Automatic Pilot Stock Portfolio

If you do not want to constantly monitor your long-term investment portfolio, a diverse portfolio of exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and a few high-quality, dividend-paying stocks might be you. Buy the investments when they are down in price but on the price upside and then hold them for the long run. Be sure to reinvest all dividends so you accumulate additional shares with no extra effort.

Once you make your selections, your portfolio is on automatic pilot. You do not need to check it daily or weekly, but be sure to review it every few months.

The following sample automatic pilot portfolio includes a diverse mix of 13 domestic and global exchange traded funds that track broad market averages. The gold and natural resource ETFs broaden the diversity of the portfolio. The individual stocks add the opportunity to outperform the broader market averages.

Auto Pilot Stocks
Stock	Price Quote & Dividend	Interactive Price Chart	10-Year Moving Average	Dividend Growth Rate & Chart	Return Calculator	Return Map	Comments
SPDR 500	SPY	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Tracks S&P 500
PowerShares QQQ	QQQ	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Tracks Nasdaq 100
SPDR Utilities	XLU	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Large electric and gas utilities - pays dividends
PowerShares India Portfolio	PIN	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	India
iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 Index Fund	FXI	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	China
iShares GSCI Commodity-Indexed Trust	GSG	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Natural Resources and commodities
iShares MSCI EAFE Index Fund	EFA	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Tracks MSCI EAFE Index (Europe, Australia and the Far East)
PowerShares Dividend Achievers Portfolio	PFM	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Dividend-paying stocks that comprise the Broad Dividend Achievers Index.
streetTRACKS Gold Shares	GLD	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Tracks gold
3M	MMM	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Conglomerate
Emerson Electric	EMR	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Industrial Goods
International Business Machines	IBM	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Technology
Procter & Gamble	PG	Chart	Chart	Chart	Table	Map	Consumer Goods

To follow the day-to-day progress of the Auto Pilot Stocks portfolio, check out the returns table and chart below. Dollar values are computed using weekly closes for stocks from Yahoo! Finance.

The 11 stocks included in the value computations are: SPY, QQQ, XLU, FXI, EFA, PFM, GLD, MMM, EMR, IBM and PG. The current value of the portfolio assumes that $909.09 was invested (total of $10,000) in each stock at its closing weekly price for the first week of January 2006. PIN and GSG were excluded from the chart computations because of insufficient price data.

Auto Pilot Stocks - Return Results
Portfolio:	Auto Pilot Stocks
Start date:	Jan-03-2006
Start value:	$10,000
End date:	May-23-2013
End value:	$18,012
Number prices	386
Minimum value occurred on Mar-02-2009	$8,308
Maximum value occurred on May-13-2013	$18,211
Total gain or loss (Start date to End date)	80.12%
Annualized gain or loss (Start date to End date)	8.25%
Sharpe Ratio	0.74
Total dollar value on End date of a $10,000 purchase made on Start date	$18,012
Average percent return for all possible buy/sell combinations	20.29%
Number returns	74,305
Number profitable returns (Winners)	61,156
Percent profitable returns	82.30%
Number unprofitable returns (Losers)	13,149
Percent unprofitable returns	17.70%
Winners to losers ratio	4.65

Click chart to enlarge it.

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