My Misguided Quest to Beat the Market
During my first 15 years as a professional investor, I fully believed it was possible to identify individual securities through fundamental research that would outperform the market. That commitment to seeking alpha is the one investment decision I would most...
Currency Hedging? Individual Investors Shouldn’t Bother
As it has been so frequently noted in the financial press, last year the U.S. dollar appreciated significantly against most foreign currencies, including the widely quoted benchmark euro. For investors with a portion of their portfolio in unhedged international stocks,...
Why Individual Investors Shouldn’t Read Earnings Reports
During the years I worked as a buy-side equity analyst and an institutional portfolio manager, the first item I would always examine in an earnings report were the footnotes. That’s where all the truly juicy information appeared, and it never...
How Economics and Literature Made Me a Better Investor
When I look back at the courses in high school and college that were most influential in my financial life, it’s a dead-even heat between economics (expected, right?) and English (whoa, come again?). At Wellesley College, there is an iconic...
