If you want clear evidence of why Vanguard is too big, then look no further than the money flow into passive index funds. When investors are lulled to sleep by a bull market, they dream about things like early retirement, vacations, and second homes. What they tend to miss is that reversion to the mean […]
Kick-Start Your Weekend with Boston’s: Don’t Look Back
Do you remember your first record album? Boston’s Don’t Look Back was mine. A Christmas gift from my Aunt Susan (thanks to the help of cousins Karen and Kim). You want to listen to Don’t Look Back with headphones so you can crank it up loud. How loud? Imagine sitting on your bedroom floor with […]
The Fed is Clueless
Don’t be head-faked by the Federal Reserve’s 25bps cut in the Fed Funds Rate (FFR) this week. Because the real story is in Repo where demand for Treasuries has been through the roof. If you look at my chart on the 10-year Treasury you can see this problem began not in 2019 but at the […]
The Rich and Famous: How to Invest Like Jay Leno
If you want to see Jay Leno’s home in Newport, RI all you have to do is leave my office, turn on to Bellevue Avenue and head out to Ocean Drive, and you’ll see it right there on the water. “Leno and his wife first admired the house around 30 years ago, when he was […]
Tucker Carlson Is the Most Important Voice in America
If you want to thank someone for Trump’s replacement of ultra-hawk National Security Adviser John Bolton, you can thank Tucker Carlson explains Park MacDougald in his NYMag piece, “Is Tucker Carlson the Most Important Pundit in America?” Because on June 20, suggests MacDougald, when Iran shot down an American drone in the Gulf of Oman […]
This Weapon Could Drastically Affect the Balance of Naval Warfare
Russia’s Shkval Supercavitating torpedo could affect the balance of naval warfare. It’s a game-changer, and the U.S. has nothing like it in its arsenal. Kyle Mizokami of The National Interest tells us that, “a 200 knot torpedo is a very attractive capability, and as naval competition heats up in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, […]
Your Retirement Life: To Everything There is a Season
Here in New England, you can already feel the change in seasons approaching. You can smell it in the crisp, dry, morning air and see it from the lower sun angle. You can hear it as noisy cicadas whir and squirrels busy themselves in the trees, signaling a change from Summer to Fall is near. […]
The Two Reasons Muni Bonds Don’t Belong in Your Portfolio
Two reasons municipal bonds don’t belong in your portfolio are underfunded pensions and Wall Street. In the case of underfunded pensions look at what happened to GM. It was the bondholders who got skewered. When push comes to shove who do you think will get paid first, you or the government employees (pensions)? And then […]
Rip Rick Ocasek, Lead Singer of The Cars
I remember in fourth grade I went to my friend Bobby’s house after school. It was a big deal because I got to go on his bus with a permission slip from my parents. We had the best games of backyard football at his house. It was at his house I listened to The Cars […]
Dividends Win Today, They Won Yesterday, and They’ll Probably Win Tomorrow
It’s been quite the run for dividend paying stocks as you can see in the performance of our Retirement Compounders, which sort of looks like bragging. Believe me I’m not. Imagine for a moment you have a pile of cash. Where are you going to put it? Into the S&P 500? A passive index fund? […]