Learning Center

Your Spending Choices Often Reflect Your Values

Date20 Jul 2015

Comment0

I have a crazy idea I want to run by you. Imagine that a cultural anthropologist finds one of your credit card statements in 100 years. What would your spending suggest you value the most? Based on your spending, what assumptions might someone make about how you live your life? Our credit card statements (really,...

Reputation And Venture Capital

Date20 Jul 2015

Comment0

Last week, we recapped some of the more recent literature on the performance of private equity, and venture capital (VC) in particular. The cumulative body of evidence, we found, was damning with regard to venture capital’s ability to provide better returns than comparable—and less risky—publicly traded equities. We left off with a review of a...

2015’s ‘Sure Things’ At Halftime

Date20 Jul 2015

Comment0

Every January, I put together a list of predictions that financial “gurus” have made for the upcoming year, especially the ones that gain consensus as “sure things.” Through a series of periodic updates, I keep track of whether these “sure thing” forecasts actually came to pass. The turn of the calendar into July means it’s...

Budgeting Knows No Boundaries: A Guide for the Wealthy

Date20 Jul 2015

Comment0

“You don’t really do this stuff—do you?” The question came from a major network anchor after the camera stopped rolling. The topic was budgeting. He certainly isn’t obtuse, and he wasn’t being patronizing or condescending. It was a legitimate question that accurately reflects the underlying perception held by most people in any demographic–that budgeting is...

The Wrong Place and Time to Have a Money Conversation

Date13 Jul 2015

Comment0

A few weeks ago, I got home late after a long trip. I’d been traveling a lot recently and didn’t sleep well that night. The next morning, I woke up and felt like I’d been hit by a truck. Emotionally, I was at a really low point. When I came downstairs that morning, I asked...

Poor Active Performance Persists

Date13 Jul 2015

Comment0

The midyear 2015 Standard & Poor’s Indices Versus Active (SPIVA) persistence scorecard for U.S. equity markets provides yet another example of why—at least when it comes to the overall results of active management relative to their appropriate benchmarks—the past can, in fact, be considered prologue. Here are some of the highlights from the report: Of...

What Mountain Climbing Can Teach You About Business

Date13 Jul 2015

Comment0

When we think of mountain climbing, we tend to think of Mount Everest and big groups of people climbing in long lines. Armies of Sherpas create base camps and ferry supplies and gear up and down the mountain. Miles of rope anchored to the mountainside helps climbers reach the top. For a very long time,...

Gurus Trip Over Bond/Stock Correlation

Date13 Jul 2015

Comment0

A good number of Wall Street “gurus” have, for quite some time now, been loudly and repeatedly warning investors that bond yields will soar. That, they caution, will in turn lead to falling stock prices. Unfortunately, this bit of “conventional wisdom” regarding the relationship between stocks and bonds may have led many investors to panic...

Learning Center

Categories