Mike,

Simply, no. Not that I know of. 

I would think the best thing to do is send in an e-mail question. It probably would be directed to someone who might be in a position to give you a definitive answer. I don't think phoning into the counseling center would give you that.

Ray

Sy,
I'm trying to hide it so I'm not tempted to trade it every day :-)

Ray,
I'll send an e-mail as a technical question.

Mike

Mike, what an interesting question.  Vanguard lets you hide an entire "account" - i.e. an IRA or a Keough, but they don't let you hide a single investment (like a mutual fund) that's in an account that you want to have the rest of displayed.

However, TIAA-CREF has separate numbers for TIAA and CREF accounts, because they're operated by two different corporations.  My guess is that they have such strong regulatory and compliance duties to keep you "informed" that the answer from the horse's mouth will be "no."

Certainly, every young, un-savvy person I've heard of who got an equity account as a teenager and never looked at it for 15 or more years (dancer's union, dining room worker at U.S. Trust, etc. ...) was absolutely astounded when they finally looked at the balance. I hope your account is tax-deferred so that you won't be tempted to spend it when you finally look at it!  Of course, they were lucky their default investment option was a good one.

Just like it's hard to give someone else dieting advice, it's hard to say anything that will let you increase your will power in this regard.  Perhaps there was some virtue to the bad old days (long gone) when you couldn't take anything out of CREF Stock until you retired.

Tim 

I'm trying to hide it so I'm not tempted to trade it every day :-)

I realize that; I was just kidding. No, I don't think there's any way to hide it. You need other restraints (like disconnecting your computer and your phone).

In general, I'm almost always kidding, (except when I'm not.)

Sy

Mike,

Your question is not silly, but I wonder whether your stress would be relieved even if you weren't able to see your CREF Stock balances.  It is really very difficult to ignore what is happening in the financial markets, as it is broadcast on virtually every major news station and news program on a daily basis, and is plastered all over the internet. 

If the financial averages are in a bear market, you're certainly going to hear about it often, and even if you don't know your exact CREF Stock balances, you can surmise that they are probably lower than the last time you checked.  The DJIA just made a 21 month low yesterday, but some financial averages reached six year lows during the 2000 - 2002 time period.

As an investor, peace of mind is extremely important to me.  After CREF made the Money Market Fund available, I used it to transfer in and out of equity funds.   I used the 200 day moving average of the equity fund as a very simple guide.  Sell when the fund price falls below its moving average, and buy back when it rises above it.  The timing was not always precise, and occasionally I got whipsawed, but it did keep me out of equities whenever the environment got really bleak.

Jared

Hi Mike,

Let's get past the technical question of how to "hide" a part of your account and maybe exchange with one another (as a supportive community) about how we deal with difficult investment times.  Lord knows, I've been through a few!  And sometimes these events teach us hard lessons about ourselves as investors and as unique individuals with our own unique circumstances.

I happen to have a more than passing interest in behavioral finance.  One thing you might want to know that applies to your situation (as well as to many of the rest of us) is, to quote from some material: "By some estimates, the emotional response to experiencing a loss is about twice as intense as that for experiencing a gain."   I don't want to trivialize your discomfort, but it is perfectly understandable.

In the same vein, during such stressful times the urge to do something is really quite powerful.  So, at the risk of boring you with some more info, I'll run the risk of calling your attention to a relevant piece by John Authers that was published in The Financial Times last February.  Give it a go and see if it makes some sense to you.  http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7a4c06c4-dbc8-11dc-bc82-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1

On the other hand, it's also possible that your desire to hide a portion of your investment portfolio may, in fact, be telling you that you've taken on too much risk and perhaps ought to revisit your plan in that light.  Do you need to hold as much equity as you do?  It certainly sounds like this market is affecting your personal well-being.  That's simply not good for you.

It's better to cut your losses than let your investments cut your guts out.

Stay well, Mike.  That's the most important thing.  Best wishes, Bob U.

Thanks Bob. In order to read the article without registering, I found I had to truncate the link you kindly provided:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/7a4c06c4-dbc8-11dc-bc82-0000779fd2ac.html

But I also suspect it depends on not having visited the FT site before on the same day, which might trigger the demand to register.

Tim 

I accessed it via Tim's link. I had not seen the article and I am grateful to both Bob and Tim for making it accessible. I found the article to be fascinating and I will have to give it some thought.

Thanks to both of you for making it so readilly available.

Ray

Mike,

I originally answered you in a joking way, but if you're serious about your feelings and you obsess about it, then Bob U. suggests the solution in a diplomatic way:

On the other hand, it's also possible that your desire to hide a portion of your investment portfolio may, in fact, be telling you that you've taken on too much risk and perhaps ought to revisit your plan in that light.  Do you need to hold as much equity as you do?  It certainly sounds like this market is affecting your personal well-being.  That's simply not good for you. It's better to cut your losses than let your investments cut your guts out. Stay well, Mike. That's the most important thing. 

You have to really know your risk level, not think you know, and sometimes the only way to find it out is when the sh*t hits the fan. That's the cost of the lesson and sometimes it can be very expensive. If you wait for the "recovery" of the losses; it may take too long, or it may never even happen. There are no guarantees with equities (the company keeps reminding you of that in the prospectus). Money returned to Traditional may not recover your losses quickly, but it certainly does in time, and it continues to compound. It's like a healthy curative drink. After a time, you'll have completely forgotten about it (something else will replace it in that active brain.)

Best of luck,

Sy

The problem is that there is no rational mapping between feelings and the imagined or realized short-term or long-term outcome of investments. And there is certainly no guidance from answering one or two ordinal scale items: "I don't like to lose my money, 1=who cares ... 10 = not even a penny!" For that reason, I have found that the best way to deal with my anxiety about the future is to be informed. Although meetings with TIAA counselors and WMAs can't take away all dis-ease, it helps, for me at least. Acting on your feelings can sometimes be self-destructive, and I think the TIAA game of risk assessment may not be the best way to plan a retirement investment or payout strategy. Risk assessment has nothing to do with the data -- it's all inside.

Henry

Mike,

Let me add some thoughts to my original response.  In terms of investing in equities during market declines, I think a person's strategy will often depend on his/her time horizon to retirement, and his/her personal tolerance for risk.

If you have a long time horizon (15 to 35 years), you can afford to remain in equities during bear markets, and may even increase your equity holdings to take advantage of the lower prices.  If you are closer to retirement (1 to 15 years), you may want to be more conservative and reduce or even temporarily eliminate your stake in equities, as the risk is greater that you may not be able to recover from a large loss.  If you are in retirement, as I am, then conservation of capital becomes paramount.

I am a long time reader of Richard Russell's Dow Theory Letters.  One of his favorite sayings is that in a bear market, the winner is the one who loses the least.  I think this observation can also be applied in a psychological sense.  No matter what your investment horizon is, if you have trouble sleeping at nights because your equity holdings are falling, then you would want to think seriously about why you are subjecting yourself to such stress.  You may find you are a lot happier in a money market fund.  As I've gotten older, I've learned that health is better than wealth.

Good luck!

Jared

Thanks everyone for your thoughtful replies.  Bob's FT article was helpful and the subject of behavioral finance convinced me to buy the new book by Jason Zweig.  I am sleeping fine and am comfortable with my level of equity investments.  The equity portion will not be needed for some time and perhaps will fold in with what some consider a legacy portfolio (modest but something).  I got the legacy idea here (Ray or Sy I think).

What I am attempting to do at this point is enjoy life a bit more than I have in the past.  I am trying to listen to music now (all types) rather than news radio and all day cable television news broadcasts.  I am reading books I have put aside in the past.  I received an Amazon Kindle for Fathers Day and it is a wonderful little device that allows me to have a library in a book sized package (with large text) that I can, and do, carry everywhere.  Sundays are again being enjoyed with my three daughters and their families visiting us and I am the barbeque chef again as I was many years ago. 

As part of enjoying life I was looking to remove an unenjoyable part of it (seeing stocks fall).  Seeing TIAA Traditional rise daily gives me a feeling of contentment.  I've never had an investment that never loses value and always gains.  I guess I was wanting to look at the good without seeing the bad. 

Thanks again
Mike