Articles (130)

At least one hedge fund manager has resorted to sending a message of distress to investors via ...Read More

With technology bellwethers Apple and Amazon becoming America's first companies with market capitalizations surpassing $1 trillion, blue chip domestic stocks turned in banner performances in 2018's third quarter. Robust economic growth and corporate profits overshadowed jitters ...Read More

As part of our ongoing series on IFA's investment process, we look at how our analysts screen between different types of ...Read More

SALT caps make tax-free bonds a timely conversation. But higher returns court a certain amount of ...Read More

It's almost Election Day in the US once again. For those who need a brief civics refresher, every two years the full US House of Representatives and one-third of the Senate are up for reelection. While the outcomes of the elections are uncertain, one thing we can count on ...Read More

"Sellers were out in force on the market today after negative news on the economy." It's a common line in TV finance reports. But have you ever wondered who is buying if so many people are ...Read More

Active managers see a new election cycle as screaming for change. Our research, however, warns against 'shooting from the ...Read More

The job of a free market is to set prices so investors are rewarded for the risk they take. Here's a breakdown showing how prices reflect the uncertainty of expected ...Read More

Tax reform is seen by industry analysts as fueling adoption of these types of tradtional retirement ...Read More

Key options exist for handling required minimum distributions (RMD), including tax rules impacting qualified charitable ...Read More

Reports cite complaints that bank's wealth management unit is pushing riskier investments and cross-selling banking ...Read More

Determining the best use of these tax-friendly options can prove crucial to boosting your retirement ...Read More

Discounts and tailored loans are some of the services that our planning network can access through other large financial ...Read More

Dimensional's co-head of research explains how best to track and quantify the premium investors gain from tilting to value ...Read More

This popular tech tool, which clients can utilize for free, is part of an enhanced IFA financial planning ...Read More

Diversification is important not just in terms of investing, but also in developing a well-rounded and comprehensive financial ...Read More

A new study by Wharton researchers compares 16-plus years of returns for the TV star's AAP portfolio, which spotlights many of his top ...Read More

Trying to take advantage of the benefits of diversification, purveyors of liquid alts are going wild. But don't believe all of the ...Read More

Advisors offering fiduciary services to 401(k) and 403(b) plans aren't all the same. In fact, they come in two distinct ...Read More

New research by DFA confronts head-on whether the value premium is fading. Analysts crunch 90 years worth of data to gain a better ...Read More

As global trade tensions rose, investors kept buying shares of domestic companies. But foreign stocks fell into the red for the quarter and ...Read More

Such an asset protection strategy often needs to be extended to a wider swath of home and investment property owners than initially ...Read More

As part of IFA's ongoing series breaking down how active managers at major fund complexes are actually doing compared to their indexes, we've put through our microscope Principal Financial ...Read More

Now paired with eMoney, MGP offers our clients greater flexibility in working with their IFA advisors to build comprehensive financial ...Read More

New research by IFA and DFA show how portfolios can be bolstered to take advantage of market-cap size in good times and ...Read More

Active bond fund managers had little success in beating their respective indexes, based on net returns studied over a nearly 16-year ...Read More

Experts warn that cryptorcurrencies like Bitcoin bring out investors’ worst behavior, even more so than actively trading in ...Read More

Pope Francis’ latest bulletin calls for increased accountability from financial service ...Read More

S&P data show that while rising economic tides lifted all boats last year, actively managed funds still couldn't overcome indexing's long-term ...Read More

The complexities of implementing and executing 401(k) and 403(b) plans keep expanding. For plans advised by IFA, we're stressing a back-to-basics ...Read More

LPL Financial, which works with thousands of active advisors, is hit again about sales practices of highly illiquid investment ...Read More

A new Mutual Fund Landscape study by DFA piles up more data showing how active management is a losing proposition in both good times and ...Read More

Investors continue to sue their corporate 401(k) and 403(b) retirement plans. The latest, involving Principal Financial Group, is a reminder of how closely passive investing and fiduciary advice need to go ...Read More

New research finds that in order to significantly increase income replacement rates to live comfortably in retirement, today's savers would be well-served by working with an investment ...Read More

The power of portfolio diversification showed in the initial three months of 2018. While blue chip U.S. stocks took a step back, IFA's indexes tracking emerging markets surged ahead in the first ...Read More

Caution: Technical Discussion to Follow—READ AT YOUR OWN RISK. As the old saying goes, there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. It is true data can be tortured with statistical tools that will make it confess to almost anything. On the other hand, ...Read More

A group of 13 large active managers have agreed to suppy data about how closely funds track their indexes. Overall, closet indexers are expected to top $1.3 trillion in ...Read More

The financial advice industry has a dark secret, one that costs global investors dearly every year. In a wide-ranging Q&A, IFA Founder Mark Hebner talks about these and other money management potholes that investors should avoid and how to do ...Read More

Transferring my portfolio to IFA didn’t come without a bit of angst. It gave this reformed journalist a chance to snoop around. Here's what I ...Read More

Professional performers might be successful in the spotlight, but advisor warns that a new set of skills is necessary to manage any newfound wealth. What to keep in ...Read More

The U.S. retirement plan marketplace keeps evolving. Just ask Shareen Balkey, who sees such changes in 401(k) plans and the like as boosting the need for true fiduciaries to help both plan participants and ...Read More

I was trained as a journalist to approach any type of speculative claim with a high degree of skepticism. But it took years of sifting through a wealth of academic research and market evidence for me to finally make a career change. In all honesty, it's just become too apparent ...Read More

Each year, fund managers randomly land in one of four performance quartiles. And, every year, Standard and Poor's issues its annual Persistence Scorecard, tracking the past and subsequent performance of those managers. One of the uses of the study is to track how winning ...Read More

Embarking on a financial plan is like sailing around the world. The voyage won’t always go to plan, and there’ll be rough seas. But the odds of reaching your destination increase greatly if you are prepared, flexible, patient, and well-advised. A mistake many ...Read More

Great-West Financial is a subsidiary of Great-West Life, Co. (TSX: GWO), which itself is a subsidiary of Power Financial Corp. (TSX: POW) based out of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Great-West Financial is the American market for Great-West Life, Co.’s, selling its investment, ...Read More

Despite a push by regulators to raise legal standards for how brokers work with investors, misdeeds keep popping up in the public record. The latest development is that the Securities and Exchange Commission has settled with Ameriprise Financial Services over allegations the ...Read More

Markets have been up and down this year, which can be hard for many investors to live with. During periods like these, hearing stories about how other people deal with uncertainty can be helpful. My friend Dave Goetsch is an executive producer of The Big Bang Theory. Even though ...Read More

As advocates for passive investing, it is a common question amongst clients and prospects about why our 100 IFA Index Portfolios utilize strategies from Dimensional Fund Advisors versus better-known passive fund companies such as Vanguard or iShares. The answer is quite simple: ...Read More

To pique the interest of investors, the financial media often features stories about the hidden dangers in the market—and index funds have been a recurring topic lately. According to some stories, the rising popularity of indexing has distorted prices because fewer shares ...Read More

In 2017, we were again reminded of the importance of following an investment approach based on discipline and diversification vs. prediction and ...Read More

Once again in quarter four of 2017, markets delivered positive results across all major asset classes to close out the year.  While International Developed Markets fell behind the performance of U.S. Domestic Equities when comparing quarter three with quarter four; Emerging ...Read More

In light of all this market volatility over the last few days, we wanted to remind you of the benefits of being a buy and hold ...Read More

After a period of relative calm in the markets, in recent days the increase in volatility in the stock market has resulted in renewed anxiety for many investors. From February 1–5, the US market (as measured by the Russell 3000 Index) fell almost 6%, resulting in many ...Read More

Throughout 2017, the S&P 500 Index recorded 62 new closing highs in 251 days of trading. In the first three weeks of January 2018 alone, the index crossed 10 new record closing highs in 13 days of trading. With stock indices continuing to set new highs, does this mean ...Read More

“Reversion to the mean,” Jack Bogle once said, “is the iron rule of financial markets.” And if you understand nothing else about how investing works, grasping this one simple concept will give you a better chance of succeeding at it than supposedly ...Read More

Prudential Financial is a Fortune 500 company based out of Newark, New Jersey. Traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: PRU), Prudential Financial employs over 49,000 people across 40 countries, offers insurance products, wealth management, fund management, and retirement ...Read More

“I have found that the importance of having an investment philosophy—one that is robust and that you can stick with— cannot be overstated.” – David Booth The US stock market has delivered an average annual return of around 10% since 1926.[1] ...Read More

Imagine you’re at a village fête, and you decide to have a go at guessing the number of jelly beans in a jar. How confident would you be of guessing exactly right or, say within one or two of the actual number? Chances are, it’s a bit of a long ...Read More

Recently, we received a question from a client that we will paraphrase as follows: “While I know that the returns I have gotten from index funds have beaten the majority of active managers, would I not have been better off in funds like the Fairholme Fund (FAIRX) or the ...Read More