Something that really surprised me was that a recent book written by a young white female urbanite could not be full of SJW garbage. Very refreshing. She actually makes it sound like it's okay to be white, to work hard, and to make money, and that even despite all of that "privilege", thin...

Ordered this book from the library on Kriegsspiel's recommendation. Couldn't hardly put it down. Stayed up until 3 a.m. last night finishing it. Highly recommended, especially for HBPP people.

I will. And I assume it will dispute a lot of the accounts. The problem is, you can easily imagine that's the state of the White House given how he acts in public and on Twitter. On the way Trump operates -- I have had 13 different jobs in almost 30 years of working. I have worked at companies wher...

I read Bob Woodward's book Fear, and assuming his sources and details are accurate... It might be worth reading some critical reviews of Fear and Woodward's other books for additional input, if you haven't already. I will. And I assume it will dispute a lot of the accounts. The problem is, you can ...

Jesus said that only the sick need a physician. If you're not sick, you don't need Him. Very simple.

But that's not what Harry Browne promised us. He said that every single day that stocks go down, gold will go up twice as much. Right? He did say that, didn't he? I'm pretty sure I heard that somewhere.

If December ends today, then we have bigger problems than worrying about which asset to be invested in.

They say that money can't buy happiness.

However, it can buy books ... which is almost the same thing.

You could do worse than starting with some of HB's. Or the Bible. Or both.

Budd, I don't think you get our point. Even Harry Browne wasn't 4 x 25, and he was the inventor of the PP. He was only 4 x 25 for a certain portion of his portfolio -- the portion that he figured was too important to bet on riskier investments. Each PP investor has to figure out for themselves what ...

Cmon guys, this forum has generally been a civil place. Let's keep it that way. Budd, we love you, but your posts CAN be a bit irritating. Day after day, more of the same. We get it, the PP ain't doing so great these days. Believe me, none of us are happy about that. The ones who are happy are the o...

Here's an image from Portfolio Visualizer showing the PP performance vs the S&P 500 for 2000 to 2018 (I hope that worked; I don't show images often): https://ibb.co/nmTHqNJ Actually the PP has a higher CAGR and Sharpe ratio and quite a lower maximum drawdown. Of course, that start date is cherry...

Cortopassi,

Could you extend the start date of your graph back to 1/1/2000 to illustrate to Buddtholomew why some people have a little more faith in the PP than he does?

It's very hard to legislate morality. Big government throws money at problems, but in ways that tend to exacerbate problems rather than helping -- for example, incentivising more births of children into homes without fathers. Hollyweird doesn't help by making morality look passe. Everyone says that ...

Have you actually listened to a whole Trump speech, or just the excerpts provided by the media? Big difference in tone and content.

For me, it's a lot of fun to read what the mainstream media write about Trump's latest speech, basically painting him as the xenophobic, hate-mongering reincarnation of Hitler, and then go find it and actually listen to it, only to be let down again when I just hear him say things that actually soun...

This was for a hypothetical super investor who gets average 15% returns with a 10% standard deviation. I imagine the analysis for say a PP invester who gets average 7% returns with a 5% standard deviation (or whatever) would be pretty similar. In other words, a small majority of days are up over the...

I'm reading "Fooled by Randomness" by Nassim Taleb. He gives a quantitative example of why it's foolish to look at your portfolio very often. Consider a super investor who averages 15% returns annually with a 10% standard deviation. Measured on a yearly basis, he has a 93% chance of a prof...

The question asked a few posts back is a good one. If Central Banks hold almost 20% of the world’s gold and if some of them (like Russia) are stocking up on it, does that tell me as an individual investor that it needs to be a part of my portfolio? Or are their curcumstances different? Not sure if ...

barrett wrote: ↑Mon Nov 19, 2018 2:38 pm Our parents worked hard and lived well within their fairly limited means. That was their main contribution to our understanding of money .

That is the most important lesson to be taught, and is also I think very much in line with Pointed Stick's original post in this thread.

Wish I could help more directly, but I can suggest that you post this over at bogleheads.org in their Personal Consumer Issues section. I think they have a lot more traffic over there, and I suspect you will get more help.

It's clear that many central banks hold a lot of gold. I'm not quite clear on what that means for a personal investor. Should I look at it that if the central banks hold it, then it should be good for me too? Or that the two cases are completely different? And why? For the record, I like gold and ho...

I don't invest some of my money in the PP because of fear. I invest some of my money in the PP because it's smart. It gives reliable real returns under many economic conditions with much lower volatility than most portfolios. It systematizes the process of buying low and selling high, which is the o...

Budd, Have you read any of HB's books or listened to his podcasts to understand why he recommended 25% gold? it's not just about annual returns. BTW, I always enjoy your Buddbursts, both the happy and sad. Glad you are here. As they say, if you weren't here, we would have to invent somebody like you...

That's a great post DragonJoey. You have to understand that Budd only has $13M in his portfolio, so he needs to swing for the fences in order to meet his FI goals. Budd's bitter that he's not getting 15% returns every year, and I'm bitter that I don't have $13M to put into T-bills. I guess the grass...

dualstow wrote: ↑Sat Nov 03, 2018 12:42 pm

@Stuper, I know it’s beside the point, but: 1787.

You know that, and I know that, but do you think the people who I was parodying know that?