Be Old and Get Gifts – December 2025 End of Month Update

Portrait of an Old Man – Rembrandt Van Rijn – Harvard Art Museum

Slack Investor would have to say that getting old has several disadvantages. However, the Australian government is compensating for this – perhaps a little too much. Under the current ‘Intergenerational contract’ and our ‘tax transfer’ system – it pays to be old!

25 years ago, the 75+ age group’s post-tax income was only 75% of the average, but now it matches the average, indicating a significant shift. –(Source: ANU)

The Black line on the chart below, represents the net value (aggregate) of government taxes and services at each age. It is a good demonstration of how the Australian tax and transfer system works. A recent ANU Report shows that these transfers are part of the intergenerational contract where the working community ‘looks after’ the young and the old:

The Australian tax and transfer system – (Source: ANU). The intergenerational contract is graphically displayed – the black line is the net value of government taxes and services at each age.
  • When people are young, they pay relatively little tax and they receive services such as education.
  • During working age, people typically pay more in taxes than they receive in services.
  • After retirement, older Australians usually receive more in government benefits and services (age pension, aged care and health care) than they pay in taxes.

These principles are sound in a caring economy. However, there is something profoundly wrong with the whole Australian tax system where:

Australians over the age of 60 have enjoyed a post-tax income similar to that of mid-career working age Australians and much higher than Australians aged 18-30 –(Source: ANU)

The report describes how, in earlier periods, older Australians earned relatively little income while the tax and transfer system provided income and support. In recent years, Australian retirees generally have generated income from significant Real Estate and Superannuation accumulated wealth – and the Australian tax and transfer system has not adjusted.

We’re a country that overtaxes hard work that actually contributes to the economy and rewards those hoarding unproductive assets while contributing little back. – Tom Stelzer, Livewire

The Australian Budget is in a structural deficit – the cash balance will be negative in every year going forward! In the next few years, it will be necessary to increase taxes or reduce Government spending.

The ANU Report suggests that budget repair should include both a mix of tax increases and spending reductions on older Australians. The proportion of over 65s paying tax has halved in the last 20 years. Slack Investor is not one to eagerly put his hand up for extra taxes – but he can see the community benefit. He will take it on the chin when it happens.

December 2025 – End of Month and Year Update

Although December in the US was a flat month (S&P 500 +0.0%), there was a bit of a ‘Santa Rally’ this month for Australia and the UK. The ASX 200 was up 3.3% and the FTSE 100 up 2.2%. Slack Investor remains IN for the FTSE 100, the ASX 200, and the US Index S&P 500.

I haven’t yet done the full maths on the market yearly gains that include dividends. In raw terms (without dividends), for calendar year 2025 the ASX 200 was up 7%, the FTSE 100 up a magnificent 21%, and the S&P 500 up 16%.

Amongst all this positive news, the Slack Portfolio has had a negative calendar year and is down 3.1%. Slack Investor has good long-term performance and accepts the volatility of the stock market. He is not surprised by the odd bad year, but amongst all this background rising tide – it is just poor form!

The Ashley Owen graphic below shows one of the reasons for the Slack portfolio negative performance is that he has attached himself to some of the biggest losers of calendar year 2025 (CSL -35%, Goodman Group -17% and Wisetech -41%). My New Year’s resolution is to pay a bit more attention to the Slack Portfolio and try to turn things around.

The ASX top shares movement till 12 Dec 2025 – From Ashley Owen IFPA lecture series – OwenAnalytics

All Index pages and charts  have been updated to reflect the monthly changes – (ASX Index, UK Index, US Index). The quarterly updates to the Slack Portfolio have also been completed.

A technical note on the Slack Portfolio. Slack Investor has moved his Wesfarmers (WES) and Coles Group (COL) shares out of the growth-oriented Slack Portfolio because of their relatively weak projected growth (5%-10%). He remains a shareholder of these solid companies, but he has moved them into his Stable Income Fund – where they more comfortably sit.

Small Things

Slack Investor is enjoying the hallmarks of the festive season and has collected a ‘grab bag’ of smaller finance issues that just wouldn’t make a whole post. So, here they are as a collection.

Revised Division 296 Super Tax

Slack Investor wasn’t the only one going on a bit of a rant about the poor design of the proposed tax on large super balances – Division 296.

There was an unusual change of heart within the government after many months of stonewalling. The Division 296 proposal to tax both ‘realised’ and ‘unrealised’ gains on superannuation balances over $3m was finally revamped. The Australian treasurer Jim Chalmers relented. The new revisions are not law yet and are expected to be presented, and passed, in early 2026 with an implementation date of 1 July 2026. The changes from treasury outlined below are practical and sensible – and include indexation on the balance limits.

  • Superannuation earnings attributable to balances between $3 million and $10 million will be taxed at an effective rate of 30% (i.e. the existing 15% rate plus the additional 15% Division 296 charge).
  • Earnings attributable to balances above $10 million will face a 40% rate.

Slack Investor sees this as a welcome change of heart and a testament to the many persistent voices in the superannuation community that pointed out the flaws in the initial proposal. It is not often that Slack Investor is pleasantly surprised by a proposed tax outcome.

Yes, the S&P 500 is currently expensive

Slack Investor is a fan of using the forward adjusted S&P 500 Price/Earnings ratio (CAPE) to evaluate market value. Another way of looking at how expensive the S&P 500 is currently – is through a whole market yield analysis. When the overall market yield is high, this indicates that the market is cheap, lower yield (dividend) values represent an expensive market.

Gurufocus

The median dividend yield value for the S&P 500 is 2.83%. The Mid-December 2025 value is 1.14%. This is approaching the lowest point in the 60 years that the chart represents.

Payday Loan Sharks

Slack Investor’s pre-Christmas bliss was interrupted by a cheery ad on SBS offering a loan from Cash Converters … with no fees!

I thought this was very decent of the Cash Converter’s crowd to help out this way – because in finance world we are always trying to reduce our fees and transaction costs. A search down to the details revealed that, sure, there were ‘no fees’ but there was an ongoing interest charge of 48% on amounts owing!

Interest is charged at a fixed rate of 48% per annum on the total outstanding balance – Cash Converters

Admittedly, these loans are unsecured but in an environment where the comparison rates for various products are typically:

  • Home Loan: 4.8% – 6.5%
  • Personal Loan: 5.8% – 22%
  • Credit Card: 8.0% – 22%

These interest rates would seem outrageous! ‘Cashies’ are not alone in this space with the heavily advertised Wallet Wizard offering a 47.8 % loan interest and Nimble puts the screws in for 47.6%. There are many other harmless sounding short term loan providers with similar products, e.g. Swoosh, Sunshine, CashTrain, etc.

Slack Investor knows that there is a market for these payday loans to help manage unexpected bills and was glad that there is some form of regulation of this sector through ASIC. There was a big push to introduce protections in 2013 but these regulations applied specifically to loans less than $2000. Further regulations were introduced in 2022.

However, it is time to sharpen the ASIC regulation again, and with a few more teeth. Payday lenders are now pushing punters into the less regulated area of loans greater than $2000.

In the meantime, if you are in desperate need of cash in a hurry – try to avoid these payday loan sharks and apply for no interest loans through a charitable organisation like Good Shepherd. To get out of a debt trap you often need help and government-funded debt counsellors can provide this.

For an entertaining comedy/drama on Payday Lenders, Bank of Dave 2: The Loan Ranger is recommended – based on a true story (Netflix). Slack Investor offers festive greetings to all.

On the Hunt – November 2025 End of Month Update

Hunting Scene with Foxhounds
John Frederick Herring – Art UK

Slack Investor has a little bit of spare cash and his Macquarie bank savings accounts are offering a risk free (but taxed!) interest rate of 4.25%. Not a bad place to park your money temporarily. However, even in this risky environment, he would rather have his money working in a profitable company. He is continually hunting for opportunities.

Last September, he read about a profitable business in a Livewire discussion with Martin Hickson and Steve Johnson. They mentioned SKS Technologies a company that is gaining contracts in building data centres and other types of electrical and audio visual fit out work. Slack Investor put SKS on his watch list and did a bit of research. This is not advice, just a little journey into Slack Investor’s small mind and a case study on how he finds companies to invest in. This type of information gathering is something all investors should try to do before they press the ‘BUY’ button. Extra research offers no guarantee of success, but Slack Investor only aims for ‘mostly right’.

SKS Technologies Group (SKS)

My first port of call is always the Market Screener Finance page to see if this idea is worth exploring further. Their income, projected income growth and lack of debt looked fine.

Next he looked at the projected numbers on the business health and relative price. Projected Price to Earnings ratio (PE) was refreshingly low for a growing company. Return on Equity (ROE) was high indicating a very profitable business. Because of some recent successful tenders, Earnings Per Share (EPS) Growth was also very high. These type of numbers gave an extremely large Slack Factor. Was this too good? Is the recent growth inflating the numbers too much?

Slack Investor was recently burned by a few recent purchases in the pharmaceutical sector that had high projected growth figures and a subsequently high Slack Factor score. The stock price came crashing down when there were a few regulatory problems and doubt on the future growth.

Over 70% of their order book now comes from data centres, and that’s up from zero four years ago … At the moment, the company has an order book of $200 million, a tender pipeline of $500 million – Martin Hickson, 1851 Capital

SKS is an unusual type of business for Slack Investor to be interested in. They submit tenders for their services and their income depends on whether their tenders are accepted – there is always some uncertainty about the future income flow of these type of businesses. However, things are running hot at the moment with a just completed acquisition of a similar business and, they have just announced a new $130m project.

I don’t see SKS as a long-term ‘set and forget’ holding as the tender process is competitive and results (income) are not assured. But for now, data centres are the big thing and SKS certainly have the established expertise and a growing tender pipeline. They also have won contracts with Defence and other government work. I will hold my small parcel (0.5% of Slack Investment Portfolio) and, with the lessons learned from recent pharma investments, watch for the first earnings downgrade – then exit with some dignity (hopefully).

Waiting … Waiting

Daily Price Chart for SKS Technologies – incrediblecharts.com

Sometimes, the numbers (fundamentals) on the business can be really good and the chart tells a different story. Slack Investor kept looking at the charts, weekend after weekend in October. SKS was caught up with a general bad feeling on the AI and data centre companies – with a subsequent price slide. The market thought that these sectors were ‘overcooked’ – and prices were falling. This changed on Monday 24 November 2025 when there was a 10% price rise after a positive AGM presentation. Somebody was buying. Slack Investor got onboard with this momentum at $3.70.

November 2025 – End of Month Update

Slack Investor is IN for Australian index shares, the US Index S&P 500 and the FTSE 100.

The S&P 500 (+0.1%) and the FTSE 100 (+0.0%) had a volatile but eventually flat month. For the ASX 200, a bit of a slide downwards (-3.0%). The UK Index (FTSE 100) needed its stop loss moving upwards as prices were 15% above the previous value. The new UK stop loss was moved up to the new ‘higher low’ of 9276.

All Index pages and charts have been updated to reflect the monthly changes – (ASX Index, UK Index, US Index).

Warren Buffet and Market Value – November 2025 Update

Warren Buffet and his offsider the late Charlie Munger are dead set Slack Investor Heroes – and a reminder that the USA offers a crucible for outstanding qualities to emerge in individuals – as well as, in some presidential types, some not so good qualities. Mr Buffet is a great investor and philanthropist and full of insightful but humble advice that is worth heeding. Every November he writes a letter to his Berkshire Hathaway shareholders and it is a delight to read in full. This will be his last shareholder letter as he is retiring at the grand age of 95.

‘Our stock price will move capriciously, occasionally falling 50% or so as has happened three times in 60 years under present management. Don’t despair; America will come back and so will Berkshire shares.’ – Berkshire Hathaway 2025 Newsletter

Even investors as great as Warren Buffet are not immune to large market swings. After all, it is your long-term performance that is the most critical for a lifetime investor.

‘Since 1965, shares of Warren Buffett’s conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B), have delivered a compounded annual return of 19.9% — almost double that of the S&P 500 over the same period.’ – Investopedia using data from the Berkshire Hathaway 2024 Newsletter

Warren Buffet liked to look at current market valuation (S&P 500) as a ratio with the current US Gross Domestic Product (GDP). At 30 June 2025 the ratio was 217%. A long way above the trend line and a warning that the S&P 500 was growing at a rate much faster than the general economy – this is a danger sign.

The Buffet Indicator is the ratio of the total United States stock market to GDP. The ratio is now two standard deviations away from the historical trend line – from Current Market Valuation

Market Value – November 2025 Update

Slack Investor also likes to keep up to date with how the markets are travelling for value and he has been using charts for the Cyclically Adjusted Price to Earnings ratios (CAPE). This value is also known as the Shiller P/E Ratio after Robert Shiller the economics professor that made this measure popular. Slack Investor first started using CAPE as a ‘value’ tool in September 2021. The most recent post on Market Value was mid-April 2025 about 6 months ago.

For the following charts, Slack Investor uses monthly CAPE data from Barclays, the 40-yr mean is calculated and plotted together with the latest actual CAPE values up until 31 October 2025. A ‘fair value’ zone is created in green where the CAPE is within one standard deviation of the mean (average) – click images for better resolution.

ASX 200 CAPE Value 22.89 (11% above long-term av.)

ASX CAPE values – up to 31 October 2025

FTSE 100 CAPE Value 18.24 (5% above long-term av.)

UK CAPE values – up to 31 October 2025

S&P 500 CAPE Value 39.76 (59% above long-term av.)

US CAPE values – up to 31 October 2025

The UK and Australian markets are not too overvalued. However, in terms of the Shiller P/E the S&P 500 has entered some lofty territory. Unfortunately, whenever the S&P 500 has a large correction the effects are usually felt in other markets.

There is some good research that links CAPE to long-term returns … and future returns are what gets Slack Investor excited. The predictive skill of the Schiller CAPE is not very good over 1-yr and 5-yr periods. However, it does show some skill for periods of 10 years and longer. The tight spread around the trend line indicates that the Shiller P/E might have some predictive skill.

Shiller P/E and S&P 500 10-year annualised forward returns since 1983. The data shows 41 years of S&P 500 10-year average annual returns based upon the Shiller PE ratio (from 10 years ago). Slack Investor has modified the chart and circled the 10-year average returns based upon the times when the Shiller P/E was previously around 40 – From Invesco.com

If this relationship holds, the average S&P 500 10-year annualised forward returns are predicted to be close to zero or negative. This indicates that now is not a good time to start buying the S&P 500. Tech stocks (with high P/E) have fallen sharply lately and this could be early signs of a readjustment.

Slack Investor is not one with predictive skills. He just plods along – staying mostly invested and knowing that he has his stable income pile to ride out any market gyrations. Cripes … even the great Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway stock had 11 negative years between 1965 to 2024. Slack Investor could only dream of emulating the Buff’s long term compounded annual return of 19.9% over 55 years.

Ride that Horse! – October 2025 End of Month Update

Calgary Sun

Slack Investor reads a lot of finance news each week. Sadly, there now seems to be a portion of the finance news that seems to come from AI sources. However, there is still a lot of good stuff by real people – and he came across an excellent article by Carl Capolingua that had some great investor truths that apply to the current market.

A disciplined investor doesn’t fight the market – they respect it. They accept the market is responsible for their investing outcomes, win, lose or draw. They also accept that they have absolutely no control over the market or the outcomes it delivers. – Carl Capolingua, Livewire Markets

The original article focuses on the difficulty of letting go of investments that have shown a loss. Slack Investor is still searching for this zen state and has written about his own troubles with selling stocks that have had a sudden fall. However, the quote above sums up ‘the bargain’ that Slack Investor has made with stocks and their volatility. I don’t know when the next correction (or worse!) is coming … but I know it’s coming.

World Markets are Expensive at the Moment

Although Slack Investor collects his own data on relative market value using CAPE numbers, the remarkable Ashley Owen has produced a great graphic showing the relative size of the world markets and how expensive they are at the moment in terms of PE and Yield. Clearly, the US market looks over ripe and any corrections here will historically influence all other markets.

World markets plotted by PE Ratio and Yield – From the very erudite Ashley Owen of Owen Analytics

Short-term Returns are Volatile

The chart below shows that the S&P 500 returns for a calendar year are all over the place, but if you just hung on, and didn’t sell the S&P 500 when times were tough, you would be rewarded with an average annual return of 12.2% over 30 years. Not Bad. Australian shares have returned an average yearly gain of 11.5% from 1900 to 2020.

Yearly Returns of the S&P 500 (green columns) and 15-yr rolling returns (blue line) – From T. RowePrice

What to do when the Correction comes

‘If you have trouble imagining a 20% loss in the stock market, you shouldn’t be in stocks.‘ – Vanguard founder – John C. Bogle

Slack Investor has had no real luck in timing the markets – despite a disciplined 21-yr project trying to do this. There are those that can, Marcus Padley and his investment team have gone to 100% cash and reported this on 21 October 2025. Slack Investor hasn’t the knowledge, or gumption, to confidently predict market exits and entries – and yet, has done OK in the investing business without too much angst.

Slack Investor knows that for an ordinary person, the stock market is the place with best long-term returns with minimal transaction costs. The bargain – to accept volatility in return for long-term gains – is accepted.

  • He has his stable income pile to keep the dogs from the door.
  • He tinkers with his Investment Portfolio of predominantly growth shares, but mostly he leaves it alone.
  • He will not sell his shares after a correction and convert to cash.
  • He has elevated his cash position slightly (6% cash, 94% invested) in case some bargains come up post-correction.

These are choppy times and there is an uncertain near-term future – situation normal in the stock market. Some of his portfolio (e.g. CSL, WTC, TLX) have had big falls lately. However, Slack Investor has had a look at future revenue predictions and has not completely given up on these stocks. Though, CSL is losing its shine as a growth company in Slack Investor terms.

He will keep riding that stock market horse … and push to the forefront of his mind the pleasant times at the rodeo bar with his cowboy mates … reflecting on our glorious achievements.

October 2025 – End of Month Update

Slack Investor is IN for Australian index shares, the US Index S&P 500 and the FTSE 100.

The S&P 500 (+2.3%) and the FTSE 100 (+3.9%) have continued their strong monthly growth. Slack Investor is pleased to stay on board but there he remains nervous about the US markets. For the ASX 200, (+0.4%) a flat month with plenty of volatility.

All Index pages and charts have been updated to reflect the monthly changes – (ASX Index, UK Index, US Index).

The Minutia of Investing – Portfolio Tracking and Tax Reporting

Slack Investor has just finished the inputs for his family tax returns and our SMSF tax return. All Good – and he was pleased that it was a painless procedure. After many years of investing, he has got himself organized.

A lot of the tax-time pain has been erased because of his disciplined rituals. As soon as he gets a communication about his shares (usually email) it is downloaded to one of Slack Investor’s Finance folders on his PC. The Finance folder has two sub-folders one for Transactions (Buy/Sell contract notes from Brokers) and, another for communications from Share Registries labelled DIVIDENDS_TaxStatements. He then saves items in these folders with specific notation Account_StockSymbol_Type of document_Date of issue (YYYY-MM-DD). For Tax Statements, Slack Investor will allocate the date for the end of tax year that the statement covered. After completing tax returns, Slack Investor will archive the files to the folder for the previous tax year – and start again for the current year.

Slack Investor’s Portfolio Tracking

Microsoft Money Sunset

Slack Investor will also enter any transactions or income events into his portfolio tracking software. He uses the retired but excellent (and free) ‘Sunset’ International English version of Microsoft Money downloaded from Gareth J. M. Saunders site. There is also a UK Version, and a US Version.

To automate share price updates it is necessary to use a service like  MSMoneyQuotes. The latter is not freeware but the $US10 lifetime licence is money well spent. MS Money is now a 20-yr old bit of software and is a bit clunky but there is a good installation guide at TechFinitive that will help you through – including some registry changes to work with windows 10/11. Slack Investor loves MS Money, and the many support sites, e.g. View from the Potting Shed which has a free support pdf available, Ameridan’s Blog and moneymvps.org. He has been using versions of MS Money for 30 years!

For those who don’t want to wander through the complications of the Microsoft Money path, it is really important to track your portfolio for capital gains and performance, and at least some sort of portfolio tracking is recommended. Slack Investor cannot stress this enough. The ATO will want information when you sell stocks. They require your sell date and price, and the harder to find, buy date and initial cost of your shares/ETF’s – in order to calculate any capital gains tax. This procedure can get complicated when you buy shares in different lots or, participate in a dividend re-investment program as the ATO require a cost-basis for each parcel. It will make your life easier if you have a portfolio manager or, at least, a capital gains tracker.

Portfolio Tracking with Monthly Fees

For Australians, the slickest products involve an annual/monthly cost as good financial software requires constant development.

Sharesight

A highly-rated financial portfolio tracker that includes tax statements and capital gains tracking for $228 annually for one portfolio or $348 annually for up to 4 portfolios. Sharesight used to have a free version that included tax reporting for one portfolio with under 10 shares. However, they have now dropped tax reporting privileges for free accounts.

Navexa

Another nice looking and highly-rated product. A financial portfolio tracker that includes tax statements and capital gains tracking for $240 annually for one portfolio or $300 annually for up to 3 portfolios.

Snowball

This is a US-based portfolio tracker so it will not help greatly with your Australian tax reporting. However, it is a highly-rated and a good looking way to track your Australian and US shares for around $130 AUD annually for one portfolio or $230 AUD annually for up to 10 portfolios.

Finance Tracking without Monthly Fees

Down at the budget end we have products that require a bit more work. There are a few other alternative finance products that are discussed in Whirlpool – but Slack Investor presents a few solutions below.

Yahoo Finance

This is a very basic tracker that can track your overall portfolio performance if you enter your buys and sells and dividends manually. Slack Investor uses Yahoo Finance to keep an eye on the day to day movements of his portfolio plus watchlists. There is no tax reporting or help with capital gains, but Yahoo Finance is a free portal to track your portfolio and it will have your buy and sell information in one place.

Stock Profit

An excellent free alternative to portfolio tracking is the google sheets based Stock Profit. There is a bit of a effort in setting it up but it will track your performance and capital gains with ease. This really is a good product.

Capital Gains Tracker

If you are not worried about portfolio tracking you will make your life easier at tax time if you have some means of tracking capital gains and the free web-based but locally stored cgtracker will supply you with capital gains information and tax statements. Capital Gains Tracker is free to use but you must enter all your buy/sell information.

Personal taxes and Mytax

Firstly, a ‘Hats Off’ to the ATO who have made their online tax returns (MyTax) a very simple process with the ‘pre-filling’ of wages, dividends and distributions. Slack Investor usually waits till September to allow all the pre-filling documents time to trickle in to the ATO. It is now incredibly easy to fill in a tax return yourself and only those with very complex tax affairs should need an accountant.

If your tax affairs are relatively straightforward, MyTax is a fast, free and effective way to lodge your return online. It puts control in your hands, provides instant access to pre-filled information, and helps you get your refund sooner. – Tax Window

By September, all of Slack Investor’s personal tax information was pre-filled, including the distributions from ETF’s that often have internal capital gains and foreign income. He had additional capital gains from share selling and opted to use their Capital Gains Worksheet which was part of MyTax – it already had the small ETF internal capital gains prefilled and he just had to add buy dates and costs for each lot of shares sold. Slack Investor had all of this information on MS Money – but any capital gains tracker would have this information in one place. For advice on any problems with MyTax, he went to the ATO community rather than the official ATO site – which often has opaque, or vague, solutions to your problems.

SMSF Tax Return

Slack Investor started the process in October when his provider (Esuperfund) prompted him to allocate categories to each of the transactions for his SMSF Bank account. All the dividends and distributions were pre-filled but he needed to label the type of contributions (concessional/non-concessional) and the relevant member of the SMSF. Also, he had to determine from which pension account any withdrawals came from. There was some head scratching to make sure the minimum amount withdrawal requirement (5% age 65–74, 4% age under 65) from each pension account had been fulfilled.

Slack Investor had to assure Esuperfund that he hadn’t bought any exotic assets outside of their monitored banks/brokers. He also had to upload Tax Statements from each of the ETF’s in the SMSF portfolio. Luckily, they were all in one place in my Dividends_Tax Statements folder. He submitted the checklist and now have to wait a long ~7 months – till May 2026. By which time, Esuperfund will have obtained an Auditor’s review and will present the trustees with the 2025 SMSF Tax Return to sign.

CSL – Is Slack Investor flogging a dead horse? – September 2025 End of Month Update

CSL Price Chart – Market Index

Apologies to all readers who may have jumped on the CSL train in the past 5 years due to Slack Investor continually ‘bigging up’ this grand old stock. He has always been impressed with companies that spend a good portion of their profits in Research and Development.

‘CSL have committed to spending 10% of global revenue on R&D for new and existing products.’ – Livewire

Slack Investor has been a holder of this company since the ‘good old days’ (before 2020). But has occasionally topped up when the price dipped below $300. So, he does share some of the recent pain.

The latest price slump was on the back of the FY 2025 results and the announcement that one of CSL’s components, CSL Seqirus, was to be demerged. The markets were not that impressed with the planned restructure and slowing growth momentum.

However, some sectors of the business are doing well. CSL Behring and CSL Vifor reported strong growth.

This CSL horse should have some good riding ahead

The 2025 AGM indicated that management were taking the knife to costs and staff in a restructure of the business that is underpinned by the Seqirus spinoff and $500 million in pre-tax savings.

‘Despite all the headwinds from competition and regulatory price cuts, they’re (CSL) still growing double digit. I think that’s a pretty good business.‘ Daniel Moore – IML, reported in Livewire

When nervous … Slack Investor will always go back to the numbers. Market Screener – Finance Tab for CSL supplies some of the answers. The Income chart looks healthy.

Income (Black) and projected income (Striped Grey) for CSL – Market Screener

Looking at the projected PE, ROE and growth from Market Screener – future predictions look OK.

Perhaps the big growth days of CSL are in the past due to the more competitive environment in some sectors of the business. However, Slack Investor is a long-term investor in CSL and happy to hold. He would buy more – if CSL wasn’t already 8.1% of portfolio.

September 2025 – End of Month Update

Another wild month. The S&P 500 (+3.5%) and the FTSE 100 (+1.8%) remain in all time high territory. The ASX 200 sputtering and down 1.4% for the month.

Slack Investor remains IN for all markets.

The recent strength of the US market has pushed the closing monthly value to more than 15% above my old stop loss. I adjusted the stop loss upwards to a new ‘higher low’ of 6212 for the S&P 500.

All Index pages and charts  have been updated to reflect the monthly changes – (ASX Index, UK Index, US Index).

The quarterly updates showing the current holdings and cash position of the Slack Portfolio have also been completed.

Hubris

noun
  1. pride or arrogance
  2. (in Greek tragedy) an excess of ambition, pride, etc, ultimately causing the transgressor’s ruin.

Slack Investor possesses all the human frailties – try as he might, even after decades of investing, some of these failings will occasionally surface. Recently flushed with pride with his good performance figures for the past 15 years, he let a few stock plunges go too far – on the mistaken premise that the market will quickly correct itself to reinforce Slack Investor’s view of the world.

A bit of history here … Slack Investor is disciplined in his investing in many ways. However, a trait that he struggles to shake is the sin of hubris. So convinced is Slack Investor of his magnificent stock picking abilities – he sometimes will persuade his inner self that, after a stock price fall, the ‘market’ has got this one wrong! He was so happy while his healthcare stock prices were going up that he brushed aside the unmistakable signs of decline over the past 6 months.

Slack Investor waded into Telix Pharma last year on the strength of its very impressive projected growth figures which led to a very high Slack Factor score. What he didn’t account for is the huge effect of any regulatory problems on potential growth. During reporting season, just the suggestion of problems with the regulators causes great panic.

The Telix share price plunged 18.8% on the day after the company revealed it had run into a snag with the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA). – From Motley Fool, reporting on just one of the TLX shocks that has led to a 30% stock price drop in August 2025.

With hindsight, Slack Investor wishes he had acted more quickly with his stop loss levels, but the falls were so dramatic that only the day traders would be able to get out with some dignity. Slack Investor is not a day trader and looks at his stocks weekly.

What to do about Telix now?

The FDA concerns with TLX were about some future products in the pipeline and the actual 2025 reporting season results were quite good – hopefully, all the bad news is already priced in! It is time to rationally have another look at the stock to decide whether to dump TLX and look for other opportunities. I go to the Market Screener Finance tab for TLX.

Slack Investor first looks at the Income/Projected Income chart to ensure that the income over the past few years and the projected income are showing a rising trend. The next chart down is the Balance sheet. He is looking for debt levels that are well covered by sales. No red flags here.

He then collects a few numbers. PE levels at 170 (December 2024) are frighteningly high … but, if the projected sales growth comes to fruition, the predicted 2027 PE Ratio is a more comforting 21.

A look further down the financial page reveals the predicted profitability (ROE). The forecast ROE for 2027 is a healthy 21.53%. Further down on the page is the predicted Earnings Per Share (EPS). Slack Investor is interested in how these earnings are predicted to grow. For 2025, 2026 and 2027, the forecast EPS growth is 26.04%, 97% and 91.62%

All Charts and Data from Market Screener

Combining all this data together with other healthcare stocks in my portfolio that had big falls over the past few months helps me determine whether to hold onto these stocks – or not!

Where, PE (2027/28) is the forecast P/E Ratio for 2027/28; ROE (2027/28) is the forecast ROE for 2027/2028); EPS Growth is the forecast EPSG for the next three years (EPSG AV). The Slack Factor is a combination of these metrics using the formula defined in previous posts.

Lessons?

‘Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent‘ – John Maynard Keynes

There is no doubt that Slack Investor should have parked his hubris and let his healthcare stocks go at a much earlier stage in their decline – but for all sorts of human reasons, Slack Investor has found this very hard to do.

However, we are here now … and what should he do? Would he buy these stocks now at the current price? Given these forecast growth figures above … probably! So, for now, I’m being patient and hanging on.

Healthcare stocks often seem to have heroic growth estimates that are easily thwarted for regulatory reasons or the efficacy of competing products. These forecast growth figures can distort simple measures like the Slack Factor.

Mental note to Slack Investor … weather this crisis … and then, reduce exposure to speculative healthcare stocks.

Bogleheads and Vanguard Annual Chart – August 2025 End of Month Update

Slack Investor Hero John ‘Jack’ Bogle with a fitting ‘HOLD’ mantra.

Bogleheads and Vanguard

Slack Investor has paid tribute to the contribution that Jack Bogle has made to the investing world. He started Vanguard Investments in 1974. Bogle’s philosophy wasn’t about trying to beat the index and charging high costs – instead, he would offer a low-cost alternative fund based on the US index. Mr Bogle’s pioneering work with these low-cost funds has led to the popular low-cost Exchange Traded Funds (ETF’s) that proliferate today. Astonishingly, there are now more ETF’s listed in the US (4300) than actual companies (4200).

Slack Investor can well remember the days when a fund manager would charge you 4% of your capital for entry and then lift a further 2-3% in annual fees for the privilege of investing your money – that was not the ‘good old days’.

‘Bogleheads’ are a group of mainly US followers of Jack Bogle’s philosophy and they strive for long-term growth through low-cost, diversified index funds while minimizing fees. They are generally ‘Buy and Hold’ investors. One of their strategies is the three-fund portfolio – where investing is simplified into three low-cost funds – one for the local share market, one for international shares and one for bonds. For the US, the conservative recommended proportions are, your age defines the % in Bonds and the remainder percentage is split so that roughly 20% is in international equities.

In Australia, such a portfolio is a little more complicated as you need to cover yourself for currency risk – and hedge your international exposure for any fluctuations in the Australian dollar. Exposure to emerging markets is also recommended as a diversifier of risk. A Bogleheads type of portfolio is possible using 5 Vanguard funds.

AUD based equitiesVAS  (MER: 0.07%)(Australian equities)
VGAD  (MER: 0.21%)(Developed world ex-Australia equities – hedged to AUD)
Non-AUD based equitiesVGS  (MER: 0.18%)(Developed world ex-Australia equities)
VGE  (MER: 0.48%)(Emerging Markets)
BondsVAF  (MER: 0.10%) (Aggregate bond fund)
The 5 ETF’s for an Australian Bogleheads portfolio. Management Expense Ratios (MER) ar shown for each ETF. For a younger person, Australian Bogleheads suggest proportions VAS: 20%, VGAD: 20%, VGS: 40%, VGE: 10% and VAF: 10% – From Passive Investing Australia.

Slack Investor can see the attraction that Bogleheads have in passive investing and, when he loses his mojo, will opt for a more simplified Boglehead-approved passive exposure to growth and cash/bond assets. Stockspot also offer diversified portfolios using just 5 ETF’s – with excellent performance so far.

Vanguard Financial Year Total Returns for major asset classes

Every August, Vanguard produces a summary brochure focusing on the last 30 years of finance data. It is a reminder that the top performing asset class for each year (green) is seldom the top performer the year after. A lesson in diversification.

Extract from the FY 2025 Vanguard Index Chart Brochure showing the total returns for each asset class for the financial years since 1996. Top performing asset class for the year is highlighted in green and the worst in pink.

Vanguard Annual Chart

It is now time for Slack Investor’s favourite chart – a succinct demonstration of long-term investing. The essence of successful investing is to be invested at least somewhere in appreciating assets – and then, let time do its work. Below is an extract from the Vanguard 2025 long-term investing chart. The numbers on the right are the results of investing $10,000 in the Index funds of the indicated asset classes for 30 years.

Extract from the 2025 Vanguard Index chart (Just the 2007-2025 portion is shown) – the dollar values on the right are the results of investing $10,000 in index funds in each asset class for 30 years (since July 1995). – Check out the full 30-year glory of the Vanguard 2025.PDF chart – Click image for the whole 30-yr chart.

August 2025 – End of Month Update

Slack Investor is IN for Australian index shares, the US Index S&P 500 and the FTSE 100.

The S&P 500 (+1.9%) continues its progress. Slack Investor is pleased to go with the flow but remains nervous for the US markets. For the ASX 200 (+2.6%) and the FTSE 100 (+0.6%), also some monthly gains.

The latest reporting season has brought a few shocks to the Slack Portfolio. Big falls in Botanix (BOT), Telix Pharma (TLX), and CSL. Not so worried about CSL, but looking to reduce holdings in the less established companies (BOT, TLX) when things settle down. Next blog, Slack investor will go into detail how he is dealing with a few sudden drops in individual stocks.

All Index pages and charts have been updated to reflect the monthly changes – (ASX Index, UK Index, US Index).

Financial Year 2025 – Full Slack Results

‘In God we trust; all others bring data.‘

W. Edwards Deming Statistician/Consultant (1900–1993)

Slack Investor likes to measure things, especially long-term results. In the world markets, for FY 2025, the FTSE 100 Total Return Index was up 10.8% (FY 2024 up 11.8%). Dividends helped the Australian Accumulation Index to be up 9.0% for the financial year (FY 2024 +12.2%). The S&P 500 Total Return Index is again the top performer – and was up 15.2% (FY 2024 +24.2%). All of these Total Return Indices include any accumulated dividends.

Slack Investor has stuck to his strategy of mostly investing with growing companies that are profitable (Return on Equity >15%), have an established earnings record and, not too expensive (forward P/E ratios <50). He expects a bit of volatility in his growth oriented investment portfolio. He is reassured that, despite the odd negative year in the Slack Fund, the dividends and his separate Stable Income portfolio are doing what they should – keeping Slack Investor with enough cash to ‘keep the wheels on’ the Slack lifestyle – should the stock market sour.

Slack Portfolio Results FY 2025

All Performance results are before tax. The Slack Portfolio is Slack Investor’s investment portfolio. He is glad to report an annual FY 2025 performance of +18.1%. Full yearly results with Australian benchmarks are shown in the table below. Slack Investor realises that only long-term results really count.

For property values, Slack Investor is using the Home Price Index supplied by PropTrack. The Index uses median values for each city – I would have preferred calculations that include the net rental yield, but this will have to do. Of course, the real estate industry avoids true measurement of real estate performance by collecting figures only on gross price changes – they ignore the significant transfer costs involved (Stamp Duty, Conveyancing, Bank Fees, etc) and, the costs of any home improvements and renovations.

For FY 2025, the Australian Share market Total Return Index (ASX200 Acc) was up 9.0%. The Vanguard Diversified Growth ETF (VDGR), comprising International shares (42%) and Australian Shares (28%), increased by 12.7%. Inflation is now within the Reserve Bank target – with the CPI at +2.1%.

The Cash rate of 4.3% is above inflation. Cash is important – but not a way to grow your wealth. The average readily available cash rate of return since 2010 is 2.6% and, for cpi measured inflation, it is 2.7%.

Yearly Performance (%) results since 2010

The Slack Fund yearly Internal Rate of Return (IRR) vs BENCHMARKS. The Median Balanced Fund (41-60% Growth Assets), Vanguard Growth Fund, ASX 200 Accumulation Index, PropTrack Home Price Index in both Brisbane and Melbourne, and Cash (Australian Super Cash Fund) and Consumer Price Index (CPI). AV. YEARLY is the annual mean of all the data since 2010.

5-yr Average Annual Performance

Although Slack Investor collects yearly figures, the 5 and 10-year compound annual performance gives me a much better idea about how things are really going. Long-term results will smooth out any dud (or remarkable!) yearly figures. The Slack Fund is still ahead of most Benchmarks – but running a close second is Brisbane Residential real estate over a five-year period.

The Slack Fund average 5-yr compound yearly return vs BENCHMARKS in chart form.

10-year compound annual rate of return

The Slack Fund has been around a while and generating some good long term data (10-year compound ‘rolling’ annual rate of return). Over this time frame, the Slack Fund has been performing very well. For FY 2025, a 10-year annual rate of return of over 17% – Go Slack Fund! The 10-yr data is shown below in table and chart form.

It is useful to note that, the 10-yr rates of return for the Median Balanced Fund, Vanguard Growth fund, ASX200, and residential property in Brisbane and Melbourne are also good long-term investments. These appreciating assets generate a 10-yr compound annual rate of return in the region of 6-9% p.a.

The Slack Fund average 10-yr compound yearly return vs BENCHMARKS in table form. Prior to 2022, 10-yr Vanguard Growth fund figures were not available. AV. YEARLY is the annual mean of all the data since 2019.

Although Cash is necessary to add stability and flexibility to a portfolio. From the chart below, Cash as a long-term investment vehicle, is a poor choice.

The Slack Fund average 10-yr compound yearly return vs BENCHMARKS in chart form.

15-year compound annual rate of return

Perhaps because Slack Investor is showing signs of age, he notices that there is enough accumulated data for rolling 15-yr rates of return. Happy to report solid long-term results.

The Slack Fund average 15-yr compound yearly return vs BENCHMARKS in table form.

Growth of a $10 000 Investment Since 2009

The beauty of compounding with a succession of good performance results can be seen in the chart below showing the growth of an initial investment in June 2009 of $10 000.

The growth of $10 000 invested in the Slack Fund vs BENCHMARKS. The Median Balanced Fund (41-60% Growth Assets), Vanguard Growth Fund, ASX 200 Accumulation Index, PropTrack Home Price Index in both Brisbane and Melbourne, and Cash (Australian Super Cash Fund).

The Slack Fund has exceeded my expectations. Also, the chart shows that investing in either shares or residential property has been a solid way of growing your money over the long term.