“The facts of the present won’t sit still for a portrait. They are constantly vibrating, full of clutter and confusion.” – William Macneile Dixon When I was growing up dinosaurs were described as slow, cold-blooded, reptilian, and not very colorful. New research has determined that many dinosaurs were in fact fast and could have been…

On this week’s Animal Spirits with Michael & Ben we discuss: Elon Musk and the prospects for Tesla actually going private. Was “funding secured” one of the best days ever on Twitter? Why are stock buybacks now the scapegoat for wealth inequality? How could we actually fix wealth inequality? Why housing plays such a large…

A reader asks: I’m a doctor and a lot of my colleagues are getting into real estate. There’s a group that invests in local deals in our area and all I have to do is write a check (no property management, upkeep, dealing with tenants, etc.). What are your thoughts on investing in real estate?…

Here are 8 random questions I’ve been pondering lately: 1. What if gold dies out with the boomer generation? The market value of gold around the globe is estimated at more than $7 trillion. I understand some of the reasoning behind the fact that people still put a lot of faith in the yellow rock —…

I wish high schools and colleges would teach personal finance. They could show young people things like how to do their taxes, which it seems like maybe 3-4% of the population knows how to do (and that’s being generous). The U.S. federal tax code is around 4 million words and almost 75,000 page long. To…

Phineas Gage worked on a railroad construction crew in Vermont during the mid-1800s. While his crew was blowing up rocks using blasting powder to clear the way for a new rail line, a 13-pound iron rod was accidentally shot out from the explosion. It went through his cheek, left eye socket, and out the top…

On this week’s Animal Spirits with Michael & Ben we discuss: The debacle that is MoviePass. Why Disney’s streaming service will be so successful. Does it matter that Fidelity now has two index funds with no fees? Myth-busting the idea that everyone had pensions in not-too-distant the past. Why the pension funding crisis is something…

I put the following thoughts out on Twitter last Friday following the release of the employment numbers: I was a little shocked at the enormous number of replies that read something like this: Well, of course, we’ve had a long recovery and stock market boom. Central bankers have manipulated the markets higher for years now…

A friend gave me a book a few months ago to get my opinion on the investment strategy it was selling outlining. I gave it a read and didn’t get the best first impression. I’m not going to name the book because the name isn’t important. This could have been hundreds of different books or investment pitches….

This week Fidelity became the first fund company to offer index funds — a total U.S. stock market fund and an international stock market fund — with an expense ratio of 0%. Fidelity is a massive company that more or less missed the boat on index funds and ETFs when the first wave hit. This…