{"id":187523,"date":"2025-12-12T07:26:20","date_gmt":"2025-12-12T07:26:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/187523\/"},"modified":"2025-12-12T07:26:20","modified_gmt":"2025-12-12T07:26:20","slug":"im-about-to-retire-with-90-equities-and-10-cash-should-i-decrease-my-investment-risk-level","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/187523\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I\u2019m about to retire. With 90% equities and 10% cash, should I decrease my investment risk level?\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m in my late 50s but am retiring at 60. My partner, who earns $110,000 gross per year, plans to retire in four or five years. Our asset allocation is 90-per-cent equities (60-per-cent U.S. and 40-per-cent Canadian) and 10-per-cent cash. All registered accounts are maxed out, and we both have non-registered accounts as well. Should our investment risk level be decreased even though my wife\u2019s time horizon is much longer?<\/p>\n

We asked Jillian Bryan, senior portfolio manager and senior investment adviser at TD Wealth Private Investment Advice, to answer this one.<\/p>\n

Ms. Bryan agreed that it is the right time to reconsider risk exposure. \u201cA 90-per-cent equity allocation is aggressive for someone approaching retirement, especially when you\u2019ll soon start drawing from the portfolio,\u201d she said. Sequence-of-returns risk \u2013 the danger of poor market performance early in retirement \u2013 can significantly erode long-term wealth, she noted, even if average returns look good on paper. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot stress enough how much the sequence of negative returns can materially impact your retirement portfolio,\u201d she said. Given the market is at an all-time high, she added, there\u2019s risk that your current asset mix is built only for market perfection.<\/p>\n

\u2018I\u2019m 45 and just starting to take retirement savings seriously. How much should I have saved by now?\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

What can help with this is a bucketed structure plan. \u201cOne to three years of cash and short-term fixed income for known expenses, mid-term (four to 10 years) of balanced holdings to generate income and moderate growth and long-term (10-plus years) growth-oriented equities to protect purchasing power,\u201d Ms. Bryan advised. <\/p>\n

\u201cMoreover, a more balanced approach \u2013 perhaps 60- to 70-per-cent equities and the rest in high-quality bonds and alternatives \u2013 can provide a smoother ride and reduce the need to sell equities in a downturn to fund expenses.\u201d <\/p>\n

Your partner\u2019s continued income provides a cushion, so you don\u2019t need to rush to derisk completely, but, according to Ms. Bryan, this is a prudent time to shift gradually toward a portfolio that can weather volatility while supporting predictable withdrawals.<\/p>\n

Finally, liquid alternative investments (or liquid-alts, which are alternative investment vehicles that aim to be more accessible to investors) are an often-overlooked component of portfolios, she said. \u201cWe position liquid-alts to protect you in a declining market and may even generate positive gains when the rest of your portfolio is declining in value.\u201d <\/p>\n

Do you want advice on a financial planning or retirement issue that\u2019s affecting you? Send us an e-mail.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I\u2019m in my late 50s but am retiring at 60. My partner, who earns $110,000 gross per year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112200,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[72,176,61,60,174,175,4925],"class_list":{"0":"post-187523","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-finance","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-personal-finance","13":"tag-personalfinance","14":"tag-r-fp"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}