2011: Let's All Try to Forget It

I had a horrendous 2011. The Dow was up 5.5% for the year, but I was down a staggering 27.5%. Without AgFeed, I still would have been down 14.9%. I sold my AgFeed position at the end of August for $1.012 a share. It stopped trading in December at $0.39. There's now a class-action lawsuit against AgFeed, but unless they're insured against the losses, I doubt I'll see anything. Well, it sucks, but better men than me have been burned by sketchy Chinese equities. See: John Paulson.

I've plotted my returns since 09/30/2008 against the Dow 30, above. I was outperforming the market from March of 2009 to March of 2011, but I've since eaten it. There's a lot of risk in my portfolio, so I can wait on a rebound, but I may have a really weak porfolio. I'm not getting rid of my casinos and my only winner has been the Pimco-managed bond fund (NYSE:PHK). I bought additional shares of Bank of America at $6, which will probably bite me in the end. The graph below plots my excess returns (the difference between my performance and the Dow's). If the graph is positive, I'm beating the Dow and if it's less, I'm underperforming. Proof I suck. I'm learning a lot in my Master's program, so when I'm less busy at work, I hope to revisit my portfolio and fix its weaknesses. Until then, I'm just praying for a rebound.