Despite increasing pressure to slash debt and rebuild retirement funds, nearly two-thirds of consumers do not have a written financial plan, according to the 2009 National Consumer Survey on Personal Finance. The survey, released today by the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, found that 64% of respondents do not have a written financial plan [...]
Tag Archives: Diversify
Two-Thirds Don’t Have a Financial Plan
Posted in Home Also tagged 529, asset allocation, College Savings, Educational Planning, Financial Goals, Investments, Investor Behavior, Retirement Planning Comments closed
We (Still) Believe in Modern Portfolio Theory
There has been a lot of talk about the demise of Modern Portfolio Theory. We still believe in Modern Portfolio Theory. Modern portfolio theory is concerned with controlling risk (risk management) for the whole portfolio by allocation among asset classes that in themselves may be volatile (and correspondingly have higher returns), but whose returns are [...]
Modern Portfolio Theory
Modern portfolio theory suggests that a basic element in diversification of risk (with risk defined as the variation of actual returns around an expected return) is allocating the assets in an investment portfolio among categories of investments whose statistical performance correlations to each other are relatively low (or even with no correlation or negative correlation). [...]
Lessons from the Madoff Scandal
Unfortunately, we are all now too familiar with Bernie Madoff, the once-storied hedge fund manager who was running nothing more than a $50 Billion Ponzi scheme. Undoubtedly, the size and depth of this scandal will bring about needed regulation, but what can the individual investor do now to protect themselves from investment scams? A few suggested guidelines [...]