Here’s an investment opportunity for your consideration. It’s managed by an investment committee that seeks to build a portfolio to be representative of the U.S. economy. The committee meets regularly to determine what stocks to add to or remove from the portfolio, and routinely makes between 10-40 changes per year. These decisions are not made…
The Dangers of ETFs (And Why You Should Avoid Them)
It’s not unusual for my phone to ring in the wake of a financial crisis. May 6, 2010 was one of those days. Around 2:30 that afternoon, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged nearly 1,000 points, only to recover all of those losses 36 minutes later. During the tumult, many exchange-traded funds (ETFs) were priced…
Sir Isaac Newton: Brilliant Physicist. Miserable Investor.
At Holcombe Financial’s recent client learning event about “Behavioral Biases and Their Investment Limitations”, my favorite story was about Sir Isaac Newton’s early investment success and subsequent failure during the South Sea Bubble. In 1720 Newton profited handsomely, earning £20,000 by the time he sold his shares (big bucks in those days). Sounds like an expert…
What I learned losing ONE MILLION dollars?
“Experience is the worst teacher. It gives the test before giving the lesson.” Unknown The book “What I learned losing one million dollars” by Brendan Moynihan should be required reading for every investor. The book shares the story of legendary trader, Jim Paul, then President of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, who was unceremoniously removed after…
Can Money Buy Happiness?
Yes, but not in the ways that most people think. When someone experiences a liquidity event, it is often accompanied with visions of a new home, new car, redecorating the house, a new pool in the backyard, or paying off debt. Whether it’s an entrepreneur or inner-city athlete signing his first NFL contract, there is…
4 tips to survive divorce as an entrepreneur
Corrected as of May 11, 2015. Original draft blog was inadvertently published April 29, 2015. Divorce is never easy and always painful. But as an entrepreneur divorce can put your business in serious jeopardy. There is no magic bullet; and the process is going to awful if both parties are not amicable, especially if kids…
Big Data Must Die
On our annual ski trip, we decided to ride the California Zephyr, which cuts an unimaginable path through the Rockies. We arrived at the terminal in Denver at 7 am to check our bags and were greeted with something that looked like it came off the set of Indiana Jones. The luggage cart with steel…
Never A Good Time To Invest
The last five years have been nothing more than spectacular for those that endured the stock market collapse of 2008-09. Now we find ourselves six years post crash, market performance is at record highs and the rumblings of fear have returned. The chart below tracks the MSCI World Index along with select Time magazine headlines…
How much will my 401(k) pay per month?
I have written about retirement before, even arguing “Don’t save for retirement” at times to make the point that saving for retirement is not about building a certain amount of net worth on which to retire. To reach your Point of Independence, it is much more important to focus on creating a recurring revenue model…
How hard is it to ‘make it ends meet’ on $400,000 per year?
The Wall Street Journal posted a video of an imaginary couple making $400,000 and how they would still only ‘just get by’. The Huffington Post and other media outlets were quick to ridicule the video and even call it the “a deliberately unsympathetic joke designed to agitate the stirrings of an American class war”. For…