1) Do we still get a personal exemption on Form 1040? 2) Have the taxable income ranges been announced, so we know to which amounts the new brackets apply? I could not find anything. 1. AFAIK, yes; personal exemptions will remain for taxpayers themselves....but NOT for dependents. The increased sta...

I found an EM ETF with 16% China, not 27%. It's FNDE. If I pair it with Meb Faber's EM-like GVAL, I can get the China exposure to 8%. I am concerned China is another central bank and real estate bubble, and their growth stats are all fictions. If I recall correctly EDOG (the S-Network EM Dividend D...

Yes -- all data is from the Simba spreadsheet.  If you have better data and can explain why, I'm all ears!  Send me a PM.  I've also started communicating directly with the guys that update the Simba spreadsheet, and am happy to share your info and get their side as well. FWIW, your note on EM is e...

Tyler, Would there be any chance of adding another asset to your charts:  zero-coupon long term treasury bonds (e.g., EDV or ZROZ)?  You would probably have to do some kind of synthetic calculation to get older data.  I'm not certain on the details of such a calculation, but it may not be very diff...

Following up on some earlier discussions, I now have a tool that will find the set of portfolios with the tamest drawdowns for a given minimum return.  http://portfoliocharts.com/2016/03/07/the-ultimate-portfolio-guide-for-all-types-of-investors/ For kicks, type in a 5.8% return and look at the top...

Using VUSTX mutual fund (long bonds) 1998-2015 Absolute Momentum: CAGR 6.69%, StdDev 8.81%, MaxDD -12.89%, Sharpe 0.41 1998-2015 Buy & Hold: CAGR 6.86%, StdDev 10.26%, MaxDD -16.68%, Sharpe 0.50 Insight: Absolute Momentum doesn't help with Long Bonds over this time period . Bonds are volatile i...

Also, getting back to the risk involved - in a SHTF scenario, could I take a huge hit?  Is anyone aware of a period, say, the past 100 years, in the US where owning a bunch of small rental homes would have done very poorly in regards to cash flow (I'm not worried if the values of the homes dip as l...

D1984, There are 3 different possible contexts for this discussion: 1. treating diabetes (or polycystic ovaries I suppose) 2. short term use for e.g. obesity 3. use by healthy people for anti-aging. Many choices in life come down to risk vs benefit.  If you are diabetic that is very different discu...

http://www.faim.org/diabetes/avoid-the-metformin-bandwagon.html Reub (Benko, or MG, or any of the other supplement experts please feel free to chime in as well), What do you make of the following: http://diabetesupdate.blogspot.com/2013/08/berberine-works-but-may-very-well-be.html Anything to be co...

MG,

What are the parameters you used for this backtest as regards commissions, slippage, and trading costs? How much of a percentage did you assume the commissions and/or trading costs for mutual funds, bonds, and gold were?

todays self off in TLT and treasury's are an example of what you could face if rates continue upward. TLT  was down  the equal to a 300 point drop in the dow . there is a reason many knowledgeable investors are switching to bond funds  with short durations. I have about 10% in vanguard total bond b...

the failure periods for the bengan  study were 1907  1926 1937 and 1965-66. the 4% swr is based on starting your retirement in those  years .  they represent the worst periods to date although the hypothetical y2k retiree is on track to fail .. the difference between bill bengans work and the trini...

Bottom line - maybe it is an excellent razor, maybe it isn't, but I wouldn't buy anything from Porter Stansberry or his associates at all. If what one is selling is good enough to begin with, one doesn't need to hype it and make puffed-up claims about it. You obviously have no real world business e...

http://www.onebladeshave.com/our-story/ Porter Stansberry ?!?!?!? No wonder they are trying to sell us some sort of hyped-up super-duper razor for $300 if this "Porter Stansberry" is the same one I think it is. For those who wonder what I mean by that, Porter Stansberry (if this is indeed ...

researching on internet today, i have found a very interesting tool. Compound Annual Growth Rate (Annualized Return) calculator for sp500 (source: Robert Shiller data base) since 1871. Obviously, SP500 starts in 1926, but maybe they are using other indexes like Down Jones: http://www.moneychimp.com...

we can't do it with pp.  .  gold was not an investment that could be tracked during the actual failure periods in the trinity. but 100% equities had a fine success rate of 93% .  going out to 40 years it beat a 50/50 mix  i posted the chart here earlier. i will try a smalle resize.  is this what yo...

you really can't  compare since we are not japan.  long term even 100% equities has done quite well over every 30 year time frame. Even retirees spending down would have withstood every 30 year time frame since 1926 even if they used 100% equities. diversification historically is like using cash bu...

Laugh all you want...My 65/35/5 is up 2.2% YTD even after yesterdays decline and has been handily thrashing the PP for over 7 years now. I never joke about money and for those solely invested in the permanent portfolio I hope you achieve your retirement with these pathetic gains (or should I say lo...

Another favorite of mine is from Ryan Melvey (melveyr).  http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Olmcg4ieFKg/TbcL7ZRl_5I/AAAAAAAAADM/QF68g7nuKMM/s1600/ppreal.jpg More info here: http://tinyurl.com/otuojkc Good chart but it looks like it ends in 2011...any chance of an updated version out to 2014 or (so far) 2015...

VTCLX is more "tax-managed" in the sense that they try to sell shares as seldom as possible and thus minimize realized long-term and short-term capital gains. They do in fact distribute dividends; see http://finance.yahoo.com/q/hp?s=VTCLX&a=10&b=12&c=2001&d=05&e=29&...

Look, I like what you're doing, matching volatilities.  But to ignore a major singularity like losing the dollar/gold peg, is just not rational.  I'm not ignoring it.  I want to capture it in the data.  It's a real event that happened.  I don't understand why you would want to sweep it under the ru...

Just curious...have you ever done a backtest on an equal weighted (and regularly rebalanced...like every month or every quarter or twice a year) portfolio of US stocks that meet all of the above criteria? I would imagine it could be accomplished in something like Portfolio123; they have data for cr...

Why is this section always dead?  Doesn't anyone trade stocks for a living or side-income? ::) Anyway, the criteria below is the best I've ever seen to consolidate a heck of a lot of fundamental analysis into five simple metrics while still hitting all of the critical spots for selecting elite stoc...

With the whackos and liberals on these boards, in the White House, and in local governments attacking police throughout our land, shootings and deaths of black people have skyrocketed in the past few weeks. How stupid are you? Do black lives still matter to you now? I fail to see the connection bet...

A comment to the SEC (this was made during the public comment period before the actual ETPs were launched) explaining why these things probably won't work as intended:

http://www.sec.gov/comments/sr-nasdaq-2 ... 4065-4.pdf