Navexa Blog

Dividend yield is what drives income investors to buy shares. It’s what companies pay their shareholders as both reward and incentive. We explain dividend yield and how to easily calculate it.

Dividend-paying stocks form part of many portfolios for a good reason; they pay investors to hold shares. Owning dividend stocks means investors need to be able to easily determine their dividend yield — and the impact this income has on their broader portfolio performance. 

Dividend yields are important for investors. By analyzing dividend yields, they can gain insight into how profitable and generous to shareholders a company may be. Being able to accurately calculate dividend yields can help investors predict how much a particular investment might pay annually. 

Receiving dividend yield from companies can help portfolios grow and balance the risks of a volatile share market.

However, calculating dividend yield might seem tricky. Luckily, we’re here to help you figure out how to calculate dividend yield. Keep reading to learn more about the value of dividends, how share price affects the yields, and what to look out for.

What Are Dividends?

Dividends are defined as the distribution of a company’s earnings to its shareholders. Once they invest in a company that pays out dividends, investors can earn money for holding that stock.

The board of directors usually decides whether the company pays dividends or not. Dividends can be paid in cash, or in additional shares.

What About Dividend Yields?

Yield is defined as the amount of money an investment generates over the period of time while an investor holds it. Yield is usually expressed as a percentage based on:

• The invested amount
• The current market value of the security
• The face value of the security

Yields might be classified as known or anticipated, depending on the valuation of the security.

How and Why Do Dividends Generate Yield?

When a company decides to pay out dividends, it’s rewarding its investors for buying the company’s shares. By paying a dividend, it creats a yield for investors in the form of cash or additional shares. The company may also incentivize investors to keep holding the stock. 

Dividends might also make the company attractive to other investors. When new investors buy into the stock, the stock price could rise.

Dividend Yield Stocks to Consider

Some common dividend yield stocks traditionally include companies in the following industries:

• Electricity, water, natural gas supply
• Consumer staples
• Telecommunications
• Real estate

A well-established business may be more likely to pay dividends than a smaller company. Larger companies tend to have more income, and be more financially stable, so they can pay part of their income to investors.

Still, companies may decide to stop paying dividends in the future. There are a variety of reasons why dividends may decrease or stop altogether.

Are There Different Types of Dividends?

There are many types of dividends. For example:

• Cash dividend
• Bonus share
• Property dividend
• Scrip dividend
• Liquidating dividend

A cash dividend is paid in cash per share terms. It’s the most common type of dividend paid to investors.

Bonus shares are additional shares awarded to investors.

A property dividend is a payment in the form of an asset.

A scrip dividend is a promise that an investor will be paid later.

Finally, liquidating dividends are paid when the company shuts down, and represent the return of the original investment to the shareholders.

Other Dividend Types

There are other dividend forms you might see when exploring how to generate dividend yield. For example:

• Ordinary dividend
• Qualified dividend

The main difference between ordinary and qualified dividend is the tax investors have to pay. Ordinary dividends are generally taxable as income. Qualified dividends may be taxed at lower capital gains rates.

Different Types of Dividend Yield

 A high dividend yield isn’t always the best single reason for investing, especially long-term. When companies pay high dividend yields, it can sometimes be unsustainable.

A good dividend yield is generally considered to be between 2% and 4%. This range is considered safe and strong. On the other hand, a dividend yield above 4% may appear like an attractive opportunity — but it may carry more risk.

Low dividend yield may be a sign of poor company health. Generally, income investors want to avoid low dividend yield stocks.

They should, however, consider other stock attributes besides the dividend yield alone. For example:

• Stock price
• Earnings per share
• Price to earnings ratio
• Frequency of dividend yield

How Often Is Dividend Yield Paid to Investors?

Dividends are usually paid out quarterly or annually. Shareholders know ahead of time exactly when to expect their payment. Some dividend payouts can be paid monthly, but those tend to be rare.

Advantages of Dividend Yield

There are several advantages of dividend yield for shareholders, including higher ROI (than simply profiting through capital appreciation alone).

High Return on Investment

Dividends can grow steadily over time — larger companies, especially, may increase their dividend payout annually. For example, some companies have increased their dividend payout for 25 years. This generates a higher compound annual growth rate, which benefits long-term shareholders.

Of course, stocks’ values rise and fall. One stock our founder held, for example, went nowhere for many years. This is where dividend yield can be so vital to investment performance. In his case, he nearly earned back in dividend yield what he bought his shares for, despite the lack of capital appreciation. 

Dividend Yield Is Useful for Equity Evaluation

Dividend yield can be a good signal of how stable a business is.  Investors may see high dividend yield as a sign of strong earnings.

Disadvantages of Dividend Yield

One of the main disadvantages of annual dividends for individuals is that they are observed as taxable earnings.

For companies, the pressure to pay or maintain a high dividend yield may put pressure on the business’s finances, or even inhibit reinvestment and growth.

Does a Stock Price Affect Dividend Yields?

There’s a direct correlation between dividend yield and stock price. Dividends can change as a company’s stock price changes. Plus, companies can change the size of the dividend yield, regardless of stock price.

A company that’s committed to paying dividends will generally be expected to increase the payout if its stock price rises. This both benefits the investors and can make the company more appealing to potential investors.

How to Calculate Dividend Yield

Calculating dividend yield is not that difficult. All you need to do is use the dividend yield formula. Divide the annual dividend by the current share price and you’ll get the dividend yield.

Keep in mind that dividend yield is not calculated by using quarterly, semi-annual, or monthly payments.

If you get stuck, find the company’s annual report which lists the annual dividend per share.

Calculating Dividend Yield From Quarterly/Monthly Dividends

If you find a company that pays dividends quarterly, you’ll have to convert the quarterly payments into annual payments to calculate the dividend yield. Meaning, you’ll have to multiply the most recent dividend by four to get the annual dividend.

If your dividend yield is inconsistent, you’ll have to add the last four quarterly dividend yields to get the annual dividend yield. Then you can use the yearly dividend yield formula.

The same goes for calculating monthly dividends — you’ll have to find the annual dividend per share to be able to calculate your dividend yield.

Of course, you don’t need to worry about calculating your dividend yield manually. When you use Navexa to track your portfolio, the platform automatically records your dividend payments and calculates their impact on your portfolio performance.

The Importance of Dividend Payout Ratio

Besides the annual dividend payment, you’ll also want to take a look at the dividend payout ratio. It’s defined as the total amount of dividends that’s paid to shareholders, relative to the net income of the company.

Payout ratio = dividends paid/net income.

You can also calculate it based on the retention ratio, which is equal to earnings per share divided by dividends per share.

This number tells you more about the company’s maturity and whether it can continue to pay out dividends. For example, a company might reinvest all its earnings, which results in a 0% payout ratio.

On the other hand, the payout ratio would be 100% for organizations that pay all of their income as dividends each year.

Potential Dangers of High Dividend Yield

Here are some things to consider about high dividend yields.

The Yield Trap

Just because a stock’s dividend yield is high, that doesn’t guarantee the business is stable or growing. A yield trap, or dividend trap, is when investors fail to do their due diligence and invest purely for an attractive dividend yield. 

In an extreme scenario, an investor might buy shares of a stock based on its attractive dividend yield, only to find the value of their investment plummeting, negating any gain they might have hoped to realize from the dividend income. 

This is why it’s always important to look at both long-term performance for any potential investment, and to research the company’s underlying financials, rather than just skim headline numbers like dividend yield. 

Track Your Dividend Yield Automatically

Understanding how dividends work, and how they’re tied to share price is just a small piece of the investing puzzle. By understanding dividends, you’ll understand part of what to look for when you dig deeper into a company’s financials.

It’s generally best to analyze the whole company, the current market conditions, the stock’s value and long-term performance, and many other factors. Plus, in some cases, you can earn dividends you can reinvest for greater compounding returns over the long term.

The Navexa portfolio tracker tracks every trade and transaction for your portfolio. It automatically records and calculates an investments dividend or staking income, and shows the total yield at both the individual holding and portfolio level.

It’s simple and free to start using. Once you join Navexa, you can add your portfolio in minutes and begin tracking your performance.

In this post, we profile 16 of the best investing, personal finance blogs and podcasts (and YouTube channels) you’ll find on the web in 2022. Whether you’re new to personal finance and investing, or you’re looking for advanced economic analysis and trading content, these podcasts, blogs and channels will build your knowledge and financial literacy.

There’s never been more content about investing, personal finance, money management and financial independence than there is today.

As you’re reading this, thousands of content creators and journalists around the world are producing and publishing content aimed at helping you better understand personal finance, the markets and the deeper economic forces that drive them.

I’ve been in the financial research and publishing world for more than a decade. I’ve read, watched and listened to a lot of posts, videos and podcast episodes on investing, trading, personal finance and financial independence.

There are plenty of fantastic finance podcasts and blogs out there for those learning about everything from how to get started investing, or saving money, through to more advanced areas like options trading, portfolio management and macroeconomic theory.

But, as with most topics in this content-saturated era we’re living in, there’s also a lot of junk — clickbait content that promises fascination but turns out to not really say much at all.

That’s why I’ve put this post together. The 16 podcasts, blogs and channels I profile here are, in my and the Navexa team’s experience, some of the best investing and personal finance blogs and podcasts out there today. From deep economic analysis to business news, interviews with the world’s wealthiest investors and model portfolios designed to uncover once-in-a-lifetime investment ideas, these shows and websites span the spectrum of expertise.

Presented in no particular order.

#1: Chat With Traders — Pro Traders Share Their Stories

Professional trader Aaron Fifield launched the Chat With Traders podcast in 2015. Each podcast episode takes the form of a long conversation between the host and the guest — a billionaire fund manager, legendary options trader, a strategy specialist, or other industry expert.

These interviews are deep explorations that dive into what drives and motivates pro traders, what they’ve learned in their journey, and how they apply their knowledge to making money.

The CWT podcast is definitely not for beginners. While some of the ideas and principles you’ll learn in these episodes are universal and useful to investors of every level, you probably want to have a high degree of prior knowledge of trading (as opposed to investing) to get the most out of it.

I recommend podcast episode 214 with professional trader, James King, who shares four principles that drive elite performance.

#2 Equity Mates — An Aussie Investing Podcast Ecosystem

You can’t find an investing or finance podcast in Australia without stumbling upon Equity Mates. Founded in 2017, university mates Alec and Bryce created Equity Mates as a means to share their journey into investing and wealth building. They felt that ‘financial markets were seen as complex and inaccessible and financial media catered to the industry but not everyday Australians’.

The content you’ll find on the Equity Mates podcast and blog today is very much the opposite of industry-centric. Now spanning nine podcasts, online courses and even the FinFest live event, Equity Mates has expanded to cover a huge range of personal finance and investing content.

From the original Equity Mates Investing Podcast to Crypto Curious, Get Started Investing and more, there’s pretty much something for investors of almost every level to learn here. Thanks to their rise to prominence in Australia’s investing podcast world, Equity Mates now pulls some high-profile guests on its shows, too.

Check out this podcast episode, in which the Head of Research & Portfolio Management at InvestSmart, Nathan Bell, shares his 2, 4, 6 rule of portfolio construction.

#3 Equity ASA: Short & Sharp Podcast Episodes For Australian Investors

The Australian Shareholders Association has been around since 1960. It’s a membership-based association that represents retail shareholders. The ASA ‘safeguards shareholder interests in Australian equity capital markets, helps its members to improve investment knowledge and fosters a connected retail investor community’.

Navexa has worked with the ASA several times, presenting webinars on portfolio performance tracking and delivering a live presentation on financial democratization at the 2022 ASA conference in Melbourne.

A more recent part of the ASA’s offering is its podcast series presented by the brilliant Phil Muscatello. Phil has his own podcasts, which I’ll get to shortly, but he still finds the time to front the ASA’s Equity Podcast.

The podcast takes the form of brief, varied interviews with guests ranging from portfolio managers and financial research houses to algorithmic traders and precious metals experts.

Each podcast episode seeks to inform the listener about a different aspect of the financial industry, and grant access to some of the most influential and experienced people on behalf of ASA members.

#4: Shares For Beginners — The Jargon-Free Investing Podcast

Navexa featured on Phil Muscatello’s Shares For Beginners Podcast when I chatted with Phil about portfolio performance tracking and financial literacy in 2021.

Our podcast episode discusses the pros and cons of the modern, app-first investment world and, of course, goes into the reasons why we’ve developed a portfolio tracking platform that allows investors to track all their investment performance in a single account.

But more broadly, the Shares For Beginners podcast is what is says it is — a great place to get into the ideas and concepts around investing without a huge amount of prior knowledge.

Phil’s effortless, casual podcast presentation and interview style does away with jargon and industry-speak in favour of easy-to-digest conversations with guests from fintech startups (us) to hedge fund managers, private investors, psychologists, even the editor-in-chief of Investopedia.

The episodes and topics are wide ranging, and you can be sure to learn something from pretty much any of the short, sharp episodes you dive into.

#5: QAV Podcast — Dedicated Value Investing Content

While I’m on the subject of finance podcasts we’ve appeared on, I should mention the small, but growing (and loved by its audience) Quality At Value Podcast.

Started by investors and friends Cameron Reilly and Tony Kynaston, QAV is a podcast, blog and membership club for value investors. The episodes and content centre on Tony’s impressive history as a long-term value investor.

Tony has achieved an annualized return of around 19.5% for the 30 years he’s been investing in the markets. That’s a seriously strong performance.

In the QAV podcast episodes and content, Tony and Cameron dive into all thing value investing. Specifically, they share Tony’s wealth of experience and the specific rules he’s created to spot winning stocks over his impressive 30-year run in the markets.

Navexa provides the QAV team with performance tracking for their model portfolio — which at the time of writing is outperforming the SPDR 200 benchmark by more than 10%.

Check out Navexa’s conversation with Cameron and Tony on S04E20 of the podcast.

#6: New Money — Top Quality Investing YouTube Channel

You shouldn’t, in my opinion, restrict your personal finance and financial education content consumption purely to podcasts. In the past few years, YouTube has produced a new generation of content creators spanning personal finance, investing, financial freedom, financial independence and so on.

Search ‘invest like the best’ or ‘financial freedom’ on YouTube and you’ll find hundreds of videos on everything from opening a crypto exchange account, to real estate investing, personal finance and beyond.

Of course, not all of it is great personal finance content. There’s no shortage of clickbait videos by blinged-out teenagers promising to reveal the secret to owning three Teslas before you have a driver’s license.

But dig a little deeper, and you will find some truly top-notch channels, like New Money, an investing and markets-focused show led by Australian Brandon Van Der Kolk. Brandon’s videos are about 10-20 minutes long.

They focus on topics like what stocks Warren Buffet and Berkshire Hathaway are buying and selling, how to understand key economic indicators and predictions, and — my personal favourite — deep dives into Dr. Michael Burry’s enigmatic tweets.

There’s a lot to learn here. The content is entertaining, easy to understand, and useful for investors whether they’re new to the markets or already years into their investing journey.

#7: We Study Billionaires — Wealth Hacking The World’s Best

So far I’ve kept the list local to Australia. But of course, you can’t dive into the world of investing — or investing and personal finance podcasts — without looking to the biggest market in the world, the US.

We Study Billionaires is a podcast on The Investor’s Podcast Network. Hosted by Danish investor, author and former professor Stig Brodersen and veteran CEO Trey Lockerbie, this show does what it says in the title.

The duo study, discuss and interview some of the wealthiest and most influential investors and businesspeople on the planet to learn the key factors and lessons in their success.

We Study Billionaires podcast features Warren Buffett, Howard Marks, Bill Gates and plenty of other high-calibre guests. There’s fresh episodes every week, plus the brilliant starter packs you can use to get up to speed on key topics fast.

#8: Motley Fool Money — Daily Business News & Financial Coverage

While you’re looking at US-based podcasts, you’ll likely find financial research publisher The Motley Fool’s show, Motley Fool Money. These short and sweet daily episodes don’t necessarily follow a strict theme, like We Study Billionaires or QAV.

Host Chris Hill and a revolving cast of the firm’s analysts cover daily business and market headlines and break down implications for stocks and investors.

On the weekends, they run investing class-style episodes that teach financial and investing literacy from ‘special guests helping to shape the future’.

One notable feature of Motley Fool Money is the show’s episode notes, which break down key talking points with timestamps, and list the ticker symbols of any stocks discussed in that episode. Great for browsing and finding episodes on companies you hold or want to know more about!

#9: WSJ Your Money Briefing — Financial Literacy With Wall Street’s Leading Journalists

While we’re talking big American personal finance podcast players, I should mention the Wall Street Journal‘s Your Money Briefing. Billed as a ‘personal finance and career checklist’, Your Money Briefing is another show that seeks to interpret mainstream financial and economic news and translate that into actionable personal finance ideas for the listener.

Whether it’s spending and saving habits, predictions on energy prices or trends in the corporate workforce, the show is broader than just stock market commentary.

The Wall Street Journal is one of the premier business publications on the planet, and their reporters and analysts are among the best in the business.

One interesting piece of trivia about Your Money Briefing is that the host, J.R. Whalen, was in a past role responsible for assigning dollar values to each question on the show Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. If that’s not a sign that this show’s host understands the value of information, I don’t know what is.

Your Money Briefing runs daily Monday to Friday, and joins nine other high quality podcasts in the WSJ stable — one of which I cover below.

#10: WSJ The Future Of Everything — Covering Big, World-Shaping Trends

The WSJ’s future focused podcast aims to answer a big question — what will the future look like? By projecting the trends we’re seeing in the world today into the decades ahead, The Future Of Everything brings a unique macro view to any investor’s podcast library.

You can expect plenty of science and tech — obviously — and you’ll find a nice balance between both challenges facing civilization and the breakthroughs that could overcome them.

Episodes tackle big topics like how best to decide which species to save and whether genetically modified crops are the future of food.

Hosted by Danny Lewis and Alex Ossola, The Future Of Everything comes out about every fortnight. Each episode runs for around 20 minutes.

#11: Money For The Rest Of Us — Former Pro Investor Helps Everyday People Build Wealth

Former financial advisor and money management expert Bret Stein quit his professional investing career after 20 years and started the Money For The Rest Of Us Podcast.

The big idea is that Bret now shows listeners how to apply the principles and investment philosophies he developed at $15 billion asset management firm FED Investment Advisors in their retail investing and personal finance journeys.

Money For The Rest Of Us is less about financial news and economic coverage than is is about how those things impact personal finance, investment strategy and retirement planning for everyday investors.

According to Bret, ‘Money For the Rest of Us is for people like you and me who aren’t relying on someone else to make sure we have enough to retire. We’ve taken control of our financial future’.

With close to 20 million downloads, this personal finance podcast is among the most popular of its kind. And it goes beyond just the weekly personal finance podcast episodes, which run for around 30 minutes.

Money For The Rest Of Us also offers free reports, an email newsletter, a members-only education platform (which teaches students to manage their personal finance like a professional) and Bret’s book, Money for the Rest of Us – 10 Questions to Master Successful Investing.

#12: Contrarian Edge — Great Content On Investing & Life

Vitaliy Katsenelson is a deep thinker whose curiosity about the world of finance extends beyond just the markets and investing. A professional investor, educator and writer, Vitaly’s Contrarian Edge blog is packed with deeply researched and brilliantly-written content.

The prolific Vitaliy shares opinions and analysis on a wide range of subjects related to investing. From macroeconomic and geopolitical coverage through to single stock analysis, personal finance and more philosophical pieces on the qualities and principles one need cultivate for a fulfilling investment journey, Contrarian Edge is as informative as it is entertaining.

Vitaly has published two books to date, Active Value Investing and The Little Book of Sideways Markets, with a third title on the way at the time of writing.

While Contrarian Edge is a blog, you’ll also find podcast episodes on the site — a mix between Vitaliy’s guest appearances on podcasts and audio versions of his blog posts.

#13: Value Investing with Sven Carlin, Ph.D. — The Dedicated Value Investing YouTube Channel

You won’t find many people with a doctorate in investing. But Dr, Sven Carlin is one such man. Having developed a Real Value Risk Model for emerging market stocks during his studies, Sven has worked for Bloomberg in London and taught finance and account at The Amsterdam School of International Business.

Today, he runs the 200k-plus subscriber YouTube channel, Value Investing with Sven Carlin, Ph.D. The channel is packed with video content on everything from individual stock analysis and commentary, commodities, tips for beginner investors, investing book reviews, and Sven’s YouTube model portfolio, which he launched in 2022.

The model portfolio is an interesting differentiator here. Not many other YouTube investing content creators go beyond the tried and true (and, once you’ve watched a few of them, tedious) ‘how to open a brokerage account’ and ‘3 most popular ETFs’ formats.

Sven’s plan with his YouTube portfolio is to build a $1 million paper portfolio and run it for several decades, with regular videos explaining trades, trends, and the reasoning behind investing decisions.

Sven’s inspiration for his YouTube portfolio is one of the all-time value investing greats.

Munger’s 50-Year Journey To Find a Single Worthwhile Investing Idea

Berkshire Hathaway’s Charlie Munger is infamous for his contributions to the firm’s world-beating investment performance.

One of his stories illustrates how discerning the man is with investment ideas. Barron’s, a sister publication to the Wall Street Journal, has been around more than a century. Munger read the magazine for half a century before he found an investment idea in it that he thought worth following.

According to Munger: ‘In 50 years I found one investment opportunity in Barron’s out of which I made about $80 million with almost no risk. I took the $80 million and gave it to Li Lu who turned it into $400 or $500 million. So I have made $400 or $500 million reading Barron’s for 50 years and following one idea.’

This is what Sven Carlin is trying to emulate with his YouTube portfolio; a long-term investment idea generator which perhaps uncovers one big winner, and which teaches much along the way.

#14: The Acquirer’s Podcast — Making Complex Financial Analysis Casual & Entertaining

Here’s another podcast that’s also a blog and, in this case, an investment fund. Tobias Carlisle is a professional investor, author, and lawyer. He runs The Acquirer’s Multiple, where he shares his wisdom from a career spent managing merger and acquisition transactions, and his own deep value investing.

Tobias has published four value investing books. Most recently, The Acquirer’s Multiple: How The Billionaire Contrarians of Deep Value Beat The Market was the #1 new business and finance book on Amazon. Over on his website, The Acquirer’s Multiple, you’ll find The Acquirer’s Podcast, along with the ‘absurdly simple, ridiculously powerful’ stock screener which is available on a subscription basis.

The podcast itself is super high quality. It leans more towards to expert end of the finance podcast spectrum. It’s long-format and doesn’t dumb anything down. The episodes I’ve listened to are packed with interesting information, but they don’t put you to sleep like some of the other expert-level shows you might stumble upon.

If you’ve seen The Big Short (which I list below, for reasons I’ll explain), you’ll have enjoyed that rare balance of dense finance topics with light, accessible explanation. Or, you will have become dizzy with all the Wall Street jargon, slam zooms and quick cuts.

I mention this, because tuning into The Acquirer’s Podcast feels sort of similar to watching this film. You’re in the room with veteran professional investors whose careers and lives have been shaped by the markets. They speak the language of Wall Street, but they let you in on what it means.

This recent episode features Tobias and his two regular guests discussing the complexities of defining a bear market. It’s a great example of the sort of content you’ll get from the podcast — market and economics analysis discussed by professional traders as though they’re enjoying a post-work debrief at a bar.

#15: The Big Short — The Feature-Length Adaptation Of The 2008 Subprime Crisis

I know. It’s not a personal finance podcast or YouTube channel. But hear me out. Because while there’s plenty of shows and channels out there for market and economics commentary and education, there are relatively few that take you behind the scenes of the upper echelons of the financial markets.

Adam McKay’s The Big Short is, in my opinion, a must-watch for anyone investing in the markets. Why? Because in just over two hours, the film explains the 2008 global credit crisis with both massive scope and detailed depth.

The cast of characters includes Christian Bale’s memorable performance as Dr. Michael Burry, the hedge fund manager who predicted and led the betting against the crash. It pulls together top-tier dramatic talent like Ryan Gosling, Steve Carrell and Jeremy Strong with celebrity cameos from Margot Robbie and the late Anthony Bourdain, all in service of explaining and illustrating the economic, market and cultural circumstances that set up the biggest crash (so far) of the 21st century.

The film goes deep into the psychology of the people who contributed to, predicted and profited from the ’08 subprime crash. More than any other film about the financial markets — which tend to get lost in portraying the luxury lives of the ultra-wealthy — The Big Short illustrates the disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street in early-2000s America.

To go even deeper into this fascinating episode of financial history, check out the Michael Lewis book, The Big Short: Inside The Doomsday Machine, on which McKay based his film.

#16: A Wealth Of Common Sense — Pro Institutional Investor Making the Complex Simple

While we’re looking at content that helps you navigate the complex world of finance and economics, I should mention A Wealth Of Common Sense. This blog, written by Ben Carlson (Director of Institutional Asset Management at Ritholz Wealth Management) is another example of a professional investor breaking down market news and analysis for everyday readers.

Huge institutions turn to Ben for investment advice and portfolio guidance. Having managed people’s money his whole career, he has broad and deep knowledge of the markets, money and financial advice. But his ethos on the blog — and the accompanying podcast, Animal Spirits — is to keep it simple.

According to Ben: ‘Both the economy and the financial markets are complex adaptive systems, but I’ve never found complex problems require complex solutions. Common sense and self-awareness are extremely underrated attributes in the world of finance.’

This post on surviving bear markets at different stages of life is a brilliant example of the quality and readability of Ben’s writing. And this episode of Animal Spirits shows you the type of in-depth analysis and commentary you’ll find on the show’s weekly, roughly hour-long episodes.

How To Make The Most Of Financial Independence & Personal Finance Podcasts

So there you have it. My 16 best personal finance and investing podcasts and blogs from across the web. From advanced, pro trader-level podcasts to more everyday content aimed at helping ‘normal’ people invest, save money and build their financial independence.

The shows and sites (and the feature film) I’ve featured here give, IMHO, a wide range of content that I hope result in you discovering at least one new resource on your own financial journey.

Of course, I have included two finance podcasts that we’ve appeared on ourselves here at Navexa. That’s because we’ve created a platform to help investors make the best possible financial decisions for their investment portfolio.

The Navexa Portfolio Tracker: Optimize Your Investment Journey

Whatever your financial goals, or which industry experts you might listen to for tips on money matters and financial topics, one thing we all need on our personal financial journey is a reliable tool for tracking our performance and returns.

As you’ll hear on our episode of the QAV Podcast with Cameron and Tony, our founder Navarre is a long-term, buy-and-hold investor to whom strong, annualized returns matter more than eye-grabbing one-off gains.

He’s been learning about investing for a long time. Everything he’s learned has proved it’s far better to work with hard data than skewed or incomplete information about a portfolio.

This is why the Navexa Portfolio Tracker, today, is one of the leading portfolio tracking platforms. It allows you to add portfolio data from stock brokers, crypto exchanges, cash accounts and even unlisted investments like property.

This means you can track all your investments in one place. Which, in turn, means you can look at your overall portfolio performance, measured together using the same industry-standard performance calculation.

Once you load your portfolio into Navexa, you can see true performance over the long term. You can see at a glance your capital gains, currency gains, investment income — all net of your trading fees.

You can run comprehensive tax reports with a couple of clicks. You can track & analyze more than 8,000 ASX & US-listed stocks and ETFs, plus cryptos, cash accounts and unlisted investments (like property).

And, you can go even deeper, running reports like Portfolio Contributions, which shows you in chart form which of your investments are boosting (and which are dragging down) your overall performance.

Invest In Knowledge While You Invest in The Markets

We’ve developed Navexa so that you can spend more time learning about the financial and economic forces driving the markets, the strategies that some of the world’s best investors use to outperform the rest of the market, and the investing and personal financial principles that underpin strong long-term investment strategies.

How? Because once you start tracking your portfolio performance in Navexa, you’ll no longer need to spend time manually tracking, calculating and reporting your investment performance — especially at tax time, when the government requires you provide accurate, comprehensive records of every trade and transaction you’ve made in a given financial year.

Not that podcasts or blogs were around in his time, but Benjamin Franklin famously (among many other things) said, ‘an investment in knowledge pays the best interest’. By which he meant that taking the time to learn about how money and the markets work can be more valuable than buying and selling investments themselves.

Between the 16 investing and personal finance podcasts and blogs I’ve detailed here, and the powerful portfolio performance tracking tool we provide here at Navexa, I hope you’re now better equipped to learn about investing and to build your financial literacy!

Sign up to Navexa here for a free 14-day trial to see how tracking all your investments together helps optimize your investment journey.

Different market sectors offer unique opportunities and risk for investors, as well as ways to diversify a portfolio. These are the 11 key market sectors, and the pros and cons of each.

The US stock market is packed with different types of companies, focused on a massive range of products and services. This market is broken down into 11 sectors. This creates a lot of different options for investors in terms of which sectors and industries they want to get exposure to by buying shares.

Each sector has its own advantages and disadvantages. We’ll introduce each and then examine the pros and cons. 

Why Invest in Different Sectors?

Investing in different sectors allows for portfolio diversification and can be a key element of wealth management. A diversified portfolio, with a variety of stocks, dividends, and ETFs, offers exposure to different parts of the market. This, in turn, exposes the portfolio to both the potential risks and returns of each sector. The key idea of diversification is that the risks associated with one sector are balanced by the returns of the other.

If you own or plan to own a diversified portfolio, Navexa can help you track it. Our platform helps you map your financial goals and automates tax reporting. You can start using it today for free, and upload your holdings in minutes.

What Is the GICS System and Why Is It Important?

The Global Industry Classification Standard (GICS) divides the investment market into 11 sectors further comprising24 industry groups, 69 industries, and 158 sub-industries. This is a common system that investors use to learn how companies are classified, and what ETFs and mutual funds consist of.

The GICS was created in 1999 by MSCI and Standard & Poor’s. This classification system includes the following groups:

• Sectors
• Industry groups
• Industries
• Sub-industries

It’s occasionally revised, following the growth and developments of certain industries. For example, the latest addition was the real estate sector. This sector was included in 2016, due to the increasing growth and importance of real estate and equity REITs. 

This change had a powerful effect on the real estate sector. For example, it drove more money to real estate companies. Additionally, large fund companies had to purchase more real estate stocks to offer them in index funds. Adding the real estate sector to the GICS opened doors for other changes and introduced investors to new options.

However, the GICS is not the only method of classifying industries and sectors. The Industry Classification Benchmark (ICB) is one alternative. The ICB schema was developed in 2005 by Dow Jones and FTSE. It divides the market into 11 industries and 20 supersectors, which are further divided into sectors/sub-sectors. The ICB standard is used in many international markets, including NASDAQ and NYSE.

Today, we’ll focus on the Global Industry Classification Standard and its 11 stock market sectors.

Key Information on the 11 Sectors Plus Pros and Cons

These 11 stock market sectors represent 11 groups of public companies that share similar business activities, products, services, or features.

1. Energy: Exposure to Different Stocks

The energy sector includes companies that focus on the exploration and production of energy products. However, with COVID-19, there has been a change in how energy resources are seen and utilized. The pandemic increased interest in renewable energy sources due to the energy pressures it exacerbated. Renewable energy infrastructure has shown potential to address some of those pressures. Still, investments in the clean energy sector are generally not as stable as investments in oil and gas. 

Some of the top categories in this sector are:

• Oil and natural gas stocks
• Pipeline and refining stocks
• Mining stocks
• Renewable energy stocks

Companies in the energy sector aren’t limited to just one category. Instead, they’re often focused on several operations around one energy product.

Additionally, the energy sector is vast. It accounts for trillions of dollars annually, and will always be in demand. Companies that increase the prices of their services tend to have more money to set aside for dividend payments. This sector also offers a variety of investment opportunities, from ‘traditional’ like oil and gas, to solar and wind energy stocks.

However, there are certain risks involved in investing in this sector:

• Can be a highly volatile market
• Companies involved in this sector often need to make huge investments into research and development and might lose money
• There’s a chance of regulatory risk regarding limitations on the production of some energy sources
• New technology may reduce long-term demand

2. Materials: Performs Well When the Economy Grows

The materials sector refers to companies that take raw materials or natural resources and turn those into useful products. Companies that produce chemicals, paper, glass, metals, packaging, construction materials, and so on.

This sector usually does well when the economy is growing and there’s a high demand for certain products. However, many things affect this sector, such as:

1. Changes in the supply chain
2. Cyclical demand for materials
3. Changes in the economy that affect companies
4. Legislation
5. Inflation

3. Industrials: Essential for the US Economy

The industrial sector is one of the essential sectors of the US economy. It performs three functions:

• Producing and distributing capital goods
• Offering commercial services
• Providing transportation services

The companies operating in these sectors are often related to aerospace, construction, transportation, waste management, and similar.

As with any other investment, recognizing the best company in the market is challenging. Investors often check whether the company has diversified operations, low operating costs, and solid credit ratings.

The industrial sector has a cyclical nature. Thus, it’s more suited for risk-tolerant investors. The sector is strong during economic growth. However, economic downturns directly reduce the demand for industrial goods and services, which may cause stock prices to drop.

4. Consumer Discretionary: Another Cyclical Sector

This sector deals with goods and services that aren’t considered essential for people. Usually, these include items and offers people can purchase if they have enough income. For example:

• Cars
• Durable goods
• Leisure equipment
• Household items
• Media production
• Apparel
• Services like hotels and restaurants

This sector is the most sensitive to economic cycles. The companies that offer consumer discretionary products will grow quickly in a good economy, but slow down when the economy contracts.

Gross domestic product (GDP) is one metric to consider when investing in this sector. If GDP is on the rise, people are more likely to afford these items and services and the demand will increase.

5. Consumer Staples: Low Stock Decline During Bear Markets

In contrast to the consumer discretionary sector, the consumer staples sector includes companies involved in the production of foods, drinks, tobacco, and non-durable household items. The consumer staples sector tends to generate consistent revenue even during recession periods. Companies involved in the consumer staples sector may face lower stock declines during bear markets.

What’s more, it might happen that the demand for consumer staples increases during economic downturns. Those who invest in this sector usually benefit from dividend income, depending on their investment decisions.

The volatility in consumer staples is generally lower. This industry matures with modest growth.

6. Healthcare: Essential for Aging Demographics

This sector includes companies that provide healthcare services and manufacture healthcare equipment and technology. These companies are present at all stages of pharmaceutical and biotech research, including development and production.

This is a highly interesting sector, with quickly growing companies and overall above-trend growth. Companies in the healthcare sector are often considered a hedge against market downturn.

These are the common healthcare stocks:

• Drug stocks
• Medical device stocks
• Payer stocks (like insurers)
• Healthcare provider stocks

There are several things to consider when looking into healthcare sector companies:

• The company’s growth data
• Growth strategies
• Potential mergers and acquisitions
• Financial statements
• Valuation
• Dividends

When it comes to risks, the primary issue is competition. A competitor discovering better products and services may drive another company down. The healthcare sector is also highly regulated, but any new regulation and/or FDA decision can drastically affect the company and its stock.

Additionally, drug companies are exposed to litigation risks. 

Still, aging demographics and technological advancements should, generally speaking, positively affect the healthcare sector long-term.

7. Financials:  Banking, Insurance, Finance

The financial sector includes companies involved in providing products and services around mortgages, banking, consumer finance, insurance and similar. This is one of the most important market sectors for the economy.

Types of financial sector stocks include:

• Bank stocks
• Insurance
• Stocks from companies involved in other financial services
• Mortgage REITs
• Blockchain and cryptocurrencies
• SPACs

The financial sector dictates how the economy functions, since it ensures the free flow of capital and liquidity in the marketplace. When the financial sector is strong, many other market sectors follow suit. Generally, this sector has shown robust growth and profitability. Still, it can be affected by changes in interest rates and other economic factors.

8. Information Technology: Offers Four Mega Sectors

The information technology sector involves companies that produce software and IT products and services. This includes the manufacturing of hardware, mobile phones, computers, and similar. Therefore, some experts divide this sector further, into four ‘mega sectors’:

• Semiconductors
• Software
• Networking and internet
• Hardware

The information technology sector is also widely used by many other industries. It’s one of the fastest growing stock market sectors in the last decade and contains some of the largest companies in the market (think Microsoft, Adobe, Oracle Corp, and so on).

Still, many new companies in this sector don’t produce cash flow right away. Competition is fierce in the space, and investors often use guesswork instead of calculated valuation to invest in a company.

9. Communication Services: New vs. Old

The communication services sector includes companies involved in everything from traditional media to the internet. This also includes entertainment-oriented companies, products like interactive games, communications services and so on.

The usual methods of analyzing communications stocks are:

• Comparing companies that operate in the same industries
• Comparing companies that are at similar stages of growth
• Analyzing user base size and engagement trends
• Paying attention to the company’s expenses

The communications sector offers growth opportunities for companies that focus on online services. On the other hand, companies that work with traditional communication services and products may face challenges as the industry evolves rapidly.

10. Utilities: Attractive Even in a Bad Economy

This is one of the stock market sectors that’s also essential for the economy. Companies in this sector provide electricity, gas, and water to commercial and retail users. Generally, this sector offers steady performance.

The utilities sector usually offers dividends to the company’s shareholders. Additionally, economic downturns can make utilities attractive for long-term investing. This sector generally has lower volatility.

On the other hand, the utilities sector is intensely regulated. Regulatory change can negatively impact these businesses. Organizations in this sector may also have to invest in expensive infrastructure to provide their services. This can place them in debt, which in turn can be sensitive to interest rate changes.

11. Real Estate: Great for Portfolio Diversification

The real estate sector includes several indirect investment opportunities:

• Companies that work in real estate services
• Real estate developers
• Equity REITs

Besides purchasing stocks from companies involved in this sector, investors also make money by renting and flipping properties (direct investing). This sector generally has steady growth. Depending on the type of investment, it can offer quick returns (flipping) or steady income (renting).

Investing in the real estate sector is a popular way to diversify one’s portfolio. This sector is not closely correlated to stocks, bonds, or commodities. Still, there are some limitations of directly investing in this sector:

• Managing tenants
• Potential property damage
• Reduced income from vacancies
• Requires deep market knowledge

When purchasing real estate stocks, investors should be careful about:

• Management costs
• REIT’s low growth
• Interest rate changes
• Possible market downturns

The 11 Stock Market Sectors and Ways to Invest

There are many different ways to invest in each of these market sectors. Some of the most common ones include ETFs, investment trusts, and index funds. Here’s how investors usually get in:

• Energy sector: The easiest way to get into the energy sector is via mutual or index funds. There are many funds to choose from, and each is managed according to a strategy or energy index.
• Materials, industrials, consumer discretionary, and consumer staples sectors: These sectors usually offers dividends, so buying individual stocks is one way to go. Some ETFs invest in companies in this sector as well.
• Healthcare sector: Utilizing ETFs and healthcare mutual funds is the popular way to enter this market.
• Financials, communication services sector and information technology and utilities: The most common way to get involved with these is through individual stocks.
• The real estate sector: This market comes with several investment opportunities beyond property itself, such as REITs, real estate stocks (via a brokerage account or a tax-qualified retirement account), ETFs, index funds, and Real Estate Investment Groups (REIGs). 

These 11 Sectors Offer Unique Market Exposure And Diversification Opportunities

These market sectors are key to portfolio diversification. From products and services essential to everyday life, through to more speculative technology projects, diversifying across these sectors can expose a portfolio to a variety of potential risks and rewards.. 

For example, the materials sector, utilities sector, and services sector are key components of the economy, regardless of whether it’s growing fast or slow. Still, companies in these stock market sectors are often affected by market downturns, interest rates, and economic changes — some more than others.

However you invest or diversify, whether you’re into high-growth tech stocks, or slower, steadier opportunities like consumer staples and real estate, you must always track your trades, transactions and investment performance. 

Why? Because it’s essential to both optimizing your investment journey through data-driven decision making, and meeting reporting requirements at tax time.

Navexa helps you do all of this in an easy-to-use, accurate portfolio tracker currently being used by thousands of investors around the world. With detailed performance analytics and reporting on diversification, portfolio contributions, income and more, Navexa gives investors actionable insights on their portfolio. 

Create an account free today and see your portfolio like you’ve never seen it before.

Total Stock Return is an investment performance metric that measures capital gains & income together. Here’s how to calculate it, use it, pros & cons, and more.

It’s vital to understand how your investments are performing. This is especially true for stocks that provide a dividend, which can have a significant impact on value and performance.

This is why it’s useful to know how to calculate total stock return. Knowing this allows investors to determine the real value they receive from their stocks, and better plan their investment strategy.

The Total Return, or Total Shareholder Return (TSR), also called the Total Stock Return, is the number that shows the amount of value gained for an investment. TSR includes dividends, and capital gains.

Here are some of the ways to calculate total stock return, including using the Navexa portfolio tracker, and its Modified Dietz Method.

What Are Total Returns?

Stocks can give returns in a couple of ways:

• Through the increase of the stock price.
• Through dividends.

Total stock return reflects all returns from capital gains, dividends paid, plus any other gains.

It’s measured for a specific time period, and helps the investor see performance over that period. The metric can be expressed as a percentage, or a dollar amount.

The Importance of Total Return

There are several reasons investors should keep track of their total returns. Primarily, this number shows how well the investment performs. It’s also handy for comparing stock performance to each other, or the wider stock market.

Some investors tend to ignore the total returns of their holdings, and only focus on how the individual stocks move day to day, or week to week. This can create confusion about investment performance and strategy.

Since TSR accounts for the initial and ending stock price, plus dividends, it gives clarity over total investment performance.

Finally, knowing the total return helps with dealing with taxes and authorities, and possibly minimizing tax on investments.

Terms Investors Should Know

When dealing with the total stock return, investors should understand key investment terms, and concepts. Understanding the following ideas can help shareholders improve their financial literacy.

• Annualized return: Return on investment over a 12-month period.
• Simple returns: Returns that are based on the initial investment only.
• Compound return: Return that’s paid for the initial investment plus accumulated income.
• Compounding frequency: The rate at which an investment compounds — it could be annually, quarterly etc.
• Dividend reinvestment: Receiving dividends as additional shares instead of cash.
• Internal rate of return (IRR): Similar to total returns, only includes a future profitability metrics.
• Expected total return: Same as total return, but using future assumptions instead of actual earnings.
• Unrealized capital gains: Gains that are yet to be converted into cash by selling out of an investment.
• Realized capital gains: Financial gains after an investment is sold.
• Risk-adjusted return: Metric that includes investment risk levels while calculating returns.

How to Calculate the Total Return for a Stock?

There are several ways of calculating total stock return. The shareholder may use the formula below, an online calculator, or a next-generation tool like the Navexa portfolio tracker.

TSR Formula

There are a few steps to take before working with the TSR formula.

First, investors should calculate the capital gain on their investment since they purchased it.

For example, if the initial investment was at $100 a share, and the share is now trading at $150, capital gains are $50 per share.

Then, add all the dividends, and other earnings that the investment has paid during the entire holding period. This will show the total stock return, expressed in dollars.

The simple formula goes like this:

TSR = (capital gains + dividends) / purchase price

The purchase price is the amount of money the shareholder invested in the stock.

To get the TSR as a percentage, use the dollar amount of the total returns, divide it by the price paid for the investment, and multiply the result by 100.

TSR Annualized Formula

To annualize their total return, investors should:

• Take the percentage calculated in the previous step and add 1.
• Then raise that number to the power of 1 divided by the number of years they held the investment.
• And finally subtract 1.

This is a more complex formula, and it looks like this:

Annualized total return = (total return + 1) ^ 1/years – 1

Furthermore, this formula assumes annual compounding. Some shareholders may use monthly or continuous compounding, but this calculation should be enough.

TSR Calculated in Excel Sheet

Besides using the total return formula, some investors use Excel to get their numbers. The “Rate” formula can help out, but the shareholder still has to manually enter the details of their overall performance to get the correct data.

TSR Calculator

Those who want to calculate their total return can also use online TSR calculator forms. They can select their currency, fill in the starting and ending stock price, enter the total amount of dividends, and run the calculation.

TSR Calculated in Navexa Portfolio Tracker

Investors can use Navexa to get deeper insights into their holding and portfolio performance. 

The method behind Navexa’s calculation is called the Modified Dietz Method. It provides a dollar-weighted analysis of the returns. It’s known as one of the most accurate methods to calculate investment performance, and gives investors a detailed view of their total stock returns.

Plus, our tracker accounts for the frequency, and size of cash flows, providing a complete picture of performance. 

Total Shareholder Return Example

Here’s a simple example of TSR:

Let’s say an investor purchased 100 shares, each of them for a price of $10. This makes their total investment $1,000.

The shareholder decided to hold this number of shares for a certain period of time. During this time, the company paid a $2 per share dividend, while the share price hit $12.

The TSR for the time period equals ($12 – $10) +$2 / $10 = 0.4

To get the percentage, the investor should multiply this number by 100, which equals 40%.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Total Shareholder Return

There are many benefits of using Total Shareholder Return:

• It’s a solid tool for performance analysis.
• TSR is highly valued as a performance metric because of its simplicity.
• The calculation offers a clear idea of an investment’s overall performance.

On the other hand, TSR is not a perfect methodology. Some of its disadvantages include:

• It’s limited to the past performance of the stock and dividends paid per share.
• Any market volatility, and market fluctuations will affect TSR numbers.
• It only evaluates performance for a single period.

Total Return With Reinvested Dividends

For shareholders who reinvest their dividends, calculating total return is a bit more complicated. This is because each of the reinvestments, including the capital gains, can easily become its own TSR calculation.

The formula we mentioned won’t work with this type of investment, as the new shares accumulate at the current trading price. This causes investors to end up with more shares than when they received the dividend. Plus, those shares will also start paying dividends on their own, and the numbers will start piling up.

The best solution to this issue is to simplify the approach — observe the overall investment, instead of looking at it on a per-dividend basis.

Using Navexa is an ideal way of keeping tabs on real returns and investment performance. The platform supports tracking for cryptocurrency ROI, so investors can view all their investments’ performance in a single account.

How to Use the TSR Formula in Investing?

There are many uses of TSR in investing. As we stated above, it’s a great way of comparing the total performance of different investments over time.

This is especially true for shareholders who would like to know which of their stocks (that pay dividends) are performing the best. With TSR, investors get a metric that tells them the past performance of an investment.

TSR can also help in improving investment strategy. 

Benefits of TSR in Investment Strategy

When it comes to stocks and investments, knowing the total and expected returns is crucial for making the right decisions.

The total return formula helps people who want to understand how their investments are performing. The calculation accounts for all gains, dividends, and other earnings This gives investors a clear picture of how their investment strategy has been performing.

A Useful — But Not Perfect — Investment Performance Metric

Being actively invested in the stock market means one should be keeping track of every share and dividend in one’s portfolio. 

One of the easiest ways to do this is with the Total Stock Return formula. The TSR calculation includes all gains, and dividends earned per share received over a given period.

However, this calculation is limited to the past value of the dividend, and stocks. Plus, it can be affected by market volatility.

Still, it’s a great way of evaluating investment performance. 

For a fuller, clearer picture of investment and portfolio performance, try Navexa. We’ve developed an all-in-one portfolio tracking platform that shows the true performance of stocks, crypto and unlisted investments. 

Navexa’s advanced performance calculation accounts for capital gains, dividend income (including reinvested dividends), currency gain and other key factors that impact true performance.

Try Navexa free for 14 days — create your account now.

Measuring portfolio performance can seem like a complex, dark art. We introduce eight powerful portfolio performance metrics for better understanding investments.

When it comes to investing, you want to make sure that you are keeping track of your portfolio’s performance. 

This will help you stay on track and achieve your investment goals. 

In this blog post, we will discuss the top eight portfolio performance metrics. 

By tracking these metrics, you can make informed decisions about your portfolio performance and ensure your money is working hard.

What Are Portfolio Metrics?

A portfolio metric measures how well or poorly an investment or portfolio is performing. There are a variety of different portfolio metrics, each of which measures a particular aspect of investment performance. Tracking these metrics ensures that your portfolio is on track to reach your investment goals.

The 8 Best Portfolio Performance Metrics

We’ve compiled this short guide to eight of the most popular and respected investment performance metrics investors and analysts use to measure and judge stocks, funds, sectors and markets. From overall returns to different ‘delta’ measurements, all these metrics are useful and unique. Let’s dive in. 

1.Compound Annual Return

The compound annual return, sometimes called compound annual growth rate, or CAGR, is the most common and most important metric for most investors.

Compound annual return is one of the most crucial portfolio performance metrics. It measures the percentage increase in your investment’s value each year, considering the reinvestment of dividends and capital gains.

This metric is essential for long-term investors as it can help measure the effectiveness of an investment strategy over time. By tracking compound annual returns, you track and analyze not just capital appreciation, but the impact of letting reinvested gains progressively fuel that growth.

2.Compound Annual Return vs. Benchmark

Comparing a compound annual return to a benchmark is a great way to measure a portfolio’s performance. A benchmark is a standard against which you can compare aninvestment’s performance. There are many different benchmarks you can use, depending on your investment goals.

For example, if you are trying to beat the US stock market, you can use the S&P 500 as your benchmark. If you are trying to achieve a specific rate of return, you can use your own benchmark based on that goal.

3. Sharpe Ratio

The challenge with the compound annual return is that it only focuses on return and says nothing about risk.

The Sharpe ratio is a measure of risk-adjusted return. This takes into account the volatility of your investment’s returns. This metric is vital for investors who are looking for a higher return potential but still want to keep their eye on risk.

The Sharpe ratio compares an investment’s potential return to its volatility. By tracking the Sharpe ratio, investors can make better informed decisions on a portfolio’s path, combine multiple diversified asset classes to smooth returns, or even lever investments to target a certain level or tolerance of risk.

4. Beta

But what about if your portfolio’s volatility is greater or less than the market as a whole? You would expect that investors taking on additional volatility must be compensated for the extra volatility risk.

Beta is a measure of how risky the overall stock market is. It’s like taking every stock in the market and combining it into one and calculating its volatility.

A beta of 1 means that the investment is just as volatile as the market, while a beta of 0.5 and 2 means that the investment is less and more volatile than the market, respectively.

Here’s an example of beta in action.

Say Walmart’s beta is roughly 0.5. This means that when the market goes up 2%, Walmart should go up 1%. The reverse is also true. If the market goes down 5%, you expect Walmart to only go down by 2.5%.

One important thing to understand is that stocks and other asset classes can have a negative beta. This means that when stocks go up, the negatively correlated asset will go down. And when stocks go down, this asset would go up.

This critical understanding enabled Ray Dalio to turn Bridgewater into a behemoth and is an asset allocation strategy shared by almost all of the best proprietary trading firms.

5. Jensen’s Alpha

If your performance beats beta, you get alpha.

Jensen’s alpha, also known as just alpha, is a measure of how much an investment outperforms or underperforms its expected return. If Walmart, with a beta of 0.5, matched the return of the market (beta of 1), you achieved alpha. You took less volatility risk than the market but matched the market’s return.

By tracking Jensen’s alpha, you can analyze which investments are outperforming or underperforming their benchmarks.

6. Treynor Ratio

While Jensen’s alpha focuses on excess return, the Treynor Ratio focuses on total risk-adjusted return.

This metric is helpful for investors who are looking to minimize their risk while still achieving a high return relative to the market.

The Treynor ratio can help determine whether an investment is worth the risk by comparing its potential return to its beta.

7. Sortino Ratio

How many investors would complain their portfolios are too risky after an 11% gain?

Likely not many.

The Sortino ratio is similar to the Sharpe ratio but only looks at downside volatility instead of total volatility.

This metric is essential for investors who are looking to minimize their losses and protect their principal investment.

The Sortino ratio can help determine whether an investment is worth the risk by comparing its potential return to its downside volatility. 

By tracking the Sortino ratio, you can make judgments around downside risk. Combined with the Sharpe ratio, investors can use it to smooth their portfolio risk and expected returns. 

8. Calmar Ratio

And while volatility to the downside is an essential proxy for risk, I think far more investors are concerned with the total permanent loss of capital.

The Calmar ratio is another measure of risk-adjusted return, which takes into account not the downside volatility but the maximum drawdown of your investment’s returns.

This metric is vital for investors who are looking to minimize their losses and understand the worst-case scenario for their investment.

The challenge with the Calmar ratio is that there are not as many data points to make it as statistically significant as the other methods.

What Is the Best Portfolio Metric?

You’ve probably surmised that this is a trick question. While if I had to pick only one, I would crown the Calmar Ratio as king, you can get a much better view by understanding the above.

It’s worthwhile to understand multiple different portfolio performance metrics. Knowledge, as Benjamin Graham said, pays the best dividends.

By being familiar with compound annual growth, benchmarking, beta, alpha and the various ratios that measure risk and performance, investors give themselves more tools to understand and manage their investments. 

The Best Way to Track Your Portfolio Performance Metrics

Renowned management expert, Peter Drucker, famously said ‘what can’t be measured, can’t be managed’. In other words, if you don’t know how an investment or portfolio is performing, you’re going to have a difficult time managing and improving its performance.

This is why it pays to understand eight performance metrics explained here. And, why we recommend investors use a portfolio tracking platform to help them measure, analyze and optimize their own performance.

Navexa is designed to help investors do exactly that. By bringing all stock, crypto, ETF, cash and other investments into a single unified tracking account, we help you measure every aspect and factor of portfolio performance so you can focus on making data-driven investment decisions.

Portfolio Performance Metrics FAQs

What is a good ROI?

A good ROI, or return on investment, is a measure of how much money you make on your investment compared to how much money you put in. This metric is important for investors who are looking to make a profit on their investment. While this varies for each investment class, it’s usually asked in the context of the stock market.

We also know that volatility is a critical component of understanding return. However, if you’re still interested, you can check out Professor Damodaran’s Equity Risk Premium for the month and multiply by your portfolio or stock’s beta.

What Is a good Sharpe ratio?

A good Sharpe ratio is between 1 and 2, and above 3 is considered excellent.

What is a good Jensen’s alpha?

Any positive value for Jensen’s alpha is excellent. It means the portfolio has beat the market with a superior selection of assets.

What is a good Treynor ratio?

A good treynor return is anything greater than the S&P500 minus the current risk-free rate.

What is a good Calmar ratio?

A Calmar ratio between 0.5 and 3.0 is considered Great. Anything above 3.0 is excellent.

How is annual compound return calculated?

The Navexa portfolio tracker uses an advanced portfolio performance calculation based on the Modified Dietz method to measure annualized, money-weighted performance. Navexa also calculates and displays CAGR performance. 

How is the Sharpe ratio calculated?

The Sharpe ratio subtracts the risk-free rate from the investment’s return, then divides the result by the standard deviation of it’s excess return. 

How is the Treynor ratio calculated?

The Treynor ratio divides the difference between average return and the average risk-free rate of return by the investment’s beta. 

How is the Sortino ratio calculated?

The Sortino ratio divides the difference between an investment’s aggregated earnings and the risk-free rate of return by the standard deviation of negative earnings.