The recent release of the “fiduciary rule” from the Department of Labor is being hailed as a boon to consumers. Conflicts of interest in the retirement advice industry are supposed to be a thing of the best. But will they be? Many consumers seek guidance from a brokerage firm. You know them well – Morgan [...]
Earlier this week the Department of Labor (“DOL”) released new rules aimed at ensuring providers of retirement investment advice adhere to a fiduciary standard – that is, to put the best interests of clients first and above all. This may seem like an obvious point but as we wrote here many investors have no idea [...]
Years ago I was in the office of a friend and colleague who was purchasing tickets from Ticketmaster. He wished to take his young child to the circus. A fairly straightforward and common transaction. At the end of the call the Ticketmaster rep summarized the transaction. "The cost per ticket is $x including a convenience [...]
If you're a frequent reader of our blog (or, better yet, a client who's drank enough of the Apollo Kool-Aid!) then you know the importance we place on a long-term focus - on filtering out the noise. Why is it important? Because anything's possible in the short-term. Daily blips are a distortion. They blur the [...]
One of the most challenging things for many of us to grasp is that prices do NOT indicate value. Why do we use prices as the standard of value? Because prices are easy to understand. It’s the reason a 5-star fund is “better” than a 4-star fund, why a 5-star Uber driver is “better” than [...]
The folks behind Spotlight and The Big Short are teaming up to bring us the next Oscar-worthy film about investing: “Hiding Misconduct.” (OK, it’s a snarky joke but it makes the point. Isn’t that the goal of communication?) On a serious note the latest information on misconduct in the financial services industry offers a scathing [...]
Many ‘experts’ advise waiting until age 70 to claim Social Security benefits. The reasoning is sound on its face – the longer you wait the larger your monthly check. According to the SS Administration the following is how much of your full benefit you will receive depending upon the age you file: age 62 - [...]
Financial “advice” is the latest area where technology seeks to strip humans of personal responsibility – to free us of the “burden” of thinking for ourselves. (Wait, doesn’t government already do that for us?) These so-called “robo advisors” are investment programs constructed through algorithms. Human involvement is not part of the package. The Department of [...]
What’s one way so many retail investors sabotage their savings plans? Recency bias. It’s that ugly state of mind where views are most heavily influenced by what we have experienced most recently. It impedes our ability to see the big picture. We lie to ourselves if we think we’re immune. “How did my investments perform [...]