Chasing returns on your investments can be a mug’s game. It’s also human nature so can’t be said to be “wrong” per se. Our U.S. finance correspondent has his own take on the matter:

Have you ever been in thick traffic, trying to figure out which lane will move fastest? Sometimes it’s really hard to tell which lane is the fast lane. If you’re like me, it’s whichever lane you’re not in. Get in a different lane, and it changes again. It’s kind of like that with investing.

When you are stuck in traffic, you have a few options. You can decide that things are slow and you’ll get there when you get there, or you can “optimize” your travel by switching lanes. How do you know which lane is best? It’s the one that’s moving faster than you. Now, if you’ve ever tried this, you know that you can get a stiff neck and a stiff turn-signal finger (you are using your turn-signal finger I hope). What’s more, you might not get anywhere any faster than if you just picked a lane and stuck with it. You might even slow your travel by switching lanes!

What does this have to do with investing? Plenty. People sometimes “chase returns” and put their money in investments just because they’ve been hot in the past. It might work, but it might not. Most experts suggest taking an alternate route: do a good job mixing up your investments, and ignore the daily rat race of market performance. You save a lot of time and energy, so you can spend your days doing the things you value. Really, would you rather spend the summer poring through financial data, or would you rather go to a BBQ and do about as well (or better) in the markets?