Barry Ritholtz has a good article Apprenticed Investor: "How My Doin?" on his blog The Big Picture. Ritholtz encourages us to track of our investment performance so that we know if we are winning or losing. Moreover, he provides a link to a handy spreadsheet, which I think everyone should use or use something similar.
Standard and Poor's provides excellent information on the S&P 500 index, which many diversified funds use for a benchmark, on its S&P 500 Indices Webpage. Moreover, S&P provides a spreadsheet that lists the S&P 500 companies along with their ticker symbols, sector names, and other information.
What I find interesting in the S&P 500 statistics is that Energy, which constitutes about 9% of the S&P 500, is up nearly 21% so far this year. The only other sector that is up is Utilities, for about 9%. Every other sector is down for the year, and the S&P 500 itself is down about 2.7% for the year.
Getting back on track, I highly recommend reading Ritholtz's article as well as downloading and using his spreadsheet. As Jim Cramer constantly emphasizes, make sure you are diversified. With the S&P 500 information, you are able to judge your diversification. While I do not believe you should mimic the S&P 500, I do think you should be mindful of it. If you do want to mimic the S&P 500, then you should consider the Vanguard 500 Index Fund or Spyders (SPY). In order to beat the S&P 500, you must be different than the S&P 500. But that does not mean you should not be diversified. You should always be diversified.
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