[omgJustTest]

Unless you have some super special edge, Vanguard is really good IMO. Having a 0.01% or 0.05% fund is really as good as you can do and never pay attention.

Vanguard also has things like the VIGAX (0.05%) and the VITAX (0.09%) with excellent returns over the past 20 years.

You could also actively invest, where you can get lucky, but if you have a day job... it gets tougher.

edit: also you could do "better" with lower fee funds, but they typically dont match the performance over the time period, and fidelity is a recent entry for their funds.

[tobiasdorge]

actively investing is 1) hard and 2) really just a waste of time considering the amounts most people are dealing with. I think it may have been from A Random Walk Down Wall Street but the general notion is something like this:

You have a 500k portfolio, and you spend the average amount week managing your portfolio (12 hours). If you were to achieve a 2% alpha (which is considered insanely high for any actively managed fund, and almost impossible to replicate year after year), you have made an excess $10k over what you would have made investing your portfolio in a benchmark.

On an hourly basis that's about $16 per hour spent... you could get more reliable income working at a gas station in California. And of course, most people are not investing $500k, the vast majority of day traders are probably pulling their hair out managing <$100k...

[bluGill]

The counter is smaller returns are easier for small investors. If you are a large investor just the act of buying stock changes the price.