We are in bear market territory. Good or bad?

  From yesterday’s Wall Street Journal: “Had you been able to sink $100 into U.S. stocks in each of the 199 months from February 1966 through the end of August 1982, your $19,900 in cumulative investments would have left you with $18,520 after inflation, according to Morningstar.” Hard to ignore. However… …history shows that investors […]

How wise is holding only the S&P 500 index in your portfolio?

Your answer to holding only the S&P 500 index in your portfolio was good. Thanks Milan. When being bombarded with financial services marketing the average investor needs to be reminded of the MMM philosophy. The one chart in Ben’s post that I found interesting/surprising was the one showing inflation adjusted returns of the S&P500 over […]

Cut retirement spending, creator of the 4% rule recommends now.

Since 1994, retirees have relied on the 4% rule as the safe percentage of their portfolios’ value to spend in retirement. That would have protected them from running out of money in every 30-year period since 1926, even during the worst economic conditions. However, there is no precedent for today’s combination of high inflation and […]

Buy the American economy in its entirety and win or pick stocks and lose.

One of our followers recently stated that our posts have a lot of redundant content. They don’t bring  something new that isn’t already on the site but just more of the same. The reason why that is true is that our evidence-based message is as simple as it is effective. It encourages the development of […]

What to do when the market is at an irrational exuberance level.

The risk/reward relationship is inescapable. The greater the risk that investors take, the greater their possible reward. Note the word “possible” and not “likely”. We have frequently shown the chart above which demonstrates that investing in equities has had the best return for over 100 years. That requires that investors have a long-run mindset. In […]

Are we in a bubble or a hyper-bubble? What to do?

You will (almost) never hear a Wall Street firm state that the market is overvalued. Wall Street makes more money promoting a positive outlook even if it is incorrect. Over the last three years, US market returns averaged over 25% annually, not adjusted for inflation. (26.89% in 2021, 18.40% in 2020, 31.49% in 2019) Over […]

How to make $2,921,610.87 effortlessly! Avoiding the true cost of many things.

  On average, people pay $500 a month to finance a car. Over the last 200 years, the stock market as represented by an exchange-traded fund which tracks the S&P 500, has averaged 10% annually (not inflation adjusted). Over the course of a 40 year career, $500 a month invested the Monday Morning way will […]