The social aspect, though, is very real. As bizarre as my approach to life is, pretending that society doesn't have norms is a delusional exercise. Just a quick update.  I've spent the last month in Tlaquepaque, a great little community outside of Guadalajara, MX. I quickly realized that the barefo...

LazyInvestor wrote: Any other issues and tips that one should think about and follow when storing in safe boxes?

Wine vault.

But despite all of this, I have to admit that when the Fed swaps a bond for cash, no dramatic seismic event has taken place. There's nothing about that that kicks off a hyperinflationary wave that will culminate in the dollar's collapse. If I want to be an accurate critic of the government, I owe i...

In case anyone is interested in tax loss harvesting physical, you CAN buy the coins right back because the wash sale rules don't apply.  Gold coins are a collectible, not a security - and there's no ambiguity with that, unlike the situation with a gold ETF. This makes me wonder if one can tax loss ...

Power companies and large agricultural industries use weather futures to hedge their operations. I don't know what the mechanics of investing in them are, but if you could get access to the markets, then it seems like a very direct method of making the type of speculation you are referring to. http:...

You might argue that the concept of property exists within other animal species as well. I think the essential difference though is that with animals, there is no concept of "property rights". If an animal is going to assert claim over something, they must actively defend it. I think that...

"Property is theft. Nobody 'owns' anything. When you die, it all stays here." - George Carlin I'm a huge fan of George Carlin, but this quote continues to bother me. My whippet understands personal property.  He thinks I'm all that and more, but if I grab his chicken leg when he's not exp...

I've never been a huge packrat, but I have recently began becoming more minimalist. I have been going through my possessions and donating/selling/giving away anything I've not touched in over a year. I am working my way through each room. Two weeks ago I probably donated about 80% of my wardrobe. M...

No the ingredient is mineral salts. The package says no aluminum chlohydrate. I think the mechanism whereby these mineral salts work is that they inhibit the bacteria from forming by creating an inhospitable environment. You still sweat but the sweat never has the smell that result from the bacteri...

Mark, Have you thought about these? I wear the with socks sometimes around the office. Not too many funny stares and avoids me stepping in potentially unpleasant things... http://www.invisibleshoe.com/ Yes, I've seen those. When I'm out walking I really don't worry about what is on the ground. Ther...

What kind of an office do you work at? Mid sized engineering firm (About 80 people).  I'm the CTO and one of the founders - so I have a little more leeway than most people might. Seriously though, I dress in standard engineer/manager clothes and with the black socks on it is really not out of place...

I would go barefoot everywhere if it were socially acceptable and the streets werent filthy and covered with things that could cut me. I do go barefoot everywhere.  Have been for years, winter and summer in the Pacific NW.  I walk 2 miles each way to work and back through the industrial part of tow...

Pointedstick wrote: Yes! I love it.

Agreed.

The only thing that would make it better is if it included inflation adjustments.

I assume that it has periodic rebalancing built in. (??)

KevinW wrote: The fees and spreads on Treasuries are extremely small, though, so it's not very significant in practice.

Thank you Kevin.  Much appreciated.
Mark

I have really appreciated this discussion of the relative merits between a 'bullet' and 'barbell' strategy for holding the cash/long bond portion of the PP. I'm now wondering how the dynamic of the 'bullet' approach changes if the bonds are held as a 10 year ladder with an average duration of 5 year...

My model weights based off of the respective rates, so if the market was yielding 15% and the 1 year was yielding 5%, my respective allocation for that year would be 75% equities and 25% 1 year notes. I am genuinely curious as to your reasoning in weighting the allocations proportional to their his...

I have yet to try this, but I've always imagined that an effective (pre-shooting) response would be to hook up your alarm system to a cheap glycerin fog machine, some disco ball lasers and a looped recording that blares: "DENIAL SYSTEM ACTIVATED!  CYANIDE GAS DEPLOYING!" A little peppermin...

You could sell it synthetically, by selling call options. Careful selling call options. You might re-read some of the arguments as to why only non callable bonds are held in the PP.  I know the comparison is not obvious, but you are essentially cutting off upside overshoot with call options and par...

IMO, if one sets the right filters, after defaults one should be able to achieve 10-12% annual returns without all the stock market gyrations. If anyone is seriously considering P2P loans, then I would encourage you to run some scenarios that assume a 50% increased default rate over past history. M...

You want everyone to carry a bag of coins around with them?? I typically carry around a few hundred dollars in folding cash and a buck or two in change.  If I replaced my pocket change with a mix of gold, silver and coppers, I could ditch the folding money whilst carrying the same value and the sam...

Ad Orientem wrote: If you flip a coin once a day for forty years, and every day it come up heads, what are your statistical odds of it coming up tails tomorrow? 50/50.

Or as Fat Tony would say, "That coin’s gotta be loaded. . .”?  and bet appropriately.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludic_fallacy

bud there were days that the PP had all 4 asset classes going up. Why weren't you questioning it then? If all four assets can go up at once, there can be days where they all go down. PP is probably 90% of my available liquid assets, and the cash makes up my emergency fund. Like others have said, it...

Thank you, Wild.
That difference would be notable for me.

I've been curious as to the tax implications of purchasing TLT versus direct bonds. My assumption is that TLT can be treated as capital gains, while at least the coupon portion of the bonds must be treated as interest income. Assuming that everything is held in a taxable account is there a preferenc...

I just bought a little spectral app for my iPhone "SigScope".  You can set the phone on the table and it gives you a real time spectral signature from the audio input.  If you drop a coin nearby you can see immediately see the spectral response.  (Usually 3 well defined peaks).  The signat...