Investments

You shouldn’t invest in what you don’t understand.

Contrarian indicators have paid off historically.

The connection between the price of oil and the price of oil companies is loose.

Despite the headlines, the global equity markets posted gains last quarter and for the year.

Planning for your financial future is largely a question of dealing with the constant tension between living for today and saving for some future event.

Is it a crash or just a correction? On average, the drop from peak to trough takes 85 days and the markets have recovered after another 107 days.

The majority of advisors make the mistake of having significant or moderate use of actively managed funds.

Most investors don’t understand what that means.

A high turnover rate is not something you want in a stock fund.

What should you do before a market correction? What about after? The answer is the same.

There is no such thing as “over diversification.”

Despite the appearance of stability, preferred stocks can become especially volatile when markets are reeling.

The greater the number of holdings the lower the turnover rate with one surprising exception.

Stocks less frequently traded have better returns.

The higher the correlation the greater the justification to put them in the same asset class.

“Every pension plan in the nation is paying too much [for private equity], and it’s being hidden.”

Should they be over weighted in your portfolio?

Correlations over the past year have been very low, while correlations over the past 10 years have been higher.

This year’s golden nugget goes to Buffett’s definition of risk.

The cost of commission-based advisors are so hidden that you may be paying more than you realize.

Each quarter brings a different set of returns for each asset class and subcategory.

Here’s how a good advisor should respond when you call about losses in your account.

“Lawsuit lenders do not advertise prices; they advertise convenience.”

There are three rules that we follow when looking for an investment strategy and the low volatility strategy fails two.

Investing in America began with the bankruptcy of the hottest stock in England.

“What do you think of the idea of Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) implemented simply by investing in something like the Domini Social Equity Fund (DSEFX)?”

You cannot help a company by buying its stock.

“Advisers need to sell their value as keeping their clients from doing the wrong thing at the wrong time.”

With three years remaining on a ten year $1 million bet, Buffett is sitting pretty to win it.

“The most important thing I learned from my research was never to attempt to forecast the price of oil.”

At first glance, AUNZ did not have great returns in 2014. But is that the whole story?

Q&A: “I don’t understand how to explain what happened to the share price. What was going on in the fund?”

David John Marotta and radio host Rob Schilling discuss what did well in the market as well as the online security of investments.

How is the change in the value of the dollar computed?

Freedom investing beat the EAFE Foreign index by 7.92% in 2014.

When asset classes are not correlated that means they often move in different directions.

Is there a correlation which would justify talking about “the momentum of the markets”?

Either of these funds would be a good choice for a one-fund investment if you really want to keep it simple, and you could invest in both of them if you want a two-fund strategy.

The best antidote to the stress of market volatility is to understand that the markets are inherently volatile.

David Leinweber calls this technique, “torturing the data until it screams.”

A review of last year’s 2014 gone fishing portfolio returns.

Here are the returns for our six Asset Classes from November 2014.

Here are the returns for our six Asset Classes from August 2014 – October 2014.

When it comes to finances, just shut your eyes and keep them closed.

The stock market is one of the few places that when things go on sale we are less likely to want to buy.

This radio interview covers the basics of what investing is, and how to think about investing, especially in U.S. Markets with a constant stream of information available.

There was an interesting article by Joseph Lisanti in Financial Planning Magazine entitled, “Should You Be Building Bond Ladders?” which read in part: As with many strategies, laddering works best for clients with sufficient assets to benefit fully from it. … Read More

Our brains are not wired well for handling the fluctuations in the stock market. Could a financial advisor help?

Here is the number one criteria you should use in your fund screen.

Morningstar data for the 3-year annualized returns based on style boxes shows us three interesting lessons.