The Lifetime Sequence of Returns: A Retirement Planning Conundrum

The Lifetime Sequence of Returns: A Retirement Planning Conundrum

This white paper explains sequence of returns risk, the risk that the timing of investment gains and losses can significantly affect retirement outcomes even when investors earn the same average return over their lifetimes. The research demonstrates that two individuals who save the same amount, for the same number of years, and receive returns from the same market distribution can end up with dramatically different retirement outcomes solely because of the order in which those returns occur. Th