“I don’t think that many investors have learned that the more you press, the more problems you get into.” – Peter Bernstein By far the best thing I read this week was an article by Jason Zweig. It had nothing to do with current events or risks in the markets. In fact, it was published…

“Risk means more things can happen than will happen.” – Elroy Dimson

“There is nothing new in the world except the history you do not know.” – Harry Truman The 1980s and 1990s was a period of unprecedented financial market performance. These are the annual 220-year return numbers for simple total stock and total bond portfolio invested in the U.S. markets: These return numbers are absolutely mind-blowing…

“Warren [Buffett], don’t worry too much about making money. It won’t change the way you live. It’ll change the way your wife lives.” – Benjamin Graham The first investment book I ever read was The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham. Graham’s analogy about Mr. Market that he used to describe the stock market is still…

“You have to bring a total commitment to the business or you don’t belong.  Premium fees demand premium performance.” – Leon Cooperman

“The real purpose of saving is to empower you to keep your priorities – not to make you sacrifice.” – Charley Ellis BlackRock recently released the results from a survey asking investors about their five biggest retirement concerns. Here they are in order: 1. How do I start saving for retirement? 2. Am I investing…

“My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there.” – Charles Kettering Are you bullish or bearish on the market? I get this question a lot. Obviously I have my feelings on the attractiveness of the different stock markets. But in the grand scheme of things,…

“If you have trouble imagining a 20% loss in the stock market, you shouldn’t be in stocks.” – John Bogle

“The nature of human psychology is such that you’ll torture reality so that it fits your models, or at least you’ll think it does. To the man with only a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.” – Charlie Munger A few months ago I wrote a post about the S&P 500 sector quilt which…

“Perceptions of future stress are felt now.” – Richard Peterson From Richard Peterson’s Inside The Investor’s Brain: Researchers examined the stress responses of two groups of rats after they were subjected to painful electric shocks. Group 1 received painful electric shocks 10 times per hour, while group 2 was shocked 50 times per hour. The…