Fun Facts from 2024

Fun Facts from 2024

Mutual Funds & ETFs  The Refinitiv Lipper database gives the median turnover of a US mutual fund as 39%, implying a holding period of just 2.5 years. (source link)  This suggests an average holding period of around 2.5 years.  Clearly investors are waking up and...

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How to Not Become a Tech Dinosaur

How to Not Become a Tech Dinosaur

AI is all the rage these days, but some of us have an aversion to learning curves, and the older I get, the more that pertains to me. I had played around with AI a few times asking simple questions, but never really got my mind wrapped around it. So, I decided to do a...

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Private Equity: The Next Big Crisis?

Private Equity: The Next Big Crisis?

“Private equity” is the term for companies not publicly traded or “listed” (on stock exchanges). If you are like most investors, you don’t think much about private equity because it is not generally available to you as an investor. Many private equity businesses are...

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What About the Election and My Money?

What About the Election and My Money?

Some of the more frequent questions we get these days are about the election. What’s going to happen if one candidate wins, or worse, the other? What are we doing to protect your investments? Should we move to cash and just be careful?  First, let me say that the...

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Profiting from the AI Wave

Profiting from the AI Wave

I get a lot of questions these days along the lines of “is this an AI bubble?” or “is the AI Bubble Popping?” And those are good questions because bubbles do eventually burst, and you don’t want to be left holding the bag when they do. First, let me show you what a...

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A Simple Approach to Buy Low, Sell High

A Simple Approach to Buy Low, Sell High

The Great American Investment Creed of “buy low and sell high” sounds so simple, but it must be very hard to do on a consistent basis, or we would all be a lot richer.  To buy a stock like Amazon early on and get rich is the American dream. But it is not very...

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Stephen McBride on the Future of America

Stephen McBride on the Future of America

With the 4th of July coming up, I thought this would be a good time to pass along a great article from Stephen McBride of RiskHedge on the future of America.  With all the media-generated worry and electioneering hype, it helps to keep our focus on what is real....

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The Camel’s Nose

The Camel’s Nose

Artificial Intelligence, or AI as it is called, is all the rage these days.  I agree with those who say it may be the biggest technological advancement of our lives, transformative in the way electrification was 125 years ago or the advent of computers in the mid-20th...

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Thoughts on Inflation, Interest Rates, and Regional Banks

Thoughts on Inflation, Interest Rates, and Regional Banks

Make Money with Postage!  Talk about inflation!  The U.S. Postal Service’s proposed new price for first class stamps starting in July is 73 cents. That’s up 8% from the stamp’s current price of 68 cents and 32% more than the 2020 price of 55 cents.   If you want to...

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Are We in a Stock Market Bubble?

Are We in a Stock Market Bubble?

Ray Dalio is a hedge fund manager that I really appreciate for his Zen-like ability to cut through the noise of the marketplace and make his decision making so clear.  The following are excerpts from his recent paper on how he determines if we are in a stock market...

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The Market from 30,000 Feet

The Market from 30,000 Feet

I’m sure you’ve noticed how different the countryside looks when flying over it in an airplane, so we are going to take a look at the financial markets from a similar perspective to see what we can glean. This first chart shows the S&P 500 Index over past 30...

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A Peek into the Future

A Peek into the Future

My usual January comment is that I don’t like to make predictions about the financial markets. Psychologically, one tends to get anchored to a prediction they make, and if the markets behave differently, that anchor becomes a pull toward making poor investment...

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