Monthly super fund performance Reckoner

In the reckoner below you can view the median monthly investment returns for 5 superannuation investment options going back to January 2016. We’re grateful to Chant West for providing the data that powers the reckoner.

Important: Superannuation is primarily a long-term investment. While the monthly investment returns can be interesting to readers who pay close attention to their investments, and perhaps would like to spot trends over particular times of the year, it’s important to remember that ideally super is built up over a working lifetime. That could equate to more than 500 working months, or more than 40 years.

Don’t be too concerned about a negative month here or there because on average super funds have been providing positive returns for 26 of the last 31 financial years.

See an animation of fund performance for periods of one month to 15 years over six years.

The reckoner is easy to use. Just click on the blue filter boxes. You can then select if you’d like to filter by particular investment options, or by particular months. Just click the OK buttons to select those filters and the table will update automatically.

	Investment option	Month
wdt_ID	Investment option	Month	2015 return (%)	2016 return (%)	2017 return (%)	2018 return (%)	2019 return (%)	2020 return (%)	2021 return (%)	2022 return (%)	2023 return (%)	2024 return (%)	formula_1
1	All Growth	January	0.0	-4.0	-0.5	1.0	4.0	2.5	0.3	-3.6	4.2	1.7	0.6
2	All Growth	February	0.0	-1.2	1.7	-0.4	4.0	-5.4	1.6	-1.2	-0.4	3.0	0.0
3	All Growth	March	0.0	2.3	2.3	-1.6	0.8	-12.9	2.9	2.1	1.0	2.9	-1.0
4	All Growth	April	0.0	2.0	2.1	2.7	2.7	5.7	3.0	-1.7	1.7	-2.3	3.0
5	All Growth	May	0.0	3.3	0.5	0.5	-1.7	3.2	1.5	-1.7	-0.2	1.1	1.2
6	All Growth	June	0.0	-2.2	-0.4	1.6	3.3	1.1	2.4	-5.3	2.1	1.1	1.0
7	All Growth	July	3.7	4.1	-0.1	1.6	1.9	1.2	1.3	4.5	2.5	2.8	1.7
8	All Growth	August	-2.2	0.3	0.8	1.6	-1.3	2.9	2.6	-0.3	-0.4	-0.3	1.2
9	All Growth	September	-2.2	-0.2	1.4	-0.2	1.7	-1.4	-1.7	-4.7	-2.7	1.7	-0.1
10	All Growth	October	4.9	-1.3	3.5	-5.3	0.6	0.7	0.7	4.7	-2.4	0.5	-0.2
11	All Growth	November	-0.5	2.2	1.8	-1.0	2.9	7.6	0.7	3.9	4.2		2.4
12	All Growth	December	0.0	3.2	0.8	-2.2	-0.3	1.3	1.8	-3.4	3.7		0.8
13	High Growth	January	0.0	-2.9	-0.3	1.0	3.1	2.2	0.3	-2.9	3.4	1.3	0.6
14	High Growth	February	0.0	-0.7	1.3	-0.2	3.3	-4.0	1.2	-1.3	-0.4	2.4	0.2
15	High Growth	March	0.0	2.1	1.9	-1.2	0.8	-10.8	2.3	1.8	1.0	2.3	-0.8
16	High Growth	April	0.0	1.7	1.8	2.2	2.2	3.9	2.6	-1.4	1.4	-1.9	2.4
17	High Growth	May	0.0	2.8	0.5	0.5	-1.2	2.8	1.4	-1.3	-0.3	1.1	1.1
18	High Growth	June	0.0	-1.5	0.0	1.4	2.9	1.0	2.3	-4.1	1.7	0.9	1.0
19	High Growth	July	2.9	3.3	0.0	1.3	1.6	1.1	1.2	3.6	1.9	2.3	1.4
20	High Growth	August	-1.4	0.4	0.7	1.4	-0.8	2.2	2.2	-0.3	-0.1	0.2	1.0
21	High Growth	September	-1.4	0.1	1.2	-0.1	1.5	-0.9	-1.3	-3.7	-2.2	1.3	0.1
22	High Growth	October	4.0	-0.9	2.8	-4.0	0.5	0.6	0.7	3.8	-1.8	0.4	-0.1
23	High Growth	November	-0.4	1.6	1.5	-0.8	2.4	6.0	0.4	3.2	3.5		1.9
24	High Growth	December	0.2	2.8	0.7	-1.7	-0.1	1.1	1.8	-2.6	3.0		0.8
25	Growth	January	0.0	-2.3	-0.1	0.8	2.5	1.9	0.2	-2.2	3.0	1.0	0.5
26	Growth	February	0.0	-0.4	1.2	-0.2	2.7	-3.1	0.9	-1.1	-0.5	1.9	0.2
27	Growth	March	0.0	1.8	1.5	-0.7	0.8	-9.0	1.9	1.1	1.1	1.9	-0.6
28	Growth	April	0.0	1.4	1.5	1.7	1.7	3.1	2.2	-1.2	1.2	-1.7	1.9
29	Growth	May	0.0	2.3	0.5	0.4	-0.7	2.2	1.1	-1.0	-0.4	0.9	1.0
30	Growth	June	0.0	-1.0	0.0	1.2	2.3	0.8	2.0	-3.3	1.4	0.9	0.9
31	Growth	July	2.3	2.7	0.0	1.1	1.4	1.0	1.1	3.1	1.5	2.0	1.2
32	Growth	August	-1.1	0.3	0.6	1.0	-0.5	1.7	1.7	-0.4	-0.1	0.3	0.8
33	Growth	September	-1.1	0.1	0.9	0.0	1.2	-0.6	-1.0	-3.1	-1.9	1.2	0.1
34	Growth	October	3.2	-0.7	2.3	-3.0	0.4	0.5	0.6	3.0	-1.5	0.1	0.0
35	Growth	November	-0.3	1.1	1.3	-0.6	1.9	4.9	0.3	2.6	3.1		1.5
36	Growth	December	0.1	2.3	0.7	-1.1	-0.1	1.0	1.5	-2.1	2.7		0.7
37	Balanced	January	0.0	-1.4	0.0	0.6	1.8	1.6	0.2	-1.6	2.4	0.7	0.5
38	Balanced	February	0.0	-0.2	0.9	-0.2	1.9	-2.1	0.3	-0.9	-0.4	1.3	0.1
39	Balanced	March	0.0	1.4	1.2	-0.5	0.9	-6.8	1.5	0.6	1.1	1.5	-0.4
40	Balanced	April	0.0	1.0	1.2	1.2	1.3	2.3	1.7	-0.9	0.9	-1.4	1.5
41	Balanced	May	0.0	1.7	0.5	0.3	-0.2	1.6	0.9	-0.8	-0.3	0.8	0.8
42	Balanced	June	0.0	-0.4	-0.1	1.0	1.9	0.7	1.4	-2.5	0.8	0.7	0.8
43	Balanced	July	1.8	2.0	0.0	0.8	1.0	0.8	1.0	2.4	1.2	1.6	0.9
44	Balanced	August	-0.8	0.3	0.6	0.8	-0.1	1.2	1.2	-0.5	0.1	0.3	0.7
45	Balanced	September	-0.8	0.1	0.6	0.0	0.7	-0.4	-0.8	-2.4	-1.4	1.0	0.0
46	Balanced	October	2.2	-0.6	1.7	-2.0	0.2	0.4	0.2	2.2	-1.2	-0.1	0.0
47	Balanced	November	-0.2	0.7	1.0	-0.3	1.3	3.3	0.4	2.1	2.6		1.1
48	Balanced	December	0.1	1.7	0.4	-0.7	-0.1	0.7	1.1	-1.5	2.3		0.5
49	Conservative	January	0.0	-0.6	0.1	0.4	1.2	1.2	0.1	-1.0	1.8	0.4	0.4
50	Conservative	February	0.0	0.0	0.7	0.0	1.2	-1.0	0.0	-0.6	-0.4	0.6	0.2
51	Conservative	March	0.0	0.9	0.7	-0.1	0.8	-4.6	0.9	0.0	1.1	1.1	-0.2
52	Conservative	April	0.0	0.7	0.8	0.7	0.8	1.4	1.1	-0.7	0.6	-1.1	0.9
53	Conservative	May	0.0	1.1	0.5	0.3	0.1	1.0	0.6	-0.5	-0.2	0.6	0.6
54	Conservative	June	0.0	0.2	0.0	0.7	1.3	0.5	1.0	-1.5	0.3	0.6	0.6
55	Conservative	July	1.2	1.3	0.1	0.5	0.8	0.6	0.8	1.8	0.8	1.3	0.7
56	Conservative	August	-0.4	0.3	0.4	0.5	0.2	0.7	0.7	-0.6	0.2	0.5	0.5
57	Conservative	September	-0.4	0.1	0.4	0.1	0.4	0.0	-0.5	-1.5	-1.0	0.7	0.1
58	Conservative	October	1.4	-0.4	1.2	-1.0	0.2	0.3	-0.1	1.3	-0.7	-0.3	0.0
59	Conservative	November	-0.1	0.2	0.7	-0.2	0.8	1.9	0.4	1.5	2.0		0.6
60	Conservative	December	0.1	1.1	0.3	-0.2	-0.1	0.5	0.8	-1.0	1.8		0.4