These Are the Goods

Articles I asked if they measured the efficacy of the analysts’ historical picks. No. I asked if they measured the accuracy of the analysts’ fundamental estimates. No. By Leigh Drogen Curiosity’s treasures are a bitch to extract. By Mike Dariano You can’t see the end in advance, nor can I, nor can Druck. By Josh…

Ben Graham on Index Funds and Efficient Markets

Twenty-five years after he retired, at eighty-one years old and just six months before he passed, Ben Graham sat down for an hour with Hartman L. Butler. The whole interview is worth reading, but I pulled three sections that particularly stood out. HB: By some coincidence as you were becoming less active as a writer,…

The First 28 Days

There was a lot of attention given to the first 28 days of 2016. During that period, the S&P 500 fell 10.5%, which was the worst start to a year ever. Since that time, the S&P 500 is up 35%, the Dow is up 41%, the NASDAQ 100 is up 49%, and the Russell 2000…

A Millennial’s Rebuttal

Our intern Tommy Tranfo wrote a great piece about his generation and investing that I thought was worth sharing. In a recent Barron’s Next article, Why Won’t Millennials Embrace the Stock Market, they write, “The S&P 500 has grown over 75% in the past five years, yet, according to a new survey only 13% of millennials said…

Today in Market History, Buy the Rumor, Sell the News

On July 31, 2008, investors were reminded of the fact that investing is a relative game, not governed by absolute laws. Exxon Mobil reported the largest quarterly profit in U.S. history, and its stock fell nearly 5%. (The S&P 500 declined 1.3% on the same day) The chart below is a great example of how…

These Are the Goods

Articles Apple has become the greatest cash machine in history with what must have, at the time, been a ridiculously stupid idea: “let’s open stores.” By Scott Galloway How is it possible that everybody believes that they are honest yet has a difficult time identifying anyone else with the same characteristics? By Ben Horowitz The influx of…

A Few Charts and a Few Thoughts

Last night, David Schawel pointed out that the worst year for the Barclays Aggregate Bond Index was -2.9%. I’ve written in the past that a bad year for bonds is a bad week for stocks, but I was still surprised to learn just how shallow the worst calendar year was. You might say, well duh, bonds…

The Topic is Gold

Last week I participated in a focus group. This is when fund companies pay participants to sit in a round table discussion and watch behind one-way mirrors. I’ve done this several times and they’re always a great experience. I get to see how other people in the industry think, how much they know, and how…

These Are the Goods

Articles Image is worth nothing and people won’t pay for it forever. By Josh Brown Don’t blame the product for the product user’s mistakes. By Cullen Roche Investors weigh the importance of change and timelessness differently, but every great company has some element of both. By Morgan Housel  While portfolio management often brings investors into…

When Something is Obvious

One of the best descriptions of how intelligent investors behave comes from The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, which was written by John Maynard Keynes. In 1936, he said: “Professional investment may be likened to those newspaper competitions in which the competitors have to pick out the six prettiest faces from a hundred photographs,…