Wall Street’s Biggest Lies

There was a great interview this week between Quartz’s Matt Phillips and The Wall Street Journal’s Jason Zweig. Phillips asked Zweig about risk in the stock market and the need for higher returns by many investors. His response about one of the biggest lies on Wall Street was really important for investors — and savers —…

Organizational Alpha

“You need to build a machine that delivers something that’s consistent with what you promised the customers you would do.” – Ken Fisher I had the pleasure of attending the IMN Global Indexing and ETFs Conference this week in beautiful Scottsdale, AZ. The main focus of this conference was on the tremendous growth in ETFs and…

The S&P 500 Hot Hand Fallacy

It may not seem like it to some, but stocks — as measured by the S&P 500 — are up six years in a row. They’re slightly positive through the end of last week too, so if those meager gains hold through the rest of calendar year 2015, that would mark seven consecutive years of…

What Happens When There Are Fewer Suckers at the Poker Table?

The Wall Street Journal reported this week that Seminole Capital Management, a hedge fund with an enviable long-term track record, would be returning $400 million of its $3 billion under management back to outside investors. Here were some of the reasons given: In an unusually frank letter to investors reviewed by The Wall Street Journal,…

Millennials in the C-Suite

Millennials get a bad rap from the media and the older generations. They’re selfish. They’re not motivated. They live in their parent’s basement. They take too many selfies. They don’t have all of the same dreams and aspirations of prior generations.

Uncle Sam Loves Active Mutual Funds

Morningstar’s Jeffrey Ptak posted some insightful data on Twitter over the long holiday weekend. Take a look at these 10 year performance numbers for actively managed mutual funds once you account for the effects of taxes on investment returns:

The Retirement (Expectations) Crisis

It’s become a weekly occurrence to read about America’s retirement crisis. Pensions are underfunded. Americans aren’t saving enough and face a huge shortfall. Social security and medicare are both overextended and face demographic headwinds. I have yet to see a large group of retirees waiting in a bread line, so I don’t think we can…

What If Factor Risk Premiums Go Away?

A reader asks: Will there be any significant premiums in the future? What is the future of risk premiums? With the amount of competition in the markets nowadays this a legitimate concern. You can now invest in almost any strategy imaginable for pennies on the dollar and do so in a diversified, tax-efficient manner. This…