Category Archives for Blog

Resist Chasing Past Performance: Principle 3 in Evidence-Based Investing

Some investors select mutual funds based on their past performance. Yet, past returns offer little insight into a fund’s future returns. For example, most funds in the top quartile (25%) of previous

Trying To Outguess the Market Has No Role: Principle 2 in Evidence-Based Investing

Wouldn’t it be great to hold only top selections in your investment portfolio, with no disappointments to detract from your success? Of course it would. It would also be nice to hold a $100 million winning

Embrace Market Pricing: Principle 1 in Evidence Based Investing

Market pricing is about you, the market, and the prices you pay. When it comes to investing it helps to know what you’re facing. In this case, that’s “the market.” How do you achieve every investor’s

Investing in Uncertain Times

After taking a closer look at interest rates and inflation we come to the heart of the matter: When interest rates, inflation, or both are on the rise, what’s an investor to do?

Has rising inflation got you down?

Inflation is the rate at which money loses its purchasing power over time. As you might guess, there are many ways to measure such a squishy figure. There are various economic sectors, such as energy,

Fed Takes Center Stage

At its March 15–16 Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting, the U.S. Federal Reserve raised its federal target funds rate by a quarter-point. It was the first increase since December 2018, but it

Ukraine

Despite our fervent hopes that Ukraine’s sovereign rights would prevail over tyrannical aggression, it’s now clear that Vladimir Putin has doubled down on the latter.

Navigating Geopolitical Events

The recent conflict between Russia and Ukraine is an important reminder that geopolitical risk is a part of investing in global markets. Navigating geopolitical events requires expertise and flexibility.

The Small Caps That May Be Holding Back Your Portfolio’s Returns

The underperformance of small caps in 2021 was driven by poor returns of small growth companies with low profits. These companies have underperformed historically. An approach that excludes small growth

The Bumpy Road to the Market’s Long-Term Average

Since 1926, the US stock market has rewarded investors with an average annual return of about 10% – the market’s long term average. But it’s important to remember that returns in any given year

You Want the Size, Value, and Profitability Premiums … But How?

Capturing the size, value, and profitability premiums in real-world portfolios requires expertise. Investors should be cautious about favoring one premium over another or one region over another based

Fighter Planes and Market Turmoil

Have you been reading the daily headlines—watching markets stall, recover, and dip once again? If so, you may be wondering whether there’s anything you can do to avoid the motion sickness.

Market Review 2021: A Recovery Amid Challenges

It was a year of uncertainty and anticipation, of hopes for a return to a degree of normalcy following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. And it was a year that showed, again, the difficulty of

A New Year Conversation

This is no surprise. The world is enormous. To cope with information overload, we engage in what behavioral psychologists refer to as heuristics. These are rules of thumb or mental shortcuts that take

Evidence-Based Investing in Brief

How do you invest your money over the long term? If you’ve read much of our work, you’ve probably noticed we embrace evidence-based investing. But what does that mean?

Why a Stock Peak Isn’t a Cliff

Reaching a new high doesn’t mean the market will retreat. Stocks are priced to deliver a positive expected return for investors, so reaching record highs regularly is the outcome one would expect.

Myth-Busting with Momentum: How to Pursue the Premium

While both simulated and real-world data suggest momentum may not be suitable as a driver of long-term asset allocations, we believe momentum considerations can be integrated in a cost-effective way to

When It Comes to SMAs, How Do You Measure the Impact of Personalization?

Many investors want their portfolios to do more than just pursue reliable premiums. They may also want to seek tax efficiency; reflect their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) values; respect

Reading Fed Tea Leaves? Watch Market Prices Instead

Yields reflect the aggregate expectations of all market participants, including opinions on how and when the Fed will act. And even if a crystal ball could reveal the timing and direction of the Fed’s

The Ever Changing World Goes On

“News is, by definition, something that doesn’t last. It exists for only a moment before it changes. … It’s not important to living a good life. It’s not going to help you make better decisions.

All-Time-High Anxiety

Will Inflation Hurt Stock Returns? Not Necessarily.

Since 1991, one-year returns on US stocks have fluctuated widely. Yet weak returns occurred when inflation was low in some periods, and 23 of the past 30 years saw positive returns even after adjusting

Tuning Out the Noise

For investors, it can be easy to feel overwhelmed by the relentless stream of news about markets. Being bombarded with data and headlines presented as affecting your financial well-being can evoke strong

Which Country Will Outperform? Here’s Why It Shouldn’t Matter.

Investment opportunities exist all around the globe, but the randomness of global stock returns makes it exceedingly difficult to figure out which markets are likely to be outperformers. How should investors

Tax-Wise Investment Techniques

We view effective tax planning as a way to reduce your lifetime tax bill—or beyond, if you’re preparing for a tax-efficient wealth transfer to your heirs.

When Everything Screams Inflation

After last year’s economic shocks, we shouldn’t be surprised to see prices rebounding. But the potential for inflation is one among many factors investors take into account when agreeing on a price

Tax Planning in Turbulent Times

How do we plan when we cannot know? The particulars may evolve, but it seems there are always an array of tax breaks to encourage us to save toward our major life goals—such as retirement, healthcare,

Swing in Small Value Stocks Shows Benefits of Staying the Course

Value stocks, or those with low relative prices, have outperformed higher-priced growth stocks in the US over the long term. Similarly, the stocks of smaller companies have fared better than the stocks

Is Inflation Haunting Your Financial Dreams? (Part 2)

The Federal Reserve has been suggesting rising rates should wane. We hope they’re right. But we also know the future remains uncharted. Nearly any outcome is possible, and none is inevitable. This means

Is Inflation Haunting Your Financial Dreams? (Part 1)

Recent headlines have been reporting a noticeable uptick in inflation. Superlatives like “best” and “worst” grab the most attention, so outlets have been abuzz with reports of how a 5% May consumer