FWF contests

FWF contests are typically annual events that take place on the Financial Wisdom Forum (FWF) where members take educated guesses, throw darts, consult their crystal ball or use their Ouija board to forecast how the current year will end.

This article serves to both capture the results but also draw some conclusions on the futility of predicting the future.

Contests

There are two long standing contests, a predictions contest and a hedge fund contest. The Hedge fund contest was last contested in 2017.

Predictions contest overview

Guesses or forecasts for the values at year end for the following items: DOW (Dow Jones Industrial Average) ; TSX; GOLD; OIL (crude oil price); and CAD (Canadian / US Dollar exchange rate). The DOW was replaced by the S&P500 as of 2018.

Hedge fund contest overview

Members are asked to pick up to three stocks to go long and up to three to short. Equal dollar amounts are placed on each position, long or short. No trades during the year, except that you can elect at any time during normal exchange business hours to "freeze" a price for any individual position at that day's closing price, i.e. liquidate any position.

Contest results

Active contests

The 2024 Predictions contest was announced on December 28, 2023 with an entry deadline of January 22 at 9:30 AM EST

The standings are updated at month's end. The most recent standings are:

Previous year's contests

The 2023 Predictions contest was announced on December 31, 2022 with an entry deadline of January 23 at 9:30 EST.

The final 2023 standings are:

Historical contests and results

Year	Predictions contest	Hedge fund contest
2022	Announcement Final 2022 standings
2021	Announcement Final 2021 standings	-
2020	Announcement Final 2020 standings	-
2019	Announcement Final 2019 standings	-
2018	Announcement Final 2018 standings	Not contested
2017	Announcement Final 2017 standings	Announcement Final standings
2016	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2015	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2014	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2013	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2012	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2011	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2010	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2009	Announcement and final results Final standings	Announcement and final results
2008	Announcement and final results Final standings
2007	Announcement and final results Final standings

Takeaways from the results

There has been no clear, repeat winner in either contest. The unpredictability demonstrates the variation of year-to-year investor returns and reinforces the advantages of holding a diversified portfolio, which contains several asset classes.

See also

• Periodic table of annual returns
• Canadian asset class returns

External links

• Bogleheads wiki, Bogleheads® contests