Retirement Field Guide

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The Retirement Field Guide

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What are your odds?

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Imagine your friend invites you out to play a friendly game of poker. You agree to go, because why not, right? Should be fun! Once you sit down at the table that evening, you find out that the players you’ve just sat down with are the best poker players in the world. They are the stars from the World Series of Poker - each of them accumulating millions of dollars… Read More

The Problems With Behavioral Investment Advice

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In a recent Morningstar article titled, “Do Investors See Financial Advisors As Behavioral Coaches?“, Samantha Lamas discussed survey results regarding what investors find most valuable about financial advisors. What I found most interesting wasn’t what rated highly, but what rated poorly. In the survey, Morningstar asked individual investors to rank a specific set of attributes by order of importance. The list of attributes is here: In particular, many planners (myself… Read More

You have to think really hard to be pessimistic right now

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As I insinuated in my post three weeks ago, the media has a dichotomistic (made that word up) way of looking at the market. We’re either nowhere near the top or it’s all going to hell in a handbasket. The middle ground is pretty much nonexistent because it doesn’t sell advertising. So, each day, they choose one of two templates - pander to fear or cater to greed. Given the typical information… Read More

Should You Ignore Financial TV?

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This one is a bit of a softball, and you can probably guess what my answer is. But given that the end of the year was yet another apocalypse du jour and that retirees often worry themselves into making poor portfolio decisions during that sort of event, I wanted to discuss it in more detail. During the final quarter of 2018, the S&P 500 declined almost 14%. Just prior to… Read More

Comparative Disappointment

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A friend of mine has a client that inquired with disappointment that his account was down 2.5% when the S&P was up 0.5%.  He wanted to know why his portfolio was performing so poorly by comparison to the S&P.  At the time of this inquiry, the S&P was up 0.5%, Small Cap was down 5% and International was down about 15%.   This has been a pretty typical refrain for many… Read More

A Case For Long-Term Optimism - Words Matter

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The words we use are important. When you hear the term “stock market,” what immediately comes to mind?  Recently, I completed an informal survey asking that very question of various non-financial industry connections and the number one response was “risky.”  I think part of the reason people view investing as risky has something to do with the term we use when referring to the assets we are purchasing — stocks…. Read More

Objectivity as a Value Proposition

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The Latin term panem et circenses (bread and circuses) is a figure of speech for a superficial form of appeasement.  It is a diversion or a distraction from core issues.  If you’ve seen the movie Gladiator, multiple times they show Roman soldiers throwing bread into the stands of the Colosseum prior to the starting of the games.  Both the provisions of bread and the games themselves (hence bread and circus)… Read More

Lifeboat Drills

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The last time you were on an airplane, do you remember what the flight attendants did before takeoff?  Of course you do.  They provided you with a safety demonstration on what to do if there is an emergency.  But I’ll bet that virtually nobody paid any attention to them because nobody ever does.  (Full disclosure: I also ignore the safety demonstration.) If the plane has an issue though, there is no… Read More

The Role of Bonds in Retirement

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Wrote a piece for CNBC on the role of bonds in a retirement portfolio.  In the article, I share some thoughts on the topic with the aid of historical perspective and how things have changed over the past few decades.  Below is the link.   Conventional Wisdom of Bonds Dominating a Portfolio in Retirement is now Outdated   Thanks for reading! Ashby Daniels Shorebridge Wealth Management 600 Waterfront Drive, Suite… Read More

Why I Advocate For Passive Investing For Clients

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Winston Churchill is often credited with the statement that democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried. This is a lot like how I view the whole active vs passive management debate because there is no perfect way in which to manage a portfolio.  But I believe there are significant guideposts to follow that can make the decision a little clearer.  There… Read More