Thanks @wapiti for the prompt reply!!
Yes the Vanguard FTSE All-world is also good but we have decided to avoid China - although as you say the 10% weighting is not much.
I guess the simple explanation is that the fund provider (iShares) decided not to offer it in CHF.
You can check on the fact sheet, on which stock exchanges, and in which currency is the ETF available. For example, VUSA is sold at LSE in GBP and USD (because of this, it has two different tickers, VUSA and VUSD), CHF at SIX, EUR at Euronext.
https://global.vanguard.com/portal/site/loadPDF?country=be&docId=2108
Or you can use JustETF:
I was considering buying VEVE at the beginning, because it has a much lower TER than VWRL. But in the end I don’t think this difference is so big. And VWRL consists in 90% of VEVE, because emerging markets have in total a very small capitalisation compared to developed.
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Hello all,
Just joined this forum and very happy to have found some excellent Switzerland related information, that’s really fantastic.
To share my targeted ETF portfolio I’m building (I have some more investments abroad, but that’s less relevant):
VEUR 24%
VNRT 24%
VFEM 24%
Intentionally somewhat overweight on EM, and no Japan for the moment
thinking to top up the equity part with some WOSC (Small Cap) later
ITPS 14% (for the time being)
Cash 14% (to be converted to bonds at the right time maybe)
Thinking of modifying my portfolio this way:
40% EUR:
- Here I’d like to converge to one single fund, tracking the STOXX600 index. I found this one with a low TER of 0.07%, but then it says “This fund does only have marketing distribution rights for Austria, France, Luxembourg, Sweden, Spain, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Norway, Finland, Denmark.”- anyone knows what it means in practice?
https://www.justetf.com/ch-en/etf-profile.html?isin=LU0908500753
60% USD
- 25% voo
- 15% vioo
- 15% vwo
- up to 5% single stocks / precious materials / crypto / etc
I weight USD more than EUR even though I will most likely never live in the US, because I plan to invest also in real estate in EUR (I will eventually retire to an EUR country if not CH).
What do you guys think?
Hi mustachians,
Here is my portfolio at the moment:
- 40% equities (some ETFs, allocated according to MSCI ACWI by myself)
- 40% fixed income (⅘ global government and corporate bonds single ETF hedged to CHF and ⅕ US/non-US TIPS single ETF hedged to EUR)
- 15% commodities (⅔ commodities ETF, ⅓ gold ETF; I am reconsidering this allocation)
- 5% cash
All of them are invested on (mostly IE and a few CH domiciled) ETFs, and mostly from iShares. Overall the portfolio has weighted TER of 0.13%.
Hello r2d2,
go to have a look at my post about commodities to see what means commodities other than gold and the risk associated.
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Dear Mustachians,
First of all I would like to apologize for my lack of knowledge on the Topic and would appreciate any feedback.
1- I have bought some VUSA (CHF) (not much just to get started and not be paralyzed by inaction)
2- However having read some posts on the topic, I now think that VT is more diversified and probably closer to what I am looking for long term.
Therefore I have a first question: Is there any point in keeping both ETFs - VT having the majority - or absolutely none? I understand it would only increase US exposure.I don’t necessarily have a problem with it. Would then 80%VT and for instance 20% VUSA be ok to have a slight increase in US exposure or should I simply sell the VUSA now and focus on VT?
3- I can see that VUSA is domiciled in Ireland and VT is domiciled in the US. Does it make any difference from tax perspective?
thanks for the answer
hey @maillekeule,
do it 
the difference between 100%VT and 80/20 VT/VUSA, in case you are fine with both asset allocations, is you have double the transactin costs, more effort declaring taxes and managing your portfolio, etc…
overall, potentially very minor differences. unless you trade at expensive swiss brokers…
i dont see any other hard reason. however i also cant’t see any plausile reasoning on why to increase SP500 exposure over that of VT alone.
it makes a lot of difference from the tax perspective. that is the reason why the Irish ETFs exist in the first place. For Swiss domiciled investors, it is fine to stick with the American versions of ETFs, because we are not hit by 30% withholding tax on dividends, but just 15%, and even that we can get back from the Swiss tax office.
I also own VUSA in CHF and later on I bought VT. VUSA is an unfortunate fund to keep, because it is hit by these taxes I mentioned above. That’s why I will replace VUSA with VFEM. VEUR would also be an option.
You might be tempted to close the Swiss broker, but I think, since I went through the trouble of opening an account there, I will keep it. In the end, it’s not bad to keep your portfolio split between 2-3 brokers, especially if you invest 90-100%.
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I’m a beginner here, so don’t take my words for advice, but my portfolio currently consists of
70% Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF
20% SPDR MSCI World Small Cap UCITS ETF
10% UBS ETF (CH) Gold (USD) A-dis
All traded in CHF on SIX via Corner Trader.
My bet on gold is that it will react inversely to stocks in crisis times and I will use it to rebalance. We’ll see how that goes.
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I like in your portfolio that it is simple and that you obviously put a lot of thought in your strategies.
I shudder a bit remembering the TER of SPDR MSCI World Small Cap (0.45%). And I really wonder why UBS named their gold etf “dis”. 
I want to start a portfolio using VTI and VXUS. I choose these two funds over VT because of reasons listed here: Tax optimisation for ETF investing
I am still not sure about what allocation I should choose, should I just mirror VT every year? e.g. currently ~56% US 44% exUS?
Doesnt holding VT make more sense, because the allocation is adjusted automatically on the fly?
So lets say I go with the 56%US/44%exUS split now. and in 5 years time lets say VT is 49%US and 51%exUS, and I never adjust it, wouldn’t have holding VT all this time, made more sense and a greater return?
What would your guys strategy be for a VTI/VXUS(or VEA) Portfolio?
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I hold VTI, VEU, VWO and VSS atm. I have fixed ratios between the funds. I underweigh VTI with 35% atm as I feel uncomfortable with the historically very high multiples. This probably is not perfectly mustachian.
If you choose the correct ratio from the start, you will not have to rebalance. By buying 56% VTI and 44% VXUS, you basically replicate the VT, so it will, within a margin of error, stay the same.
And a market weighted ratio is not a guarantee of best long-term return. It just has a nice feature of auto-rebalancing itself so the maintenance costs are low. If you went 100% USA 5 years ago, you would have made a much better return than with VT. It’s hard to say what will do better. If your allocation is not exactly market weighted, you slightly overweigh some market, so you place a bet on that market, that it will do better than the rest.
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But what is the correct ratio?
I think when VT launched, the US part was 49% (I could be wrong, but lets assume it’s true)
So I would have invested 49% VTI and 51% VXUS, now in hindsight, this would have done worse than going with VT.
My assumtion is for the exUS percentage in VT to increase, this exUS part has to do better that the US part. Is this somewhat true, or completely wrong?
The correct ratio is the current ratio.
Look, it’s like this. Imagine you start with US being worth 100 and exUS as well 100. So the ratio is 50:50. Now US goes up to 150, while exUS stays at 100. The ratio is now 60:40. But this ratio has changed for both the VT and the individual ETFs. You don’t need to rebalance anything, because your US ETF is now worth 150. I mean… how else can I explain this that you understand?
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I see what you mean now, thanks for that!
I was too focused on how to divide my monthly investment amount, but didn’t consider the actual stache growing accordingly
Indeed, I’m also not so happy with that, but the only alternative for one stop shop MSCI World Small Caps is the iShares MSCI World Small Cap UCITS ETF which has a TER of of 0.35%, and is not traded on SIX in CHF and also has securities lending.
Were I investing on IB, I’d probably go with a mix of VSS + VTWO for small caps, but well … I’m not.
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Lets say that you are investing every month with a certain desired portfolio value.
Month 1:
Desired portfolio value: 8,000 CHF
Then, as per current weight in VT, I would buy 56% of VTI , i.e. 4,480 CHF and the rest (44%) allocated to VXUS.
Month 2:
Desired portfolio value is 16,000 CHF
In month 2, the weight of US in VT is 54% and ex-US is 46%
Which means that out of your target portfolio value of 16,000 CHF, VTI should be 8,640 CHF and the rest (46%) should be VXUS (as per the weightings in VT in month 2).
Then, in month 2, I would take the current portfolio market value on the day of investment, look at the target desired portfolio value keeping 16,000 CHF in mind and then accordingly purchase the VTI and VXUS units (taking into account transaction fees) such that the total holding of VTI becomes 8,640 CHF and the rest goes to VXUS, i.e. 7,360 CHF.
Is this the right way to go about doing your monthly purchases, or am I overly complicating things?
Would appreciate any feedback or criticism. Thanks!
You should always buy according to the current ratio. It just so happens, that once you calculate the number of shares you should buy, it should stay roughly the same.
Let’s say that one share of VTI costs 200 and one share of VXUS costs 100. Their market share is 50/50 and you want to spend 2000. So you buy 5 shares of VTI and 10 shares of VXUS. In future, if you buy the same number of shares, you should more or less keep the correct ratio. I say more or less, because of dividends, for example.
You only need to rebalance if you wish to keep a fixed ratio, e.g. 50/50.
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