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Portfolios and rebalancing

Give each holding a target weight. PF then shows how far each one has drifted and the trade that brings it back.

Build a portfolio

A portfolio is what you hold: shares, what you paid for them, and cash. It stays on your device. In the app, run New Portfolio; in a shell:

bash
gloomberb portfolio create Core
gloomberb portfolio position set Core VTI 40 280
gloomberb portfolio position set Core BND 60 72
gloomberb portfolio cash set Core 2000 USD

Set targets

A target is the weight you want a holding to have, as a share of the whole portfolio. Cash can have one too.

bash
gloomberb portfolio target set Core VTI 60
gloomberb portfolio target set Core BND 35
gloomberb portfolio target set Core CASH 5

Read the drift table

PF and gloomberb portfolio show Core add four columns once targets are set:

Ticker      Shares    Value  Weight  Target    Drift  Trade  Trade Value
──────────  ──────  ───────  ──────  ──────  ───────  ─────  ───────────
BND:NASDAQ      60   $4,212   19.6%   35.0%  -15.4pp    +47      +$3,309
VTI:ARCA        40  $15,276   71.1%   60.0%  +11.1pp     -6      -$2,383
CASH                 $2,000    9.3%    5.0%   +4.3pp               -$926
TOTAL               $21,488  100.0%  100.0%
ColumnMeans
WeightShare of the total value, cash included
TargetThe weight you set
DriftWeight minus target, in percentage points (pp)
TradeShares to buy (+) or sell (-) to get back to target

Rebalance

VTI is 11.1pp over its target, so the table says sell 6 shares. BND is 15.4pp under, so buy 47. Make both trades and every drift lands near 0pp.

Dividend income

gloomberb portfolio show Core also lists what each share or fund pays a year: its trailing twelve months of dividends per share times the shares you hold, in the portfolio's currency, and that as a yield on the holding's value. The TOTAL row gives the portfolio's income and its yield on the whole portfolio, cash included. A holding whose dividends could not be read shows —, and so does the total, never $0.

To see what reinvesting them adds, ask for a DRIP projection:

bash
gloomberb portfolio show Core --drip --years 3 --withholding 15

Each year the shares you hold pay today's dividend, the withholding comes off, and the rest buys shares at today's price. The table gives each holding's shares now and after the last year, and the income each year, net of withholding. --years takes 1 to 5.

To compare payers before you buy, rank them by yield with payout and growth: gloomberb fn DVD KO PEP JNJ.

Fine print
  • Targets need not add up to 100%; the report says what is unallocated.
  • Income uses trailing dividends, not announced ones. DRIP holds dividends, prices and exchange rates where they are today and reinvests once a year; it is an illustration, not a forecast.
  • Trades use the current price and leave out fees, taxes and lot sizes.
  • A broker portfolio uses the cash its account reports.
  • In the PF pane the columns read WEIGHT, TGT WT, DRIFT and TRADE.

Related: PF, CLI. Methodology: dividend income and DRIP.