Ally Invest (formerly TradeKing) has rolled out their own commission-free ETF list to augment their $4.95 trades and no account minimums. As an existing customer, they sent a short e-mail with the following paragraph: We're excited to announce … [Read the rest]
I've read Jeremy Grantham's quarterly letters and the GMO 7-Year Asset Class Return Forecasts for over 8 years. (Anyone can sign up at GMO.com for free.) Grantham gained successively more fame after avoiding the Japanese bubble, the Dot-com … [Read the rest]
After my last quarterly portfolio update, I rebalanced back to my target asset allocation this week. I sold some US stocks and went from 70% stocks/30% bonds back to 67% stocks/33% bonds. (I bought a little Emerging Market stocks as well.) In … [Read the rest]
Chase just announced a new free stock trade program as part of a new online brokerage arm called You Invest. This means another megabank is moving more heavily into "relationship banking" where they hope you will keep your bank accounts, credit … [Read the rest]
When it comes to constructing a portfolio, I used to think it was all about numbers and optimization. When you pick an asset class based on historical data, that assumes you hold through both the good times and the really bad times. It has helped me … [Read the rest]
Reading children's books to my kids has become a regular source of new wisdom. I guess that's not surprising, if the goal is to teach kids about life. Here's one that came across recently and keeps popping back in my head. I first read it in … [Read the rest]
Here's a refreshingly blunt quote from Scott Galloway's article Yay Capitalism via It Is Always About The Money via Abnormal Returns: Wealthy people claim they don’t think much about money. That’s bullshit; they are obsessed with money. The notion … [Read the rest]
I was surprised to read the NY Times article Vanguard Warns of Worsening Odds for the Economy and Markets. Everything is written very carefully using odds so that there is no "prediction" that could be called "wrong" later on, but at the same time … [Read the rest]
People don't like talking about money. That's why I started this site. You know what people like talking about even less? Death. My wife and I have already filled out a generic advanced health directive, but I recently ran across something … [Read the rest]
A recent WSJ article by Jason Zweig calls attention to one of the hidden ways that brokerage firms make money from you. As interest rates rise, they go out and earn the highest market rates while giving you a lot less on your idle cash. The … [Read the rest]
If you own bond mutual funds or ETFs, the most popular benchmark is the Bloomberg Barclays Aggregate Bond Index (AGG), which basically tracks all U.S. taxable investment-grade bonds, including US Treasury government bonds, investment-grade … [Read the rest]
Interest rates continue to rise, and holders of existing certificates of deposit (CDs) may be wondering if it is a good idea to break their current CDs in order to take advantage of a new higher rate. Most CDs impose an early withdrawal penalty if … [Read the rest]
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