My recent post on the Efficient Market Hypothesis brought about the usual pushback from “passive” index fund advocates. As an advocate of low fee indexing I find this debate incredibly [ … ]
Category: Investment Strategy
Why The Efficient Market Hypothesis is Useless
I noticed Noah Smith and John Authers on Twitter discussing how great the Efficient Market Hypothesis is because it explains why indexing works. I responded saying that the EMH really has [ … ]
What if There Are no Reliable Factors?
I’ve always been bothered by the notion of “factor investing”. In case you don’t know, factor investing is derived from Eugene Fama’s various factor models (which have expanded over time [ … ]
Indexing Really is the Future of Investing
John Bogle presented at this year’s Grant’s Spring Conference and made the argument for indexing as the way forward for investors. You can find his presentation slides here. Jim Grant [ … ]
Did Ben Graham Understand the Difference Between Active & Passive Investing?
Jason Zweig has a great article in the Journal this week about Ben Graham and indexing. He says that Ben Graham would have supported indexing. And yes, Graham didn’t say [ … ]
The Poor Performance of “Active” Managers Neither Proves nor Disproves Market “Efficiency”
My recent Three Things post on market efficiency caused quite a stir in my email inbox. For instance, someone writes in: “Fama and the EMHers are being proven right by [ … ]
Beware the “Passive” Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing
The dirtiest trend on Wall Street these days isn’t hedge funds or ponzi schemes. It’s high fee “passive indexers” who are passing themselves off as something different from “active managers”. I’ve [ … ]
Problems with “The Long-Term”
John Maynard Keynes once famously said “In the long-run we are all dead”. But the full quote doesn’t often get hashed out. Keynes said: “But this long run is a [ … ]
Not Your Father’s 60/40
Research Affiliates has a good piece out that touches on the future difficulty of owning a 60/40 stock/bond portfolio. They predict that a 60/40 will generate a measly 1.2% in [ … ]