Portfolio Building

The dollar is on the rise, and with it comes underappreciated consequences.

The extreme volatility from November 26 to December 3 caused many clients to panic. By using deep analytics, advisors can illustrate that this episode – and others like it – were not that unusual.

Investors have no idea the most considerable risk to their portfolio is if the Fed cannot continue to be a market magician.

While I’m a huge proponent of passive and factor investing, the argument that direct indexing is akin to active management is imprecise.

This article contrasts the valuations and environments now and in 2000 to ask if it's time to leave the party or stay and rock on. I provide a statistical analysis showing the downside risk facing the S&P 500.

The financial services field is one of the most regulated in the U.S. Our regulations are as complex as those in the medical field. This makes sense; our health and our money are two important pillars of wellbeing. Preventing harm to either can be a matter of life and death.

It was another tough week in a brutal year for bears. Despite being right about many aspects of inflation, monetary policy and the persistence of the coronavirus, equity bears who were expecting anything to put a meaningful brake on the stock market were again denied.

Regardless of which side of the aisle you are on, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act affects everyone financially and mentally, and advisors should prepare client money and minds for this historic (albeit non-transformational) event.

The economy is at maximum employment. Inflation is running red hot and increasingly showing signs it is persistent. Having neglected one mandate and largely fulfilled the other, why is the Fed so slow to reduce asset purchases and unwilling to contemplate hiking interest rates?

If easy money is the bedrock of valuations and the Fed is getting ready to shift the bedrock, investors best pay attention to market forecasts and how the Fed ultimately acts.

In this interview, Kevin Knowles and Nick Zylkowski discuss Russell Investments’ Personalized Managed Accounts (PMA) program, a suite of advisor-sold customized SMAs that support tax-loss harvesting and ESG mandates.

Is the Fed’s aggressive policy, which purposely goes against its mandate, hiding something?

Dubious debts are back again after the pandemic, and so is Elizabeth Warren, who’s renewing efforts to keep private equity firms from forcing new loans on companies they own to extract dividends that they can’t afford.

Given record profit margins and valuations, there is little upside, especially if inflation remains problematic. Throw stagflation into the formula, and the outlook is bleak.

BlackRock Inc. said active investors have an opportunity to beat the market by digging deeper into information about the sustainability of companies.

Volatile, pandemic-riven markets for stocks and bonds has Wall Street ready — again — to declare the traditional 60/40 portfolio split a dead strategy. The prospect of a low-growth, high-inflation economy (stagflation) dims the prospects of both investment categories, and certainly demands a rethink of where to stash your savings.

One of the most influential financial planning organizations I participate in doesn't officially exist.

If 60/40 portfolios had a mind of their own, they would perhaps feel like Mark Twain when he read his own premature obituary.

As Mark Twain might have put it, the demise of debt’s value within the long-favored 60-40 stock-bond diversified portfolios is greatly exaggerated -- when you adjust for risk.

For planners, no forecast is more critical than whether inflation will be transitory or long-lasting. One perilous path that will lead to permanent inflation is continued fiscal spending aimed to boost consumer demand.

The recent synchronized selloff in equities and Treasuries was likely just the beginning of what’s to come for the popular 60/40 stock-bond portfolio strategy, a growing chorus of Wall Street strategists warn.

Just because pandemic inflation is transitory doesn’t mean it’s going away anytime soon.

The battle between mutual funds and exchange-traded funds is over. ETFs won.

I explore the essential factors that drive bond yields and assess whether the recent increase in yields is a buying opportunity or foreshadows even higher rates.

The record surge in commodities has intensified investor angst that inflation could upend what has been a Goldilocks period for many markets.

The Federal Reserve is planning to tighten credit even as forecasts call for U.S. economic growth to slow and the recent high inflation rates to recede.

Data from Vanguard shows that advisors have increased allocations to passive, low-cost investment products. But they also increased allocations to commodities and timed markets poorly, particularly after the March 2020 crash.

If the U.S. and other countries sit idly by, we may look back at today as a turning point in global economic affairs. The U.S. does not have to cede economic growth. But it must readapt capitalistic logic, which, ironically, China is slowly grasping.

Even a choppy September hasn’t changed a key measure of 2021’s bullish tone: only twice in the last 20 years have more S&P 500 stocks headed into the fourth quarter with gains for the year.

Cathie Wood sold a near $270 million stake in Tesla Inc. as the bond selloff hit rate-sensitive technology stocks to spur outflows from her growth-focused funds.

Democrats hit a wall in their high-stakes effort to simultaneously avert a government shutdown, avoid a debt default and advance President Joe Biden’s $4 trillion agenda, as feuding gripped lawmakers and a looming economic catastrophe shook markets.

When AC Milan host Atletico de Madrid in the Champions League on Tuesday evening, it will be a clash between Italy’s most successful team in Europe’s elite soccer competition and last year’s Spanish title winner.

A key Democratic lawmaker said a detailed, final agreement to restore the federal deduction for state and local taxes could be reached this week, with another advocate flagging a temporary repeal of the break’s limit as the likely proposal.

After already registering the worst monthly losses in almost a year so far in September, little relief appears in sight for investors adhering to the 60/40 stock-bond portfolio strategy.

Understanding inflation beyond the headlines helps us answer the all-important question: How transitory is transitory? From there, we can assess potential Fed and market reactions.

After languishing at historical lows for the better part of the last decade, uranium suddenly came back from the dead.

Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s new investment fund is flush, courtesy of some of the same Middle Eastern countries he courted closely when he was one of the most powerful U.S. financial regulators.

There’s a fallacy among advisors that selecting a platform partner is an either/or proposition: a TAMP or an open-architecture solution. There is a middle ground. Some describe it as a “full-service portfolio management platform.” The team at SEI calls it a Techstodian^SM.

Using a risk tolerance questionnaire to establish a retirement income strategy is akin to your doctor checking your pulse to measure your cholesterol. There is nothing wrong with checking your pulse, but it is an inappropriate test for the situation. We propose an alternative test – the RISA – to select the best deaccumulation approach.

House Democrats’ plan to limit a favorite tax break for private equity -- but not do away with it entirely as President Joe Biden had proposed -- is more restrictive than it first appeared, according to investment advisers and attorneys who’ve examined the details of the proposal.

Cathie Wood’s exchange-traded funds sold $66 million of Tesla Inc. shares Tuesday and picked up more Robinhood Markets Inc. as the retail broker’s dismal stock market performance continues.

Many Fed members are vocal about tapering soon, but the Fed has not backed their words with action. Might the Fed be speaking loudly but carrying a feather?

After vaulting up the ranks of the U.S. exchange-traded fund leaderboard, Ark Investment Management is starting to slip.

Dimensional Fund Advisors converted two more of its equity mutual funds into exchange-traded vehicles, further boosting the quant giant’s heft in the $6.8 trillion arena.

Applying a relatively single-indicator trend-following strategy is an excellent way to obtain meaningful exposure to the overall market with significantly lower downside risk and higher long-term risk-adjusted returns.

There are vast inconsistencies between the stated climate objectives of money managers and “the reality of their investments.”

When American Campus Communities Inc. announced the signing of a $1 billion sustainability-linked credit line in May, its executives decided to take a victory lap.

With a 30% contribution to CPI, shelter prices are prone to boost CPI higher in the months ahead. It seems like a logical conclusion, but is it?

On August 24 and 25, we held our second annual Thought Leader Summit. Here is a short summary of each session and a link to watch the replay for CE credits.

A little more than a week ago financial markets appeared on the edge of a precipice, about to be overwhelmed by the delta variant’s insidious spread and the plateauing economic recovery.

Put simply, the climate crisis represents the “biggest market failure of all time.”

Those on Wall Street and the Fed do not see the debt elephant in the room. Even worse, they see it but ignore that perpetuating the problem serves their interests best.

Want to know where the world’s biggest technology stocks are heading? Just watch one of the oldest measures there is: the bond market.

We provide a practical definition of the ideal personalized risk-free asset, and then we’ll discuss how to construct an efficient portfolio when that ideal asset doesn’t exist in investable form.