REMEMBER: YOU STILL WANT TO BE ABLE TO RUN AT 80
By Deidré Valentine
3/1/2026
“Remember, you still want to be able to run when you’re 80. When that’s your goal, your perspective changes.”
This piece of wise advice was shared with a friend of mine by an experienced runner after she suffered an injury at the end of 2025. She had expressed her frustration on the Strava app about not being able to continue with her usual training programme.
Beware of impatience
With 2026 ahead of us, it is always difficult to know what the year will bring. Although I am not necessarily someone who embraces New Year’s resolutions, I do believe in regularly realigning my perspective with the bigger picture.
The runner’s advice once again highlighted how important it is to assess our circumstances not only in the short term, but also by revisiting the long term.
People in general have become impatient. We have access to the latest news, information, and data at the press of a button.
As investors, we too have become impatient. We are often unwilling to give our investments the time they need to grow, instead trying to achieve the best possible growth over a much shorter period.
It is not always easy to remove emotion from the equation when it comes to our hard-earned money. At times, it helps to revisit the numbers and recognise that what has happened over the past 12 months is not necessarily a reliable indicator of what will happen over the next few years.
Top performers don’t stay on top forever
The accompanying tables show the returns of different asset classes in rand terms. These figures are also compared with inflation and with what a typical balanced portfolio (the weighted average of market growth before costs) would have delivered.
Let’s look at what happened during 2025 (as at 25/12/2025):
The standout asset classes were clearly South African equities and gold, both of which delivered growth of more than 40% (in rand terms). The weakest asset classes were offshore cash, bonds, and property, which delivered negative growth, largely due to the strengthening of the rand against the dollar. The rand started last year at R18.82 and stood at R16.69 on 25 December, which represents an 11% weakening of the dollar against the rand.
A table compiled to show asset-class returns since 1995 in rand terms paints a very different picture once the focus shifts to the longer term.
It shows, among other things, that:
- Exposure to growth assets over long periods should deliver roughly 6% per year in additional growth.
- On an initial investment of R100,000, an extra 6% per year would result in a difference of R4.7 million in the final value after 31 years (R5.8 million versus R1.1 million).
- That equates to 427% more.
This does not mean that all your money should be invested in growth assets. However, if you are wary of the volatility that may accompany them, consider what you should be more afraid of: short-term volatility or a R4.7 million difference in your final portfolio value.
Don’t chase yesterday’s news
The same table also makes it clear that investors should not try to chase the next best-performing asset class.
If an investor had decided at the end of 2001 to sell all exposure to South African listed property (which delivered a 6% return that year) and instead increase exposure to offshore cash (which delivered 65% for the year), they would have been cumulatively 163% worse off over the following three years than if they had simply left their portfolio unchanged.
It is also noteworthy that a balanced investment fund with between 20% and 30% exposure to conservative assets (such as cash and bonds) has, over the past 31 years, delivered a similar return to a portfolio invested almost entirely in growth assets.
Returning to the advice mentioned at the outset, I would encourage investors to take time to reassess their perspective from time to time.
After the strong returns of recent years, there may still be another year or two of good growth ahead, or we could be facing a few years of more moderate performance.
This is when it becomes important not to become overly emotional about growth, but to remember that investing is a long-term process.
This does not mean we should be satisfied with poor growth, but it remains essential to consider how the broader market has performed when evaluating the performance of our own investments.
Remember the golden rule
Embedded in the average annual growth of 13.8% achieved by a balanced portfolio over the past 31 years are years such as 2002, 2008, 2016, 2018, and 2022, when the portfolio delivered zero or negative growth.
Ultimately, diversification and rebalancing remain critical when managing investor portfolios.
We need to regularly switch between our binoculars and our reading glasses to maintain perspective.
What makes this easier is knowing where you are headed, through a well-constructed financial plan that is reviewed regularly.
Finally, the price you pay for an asset always matters. If you are currently sitting with a portfolio full of overvalued assets, now may be a good time to revisit your 2026 plan.
Deidré Valentine is a certified financial planner at Woodland Wealth. She can be contacted at info@woodlandwealth.co.za.
Although all possible care has been taken in the preparation of this document, the factual correctness of the information contained herein cannot be guaranteed. This document does not constitute advice and anyone who intends to take any financial action based on this document is strongly advised to first consult with his/her personal financial advisor. Woodland Wealth is an authorized financial service provider with FSP no. 5966.