Most Recent Stingy News
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| My top 10 peeves |
| 12/08/13 11:34 PM EST Permlink | Markets |
| "Clifford S. Asness discusses a list of peeves that share three characteristics: (1) They are about investing or finance in general, (2) they are about beliefs that are very commonly held and often repeated, and (3) they are wrong or misleading and they hurt investors." |
| More Markets: Don't fall for the 'Santa Claus rally' |
| Never bubbles today |
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| Hewlett-Packard may finally compute |
| 12/08/13 11:32 PM EST Permlink | Stingy Investing |
| "When it comes to stocks, I take a different tack and look for the long-term losers. It might seem counter intuitive, but such stocks tend to be inexpensive based on various measures of financial merit and they've had time to make improvements. Both factors are positives." |
| More Stingy Investing: Why a stock screen is only a first step |
| Still beating the market after 9 years |
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| Index effect raises concerns |
| 12/08/13 11:30 PM EST Permlink | Indexing |
| "Goodhart's law was widely cited in the 1980s, when the UK government tried to control inflation by targeting the money supply. But policymakers found that as soon as they focused on a monetary aggregate such as M-3, the measure started to misbehave. The law is familiar to those in the indexing business, too. Investors have long been aware of the distortions that can arise when large volumes of money track or reference a particular measure of the stock market." |
| More Indexing: How low can prices go? |
| Confessions of an institutional investor |
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| Prem Watsa opens up about BlackBerry |
| 12/08/13 11:28 PM EST Permlink | Watsa |
| "Bets on debt-ravaged Greece or ailing phone maker BlackBerry would make many investors flee, but for Prem Watsa both are part of a 'cautious' strategy he employs to manage Fairfax Financial's US$23.3 billion portfolio. Indian-born Watsa, 63, often compared to U.S. investor Warren Buffett, another self-made man, prides himself on a strategy of investing in stocks and markets others avoid." |
| More Watsa: Fairfax meeting slides |
| Watsa no stranger to value |
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| Norbert's gambit |
| 12/08/13 11:27 PM EST Permlink | Brokers |
| "Norbert's gambit remains the least expensive way to convert Canadian and US dollars at a discount brokerage. For investors looking to buy US-listed ETFs, learning this technique can save hundreds of dollars by sidestepping the wide currency spreads charged by brokerages." |
| More Brokers: The best brokers |
| The problem of small accounts |
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| Key new findings on stock selection |
| 12/02/13 9:44 PM EST Permlink | Value Investing |
| "Better and more consistent results are achieved when a composite of individual factors is used. A value composite helps avoid value traps and can show some seemingly pricey stocks to be attractively valued. Financial strength and earnings quality composites are better used to identify stocks to avoid." |
| More Value Investing: Treasure hunters of the financial crisis |
| Prem Watsa the Canadian Warren Buffett |
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| Why a stock screen is only a first step |
| 12/02/13 2:06 PM EST Permlink | Stingy Investing |
| "Take Reitmans (Canada) Ltd. as an example. The ladies' wear specialty apparel retailer, based in Montreal, ran into trouble over the last few years." |
| More Stingy Investing: Still beating the market after 9 years |
| Who needs Wall St.? |
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| Frugal life leaves rich legacy |
| 12/01/13 5:53 PM EST Permlink | Thrift |
| "He clipped coupons, wore sweaters with holes in them to make people think he was poor and took a bus - not a cab - to the University of Washington when he attended an alumni luncheon in his later years. Only a tight circle of family and friends knew that MacDonald was nurturing a secret fortune. When he died in September at the age of 98, he left in his will a $187.6 million charitable trust to Seattle Children's Research Institute, the University of Washington School of Law and the Salvation Army." |
| More Thrift: The dark side of compound interest |
| Risk-free returns for everybody |
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| Don't fall for the 'Santa Claus rally' |
| 12/01/13 5:45 PM EST Permlink | Markets |
| "Wall Street does - or at least is hoping that you do. Every year around this time, many analysts and brokers begin referring to a 'Santa Claus rally' that will propel the market higher. Don't fall for the sales pitch. The stock market's average performance before Christmas is no better than mediocre. It is only in the last week of December that the market has strong seasonal winds blowing in its sails." |
| More Markets: Never bubbles today |
| More on long-term returns |
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| Still beating the market after 9 years |
| 12/01/13 5:41 PM EST Permlink | Stingy Investing |
| "Finding the right Christmas gift can be difficult and some people are particularly hard to shop for. The combination can, on occasion, make the holiday season feel like an exercise in passing the proverbial brown sweater back and forth. Investors suffer from a similar problem when looking for good stocks. But, in some ways, they have it even worse because they have to wait for months, if not years, before finding out whether their picks turn out to be duds or stars." |
| More Stingy Investing: Who needs Wall St.? |
| Markets are partying like it's 1999 |
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| Who needs Wall St.? |
| 11/24/13 9:51 PM EST Permlink | Stingy Investing |
| "Many people go to New York to try to make a fortune on Wall Street. But value investors often thrive in smaller cities, where they're insulated from the groupthink that can infect those in the big city." |
| More Stingy Investing: Markets are partying like it's 1999 |
| Companies that lower their share count |
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| The best brokers |
| 11/24/13 9:51 PM EST Permlink | Brokers |
| "The best reason to be a do-it-yourself investor is to cut costs, and the online broker that helps you do that best is Virtual Brokers. Cost is a huge category in the 15th annual Globe and Mail ranking of online brokers, and VB aces it." |
| More Brokers: The problem of small accounts |
| Wall Street hates you |
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| Survivorship bias |
| 11/24/13 9:50 PM EST Permlink | Behaviour |
| "The military looked at the bombers that had returned from enemy territory. They recorded where those planes had taken the most damage. Over and over again, they saw the bullet holes tended to accumulate along the wings, around the tail gunner, and down the center of the body. Wings. Body. Tail gunner. Considering this information, where would you put the extra armor? Naturally, the commanders wanted to put the thicker protection where they could clearly see the most damage, where the holes clustered. But Wald said no, that would be precisely the wrong decision. Putting the armor there wouldn't improve their chances at all." |
| More Behaviour: Graham & Doddsville: Fall 2013 |
| The tragedy of the commons |
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| Computers have enhanced chess skill |
| 11/24/13 9:46 PM EST Permlink | Idle |
| "In the world chess championship match that ended Friday in India, Norway's Magnus Carlsen, the cool, charismatic 22-year-old challenger and the highest-rated player in chess history, defeated local hero Viswanathan Anand, the 43-year-old champion. Mr. Carlsen's winning score of three wins and seven draws will cement his place among the game's all-time greats. But his success also illustrates a paradoxical development: Chess-playing computers, far from revealing the limits of human ability, have actually pushed it to new heights." |
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| Showing returns a big advice industry challenge |
| 11/24/13 9:42 PM EST Permlink | Hallett |
| "The financial advisory industry has long been challenged to report accurate, personalized performance to its clients. Investment management clients have always wanted good reporting but most retail clients didn't require it because returns seemed healthy. But having survived two bear markets, investors have grown disappointed with their portfolios' growth even without knowing percentage returns. Securities regulators have mandated the reporting of personalized rates of return starting in a couple of years. I believe that this will prove more challenging for the advice industry than any other regulatory initiative - including the much-discussed best interest standard." |
| More Hallett: The lesson from market extremes |
| Different strategies find common ground |
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| The lesson from market extremes |
| 11/24/13 9:40 PM EST Permlink | Hallett |
| "On November 20, 2008 I spoke to a powerpoint presentation loaded with slides showing the then-current bear market in a historical context - while doing the same with a variety of valuation statistics for North American stocks. A summary of my conclusions: North American stocks were at 20-year lows relative to earnings and book value. On an interest-rate-adjusted basis, U.S. stock yields were at a four-decade high. High yield bonds were sporting the highest spreads and yields in several decades. Stocks and high yield bonds were very attractive and they should be purchased with a focus on their longer-term fundamentals. While it's now clear that it was a good idea to invest five years ago, it's helpful to add some numerical context." |
| More Hallett: Different strategies find common ground |
| Industry risk rating failing investors |
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| Markets are partying like it's 1999 |
| 11/17/13 8:52 PM EST Permlink | Stingy Investing |
| "As a buyer of stocks, my preference is clear. I would like to buy stocks at more reasonable valuation, which should enable them to achieve good returns in the years ahead. That means I would prefer to see the market come crashing back down to earth sooner rather than later - provided it doesn't cause too much collateral damage along the way." |
| More Stingy Investing: Companies that lower their share count |
| How to find bargains |
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| Where will the boot land next? |
| 11/17/13 8:36 PM EST Permlink | Taxes |
| "But there is another kind of political risk: the temptation for governments of all political colours to change the rules, whether they relate to tax, the way that companies operate or how markets behave. And that risk has increased significantly since the 2008 crisis." |
| More Taxes: IRS: not good at math |
| Gérard Depardieu, the heroic exile |
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| Paul Krugman's blind spot |
| 11/17/13 8:35 PM EST Permlink | World |
| "Few have written more about the European financial crisis since 2008 than the Nobel laureate, New York Times columnist, and Princeton economics professor Paul Krugman. After five years, it is clear that the eurozone has survived contrary to his predictions and the countries that pursued fiscal discipline, contrary to Krugman's advice, have done better -- both economically and politically -- than those that did not." |
| More World: America has changed the way it measures GDP |
| Why Buffett bailed on India |
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| Confessions of a Quantitative Easer |
| 11/17/13 8:24 PM EST Permlink | Government |
| "Even by the Fed's sunniest calculations, aggressive QE over five years has generated only a few percentage points of U.S. growth. By contrast, experts outside the Fed, such as Mohammed El Erian at the Pimco investment firm, suggest that the Fed may have created and spent over $4 trillion for a total return of as little as 0.25% of GDP (i.e., a mere $40 billion bump in U.S. economic output). Both of those estimates indicate that QE isn't really working." |
| More Government: Obamacare's losers and why they matter |
| Political fear vs technical needs |
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| A clever way to beat the taxman |
| 11/17/13 8:22 PM EST Permlink | Cestnick |
| "Many seniors would like to have the opportunity to claim RRSP deductions even after age 71 when their RRSP is no longer around. You can do this by contributing to a spousal RRSP if your spouse has not yet reached at 71 and still has an RRSP. Or, you can consider a 'senior's overcontribution.'" |
| More Cestnick: Help with unwinding loved one's estate |
| Opening the door to savings |
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