&P 500 Index; and the international equity component seeks to replicate the MSCI EAFE (Europe, Australasia and Far East) Index."

You can probably find those indexes on Bloomberg (I don't know about the Canadian ones).  For the S&P 500 you could track VOO and EFA tracks the MSCI EAFE index.

[appleshampooid]

I assume with time I will hopefully one day find myself to realize it's boring and not as exciting to check everyday but for now I find it interesting.

I wish this would happen to me. I still obsessively check even though I'm in for the long haul. I waste a lot of time/energy on following stuff that I have no control over :/

[Dreamer]

What do investors follow to keep up to date with the current markets? For me, I just go along with the price of the tangerine fund and either think "oh it's up today or oh it's down today."

Is there a specific site or chart? Do investors use a certain benchmark depending on what they are invested in? What Iam I missing here? Please help me to understand.

Hello Kayteekate,

Personally, to get a general idea of how the markets are doing on a given day, I will check the % gain/loss of the following indices: TSX Comp, DJIA, S&P 500, NASDAQ.  I can see how these are doing real-time within my trading account.  When I log in, I see the aforementioned values (along with a few other indices I don't care too much about), and if I click one of the index names, it will show me a chart for that index.  I can then choose 1 day, 5 day, 1 month, 6 month etc., in order to get a better idea of how that index has fared over various recent time periods.  You may not have this information available with Tangerine, but you can do a google search to find these values.   Google "DJIA chart", for example, and you should see the current value, % up/down, along with charts for various time periods.

If you aren't familiar with the various indices, I'd recommend reading a quick summary of each in Wikipedia.

I hope this helps!

[ChpBstrd]

I assume with time I will hopefully one day find myself to realize it's boring and not as exciting to check everyday but for now I find it interesting.

I wish this would happen to me. I still obsessively check even though I'm in for the long haul. I waste a lot of time/energy on following stuff that I have no control over :/

I've been doing this for years. Horrible habit. It never stops on its own, you'd have to will yourself not to do it.

Work frustration is a large part of it.

[appleshampooid]

I assume with time I will hopefully one day find myself to realize it's boring and not as exciting to check everyday but for now I find it interesting.

I wish this would happen to me. I still obsessively check even though I'm in for the long haul. I waste a lot of time/energy on following stuff that I have no control over :/

I've been doing this for years. Horrible habit. It never stops on its own, you'd have to will yourself not to do it.

Work frustration is a large part of it.

Same

[chadat23]

Is your question "what is considered to be the responsible thing to do" or "what is your habit/guilty pleasure"?

If it's the first then I'm not convinced that there's any value in paying attention outside of lots of upfront research to come up with a plan and portfolio, and maybe quarterly portfolio checks to make sure that things seem reasonable if contributions happen in an automated fashion.

If it's the latter, I'll go months with almost zero market exposure and then for no good reason I'll start fixating on this thing or that. But I generally try to minimize my exposure to talking heads, market forecasts, or even current market conditions since, for me, it generally only encourages being dumb.

[sisto]

I assume with time I will hopefully one day find myself to realize it's boring and not as exciting to check everyday but for now I find it interesting.

I wish this would happen to me. I still obsessively check even though I'm in for the long haul. I waste a lot of time/energy on following stuff that I have no control over :/

I've been doing this for years. Horrible habit. It never stops on its own, you'd have to will yourself not to do it.

Work frustration is a large part of it.

Same here, I'm obsessed with checking daily. I mostly log into MINT everyday to audit all of the transactions and make sure to reconcile everything and bucket items correctly, but I of course have to also look at all my accounts too. :)

[Rob_bob]

Well the Tangerine Balance Fund isn't the same mix of stocks, or the same % or Cap weighting as the S&P 500, which isn't the same as the DOW etc. so it's not going to go up or down or the same % with those funds/markets or whatever market you are comparing it to.

Today the S&P closed down 1.73%, the DOW down 1.43% but the Vanguard Utility ETF closed up 1.14% and a REIT fund was up 0.52%

[frugalnacho]

I was the same way, checking my accounts multiple times a day.   But I've been completely convinced by MMM, and JL collins, etc and I'm in it for the long haul.  I still log into mint, my bank, and vanguard, etc and update my networth on the 1st of every month so I can chart my progress, but other than that I never check the balances.  I have absolutely no idea how the markets or my networth have changed since March 1, and I don't really care.  I'm going to pay my bills and invest the excess as soon as I get my hands on the money, and then get back to living my life and ignoring the noise.  I know I'm on the right path, and I'm not going to alter my strategy regardless of what the market is doing, so why even bother checking on it?

[hodedofome]

Finviz.com is a good free site with lots of info on the homepage.

[TexasRunner]

I assume with time I will hopefully one day find myself to realize it's boring and not as exciting to check everyday but for now I find it interesting.

I wish this would happen to me. I still obsessively check even though I'm in for the long haul. I waste a lot of time/energy on following stuff that I have no control over :/

I've been doing this for years. Horrible habit. It never stops on its own, you'd have to will yourself not to do it.

Work frustration is a large part of it.

I'll +1 this mess out of this.

IMO you should be allowed one 'Check' per week.  Thats it.

Ignore the talking heads and the daily bumps, none of those matter.  If you are in the habit of caring about daily bumps now, your psychology is pre-set for failure at the next big downturn.  That is a big deal.

I check GSPC on Yahoo about once a month.  I don't even log in to Vanguard to check my cost-basis anymore because that is not what this is about.  This is about the long-haul.

My 2cents- stop now before you do something self-harming and stupid.  And I say that with the utmost respect.  :)

[tomdrake]

I'm a big fan of Tangerine for their chequing account and no-fee credit card, but there are better options for your investing. You can get a slight savings with a robo-advisor like Wealthsimple or DIY to have even lower fees with Questrade. I have a portfolio of ETFs in my Questrade account but am considering going with the new VGRO so I can simply buy one.