Each year, the investment consulting firm Callan publishes an illustration called the periodic table of investment returns. It illustrates the performance of key asset classes on a year-by-year basis. That information is widely available, but Callan’s periodic table is unique: Each asset class is [...]
Emerging consensus?
At 82 years old, investment manager Jeremy Grantham has seen his fair share of market cycles. And as a U.K. native now living in the U.S., he maintains a balanced perspective. In an interview last week, Grantham shared his unvarnished view of the U.S. market. “American capitalism has become fat and [...]
What’s changed
This week, a unique event occurred: A group who call themselves the Bogleheads held an investment conference near the Philadelphia headquarters of Vanguard Group. Since its inception in 2000, this annual gathering has brought together dedicated fans of the late Jack Bogle, Vanguard’s [...]
Alcohol, tobacco and firearms
This week, I learned about an innovative approach to investing. A new firm called Life + Liberty Indexes has created what it calls the Freedom 100 Index of emerging markets stocks. Unlike other indexes, which typically weight stocks in proportion to their size, the Freedom 100 weights countries by [...]
An obscure story worth understanding
A little while back, The Wall Street Journal ran an article with a puzzling title: “How China Pressured MSCI to Add Its Market to Major Benchmark.” Like a lot of market news, this arcane-sounding story came and went without much notice. But it is worth pausing to understand what it was all about, [...]
