Retirement Watch Weekly
A Case Against Private Equity Investing
Private equity is investing in companies that aren’t publicly-traded. Many pension funds and endowments have allocations to private equity, though the Fairfax County fund I’ve been affiliated with doesn’t. There are good reasons we aren’t in private equity. This article does a good job explaining them. I mention this because the latest wrinkle in private […]
Government Acts Against Those Scamming Seniors
Governments at all levels have been warning about frauds against seniors for years. On Thursday, the Department of Justice announced that a group of agencies had been working together and was taking big action. It filed charges against more than 250 alleged perpetrators of financial frauds against seniors. The charges also described the scams used […]
The Revocable Living Trust “Transition Strategy”
Last week, we reviewed the pros and cons of the Power of Attorney and Revocable Living Trust (click here for Part 1). For retirees who choose the revocable living trust, it’s important to understand all the options available. For starters, after identifying your trusted person, establish a revocable living trust naming the person as current […]
Investing Half Your Assets in Emerging Markets
Jeremy Grantham, a founder of GMO, says that he’s so optimistic about the returns of emerging markets in coming years that he’s telling his kids to put more than half their retirement assets in emerging market stocks. Grantham’s made it clear over the last year or so that the best opportunities in global markets are […]
Best Places to Retire: The Trouble With Surveys
When I discuss how to decide where to live in retirement, I recommend that people not pay much attention to surveys and rankings. I’ve seen many of them over the years. While they’re interesting, a survey ranking doesn’t help an individual make a decision. You probably don’t give factors the same priority or weighting as […]
The Dog That Didn’t Bark
What was a unique feature of the recent stock market sell- off? Give yourself a prize if you said the limited action in the bond market, especially high-yield and corporate bonds. High-yield bonds are correlated more with equities than with government bonds, so when stocks have a correction, there’s usually a jump in high-yield bond […]
Social Security Underpays Widowed Beneficiaries
For the second time in four years and third time since 2008, the Social Security Office of the Inspector General concluded that the agency is significantly underpaying benefits to widowed beneficiaries. The latest report found that it doesn’t tell surviving spouses that they can apply for survivor’s benefits before age 70 and delay receipt of […]
Stock Market Bubbles – The Tulip Mania Revised
Most people who’ve done any reading on investing have come across the Dutch Tulip Bulb Mania of the 1630s. It often is considered to be the first financial bubble and the classic example of manias, financial delusions, and other mental mistakes. This article says that everything we’ve been told about the tulip mania is wrong. […]
