Data through September 2026. Annual rebalance, trading costs included.
What is in the Awesome Portfolio
Five holdings at 20% each. Browne built the Permanent Portfolio for four economic seasons, prosperity, inflation, deflation and tight money, with 25% in an asset suited to each. The Awesome Portfolio adds a fifth asset he never gave a seat to, real estate, and funds it evenly out of the other four.
| Sleeve | ETF | Job | Weight |
|---|
| US stocks | VOO | Prosperity | 20% |
| US real estate | VNQ | Real assets (REITs) | 20% |
| US bond market | BND | Ballast | 20% |
| Gold | SGOL | Inflation | 20% |
| Treasury bills | BIL | Tight money | 20% |
Two changes separate it from Browne's original:
- Real estate as a fifth sleeve. REITs grow with the economy like stocks and reprice with rents like an inflation hedge. Adding them lifts growth-sensitive assets from 25% of the portfolio to 40%.
- The total bond market instead of long Treasuries. BND has a duration of roughly six years against roughly seventeen for 20+ year Treasuries. That means far less damage when rates rise, and far less of a rally when investors flee to safety.
As modelled here it is rebalanced once a year, in January, back to 20% each, and left alone in between.
What the record shows
From Jan 1980 through Sep 2026, the Awesome Portfolio compounded at 7.8% a year after trading costs. $10,000 invested at the start grew to about $331,140.
That is 0.4 points a year more than Harry Browne's Permanent Portfolio over the same months, and it out-returned the Permanent Portfolio in all 5 decades in the record. Adding real estate and shortening the bond sleeve has added return.
Its deepest decline was 22.4%, from a peak in May 2008 to a low in Feb 2009, and it was back to its old high by Feb 2010. That is the deepest maximum drawdown of the 5 allocations on this page.
Return is only half the picture. The Ulcer Performance Index measures return against the depth and length of drawdowns, and on it the Awesome Portfolio scores 0.99, essentially level with the Permanent Portfolio at 0.99.
The bond swap was built for years like 2022, when long Treasuries fell hard as rates rose. That year the Awesome Portfolio returned -11.3% against -12.2% for the Permanent Portfolio.
The same changes cut the other way in a credit crisis. From Nov 2007 to Feb 2009 the Awesome Portfolio returned -22.0% while the Permanent Portfolio returned -4.2%. Real estate fell with stocks, and a total bond market fund rallies far less than long Treasuries in a flight to safety.
In the 195 months the S&P 500 fell, the Awesome Portfolio still made money in 27% of them.
Since 2000
The modern half of the record, with the dot-com bust, 2008, the long zero-rate decade and the 2022 rate shock all inside it.
| Jan 2000 to Sep 2026 | CAGR | Max DD | Ulcer | UPI | Sortino | MAR |
|---|
| Awesome Portfolio | 7.2% | -22.4% | 4.21 | 1.27 | 1.44 | 0.32 |
|---|
| Permanent Portfolio DMS | 8.5% | -10.9% | 3.11 | 2.13 | 2.22 | 0.78 |
|---|
| Permanent Portfolio | 6.7% | -15.7% | 3.34 | 1.45 | 1.69 | 0.43 |
|---|
| Golden Butterfly | 7.8% | -17.3% | 3.63 | 1.63 | 1.62 | 0.45 |
|---|
| All Weather | 6.6% | -21.1% | 4.86 | 0.98 | 1.40 | 0.31 |
|---|
| S&P 500 | 8.1% | -51.0% | 15.89 | 0.39 | 0.88 | 0.16 |
|---|
| 60/40 | 6.6% | -32.3% | 7.62 | 0.62 | 1.11 | 0.20 |
|---|
Return by decade
| Annual return | 1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s* |
|---|
| Awesome Portfolio | +9.3% | +7.8% | +7.2% | +6.7% | +8.1% |
|---|
| Permanent Portfolio DMS | +14.7% | +9.5% | +10.1% | +4.3% | +12.5% |
|---|
| Permanent Portfolio | +9.1% | +7.4% | +6.4% | +6.3% | +7.7% |
|---|
| Golden Butterfly | +10.0% | +8.9% | +7.6% | +7.7% | +8.1% |
|---|
| All Weather | +11.9% | +10.3% | +6.5% | +7.8% | +5.1% |
|---|
| S&P 500 | +17.0% | +18.1% | -1.0% | +12.9% | +15.3% |
|---|
| 60/40 | +14.7% | +14.0% | +2.1% | +9.4% | +9.4% |
|---|
* Partial decade, annualized over the months available.
Through the hard stretches
Total return over each period, start of the first month to the end of the last.
| Period | Awesome | PP DMS | Permanent | Golden B. | All Weather | S&P 500 | 60/40 |
|---|
| 1987 crashSep 1987 to Nov 1987 | -8.1% | +0.4% | -6.6% | -12.4% | -10.2% | -29.8% | -18.5% |
|---|
| Dot-com bear marketSep 2000 to Sep 2002 | +3.1% | +24.9% | -0.5% | +2.4% | 0.0% | -44.8% | -23.5% |
|---|
| Global financial crisisNov 2007 to Feb 2009 | -22.0% | +5.5% | -4.2% | -14.5% | -7.7% | -51.0% | -32.3% |
|---|
| COVID crashFeb 2020 to Mar 2020 | -8.9% | +4.4% | -1.4% | -6.9% | -0.6% | -19.6% | -11.9% |
|---|
| 2022 rate shockJan 2022 to Dec 2022 | -11.3% | +2.9% | -12.2% | -12.6% | -18.8% | -18.2% | -15.9% |
|---|
How it behaves month to month
| Since Jan 1980 | Worst 12 months | Positive months | Positive when S&P 500 fell | Correlation to S&P 500 |
|---|
| Awesome Portfolio | -21.5% | 64% | 27% | 0.73 |
|---|
| Permanent Portfolio DMS | -9.7% | 65% | 43% | 0.35 |
|---|
| Permanent Portfolio | -13.9% | 62% | 33% | 0.59 |
|---|
| Golden Butterfly | -15.4% | 65% | 27% | 0.77 |
|---|
| All Weather | -19.5% | 66% | 35% | 0.64 |
|---|
| 60/40 | -27.5% | 66% | 10% | 0.97 |
|---|
The portfolios it is compared with
- Permanent Portfolio DMS: Browne's four economic seasons built with modern instruments: equity long/short, global macro, gold, managed futures and tail-risk protection.
- Permanent Portfolio: Harry Browne, 1981. US stocks, long Treasuries, gold and T-bills at 25% each.
- Golden Butterfly: Created by Tyler at Portfolio Charts. US large caps, small-cap value, long Treasuries, short Treasuries and gold at 20% each.
- All Weather: The widely published risk-balanced allocation: long and intermediate Treasuries, stocks, gold and commodities.
- S&P 500: US large-cap stocks, held without rebalancing.
- 60/40: 60% US stocks, 40% US bonds, rebalanced annually.
Questions
What is the Awesome Portfolio?
The Awesome Portfolio is a five-part, equal-weight allocation: 20% each in US stocks, US real estate (REITs), the US bond market, gold and Treasury bills. It is a variation on Harry Browne's Permanent Portfolio that adds real estate as a fifth asset and uses the total bond market in place of long-term Treasuries.
Who created the Awesome Portfolio?
The Awesome Portfolio is associated with author and newsletter writer Jared Dillian, who has described it as close to Harry Browne's Permanent Portfolio with real estate added. Dual Momentum Systems is not affiliated with him. This page is an independent backtest.
What has the Awesome Portfolio returned?
In this backtest, from Jan 1980 through Sep 2026, it returned 7.8% a year after trading costs, with a maximum drawdown of -22.4%. The figures update every month.
Is the Awesome Portfolio better than the Permanent Portfolio?
On return, yes: 7.8% a year against 7.4% over the same months. On risk, its maximum drawdown was -22.4% against -15.7%, and its Ulcer Performance Index was 0.99 against 0.99. It holds more growth assets, so it tends to earn more in good years and fall further in a credit crisis.
How is the Awesome Portfolio different from the Golden Butterfly?
Both take Browne's four assets, add a fifth growth asset and set everything to 20%. The Golden Butterfly adds small-cap value stocks and keeps long and short Treasuries; the Awesome Portfolio adds real estate and uses the total bond market. Over the same months the Golden Butterfly returned 8.5% a year with a -17.3% maximum drawdown, and the two had a monthly correlation of 0.94.
How often is the Awesome Portfolio rebalanced?
As modelled here, once a year in January, back to 20% in each of the five holdings. There are no drift bands and no signals in between.
Which ETFs does this backtest use?
VOO for US stocks, VNQ for real estate, BND for the bond market, SGOL for gold and BIL for Treasury bills. These are DMS's choice of fund for each sleeve. Before each fund launched, its history comes from a matching index.
About the data
All portfolios run on the same monthly return series with the same trading-cost model and are rebalanced as each one specifies. Returns before an ETF's launch come from a matching index, as explained in where the data comes from. The Permanent Portfolio, Golden Butterfly, Awesome Portfolio and All Weather use funds with long, clean index histories. Permanent Portfolio DMS uses recently launched funds whose earlier history relies on hedge fund and managed futures index data, which can be flattered by survivorship and backfill bias, so its early decades deserve extra skepticism.
Backtests are hypothetical and are not a promise of future results. This page is educational and is not investment advice.