“People have always had this craving to have someone tell them the future. Long ago, kings would hire people to read sheep guts. There’s always been a market for people who pretend to know the future. Listening to today’s forecasters is just as crazy as when he king hired the guy to look at the…

“Even the intelligent investor is likely to need considerable will power to keep from following the crowd.” – Benjamin Graham I’ve spent the last couple of weeks going over the different aspects of investing in the bond market. Earlier this week I covered investing in bond funds, but I didn’t spend too much time addressing…

“The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.” – Benjamin Disraeli Doug Kass recently shared an interesting story in an article about an early investor with Warren Buffett in the 1960s. This particular investor was a rabbi named Myer Kripke that had become friends…

“It’s important for investors to remember the reasons they own bonds in the first place – namely for the potential for the preservation of capital, income and growth, relative steadiness and typically low to negative correlations with equities. These needs – which will only become more urgent as millions of baby boomers head to retirement…

“Bart, with $10,000, we’d be millionaires.” – Homer Simpson I was recently helping a family member set up a Roth IRA because she wanted to invest a small amount of money on a periodic basis. She eventually wants to increase that amount but we all need to start somewhere. This is a situation that many…

“The biggest factor impacting investors is no longer our knowledge base, but rather our behavioral elements.” – Barry Ritholtz There are many factors that we can look at when trying to figure out why the stock market went up or down on any given day. We can search the economic data for clues. We can…

“Risk control is the best route to loss avoidance. Risk avoidance, on the other hand, is likely to lead to return avoidance as well.” – Howard Marks The main risk most investors worry about in their portfolio comes from stock investments. Stocks can be volatile, especially in the short-term, and they run the risk of…

“Investing should be more like watching paint dry or watching grass grow. If you want excitement, take $800 and go to Las Vegas.” – Paul Samuelson Wall Street has made plenty of money over the years pushing complex investment strategies with high fees on their unsuspecting clients. Most of these investments fail to beat simple…

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school.” – Albert Einstein Common sense reader mailbag: I have two young children. How will I ever be able to afford to send them both to college? Obviously, with the high cost of tuition and the amount of student loans that younger generations…

“In spite of promising lower returns than most other investment classes, bonds earn inclusion in portfolios by providing protection against the extraordinary circumstances of a financial crisis or economic deflation.” – David Swensen If you missed Part 1 of my common sense series on bonds please read Investing in Bonds to learn about the different…