April 2020 Client Letter

Last month, I wrote to you about Ben Graham. Graham was a student of psychology and ahead of his time in behavioral economics. He recognized that investors were far from the calculating, perfectly rational actors many economists assumed.

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February 2020 Client Letter

A recurring theme surfaced as I was counseling several clients last week: how to maintain a consistent level of comfort with their money during retirement. If you are in or approaching retirement, you are keenly aware that the gig is up in terms of future earning potential.

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January 2020 Client Letter

Last year completed our 30th year providing investment counsel to investors like you who are retired or saving for retirement. As many of you are aware, the foundation of our investment strategy was formed by my dad during decades of researching and writing financial newsletters.

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December 2019 Client Letter

They will probably rise. Our forecast (it’s a guess really) is favorable not only because stocks rise in seven out of every ten years, but also because election years have historically been good for stocks…

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November 2019 Client Letter

For investors who may be new to dividend investing, a tempting first place to look for ideas is with the highest-yielding dividend stocks. If dividends are the goal, the assumption is bigger dividends are better than smaller dividends.

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October 2019 Client Letter

Several years ago, the Wall Street Journal reported the investment success of Vermont resident Ronald Read. The story recounted how Read accumulated an estate valued at almost $8 million.

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September 2019 Client Letter

It’s easy to declare a recession is on the horizon. The economy, like the markets, is cyclical, and eventually, our economy will go from a growth path to one of contraction…

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August 2019 Client Letter

On August 15, the 10-year Treasury note offered a yield of 1.52%. The S&P 500 offered a yield of 1.83% and the NASDAQ composite a measly 0.97%. Think those yields are low? More than $15 trillion of government bonds worldwide now trade at negative yields, with 10-year German government bonds recently hitting a low of -0.71%.

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July 2019 Client Letter

You may have concerns about today’s environment and how a variety of risks could impact the long-term health of your finances. One of the biggest concerns we all face is interest rates that have been so low for so long.

Jim Grant writes in his Grant’s Interest Rate Observer newsletter, “almost $13 trillion in debt world-wide is priced to yield less than nothing. Mostly, it’s just a little less than nothing, but, still, a little less than nothing isn’t much to retire on.” He calls this a 4,000-year low in bond yields.

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June 2019 Client Letter

The first half of 2019 is over, and the current investment environment appears more uncertain today than it was at this time last year. While it’s difficult to judge how the remainder of the year will play out, we’ve decided to hand out letter grades to some of the current storylines that may impact financial markets and your investment portfolio.

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