Jane Bryant Quinn, a highly regarded and nationally syndicated columnist, once called much of the output of Wall Street and the trade publications that cover financial markets “investment porn.” She summed it up this way: “Americans are indulging themselves in investment porn. Shameless stories about performance tickle our prurient financial interest.” The roller-coaster swing of…
Brian Haywood So the Fed has finally decided to raise interest rates, ending months of rampant speculation. Director of Fixed Income Brian Haywood covers the why, what and how of the Fed’s rate hike, plus what you should do about it. Short answer? Nothing. What You Need to Know About the Fed’s Move to Raise…
Some of us really like the status quo. Even when we have a better alternative, many of us are content to keep on doing what we’re doing. I think about this every time my wife and I swap cars. Depending on who is running what errands that day, we’ll switch between our big car and…
Are you a value investor or a growth investor? Could your preference be influenced by a biological predisposition partially ingrained from birth? Is it possible that your choice of investment could be explained by your personal experiences, both early on and later in life? The field of behavioral finance advances psychology-based theories to explain investor…
It seems like almost every week a new study appears to debunk the myth of active management. This week was no exception. Robin Powell, a U.K.-based journalist and financial blogger, discussed a recent study that covered 561 U.K.-based stock funds between 1998 and 2008. The study’s findings were consistent with similar research done on funds…
In my hometown of Baltimore, there’s an oft-heard saying that seems especially applicable when, like now, the seasons are changing: “If you don’t like the weather today, just wait until tomorrow.” For whatever meteorological reason, it’s not uncommon for an absolutely miserable Monday to turn into a gorgeous Tuesday. Temperatures have been known to swing…
Philip Tetlock, who teaches psychology, business and political science at the University of California, Berkeley, is also the author of “Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know?” The book, which was published in 2006, discusses the findings of his 20-year study, the first scientific study on the ability of experts from…
There has been a great deal of focus by the academic community in recent years on fine-tuning the various factor models used to explain the differences in returns of diversified portfolios. Marie Lambert, Boris Fays and Georges Hubner contribute to the literature with their 2015 paper, “Size and Value Matter, But Not the Way You…
Is it time for stock-pickers to make a comeback? That was the topic of discussion during a recent Trading Nation segment in which CNBC’s Brian Sullivan interviewed Stacey Gilbert of Susquehanna, and Phillip Streible of RJO Futures. Gilbert and Streible made the case that because the correlations (a measure of the strength of the linear…
Risk-based asset pricing theory suggests, simply, that assets bearing a higher risk should compensate investors with higher returns. While most papers investigating the risk-return relationship of assets are focused on equity markets, surprisingly few studies explore this phenomenon in currency markets (which are among the deepest and most liquid markets in the world). In fact,…
Remember how you felt during the financial crisis in 2008? People were scared. Even the professionals were uncertain about what might happen. I know, because I was scared, too. But I couldn’t show it. Whatever was going on, my clients still needed me to provide thoughtful advice and to help stop them from doing something…
Brian Haywood Nobody really knows exactly when, or by how much, interest rates will rise. But that likelihood is already priced into the market. Director of Fixed Income Brian Haywood on what you need to know if they do, and why sticking to your strategy will pay off in the end. Waiting for Interest Rates…
Bloomberg TV recently invited me on to their new show, Bloomberg GO, for a short debate with David Barse, CEO of Third Avenue Management, on active versus passive investing. After stating that funds offered by Third Avenue, which have more than $8 billion in assets under management, had been able to beat their index benchmark,…
Almost 10 years ago, I knew a guy on a financial rocket ship. He had a great house, a successful business and a solid income. But then things changed. With the benefit of hindsight, it was clear he bought a little too much house and spent a little too much money. At the beginning, he…
The current controversy over the proposal by the U.S. Department of Labor to impose a fiduciary standard on those who advise retirement plans has little to do with the rule’s merit. Rather, I believe it’s at issue because stockbrokers are the beneficiaries of a cozy system that permits them to have conflicts of interest which…