A starter portfolio in three buckets
You don't need fifteen positions. You need three buckets, a rebalance rule, and the patience to do nothing between rebalances.
6 min readPublished May 10, 2026
Bucket one: the broad-market core
Sixty percent of the portfolio in a single broad-market index — Tadawul, S&P 500, or a global tracker depending on your currency. This bucket is boring on purpose. It captures everything you don't have an opinion about and absorbs the headline risk of every other bucket.
Bucket two: the conviction tilt
Twenty to thirty percent in two or three things you actually understand — a sector you work in, a regional fund, a dividend basket. This is where personal knowledge gets paid. If you can't explain the thesis in two sentences to a friend, it doesn't belong here.
Bucket three: the stabiliser
Ten to twenty percent in something that zigs when stocks zag — gold, short-term sovereign bonds, or cash. The point isn't return; it's giving yourself something to sell when equities are down so you don't sell the wrong thing.
Rebalance on a fixed date, not a feeling
Pick a date — the first Saturday of every quarter works well — and rebalance back to your target weights. If a bucket has run, trim it. If a bucket has fallen, top it up. This single mechanical rule does more for long-term returns than any stock pick you'll ever make.
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