18 Mar 2024

The Return of Sound Money

There are a handful of annual outlooks that I look forward to each year, and one of them is Vanguard’s Economic and Market Outlook. The report, which you can find here, is thoughtful, thorough, and isn’t trying to sell you anything (which is high praise in this industry). They also have great titles, and this year’s was a standout: A Return to Sound Money. In their opening paragraph, the authors… Read More

11 Mar 2024

Understanding New Rules: 529 Plan to Roth IRA Conversions

I’ve said for some time that college planning is hard. I discovered this the hard way, through my own situation. Both of my daughters are in college now, and I started 529 accounts for each of them the year they were born. I got a little tax deduction and the benefit of tax-free growth. When my older daughter was a freshman in high school, I realized the problem: even though… Read More

4 Mar 2024

Trading to Win at Acropolis

Ten years ago, I wrote about a new book by one of my favorite authors, Michael Lewis, who went on 60 Minutes and declared that the market was rigged. Here’s what I wrote back then: The Market is Not Rigged. I knew that he was making outrageous claims to sell his book, but people were scared by his comments. The book in question, Flash Boys, was fun and interesting. It… Read More

26 Feb 2024

Japan: The Taylor Swift of Stock Markets?

People often tell me not to worry about the stock market because it ‘always’ comes back. That’s true for the United States and most other developed markets, but for my whole career, it wasn’t true for the Japanese stock market, until now. Last week, the Nikkei 225 price-index crossed a level that it hadn’t seen since 1989. That’s a long, long time. I Googled the most famous person born in… Read More

20 Feb 2024

China’s Interesting Times

A few years ago, I was listening to a financial podcast, and the person being interviewed said something like this: “Look, I’ve got a big China overweight in my portfolio. Look how much they’re growing – they’re going keep doing that, and I just want a part of that.” He was clear that he hadn’t done a lot of research on China, but thought it was ‘obvious’ that they were… Read More

5 Feb 2024

Presidential Elections & Stocks

A lot of people are worried about the effect of the Presidential election on the stock market. It seems like no matter who you support, you’re worried that the other candidate will ruin everything. I have no intention of making any political comments of any kind, and the best way for me to allay any concerns without making half of the folks upset is to take a look at data…. Read More

29 Jan 2024

Trading Against Cramer Just Got Harder

Last March, I wrote about a new pair of exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that track the bets of Jim Cramer, the host of Mad Money, known as much for his bright lights, loud sounds, and yelling as he is for his investment advice or track record (here’s a link to my article). One of the ETFs would short his stock picks, betting that the picks would fall, and the other went… Read More

22 Jan 2024

S&P 500 Enjoys Record (Close Back in December)

Woot Woot! We can surely celebrate that the S&P 500 is back at record levels as of last Friday. I updated a few charts (below), and noticed something interesting – actual investors in the S&P 500 were back in the money in mid-December thanks to dividends. I am celebrating as much as the next guy about the price improvement, but dividends are part of the equation, but they are often… Read More

16 Jan 2024

Bitcoin: Coming to an ETF Near You

I first wrote about Bitcoin in 2017 and concluded that it probably wasn’t a good investment, but maybe my grandkids would be mad at me because I didn’t buy them a coin for $4,300. A little more than six years later, I’m a little mad at myself as the price is about ten times today. But I’m not actually mad because I don’t see it as a good investment, even though… Read More

11 Jan 2024

Portfolio Insights

We are pleased to provide a digital copy of Portfolio Insights, our quarterly newsletter. Table of Contents: Stock Market Summary Bond Market Review Why We Fear Inflation Inside the Economy Protect Yourself Against Fraud The Big Picture Click here to read the issue: Q4 2023 Portfolio Insights