Monthly Portfolio Update – February 2026

Posted on March 1, 2026March 1, 2026 by The FI Explorer

Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.

Arthur Schopenhauer

This is my one hundred and eleventh monthly portfolio update. I complete this regular update to check progress against my goal.

Portfolio goal

My objective is to maintain a portfolio of at least $3,250,000. This should be capable of producing an annual income from total portfolio returns of about $112,000 (in 2026 dollars).

This portfolio objective is based on an assumed safe withdrawal rate of 3.45 per cent.

A secondary focus will be maintaining the minimum equity target of $2,600,000.

Portfolio summary

Vanguard Lifestrategy High Growth Fund	$995,439
Vanguard Lifestrategy Growth Fund	$50,114
Vanguard Lifestrategy Balanced Fund	$86,371
Vanguard Diversified Bonds Fund	$95,318
Vanguard Australian Shares ETF (VAS)	$699,678
Vanguard International Shares ETF (VGS)	$986,477
Betashares Australia 200 ETF (A200)	$358,037
Gold ETF (GOLD.ASX)	$324,307
Bitcoin	$1,024,255
Plenti Capital Notes	$84,000
Financial portfolio value (excluding Bitcoin)	$3,679,741 (+$47,657)
Total portfolio value	$4,703,996 (-$268,350)

Asset allocation

*Australian shares*	*30.8%*
Global shares	30.6%
Emerging market shares	1.2%
International small companies	1.3%
Total international shares	33.1%
Total shares	63.9% (-16.1%)
Australian bonds	2.8%
International bonds	3.8%
Total bonds	6.6% (+1.6%)
Gold	6.9%
Bitcoin	21.8%
Gold and alternatives	28.7% (+13.7%)

Presented visually, the pie chart below is a high-level view of the current asset allocation of the full portfolio.

Comments

This month the portfolio suffered a loss of $268,000 or around 5.4 per cent.

As a single month headline result, this is the eighth largest fall in portfolio ever experienced. It is also the fourth sequential monthly loss, an event which has not occurred in the history of portfolio previously.

The loss reflected continued declines in the price of Bitcoin, of around 24 per cent over the month.

Despite this, however, the smaller underlying portfolio of traditional financial assets continued to expand, hitting the highest value ever recorded ($3.67 million). By contrast, it has grown each of the past three months.

The chart below sets out the performance of both the full and ‘financial assets only’ portfolios since the commencement of the journey.

Through the month, geopolitical uncertainty continues to be heightened, with possible future military conflicts in the Persian gulf.

Australian economic developments have been dominated by a re-emergence of persistent inflationary forces, resulting in a tightening of interest rates. This occurred against a positive reporting season, which appeared to support stronger Australian equities performance (or 3.8 per cent) compared to a slight capital loss in the global equities holdings (1.1 per cent).

Gold holdings fell by around 2.0 per cent from the highs experienced at the end of the last month.

The month as previously small additional new investments were made in global equities (through the Vanguard exchange traded fund VGS), in accordance with the decision to regularly reinvest excess distributions and cash holdings.

Rose of the winds: reviewing trends and developments in the equity portfolio

Five and a half years ago, I provided a systematic analysis of the equity component of the financial independence portfolio. At that time, equities totalled $1.2 million. Today, they stand at approximately $3.0 million.

With this milestone, it seemed an opportune moment in the waning of the summer months to revisit the original mapping exercise – and the shorter snapshot in August 2022 – to see how the territory may have shifted using the compass provided by the passive indexing approach employed.

Equity holdings in the financial independence portfolio

Equities remain, as they have been since the inception, the driving force of the financial independence journey.

At the time of the first detailed review of in mid-2020, the equity portfolio stood at $1.2 million. By August 2022, that figure had grown to $1.7 million—around a 41 per cent increase.

The chart below highlights the progress of the equity portfolio in nominal value terms over the past nine years.

Monthly Portfolio Update – January 2026

Posted on February 1, 2026February 1, 2026 by The FI Explorer

A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.

Jean de la Fontaine

This is my one hundred and tenth monthly portfolio update. I complete this regular update to check progress against my goal.

Portfolio goal

My objective is to maintain a portfolio of at least $3,250,000. This should be capable of producing an annual income from total portfolio returns of about $112,000 (in 2026 dollars).

This portfolio objective is based on an assumed safe withdrawal rate of 3.45 per cent.

A secondary focus will be maintaining the minimum equity target of $2,600,000.

Portfolio summary

Vanguard Lifestrategy High Growth Fund	$984,041
Vanguard Lifestrategy Growth Fund	$49,548
Vanguard Lifestrategy Balanced Fund	$85,395
Vanguard Diversified Bonds Fund	$94,309
Vanguard Australian Shares ETF (VAS)	$673,809
Vanguard International Shares ETF (VGS)	$986,442
Betashares Australia 200 ETF (A200)	$343,574
Gold ETF (GOLD.ASX)	$330,966
Bitcoin	$1,340,262
Plenti Capital Notes	$84,000
Financial portfolio value (excluding Bitcoin)	$3,632,084 (+$38,077)
Total portfolio value	$4,972,346 (-$88,331)

Asset allocation

*Australian shares*	*28.4%*
Global shares	28.8%
Emerging market shares	1.1%
International small companies	1.4%
Total international shares	31.3%
Total shares	59.7% (-20.3%)
Australian bonds	3.2%
International bonds	3.5%
Total bonds	6.7% (+1.7%)
Gold	6.7%
Bitcoin	27.0%
Gold and alternatives	33.6% (+18.6%)

Presented visually, the pie chart below is a high-level view of the current asset allocation of the full portfolio.

Comments

This month the portfolio fell by around $88,000, or 1.7 per cent.

This reflected significant declines in the price of Bitcoin (of nearly 9 per cent), against an unsteady period for most equity-based assets. There was relatively high volatility through the month under a variety of geopolitical strains.

The financial portfolio sits at the highest ever level, of $3.6 million, despite the overall ‘headline’ portfolio value being below the absolute levels of a year ago.

The chart below sets out the performance of both the full and ‘financial assets only’ portfolios since the commencement of the journey.

Across the month, geopolitical instability has driven market nervousness, and the rise in bond yields in Japan continues to signal an important regime shift in the deepest elements of the global financial architecture.

Yields on government debt are rising across Western economies, even as inflation is relatively contained in many jurisdictions. The fundamental price of ‘risk-free’ assets is changing, at a rather unanticipated pace, bringing with it question of ‘financial dominance’ and central bank independence. Developments in commodity markets and strategic metals, such as silver, were also in focus.

Australian equities benefited from some of these developments, rising around 1 per cent through this month. International equities fell modestly, by around 3 per cent, as US markets in particular reacted to the changing global trade and debt market conditions. Despite this, US market valuations, on this view, appear to remain relatively anchored when earnings growth and cash yield considerations are taken into account.

Gold has increased by an extraordinary 14 per cent over the month, exceeding the gains by Australian and international equities over the past twelve months.

Increasingly private investors, and central banks alike are rediscovering – at least temporarily – some of the hedging properties of gold. Over the past year, gold holdings have returned above 66 per cent. This has pushed the allocation to gold to the highest level in about 5 years, and in nominal dollar terms, means movements from here exert a far stronger impact than previously.

By contrast, Bitcoin has fallen by 28 per cent over the past year, and as mentioned fell sharply this month.

This month saw portfolio distributions received, of around $16,000, from the last quarter of 2025. These have been added to a cash fund that is proportionally reinvested through this year, with a portion also being set aside to meet expected tax liabilities.

Wings of time: portfolio compounding theory meets real-world data

Part of the function of this record has been to ‘test’ the theory of reaching financial independence in the real world, as opposed to the cells of an Excel spreadsheet, with their neat eliding of reality.

Tracking expenses and the portfolio’s safe withdrawal income is one dimension of this. Another is examining whether what is often called the ‘miracle of compounding’ occurs in quite the same manner as often presented in materials on financial independence or wealth-building more generally.

Recently, algorithms assisting, I have been interested to see a lot of Youtube financial independence themed content in my feed about various defining acceleration points, or milestones in the journey.

Typically, these relate to concepts like the portfolio assuming its own gradual momentum or central role in wealth generation, compared to new investments. That is, one’s portfolio ‘working harder’ than one’s own contributions.

Portfolio Income Update – Half Year to December 31, 2025

Posted on January 18, 2026January 18, 2026 by The FI Explorer

I love all waste

And solitary places; where we taste

The pleasure of believing what we see

Is boundless as we wish our souls to be.

Percy Bysshe Shelley, Julian and Maddalo

Twice a year I prepare a summary of total income from my financial independence portfolio. This is my nineteenth portfolio income update since starting this record. As part of the transparency and accountability of this journey, I regularly report this income.

As discussed in my recent post, my primary goal is to maintain a portfolio of at least $3,250,000 which is capable of providing a passive income of around $112,000 (in 2026 dollars).

Portfolio income summary

Investment	Amount
Vanguard Lifestrategy High Growth (retail fund)	$9,366
Vanguard Lifestrategy Growth (retail fund)	$417
Vanguard Lifestrategy Balanced (retail fund)	$792
Vanguard Diversified Bonds (retail fund)	$668
Vanguard Australian Shares ETF (VAS)	$11,750
Vanguard International Shares ETF (VGS)	$5,387
Betashares Australia 200 ETF (A200)	$6,223
Plenti Capital Notes	$3,790
Total Portfolio Income – Half-Year to December 31, 2025	$37,922

The chart below sets out the distributions received on a half-yearly basis from the financial independence portfolio over the past eight years.

Looking at the Sea: Reviewing the Portfolio Goal and Investment Plan

Posted on January 3, 2026January 18, 2026 by The FI Explorer

Little islands are all large prisons; one cannot look at the sea without wishing for the wings of a swallow.
Sir Richard Francis Burton

This recorded journey towards financial independence started nine years ago, with an initial objective of building a passive income of $58,000 per annum by July 2021.

Since that time, goals have evolved and changed, with the most recent targets being achieved from January 2024 onwards, as well as temporarily before that.

Each year in early January I spend time reviewing my investment goals and how I plan to reach them.

This post talks about reflections arising from this annual review, updates my portfolio goal, and reviews the measures and assumptions I will use. It also discusses how I will approach management of the portfolio and associated finances given the current achievement of each of my past portfolio goals.

The aim each year is to have a clear written record of the objectives, approaches and reasoning underlying the plan, to serve as a reference point through the year to come. The process also enables the updating of plans and assumptions for changes in circumstances, thinking, as well as available data and evidence.

Little island? Reflecting on a post-journey agenda

The objective of this record at its commencement was to seek to test whether there were any hidden or invisible barriers to the actual achievement of financial independence, given a path of consistent investing over a long period.

Early posts around future goals were largely focused on setting specific financial targets, to put in place the foundations of financial independence, such as achieving a certain portfolio level, or amount of distributions.

At this point in the journey, following the formal meeting of past goals and targets, arguably the approach of setting yearly goals has less to recommend it. The task of a record is to focus on what is occurring, and may occur, rather than becoming trapped in formalities and rituals now existing beyond their natural utility.

Uncertainty and the potential for major market movements, and financial crises, do mean that all progress in quantity terms is provisional.

It would be within the expected run of financial markets for the portfolio’s equity component to fall 40-50 per cent in an exceptionally poor year. Similarly, more volatile components of the portfolio could suffer even larger falls, without falling anywhere outside of historical precedents. And of course, there is always the potential for entirely new precedents to be set, including ones that undermine the entire basis of the FIRE exploration.

This remains true, and yet there is another emerging, less urgent truth emerging over past years. This is that perhaps the main task is shifting from forging the portfolio, to a role of observing and monitoring its own internal processes, applying judicious action only where necessary.

A reason for this is the growing part played by internally generated compounding forces within the portfolio. Put simply, this means that the portfolio has grown to a level where it is less affected by small ongoing decisions or investment choices made. The goal perhaps switches to a more negatively framed one – of not acting in a way that interrupts, or disrupts this self-sustaining process of portfolio growth.

Again, humility is required, because compounding in equity markets does not occur by virtue of smooth annual 7 per cent glide-paths. It occurs in between brutal, sharp upward and downward saw-tooth moments in markets.

These movements themselves are demonstrations of the movement of the journey from one of deliberate, calibrated, controlled choices to a different stage. A stage requiring a greater sense of detachment from the impacts of market forces on the portfolio. And a stage that redirects energy from goal-setting in the financial sphere to other aspects of life.

The tasks that seem most relevant to this stage continue to be evolutions of the two set out for the last two years.

First, to provide for a reasonably assured passive income which is consistent in real after-inflation terms with the target chosen.

Second, to maintain reserves of cash that will be essential to future movement to entire reliance on investment returns and the application of the safe withdrawal rate to the portfolio over an extended multi-decade period.

Should financial markets fall substantially, it is possible I will use reserves in excess of the above requirements, as well as any regular distributions, to purchase new investment assets to restore in particular the targeted level of equity holdings.