When the subject of Social Security comes up during retirement planning conversations, both younger and older investors often greet it with a healthy dose of cynicism. Such discussions tend to include comments like, “Oh yeah, sure. If there’s even anything left for me” or “Isn’t Social Security going bankrupt?” Sometimes I hear a more draconian stance, like, “I just plan on it not being around when I’m retired.” This last viewpoint actually is quite common. According to a study by AARP, 65% of adults are not confident about Social Security’s future.
Recently, the “I want to retire” mantra seems to be an ever more common theme. I am even hearing a greater number of people in their early 50s, with successful careers and some with high-paying positions, say they want to retire.
Adding a family member is an exciting time. Decorating the nursery, picking out names, going to baby showers, and attending parenting classes all prepare you for your baby’s arrival home. But with the joy of a new family member comes additional responsibility. A whole lot of it. After all, your child is 100% dependent on you for all his or her needs.
Every year, the markets provide us with lessons on the prudent investment strategy. I’ve so far covered what they taught us in 2018 in lessons one through three and then lessons four through seven. We’ll finish up today with lessons eight through 11.
Every year, the markets provide us with lessons on the prudent investment strategy. Earlier this week, I covered lessons one through three. Today, I’ll tackle lessons four through seven.
Every year, the markets provide us with lessons on the prudent investment strategy. Many times, markets offer investors remedial courses, covering lessons it taught in previous years. That’s why one of my favorite sayings is that “there’s nothing new in investing, only investment history you don’t yet know.”
2018 supplied 11 important lessons. As you may note, many of them are repeats from prior years. Unfortunately, too many investors fail to learn them—they keep making the same errors. We’ll begin with my personal favorite, one that the market, if measured properly, teaches each and every year.
In a review of recent academic research into the currency carry trade, Larry Swedroe explores some of the fundamental and theoretically motivated sources of risk that drive its returns and help explain the premium.
Our recommendation on asset location is to prefer holding tax-inefficient assets in tax-advantaged accounts. In our view, the expected return of an asset is close to irrelevant when determining where to locate it. This guidance applies to Roth as well as to traditional IRAs. For many, this can seem counterintuitive, given that much of what investors find in the financial media generally discusses locating the highest-expected-return asset classes in the Roth account.
This article is broken into two sections. First, we will discuss how a security’s expected return and risk characteristics can change based on where the asset is located. Second, we will walk through a Roth-versus-taxable-account asset location decision using after-tax asset allocation.
It’s truly an amazing paradox. According to the Thomson Reuters Lipper second-quarter 2018 snapshot of U.S. mutual funds and exchange-traded products, active funds of all kinds, including money market funds, manage about $16.4 trillion.
That’s more than 2 1/2 times the $6 trillion managed by passive funds and ETFs. That’s also despite the overwhelming evidence that active management is a loser’s game (one that’s possible to win, but with odds of doing so that are so poor, the winning strategy is not to play).
Emerging market equities have substantially underperformed the S&P 500 Index in 2018, with the S&P 500 up 6.5 percent and emerging markets down 4.4 percent through July. As I detailed in a recent post on international developed market equities, remaining committed to a globally diversified portfolio can be challenging during extended periods of underperformance relative to the U.S. market. In this post, we’ll look specifically at emerging markets by examining five lessons from long-run and current market data that reinforce some of the reasons investors should remain committed to emerging markets equity investing.
Investment strategies targeting environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues and concerns have exploded in popularity. The Global Sustainable Investment Alliance recently estimated that $22.9 trillion worldwide is managed under the auspices of “responsible investment strategies,” a 25% increase just since 2014, and which now represents roughly 26% of all assets under professional management.
There is no shortage of receptacles clamoring for your money each day. No matter how much money you have or make, it could never keep up with all the seemingly urgent invitations to part with it.
Separating true financial priorities from flash impulses is an increasing challenge, even when you’re trying to do the right thing with your moola — like saving for the future, insuring against catastrophic risks and otherwise improving your financial standing. And while every individual and household is in some way unique, the following list of financial priorities for your next available dollar is a reliable guide for most.
