HEDGEFUNDIE’s Excellent Adventure (UPRO/TMF) – A Summary

Here we dive into the famous “Excellent Adventure” from Hedgefundie and how to implement it.

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In a hurry? Here are the highlights:

• Hedgefundie is was a member of the Bogleheads forum.
• Hedgefundie created a thread in February 2019 proposing a 3x leveraged ETF investing strategy based on risk parity using the S&P 500 index (UPRO) and long-term treasury bonds (TMF) held in a 40/60 allocation. The thread later expanded into a Part 2.
• Hedgefundie later updated the strategy’s asset allocation in August 2019 to 55/45 UPRO/TMF.
• Extensive backtesting, discussion, and analysis within the thread by members of the Bogleheads forum supports the validity and potential market outperformance of the strategy.
• The proposed strategy calls for quarterly rebalancing.
• Several different protocols/variations of the strategy emerged in the Excellent Adventure thread, including monthly rebalancing, rebalancing bands, and volatility targeting with various lookback periods.
• Some users have added a dash of TQQQ (3x the NASDAQ 100 index) for a minor tech tilt, as Big Tech has had a stellar run recently.
• It is recommended to implement the strategy within a Roth IRA on M1 Finance, to avoid tax implications and to make regular rebalancing seamless and easy.

Disclaimer:  While I love diving into investing-related data and playing around with backtests, I am in no way a certified expert. I have no formal financial education. I am not a financial advisor, portfolio manager, or accountant. This is not financial advice, investing advice, or tax advice. The information on this website is for informational and recreational purposes only. Investment products discussed (ETFs, mutual funds, etc.) are for illustrative purposes only. It is not a recommendation to buy, sell, or otherwise transact in any of the products mentioned. Do your own due diligence. Past performance does not guarantee future returns. Read my lengthier disclaimer here.

Who Is Hedgefundie?

Hedgefundie is was a member of the Bogleheads forum who created a now-famous thread on the forum proposing a 3x leveraged ETF strategy.

What Is the Hedgefundie Strategy?

The Hedgefundie strategy – the wild ride of which is known as “Hedgefundie’s Excellent Adventure” – is based on a risk parity allocation of leveraged stocks (3x the S&P 500 index via UPRO) and leveraged long-term treasury bonds (3x the ICE U.S. Treasury 20+ Year Bond Index via TMF).

Risk parity is a portfolio allocation strategy in which, consistent with Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT), risk is spread evenly among assets within the portfolio by looking at the volatility contributed by each asset, thereby attempting to optimize returns per unit of risk (Sharpe).

The Hedgefundie strategy relies heavily on the negative correlation (or at least, uncorrelation) between stocks and long-term treasury bonds, wherein the bonds provide a buffer during stock drawdowns. Long-term treasuries are chosen precisely because they are more volatile than shorter-duration bonds and because of their degree of negative correlation to stocks, in order to sufficiently counteract the downward movement of a 3x leveraged stocks position. This concept is based on the simple historical principle of improving risk-adjusted return (Sharpe) over long periods by holding uncorrelated assets, such as a traditional 60/40 stocks/bonds portfolio, as opposed to 100% stocks.

Consistent with the idea of Lifecycle Investing, this heavily-leveraged strategy is better suited for young investors with a long time horizon who can afford to be risky early in their investment horizon. Hedgefundie advocates for treating this strategy like a “lottery ticket” and not using it with a significant portion of your total portfolio value.

Critics and naysayers reflexively exclaim the oft-cited, overblown, platitudinous “Leveraged ETF’s aren’t meant to be held long-term because of volatility decay,” but, in short, that doesn’t concern me. Moreover, that same volatility decay can actually help when upward movement with positive momentum is occurring. I would also argue that as long as you can stomach the volatility, a major drop should [eventually] be followed by a major rebound; 3x hurts on the way down but helps on the way up. UPRO from ProShares and TMF from Direxion were chosen due to their low tracking error and high volume; again, we’re getting 300% exposure to the S&P 500 and long-term treasury bonds, respectively.

The proposed strategy calls for quarterly rebalancing. Several different protocols/variations of the strategy emerged as the Excellent Adventure thread progressed, including monthly rebalancing, rebalancing using bands, and volatility targeting with various lookback periods. It is recommended to implement the strategy within a Roth IRA on M1 Finance, to avoid tax implications and to make regular rebalancing seamless and easy.

Utilizing a traditional, unleveraged 40/60 stocks/bonds portfolio, compared to an all-equities portfolio, has relatively low volatility and should produce higher risk-adjusted return (Sharpe) over long time periods, but would also likely underperform an all-equities portfolio in terms of total return. The solution, Hedgefundie maintains, is applying leverage. We’re attempting to accept a risk profile similar to that of the S&P 500, but with much higher returns.

Hedgefundie updated the approach 6 months after posting the original strategy, opting to move to a 55/45 UPRO/TMF allocation from the previous 40/60 risk parity allocation. Hedgefundie’s reasons are laid out here, based primarily on the premise that the stocks portion of the strategy is the primary driver of the strategy’s returns and that the main purpose of holding the treasury bonds is essentially as “insurance” in case of a stock market crash.

Intrinsically, we’re relying on US stocks and long-term treasuries not crashing in tandem. At the time of writing, these assets have a seemingly reliably negative correlation close to -0.5 on average. A key fundamental assumption of this strategy that Hedgefundie proposes is that the US will not return to pre-Volcker (pre-1982) monetary policy. That is, we’ll be able to significantly mitigate or altogether avoid hyperinflationary periods like the late 1970’s, during which time bonds suffered greatly.

Stocks and long-term treasury bonds do not have a perfect -1 correlation. Sometimes they move in the same direction. This is actually a good thing. Historically, when these assets moved in the same direction, it was usually up. On days when stocks dropped, long-term treasuries fairly reliably rose significantly to mitigate the total loss.

Simulated returns going back to 1987 look like this:

Here are the rolling returns:

Below are the drawdowns. Notice the smaller drawdowns in most cases compared to the S&P 500:

I agree with Hedgefundie’s assertion that extremely volatile assets like gold, commodities, small caps, etc. would suffer worse from volatility decay and would not improve the strategy’s diversification and return. International developed markets may be a viable option to include, but Boglehead member siamond found issues with the DZK ETF.

Some users have added a dash of TQQQ (3x the NASDAQ 100 index) for a minor tech tilt, as Big Tech has had a stellar run recently.

Make no mistake that this is a risky strategy by its very nature. Read up on leverage and the nature of leveraged ETF’s before employing this strategy. Do not put your entire portfolio in this strategy.

Read more details and nuances of the strategy on the original thread here. If you’ve got the time, there’s a lot of learning to be had throughout the entire thread. The thread has expanded into a Part 2 here.

Why Not 100% UPRO?

If we’re expecting UPRO to be the driver of the strategy’s returns, why not go 100% UPRO? Hedgefundie addressed this in the original Bogleheads thread by pointing out that in doing so, we’d probably expect super deep drawdowns from which it may take decades to recover. Here’s a backtest showing 40/60 UPRO/TMF (Portfolio 1) vs. 100% UPRO to illustrate:

Here’s UPRO vs. the S&P 500 going back to 1955:

My Hedgefundie Adventure Performance

Tracking the change in the initial value of my Hedgefundie Adventure in my own portfolio:

07/01/2020: +86%
10/01/2020: +41%
01/01/2021: +39%

Alternative Options To the Hedgefundie Portfolio

If you want to utilize a leveraged strategy similar to that proposed by Hedgefundie but be completely hands off, PIMCO has been doing something similar for years with their StocksPLUS Long Duration Fund (PSLDX) since 2007. Read more about the fund here. Note that you can only access this fund through certain brokers, and it may have a minimum investment requirement. Those details are beyond the scope of this post; ask your broker if it’s available to you.

Similarly, if you’re doing this with a small portion of your portfolio or if you want to employ a leveraged strategy in a taxable account, WisdomTree’s NTSX may be a suitable option, effectively providing 1.5x leverage on a traditional 60/40 stocks/bonds portfolio. It holds 90% straight S&P 500 stocks and 10% treasury futures to achieve effective exposure of 90/60 stocks/bonds. Read more about the fund here.

Bogleheads user MotoTrojan proposed a variant by which you can match the volatility of Hedgefundie’s 55/45 UPRO/TMF and save some on the expense ratio of TMF by utilizing Vanguard’s Extended Duration Treasury ETF (EDV) in a ratio of 43/57 UPRO/EDV. Here’s an M1 pie for that.

Rapidly rising interest rates and/or hyperinflation are the primary risks for this strategy. If those concerns are material to you and make you hesitant about this strategy, or if you simply want more diversification across asset types, then a leveraged All Weather Portfolio may appeal to you. There are also some diversifiers listed below.

Addressing Concerns Over Long-Term Treasury Bonds

I’ve gotten a lot of questions about – and a lot of the discussion in the original Bogleheads thread has been about – the use, utility, and viability of long-term treasury bonds as a significant chunk of this strategy. I’ll briefly address and hopefully quell these concerns below.

Again, by diversifying across uncorrelated assets, we mean holding different assets that will perform well at different times. For example, when stocks zig, bonds tend to zag. Those 2 assets are uncorrelated. Holding both provides a smoother ride, reducing portfolio volatility (variability of return) and risk.

Common comments nowadays about bonds include:

• “Bonds are useless at low yields!”
• “Bonds are for old people!”
• “Long bonds are too volatile and too susceptible to interest rate risk!”
• “Corporate bonds pay more!”
• “Interest rates can only go up from here! Bonds will be toast!”
• “Bonds return less than stocks!”

So why long term treasuries?

1. It is fundamentally incorrect to say that bonds must necessarily lose money in a rising rate environment. Bonds only suffer from rising interest rates when those rates are rising faster than expected. Bonds handle low and slow rate increases just fine; look at the period of rising interest rates between 1940 and about 1975, where bonds kept rolling at their par and paid that sweet, steady coupon.
2. New bonds bought by a bond index fund in a rising rate environment will be bought at the higher rate, while old ones at the previous lower rate are sold off. You’re not stuck with the same yield for your entire investing horizon.
3. We know that treasury bonds are an objectively superior diversifier alongside stocks compared to corporate bonds. This is also why I don’t use the popular total bond market fund BND. It has been noted that this greater degree of uncorrelation between treasury bonds and stocks is conveniently amplified during periods of market turmoil, which researchers referred to as crisis alpha.
4. Again, remember we need and want the greater volatility of long-term bonds so that they can more effectively counteract the downward movement of stocks, which are riskier and more volatile than bonds. We’re using them to reduce the portfolio’s volatility and risk. Most of the portfolio’s risk is still being contributed by stocks.
5. This one’s probably the most important. We’re not talking about bonds held in isolation, which would probably be a bad investment right now. We’re talking about them in the context of a diversified portfolio alongside stocks, for which they are still the usual flight-to-safety asset during stock downturns. Specifically, for this strategy, the purpose of the bonds side is purely as an insurance parachute in the event of a stock crash. Though they provided a major boost to this strategy’s returns over the last 40 years while interest rates were dropping, we’re not really expecting any real returns from the bonds side going forward, and we’re intrinsically assuming that the stocks side is the primary driver of the strategy’s returns. Even if rising rates mean bonds are a comparatively worse diversifier (for stocks) in terms of future expected returns during that period does not mean they are not still the best diversifier to use.
6. Similarly, short-term decreases in bond prices do not mean the bonds are not still doing their job of buffering stock downturns.
7. Historically, when treasury bonds moved in the same direction as stocks, it was usually up.
8. Interest rates are likely to stay low for a while. Also, there’s no reason to expect interest rates to rise just because they are low. People have been claiming “rates can only go up” for the past 20 years or so and they haven’t. They have gradually declined for the last 700 years without reversion to the mean. Negative rates aren’t out of the question, and we’re seeing them used in some foreign countries.
9. Bond convexity means their asymmetric risk/return profile favors the upside.
10. Again, I acknowledge that post-Volcker monetary policy, resulting in falling interest rates, has driven the particularly stellar returns of the raging bond bull market since 1982, but I also think the Fed and U.S. monetary policy are fundamentally different since the Volcker era, likely allowing us to altogether avoid hyperinflationary environments like the late 1970’s going forward.

David Swensen sums it up nicely in his book Unconvential Success:

“The purity of noncallable, long-term, default-free treasury bonds provides the most powerful diversification to investor portfolios.”

Ok, bonds rant over. If you still feel some dissonance, the next section may offer some solutions.

Reducing Volatility and Drawdowns and Hedging Against Inflation and Rising Rates

It’s unlikely that any of the following will improve the total return of the portfolio, and whether or not they’ll improve risk-adjusted return is up for debate, but those concerned about inflation, rising rates, volatility, drawdowns, etc. and/or TMF’s future ability to adequately serve as an insurance parachute may want to diversify a bit with some of the following options:

• LTPZ – long term TIPS (inflation-linked bonds).
• FAS – 3x financials (banks tend to do well when interest rates rise).
• EDC – 3x emerging markets (diversify outside the U.S.).
• UTSL – 3x utilities (lowest correlation to the market of any sector; tend to fare well during recessions and crashes).
• YINN – 3x China (lowly correlated to the U.S.).
• UGL – 2x gold (lowly correlated to both stocks and bonds, but a long-term expected real return of zero; no 3x gold funds available).
• DRN – 3x REITs (arguable diversification benefit from “real assets”).
• EDV – STRIPS
• TYD – 3x intermediate treasuries

The Hedgefundie Portfolio ETF Pie for M1 Finance (UPRO/TMF)

Again, most users are utilizing M1 Finance to deploy the Hedgefundie strategy due to its dynamic rebalancing with new deposits, zero transaction fees, and its simple, 1-click rebalance that you can do quarterly. It takes no more than 30 seconds every 3 months. I wrote a comprehensive review of M1 Finance here.

The risk parity 40/60 portfolio would be this pie which looks like this:

• 40% UPRO
• 60% TMF

To add this pie to your portfolio on M1 Finance, just click this link and then click “Save to my account.”

The updated 55/45 portfolio would be this pie which looks like this:

• 55% UPRO
• 45% TMF

To add this pie to your portfolio on M1 Finance, just click this link and then click “Save to my account.”

M1 Finance is actually currently running a promotion offering a $30 bonus for a taxable account funded with $1,000+ within 2 weeks of opening. Details are here.

They also have a transfer bonus promotion for up to $4,000 when transferring an existing account from another brokerage through May 31, 2021, as outlined below:

Sign Up for M1 Finance

Disclosures: I am long PSLDX, NTSX, UPRO, and TMF in my own portfolio.

Interested in more Lazy Portfolios? See the full list here.

Disclaimer:  While I love diving into investing-related data and playing around with backtests, I am in no way a certified expert. I have no formal financial education. I am not a financial advisor, portfolio manager, or accountant. This is not financial advice, investing advice, or tax advice. The information on this website is for informational and recreational purposes only. Investment products discussed (ETFs, mutual funds, etc.) are for illustrative purposes only. It is not a recommendation to buy, sell, or otherwise transact in any of the products mentioned. Do your own due diligence. Past performance does not guarantee future returns. Read my lengthier disclaimer here.