It is interesting to observe balanced funds during this phase in the business cycle. Within the M* 50-70% equity category the risk level an investor assumes can vary widely. It tips the hand of the fund's perception of risk vs reward. M* produces data showing 2016-2020 Historical Equity trends. Some Balanced funds have assumed more equity exposure at stock market highs after a decade + long bull market. These funds sit at 66% up to 70%+ equities. Others funds have reduced equities from 2016-2020 protecting investors from a possible downturn (less than 60% equity). Totally opposite viewpoints of the same market. Extreme examples of two within 50-70 are BRUFX and BALFX. This wide descrepancy is obviously going to produce much different CAGR, SD and MDraw going forward. To each his own.

@JonGaltIII,
Drawdown has considerable impact on future returns. Let me try to explain this with some calculation.
Let say you lost 10% in fund A in 2020. An amount of $100 investment is reduced to $90.
100 X (1-0.1) = 90
In order to regain the $10 lost, you must gain 11% in 2021 (not merely 10%).
100 = (1+X)*90 (original 2020 value) and solve for X. X is the percentage gain required for 2021.
X = 0.11 or 11%
Therefore the deeper the "hole" or drawdown is, the larger % gain is required and often longer duration to fully recover the loss. Case in point, S&P 500 index lost 40+% in 2008, and it took 53 months to fully recover and many investors can't handle the pain or patience to wait it out. Many cut their loss and sell near the bottom which is the worst outcome as the investors now lock-in the loss permanently. Therefore the magnitude of drawdown has a significant psychological effect that often lead to panic selling. The key here is minimize the drawdown while balancing a reasonable return. Thus a well balanced portfolio with the right asset allocation will likely to have a much smaller drawdown in a down market. This would allow the investors to sleep well.
There are many very useful tools in MFO Premium site that allow one to compare fund candidates with respective to their drawdown %, recovery period, and annual return for various market cycles. And I am barely scratching the surface of Premium capabilities.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this very productive tread. Yes, 2020 was a rough one as many of us survived while earned a few bucks. 2021 will be different again. Stay safe.

Year-end portfolio tinkering.
Me thinks perhaps the market forces the Fed unleashed in March 2020 will continue to play out in 2021 as vaccines get distributed. With that in mind, a couple of "exotic" funds were added to the fund portfolio.
Bond Pot: Added SVARX. Sold PFOAX. Pot includes PTIAX, PONAX, RCTIX, SVARX, IOFIX. IOFIX will probably be eliminated as it continues to recover in 2021 (replace with GIBLX or ?).
Mixed I Pot: Added GBLMX. Sold HBLAX. Pot includes VWINX, GBLMX, DHHIX, PFANX, TRECX.

I've got some PONAX but expenses keep rising and the fund seems to be struggling since the management changes. I have LBNDX on my radard to replace my PONAX. That said, both LBNDX anda GIBLX (better longer term) have really high turnover rates.

... can understand where you are coming from. If I panicked in March 2020, I would have missed out on a huge finish to 2020. I know we can't time the market ...

I did not panic, I trust, and was not trying to time, in the usual sense. By May 11 all of our equity fund holdings were back to breakeven or abovewater (except for FRIFX, not a huge portion). I projected that this plague was going to be much worse and longer-lived than most were saying, which has turned out to be the case. (I'd lost to covid at end March my oldest college friend, of 55y nonstop acquaintance, healthy etc. --- a jarring, sudden-enough death.) I believed the economic impact was going to be much worse than predicted, including crippled consumer spending. Turned out to be only partly the case; certainly the latter did not occur. All this thinking of mine was informed by extensive reading and some crude numbercrunching. I thought if we could avoid a >20% monthslong / yearslong drop in this early stage of our retirement we would be better off. So as with so much in life I regret it only in hindsight.
I can however guarantee that right after I get back in the really big broad market drops will occur, without fail.

Ok... I somehow can't take my eyes off the drawdown on those sectors. So, given that, what is the takeaway? Because from various articles, energy and financials and small and mid caps along with emerging markets are supposed to be the 2021 winners. Is that because the drawdowns were so large in 2020? Still learning about drawdowns and why they are so important.

I'm not a professional, but I can understand your question. It seems to me that current (magnificent!) Market returns are due to the fact that stocks and bonds are utterly disconnected from "fundamentals." Governments everywhere have been busy "juicing" their economies due to the pandemic. Prior to the Covid thing, there was the "stimulus" to grease the gears again, following the Real Estate bubble and Crash back in 2008-09. I don't think all of that stimulus had ever been removed, since then. So, paraphrasing from something I read here a while ago: "The Markets are on a Methamphetamine bender." And when "ordinary," established big names do very well, they normally drag the small-caps and EM along with them. This is when those other sectors outperform.

@JonGatIII, Be mindful of the risk going forward. I survived both the tech bubble in 2000 and financial crisis in 2008 through my risk-adverse asset allocation. Even then it took years to fully recover the loss. It was a humbling experience and the black swan events will come again. It is a simple question of when and not if.
2020 was an aberration event with the Fed being part of the market as @davfor pointeded out by buying stocks and bonds while reducing interest rates to near zero. Without the Fed the stock market would be still in red as the country is in deep recession. There are consequence to these Fed's action such as higher inflation, devaluation of USD, lower bond yields and etc. While you have the luxury of time, it is helpful to learn to become better informed investors.

Ok... I somehow can't take my eyes off the drawdown on those sectors. So, given that, what is the takeaway? Because from various articles, energy and financials and small and mid caps along with emerging markets are supposed to be the 2021 winners. Is that because the drawdowns were so large in 2020? Still learning about drawdowns and why they are so important.

That was very helpful and I can understand where you are coming from. If I panicked in March 2020, I would have missed out on a huge finish to 2020. I know we can't time the market and I'm nervous after having a great 2020 year but I'm not retired or close. So, I don't want to be foolish (although I'm equity heavy) and ignore what's in front of us.
@davfor and @sven thanks for sharing. Enjoyed Reading Charles Lynn link as well. Really interesting.

Warning: Investors need to understand their individual circumstances and their volatility and risk tolerances.....
FWIW....Most of the time I just observe. Market timing is left to others. (2019 to 2020 were exceptions to this observer mind set while a new secondary investment portfolio was being established.)
These are just a few somewhat random thoughts and opinions as 2021 begins from a generalist investor who typically acts with multi-year investment time frames:
***Its important to acknowledge the stock market is very expensive by historical measures -- particularly on the growth side. The articles linked above make that clear.
But...
***The Fed is now part of the investment landscape in ways it was not in the past. That hit home to me in early 2019 when the Fed abandoned its rate tightening efforts ( Powell Put ).
***The Fed further clarified the breadth of the Powell Put by acting very aggressively last winter when the markets were in turmoil. It has also suggested it will intervene aggressively if market turmoil erupts again in the near term.
***Having Janet Yellen as Treasury Secretary will probably increase coordination between the Fed and Treasury.
***Having the Democrats in charge probably means additional fiscal stimulus will occur this year.
***The pandemic will probably have a significant ongoing disruptive economic impact for much/most of this year. The probable shape of the post-pandemic investment landscape may not come into focus until late this year or next year.
My investment portfolio thinking:
The combination of near zero interest rates, the Feds aggressive stance, and substantial fiscal stimulus helped me to decide to leave my allocation to stocks somewhat elevated by my standards when the annual review was completed in December (strong stock market performance and a shift of about 5% of the portfolio from ZEOIX to utility stocks in August had bumped it up during 2020). But, a nod to uncertainty resulted in the purchase of GBLMX, CRAAX, and SVARX as well as some trimming of growth stock holdings during the transition from 2020 to 2021.
Now I am just watching while keeping my eye on VIX out of curiosity. My crystal ball is still quite unclear about how long the Fed/fiscal stimulus part of the equation will succeed in keeping the bulls mostly in charge of the stock market. Maybe for multiple years if the Fed and fiscal policy makers navigate well??? But, maybe Grantham will prove to have been correct and the profitably investable top occurred last summer!!!
Other portfolio notes:
***There is adequate cash in reserve (SPAXX, JPST, and RPHYX) and enough investments in bond funds to enable an investment portfolio reallocation into stocks if a significant (20%+) market decline occurs.
***I am a 70 year old retiree. The dividends, distributions, and any capital gains received during the year are invested separately in the "Cash Pot" for release to a non-investment account at the end of the year. So, the set-aside beginning this month is for probable release at the end of 2021. But, there are adequate reserves outside the investment accounts to ride out an investment apocalypse event if that occurs during the year.

@JonGaltill, our own contributor to the monthly commentary, Lynn Bolin provided many insightful articles on preparing for retirement. Here is one from January 2021.
https://mutualfundobserver.com/2021/01/as-i-age/
Charles also writes for Seeking Alpha, another good resource to inform yourself in prepare for another black swan events. If you did well during March 2020's drawdown, you are on the right track on your asset allocation.
@davfor and davidmoran,
Any insights on this bullishness?

While JHQAX perked an interest in MFO discussion, it is important to assess how JHQAX performed in 2020 relative to its peers with respect to their returns and risk. As @fred495 noted that the fund uses an options strategy for the past seven years. The fund is categorized as “Alternative long/short” fund in MFO Premium.
I compared this fund to Vanguard S&P 500 index (VFIAX) as the proxy for S&P500 index without the option strategy for 2020. The option strategy enabled lower drawdown in March, -5.1% versus -19.5%, respectively, and having a shorter recovery period, 3 months versus 4 months, respectively.
However, this lower volatility is accomplished at the expense of the annual return as the market recovered in July; the S&P 500 index out-performed JHQAX, 18.4% versus 13.8% by year end. Question I ask myself is this an apple-to-apple comparison?
I also took this analysis further to over the 7 year period since the inception of JHQAX (2014). I also include Vanguard Balanced index fund, VBIAX to see if 40% total bond allocation would work better or not than the option strategy.
Here is the result in Portfolio Visualizer,
https://portfoliovisualizer.com/backtest-portfolio#analysisResults
1. JHQAX has the lowest drawdown ratio and comparable Sortino ratio to VBIAX.
2. JHQAX trails the annal returns of VFIAX and VBIAX for 1,3,5 and 7 years period.
3. The negative asset correlation of bond performed better than the option strategy over this 7 year period.
4. Overall the 60/40 allocation provides the best balance on return versus risk. However this is my personal opinion but every investors need to evaluate their own risk tolerance with respect to the return.

@Stillers ... I've done a lot of reading on FPURX vs FBALX. They are so closely correlated. Good suggestions everyone. Thank you! This is a good primer but would like your opinion. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/balanced-vs-puritan-fidelity-fund-100000950.html

John, an argument can be made for either and it would be a very close debate (as your linked article shows), ultimately decided by simple personal preference.
I prefer the L/M/S and G/B/V splatters and the slight/marginal 1-3-5-10-yr consistent outperformance of FBALX over FPURX.
That said, either one of these two is a great LT holding, AA choice, and coupled with others on my "short list," make for great core holdings in a balanced portfolio. If in doubt about FBALX vs FPURX, simply buy both at 50/50 weightings.
EDIT: BTW, I own all of the AA funds on my short list except JABAX. I have previously owned JABAX and VGSTX. I never owned FPURX. I reduced my AA holdings at EOY 2020 to just PRWCX, VLAAX, FBALX, VBIAX, FMSDX and VWIAX, all with just about the same allocations. Also, I've spent YEARS crunching AA fund options and the result of all of that time/research is these selected AA funds.

Here is another way to look at 2020 Asset Class Performance:

You get the drawdown, annual performance, and increase from the low in a single chart.

Taken From:

Can Earnings Growth Justify Current Stock Prices?

I would add VGSTX to the above list. Very diversified and had a stellar 2020. It is a fund of funds that I have had for 25 years and has never disappointed.

Agreed, VGSTX is an excellent 50%-70% AA fund that is the rough, TR equivalent of VBIAX. It being my "short list" though I decided to only include VBIAX, but VGSTX could easily replace VBIAX or be added.
Also just missing my "short list" threshold is NAINX, another AA OEF worthy of consideration in the 50%-70% cat given its Current-5yr performance.
FPURX is NOT on my "short list" as FBALX is IMO the choice between these two.

I would add VGSTX to the above list. Very diversified and had a stellar 2020. It is a fund of funds that I have had for 25 years and has never disappointed.

@Sven Yes. I had money with Matthews. A bad experience with them over the phone years ago killed my desire to keep my money with them. MAPIX had a great 2020, but did not pay at year-end. It happened all those years ago, with one particular Quarter--- which is why I was on the phone with them.... Still shepherding money for a colleague and his wife. She has some of her stuff in MAPIX and MAINX. (The rest in DODBX and DODIX.) Ever since 2010, when I rearranged their stuff. Can't complain that much, I suppose. David lately offered us some words of assurance re: MAINX. It has switch from Q to monthly pay-outs.

Many business including ours have gone virtual in our meetings in order to minimize the health hazards while running the business. Besides US is restricted to travel to many country since US has the highest infection cases in the world! I think Grandeur Peaks is doing something similar. Although it is nowhere as effective being on the ground seeing and hearing what is happening with oversea business, but there are few viable choices. With the arrival of multiple vaccines with efficiency >70%, they will help to bring back our normal lives in the near future.
Beefing up the IT support at home is not as hard as one think. Our college kids have to do remote learning since March until testing was available on campus. We moved up our data plan on broadband connection to our home; hardwired connection to multiple modems throughout the house with added wifi extenders. We all learned new virtual meeting softwares for schools and business. Our cellular plan already have unlimited data plan so it can be use as hotspot when broadband connect goes down. Overall we survived in 2020 and looking forward for the vaccines for our family.

Stop the crazy meaning everything...who in their right mind thought you could just waltz into the Capital and not learn the meaning of consequences...who thought we would have a break down in law and order...(I see where Macy's just announced pull out of Water Tower Place on Mag Mile, Chicago after being there 45 years...can you say no more looters and thugs in our stores please...ah but the tax monies!)...defund the police, crazy...police not letting up off a subdued suspect's neck, crazy...Tesla...Bitcoin....asset bubbles....folks thinking the virus is fake...
Honestly, I told the wife the other day...I don't know what to think anymore...
Here's to a saner, safer, more rational world and good health and good luck to all in 2021!
Baseball Fan

As for me, I was happy with my 2020 results---even with not much EM at all. Maybe I'll move a small bite from where it is in my bond/ballast sleeve into foreign equities. It's a really nice problem for everyone, that Markets are flying high. I hate buying at these levels, but I'll be "playing with the house's money." PRIDX. But that fund is not, ostensibly, EM. But M* shows almost 18% of its portfolio in Latin America and Asia Emerging. Less than 0.33 in Europe Emerging. I'm not surprised by that last. Which developing European countries are not run oligarch-style, like Putin's Russia? Is Ukraine in the EU yet? Will they ever throw off the Russian invasion? Putin's logic there is EXACTLY what Hitler did for the poor, downtrodden, oppressed German-speakers in the Sudetenland. And uncle Neville promised the British: "Peace in our time." In fact, uncle Donald owes some of those oligarchs big piles of money. Come to think of it. Anyway, PRIDX is closed to new investors.