Fantasy investing was inspired by fantasy football: a game I have enjoyed playing with my friends for decades now. In 2009, I started up a keeper league which is still ongoing. We even got a trophy with the winner of each year engraved on it. Even though I usually participate in half a dozen NFL related fantasy games a year, that keeper league is by far the most important to me. This past week was the semi-finals, and I was fielding a strong team with the #2 overall seed. I was even facing the exact same team I had beaten the previous week. This past weekend was a roller coaster of emotions as I jumped out to an early lead, saw it all evaporate to a wicked Burrow+Higgins stack, then saw hope spring anew courtesy of a lackluster Tyreek Hill performance. All I needed was 2.5 points from Davante Parker, a player who hadn’t score less than 6 points in any game he has played this year.

Parker ended up with 0, which means that trophy that I so covet will spend another year in the possession of another. Last night, I briefly considered tweeting out: “Lessons from 2021: I suck at fantasy football and I suck at investing”. It felt like an appropriately rueful joke about my performance in both this year, but I ultimately decided against it because I was a little worried people might take it too seriously.

Because while I don’t shy away at all about how much my fantasy investing performance has sucked this year (losing to the S&P by around 41 percentage points and not even top 10 among 17 players), I’m also a big believer in keeping perspective and looking and the long term.

So what do my long term results look like?

• Played 6 seasons of Fantasy Investing in one form or another and beat the market 5 out of 6 of those seasons
• Averaged a 46% return over those 6 seasons
• Won my 10 team fantasy football keeper league in 2 out of the 13 seasons it has been going, including making the playoffs most years

So clearly not utter dominance (especially with fantasy football), but certainly respectable.

Anyway, thanks for filling in as therapists for me and letting me vent about my bad fantasy football break last night.

If I had to sum up the story of the 2021 fantasy investing season (current results can be found here) in one poorly made movie reference, it would be: “Revenge of the Market”. We had 17 participants choosing individual stocks to try to beat the market and, if the results hold, the S&P500 is set to trounce all of them. If you fancy yourself a stock picker, it looks like there’s a decent chance 2021 wasn’t a good year for you.

Even in a year where the market reigned supreme, there is still a winner in fantasy investing. There are still a few more days for things to change, but if the results hold, a hearty congratulations goes to Adrian, who is on track to win with a very respectable +18% return thanks largely to his unorthodox picks of URA (+61%) and UPRO (+102%). Congrats on the win!

And now it’s time to look ahead to 2022. Like a tardy Santa, I’m making a list (of stocks) and checking it twice in anticipation for the kick-off next week. This post is coming out a little later than I was hoping, so if you’re interested in participating, please don’t delay! The new season kicks off next Monday, January 3rd, which leaves you around 5 days to get your portfolio in. Let me know what your picks are in the comments below, and hopefully we all have better luck in 2022!