We study optimal life-cycle portfolio allocation and its application to target-date fund (TDF) design. We show that optimal TDF allocation must be explicitly linked to a savings rate; for example, a higher savings rate generating higher financial wealth accumulation should necessarily come with a...

We propose target date funds modified to exploit stock return predictability driven by the variance risk premium. The portfolio rule of these tactical target date funds (TTDFs) is extremely simplified relative to the optimal one, making it easy to implement and communicate to investors. We show...

We solve for optimal consumption and portfolio choice in a life-cycle model with short-sales and borrowing constraints, undiversifiable labor income risk and a predictable, time-varying, equity premium and show that the investor pursues aggressive market timing strategies. Importantly, in the...

Intra-household heterogeneity can quantitatively affect the predictions of life-cycle portfolio choice models. Empirically, double-income households, single-income households and singles have different exposures to background risks and differ in covariates affecting financial decisions, reacting...

We study quantitatively how uncertainty in expected stock return predictability affects life-cycle portfolio choice and wealth accumulation in the presence of undiversifiable labor income risk. Households filter information about future expected returns from observed predictors and realized...