“Being passive doesn’t mean doing nothing.” – Larry Swedroe One of the first decisions you need to make in the process of building an investment portfolio is whether you will be an active or a passive investor.  Most investors assume this means making the choice between index funds and active management, but that’s too much…

“Wealth isn’t primarily determined by investment performance, but by investment behavior.” – Nick Murray I’m convinced that the majority of the behavioral problems that affect most individual and professional investors are all about perspective, not implementing the wrong tactics. There will always be more tactics presented to you every single day, but most of them…

“Because people play an important role in determining the course of the financial markets, stock prices move like a manic-depressive.” – Howard Marks It looks like trading by individual investors is making a comeback. According to the Wall Street Journal, TD Ameritrade, E*Trade and Charles Schwab have all posted huge gains in trading volume to…

“If I were an executive coach, I would try to focus each individual on the facets they can control. Emphasizing what’s in your control allows you to adopt an attitude of equanimity toward luck. You’ve done all that you can, and from there you have to live with the results—good or bad.” – Michael Mauboussin…

“Truth be told, if you keep buying high and selling low, you should stay out of the stock market, because you’re losing money. Your primary goal as an investor should be not to lose money.” – Carl Richards In summer of 2009, I sat in on a panel discussion consisting of 3 or 4 portfolio…

“Short-term crashes can be painful, but long-term returns are far more important to wealth creation and destruction.” – Cliff Asness Deep Risk was my favorite of the William Bernstein trilogy of Investing for Adults series of Kindle books. He sets out to show how investors should think about the stock market and then gives a couple of…

“Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.” – George Carlin

“Spend extravagantly on the things you love, but cut costs mercilessly on the things you don’t.” – Ramit Sethi This past week I was watching the news and they showed the obligatory story on the $400+ million Powerball lottery.  There were the standard interviews with people buying tickets at gas stations and 7-11. What would…

“Diversify across securities, across asset classes, across markets – and across time.” – Charley Ellis Reader emailbag: I have been saving for a number of years and have a large cash balance that I would like to invest in the market.  Should I spread my purchases out or wait for the market to fall and…

“To achieve satisfactory investment results is easier than most people realize; to achieve superior results is harder than it looks.” – Benjamin Graham William Bernstein is one of the foremost advocates for individual investors.  When he talks about the dynamics of investing, I pay attention to what he says and most of the time I…