Using Investment Software Government Employees Can Maximize their Retirement

Federal employees enrolled in the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) have unique challenges, said Raymond Dominick, CEO of Dynamic Investor Pro investment software. But these challenges can be overcome fairly easily, he added.

Some view the primary challenge with TSP as a good thing: It is limited to just five (5) mutual funds plus an assortment of “lifestyle funds”. Because there are only five funds it is hard to take advantage of market trends because all the funds are super general. It is also difficult to know where to place your retirement money because none of these funds trade on the public markets – they are all proprietary.

The five funds are:

• G – US Government exclusive treasury bonds
• F – Government and corporate bonds
• C – US stocks – large and medium companies
• S – US Stocks – medium & small companies
• I – International stocks

Dominick noted that he discussed TSP accounts and how to address them with Dynamic Investor Pro investment software in his new book, “Investing Guide for Retirement”.

The easy out, he said, is to use the “lifestyle funds”. These are a combination of the five funds with your money split between them according to your age. The critical factor with “lifestyle funds”, he adds, is that everyone your age is considered identical – same goals, same needs, and same family situations.

He suggested that in order to maximize your TSP retirement to meet your particular goals, needs, and situation, you should take control of the TSP and move your money between the five funds. How do you know which funds are performing the best this month and most likely for future months? That is a key question, he said. There are publicly traded mutual funds and ETFs that emulate the TSP funds, according to Dominick. This means you can see how these public ‘funds’ are doing and make profitable investing decisions for your TSP account.

Dominick set up trading strategies in his investment software for TSP using the emulation funds. He says you can do the same and not only individualize your TSP account but easily beat the “lifestyle funds”. It only takes a few minutes a week or even once a month.

This chart illustrates the growth of two TSP trading strategies Dominick created that cover the past 10 years, including how they performed during the Great Recession.