Your Survival Guy wants you to understand that you own bonds so you can invest in stocks. As the late, great, Ben Graham explained about portfolio allocation, investors need to fall within a 70-30 mix of stocks and bonds, or vice versa. In other words, even the most aggressive stock jocks need to have some bonds as an anchor to windward. You might be shocked at how much of a cushion having just 30% in bonds can provide for a portfolio in a market decline. But check out Your Survival Guy's Deadliest Markets This Century for proof. And for the most conservative, or wealthy among us, … [Read more...]

In California, insurers AIG and Chubb are not renewing certain homeowners' insurance because of California's regulations which make doing so unprofitable. Understand that insurers are in business to make money and when they can’t they move on to greener pastures. Don’t be caught off guard if your insurers change the rules of the game on you. Leslie Scism reports in The Wall Street Journal: Worried about wildfire exposure and frustrated by state regulations, insurers in California have been cutting back on their homeowner businesses. Now, affluent homeowners are feeling more of the pain, as … [Read more...]

This is a "rich man, poor man" market. Which one are you? The late, great, Richard Russell explained what it means to be a rich man or poor man when investing. Read his classic explanation of "Rich Man, Poor Man," below. Today, William Boston reports on the surge in luxury car sales versus lagging sales for cheaper brands in The Wall Street Journal, writing: Luxury car brands such as Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Porsche and BMW BMW +0.10% have reported record sales, thanks to customers who have craved them and manufacturers that have directed scarce chips toward their most profitable … [Read more...]

I want you to understand that stocks, like trees, don’t grow forever. Look at Apple stock. During the first trading day of 2022, Apple’s market cap surpassed $3 trillion. Did you know that on the same day with $3 trillion, you could have owned all of McDonald's, Walmart, AT&T, Philip Morris, Berkshire Hathaway, Proctor & Gamble, JP Morgan Chase, Starbucks, Boeing, Deere, and American Express combined? Does that mean Apple’s going down from here? Listen, I’m Your Survival Guy, not Johnny Appleseed. But here’s the deal. When you get older, you can’t afford to lose money (can you … [Read more...]

Originally posted on December 14, 2021. In an excellent review of a festering problem in the market today, Randall Smith of The Wall Street Journal, outlines the $1.3 trillion Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund (VTI), and the growing importance of the CRSP U.S. Total Market Index to the future of markets. What’s concerning to Your Survival Guy is that the top 10 companies of the CRSP U.S. Total Market Index comprise a quarter of its value. Does anyone remember the plight of the Nifty 50 in the 70s? When people fell out of love with the Fifty, the S&P crashed 48.2% from early … [Read more...]