Rebalancing With Cash Flows
With stocks continuing to enjoy a roaring bull market, rebalancing is on the minds of many investors—or at least it should be. Disciplined investing starts with choosing long-term targets for the asse [...]
Ask the Spud: Is There an Optimal Portfolio?
Q: I’m new to passive investing and am deciding how to allocate between the asset classes. The best split between Canadian equity, international equity, etc. should be determinable based on studies of [...]
A Periodic Review of Diversification
After the financial crisis of 2008–09, financial commentators loved to take shots at “old school” investment strategies. First came the declarations that diversification no longer works, because durin [...]
Calculate Your Personal Rate of Return
On January 9, I published the 2013 returns of my model portfolios. The equity markets performed spectacularly last year, but most investors are likely to be far more interested in the performance of t [...]
The Failed Promise of Market Timing
I’ve long believed the most difficult part of being a Couch Potato investor is resisting temptation. Index investors are asked to be content with market returns, but they are bombarded daily by fund c [...]
How Not to Prepare for a Bear Market in Bonds
The risk of rising interest rates has become an obsession in the financial media. Those risks are undeniably real: it’s quite possible that broad-based bond funds will see multiple years with negative [...]
Deep Thoughts on Diversification
Just shy of two years ago—in October 2011—I wrote a post that laid out the year-to-date returns for the Complete Couch Potato portfolio. If you can remember that far back, the third quarter of 2011 wa [...]
Seeing Diversification in Action
Why should you add multiple asset classes to your portfolio? That seems like a simple question, but it’s one many investors would answer with only a vague comment about “more diversification.” It’s mo [...]
Why Diversification is a Piece of Cake
After almost four years of false alarms, the bond bears are finally able to act smug. Broad-based Canadian bond index funds have fallen in price about 4% or so in since the beginning of May. Meanwhile [...]
Understanding Floating-Rate Notes
By now every serious investor understands the consequences rising interest rates will have on bond portfolios. For more than four years we’ve been reminded that when rates go up, bond prices fall—and [...]
