This is why I welcome more oversight for my industry. This type of fraud does nothing but discourage investors, destroy confidence, and ultimately destroy the lives of those people who have been defrauded. This is also why it is important for investment advisors and portfolio managers to be transparent in their business operations and as forthcoming as possible in all our activities. It also points to the need for investors…
An interesting look into the intense lobbying of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission by business to help shape the new financial regulatory rules enacted to help manage the largely unregulated derivatives market. Notably, this quote: “The law gives the CFTC jurisdiction over commodity, interest rate and some cred…it default swaps, the largest share of the derivatives markets. The financial stakes are high. U.S. commercial banks held derivatives with a notional…
At first glance, today’s jobs report looks bleak. In total 95,000 workers lost their jobs in September. Governments cut about 159,000 jobs. While businesses added 64,000 jobs. Netting out to the 95,000 job loss number. However, this means we are heading in the right direction, albeit slowly. Less government jobs, m…eans governments are cutting spending and trying to address looming deficits. More private jobs, means business activity is maintaining momentum…
A very good read on fixed income (bond) mutual fund credit qualities… a little hard to believe it took Morningstar this long to update and publish credit quality ratings in this manner. As the article points out, the previous system was based on simple averaging of credit qualities in the portfolio, assuming a linear relationship i n default rates. Well, default rates go up in a non-linear fashion, when credit…
Debt is a BIG issue. Its a big issue for the global economy. Its a big issue for our US domestic economy. It is a big issue for individual consumers… you could easily show a correlation between a countries debt and the personal debt of its citizens. Notice how it is the “developed” economies of the US, Japan, Australia and Europe with the highest concentrations of debt? (Click on link to…
People have said the “internet age” is over… implying, in some cases, that the bulk of the productivity gains associated with the advance of the internet is behind us. I disagree with this assumption, in that the continued evolution of hardware, software, but more importantly, social behavior (how people leverage this network) will continue to fuel a productivity surge over the coming years that easily puts the bulk of productivity…
When I started this company last year, I carefully evaluated the custodians and software vendors that I thought would add the most value to my clients experience. Fidelity stood out amongst the custodians as the most service oriented, cost-efficient, flexible and technologically oriented partner I could find. It was an easy choice. The performance and portfolio management solutions I was looking for, was a more difficult search, until I discovered…
Excellent observation article by The Economist regarding the nature of the US unemployed. Points to the fact that high unemployment can be a function of structural issues facing labor markets, not only lack of demand on behalf of employers. This calls into question the use of further stimulus to lower unemployment rates. (Click here to read article)
I’m posting a link to a timely piece put out by Fidelity Management & Research Co. It assesses the various contributions to Real GDP Growth by determining if growth was driven by personal consumption, business investment, net exports, etc. and what the trend has been over previous quarters. It also spends some time looking at what economists call the LEI’s (Leading Economic Indicators). These indicators are often used to asses…
How many people out there, feel they don’t understand the “basics” of investing? Even the word “basic” is elusive to most. By “basic” I mean do you understand some of the following concepts: risk vs. reward growth investments vs. income investments definitions of terms like equity, bond, interest, dividend, mutual fund, index fund, exchange traded fund, etc. diversification vs. correlation vs. asset allocation My sense, is most have heard the…
