Lately, I’ve heard a few references to Dalbar’s measure of how much retail investors underperform the investments they hold due to poor behaviour.  I suspect that if the people making these references understood how Dalbar calculates this measure, they’d be embarrassed at having mentioned it.  There can be legitimate academic debate about the best way to measure inv...

Spending from retirement savings, or decumulation, in a way that maximizes what you have left to spend after taxes is surprisingly complex.  I’ve done extensive simulations of various strategies for my situation, including strategies that change over time, to find what works best for me.  Here I describe how I’m managing my RRSP in retirement, but it’s important to ...

In his book The 5 Types of Wealth, Sahil Bloom makes the case that there is more to life than money, and that it is a mistake to sacrifice too much to get more money.  To most of us, this is so obvious that it’s not worth saying.  But a minority of us need to think about this message.

Bloom lists the 5 types of wealth as “time, people, purpose, health,...

A recent Morningstar podcast gave me yet another reason to stay away from private equity.  Episode 357 of The Long View is an interview with Leyla Kunimoto who “is the founder and editor of Accredited Investor Insights, a newsletter that helps investors navigate private markets.”  Among other interesting insights, Kunimoto explained how the practical e...

The 2025 investment return for my overall portfolio measured in Canadian dollars was 13.7%, which is below my 2025 benchmark return of 16.0%.  There are two main reasons for this difference.  The first is that we made a large financial gift, and the timing of our stock sale to raise cash for this gift was unlucky.  

The second reason is my decision ...