4
Mar
2015
Another Internal Market Correction
A correction is defined as a 10 percent peak-to-trough decline and a bear market is defined as a 20 percent peak-to-trough decline. With those definitions in mind, it’s worth noting that the utilities sector entered correction territory yesterday after falling 10 percent from their highs at the end of January. Energy stocks are down more than 20 percent since their high last summer, and have been in bear market territory… Read More
3
Mar
2015
NASDAQ: Party Like It’s 1999
If you were watching CNBC or Bloomberg television yesterday, you saw that the ‘big news’ of the day was that the NASDAQ market crossed 5,000 for the first time since the peak of the tech bubble. Although the financial news media loves to celebrate when indexes cross round numbers (think 2,000 for the S&P 500 or 18,000 for the Dow Jones Industrial Average), they don’t do a whole lot for… Read More
2
Mar
2015
Buffett Speaks, Acropolis Listens
Warren Buffett released his 50th annual letter to shareholders over the weekend and, as usual, it was an enjoyable read. In case you missed it, here’s a link. The report on 2014 activities was fine, but the really interesting part is a look back at the past, present and future of Berkshire Hathaway that begins on page 24. Buffett spends the first five pages discussing the early days, most notably… Read More
27
Feb
2015
Trading to Win
A little less than a year ago, author Michael Lewis created a firestorm with his book, ‘Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt,’ that chronicled the world of high-frequency trading (HFT). At the time of the launch, he went on 60 Minutes and announced that ‘the market is rigged’ and that everyone who had money in the stock market was a victim of predatory traders. Michael Lewis is one of my… Read More
20
Feb
2015
The Euro: Making Calls and Taking Falls
For a second day in a row stocks were mixed but lacked any major movement, as traders took a bit of a breather after Wednesday’s release of the Federal Reserve’s meeting minutes. Oil sold off for the second day in a row but that market seems to have calmed down from the major volatility of the last few months to settle right around the $50 per barrel area. The major… Read More
19
Feb
2015
Negative Yields: It’s a Crazy Mixed Up World
One of my most vivid memories from the 2008 financial crisis was when the yield on the US three-month Treasury bill turned negative. Investors were so scared about what might happen that they were willing to pay so much for short-term bills that they would accept negative yields. Investors knew with certainty that they would get back less than their investment. I printed the screen because I thought it was… Read More
18
Feb
2015
Mutual Funds: Decisions, Decisions..
In a recent issue of one of our industry trade ‘rags,’ the following chart really caught my eye: The chart shows the number of mutual funds by category in the US, according to Morningstar. It’s hard to read, but back in 1990, there were 665 US stock funds, 123 non-US stock funds, 481 taxable bond funds and 686 funds that fall into the ‘other’ category (I am guessing that they… Read More
17
Feb
2015
Fun With Discount Rates
Far and away, one of the best reads of the year is the Credit Suisse Global Investment Returns Yearbook – and the 2015 edition is no exception. Click here to download. The yearbook is hot off the presses, 68 pages and chock full of thought provoking content, so I am not even close to being finished at this point. One of the articles titled ‘Do Equity Discount Rates Mean Revert?’… Read More
11
Feb
2015
Black Box Investing
I am a big fan of quantitative investing, although that term is often misapplied in my judgment, so let me define what I mean by that term. When I say quantitative investing, I am simply referring to a process driven approach to evaluating securities and making decisions. ‘Quant’ investors typically rely on computers to organize and evaluate data that serves as input in the decision making process. The financial press… Read More
10
Feb
2015
The Wrong Kind of Diversification
Some kinds of diversification are better than others. Legendary investor Peter Lynch often referred to corporate ‘deworseification’ back in the conglomerate days when companies like ITT owned businesses as varied as hotels, insurance, defense contracting and for-profit education. One kind of diversification that Morningstar has popularized, but that I don’t think is particularly useful, is diversification by style box. As you can see in the image, Morningstar has cut the… Read More