Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate mostly because I'm nowhere near informed enough about your particular circumstances to make any really meaningful suggestions. My guesstimates in that direction would be of little value. Your special circumstances should dominate any recommended investment.
Offering financial advice is hazardous duty for those offering the advice, and even more hazardous for those accepting and acting on it. The pitfalls are numerous and potentially deadly to wealth accumulation or protection. I'm sure you will assess that advice with considerable caution.
Everyone has their own set of goals and timeframes. These must be carefully defined before an investment action plan can be generated.
I'm equally sure that the advice offered here is well intentioned. But how good is it? That's a tough question to assess. The credentials and experience of those offering the advice is unknown. The time the responder committed to address your question is similarly unknown. The issue is complex enough that some deep thinking time is really mandatory.
The recommendations were likely to reflect the investments that the responder has himself already exercised. The danger here is that a fair assessment of active investments is troublesome because most folks have difficulty judging these investments fairly. They overestimate the positive aspects and underestimate its shortcomings. That's a very common human bias.
These are some of the reasons I don't seek Internet advice. The information one can collect on the Net is most needed as an integral part of the decision making process. All that information can be overwhelming. But the bottomline is that the final investment decision is your responsibility. The good news is that changes can always be made to adjust for the dynamics of the marketplace.
- Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate ...
- Offering financial advice is hazardous duty for those offering the advice, and even more hazardous for those accepting and acting on it. The pitfalls are numerous and potentially deadly to wealth accumulation or protection.
- ... the advice offered here is well intentioned. (But) the credentials and experience of those offering the advice is unknown.
- The danger here is that a fair assessment of active investments is troublesome because most folks have difficulty judging (their) investments fairly. They overestimate the positive aspects and underestimate its shortcomings.
- These are some of the reasons I don't seek Internet advice.
@MJG: I've edited your overly sanctimonious reply and your distorted portrayal of a recent discussion thread a bit to capture its essence. I trust that in so doing I haven't altered your intent.
1. Go back and read the question @Puddenhead initially posed: What would you do ... ?. I took that as a bit of a brain teaser put out there to evoke a spirited discussion of various options - not a call for advice. Can't speak for others, but I for one wouldn't have responded to the post had I felt Puddenhead were seeking personal investment advice.
2. Do you seriously believe anyone of sound mind would seek and than act on advice on investing $100,000 based on a few anonymous comments offered on a discussion board? I give @Puddenhead a lot more credit than you appear to.
3. Didn't the time-frame for this $100,000 investment sound a bit "fishy" to you? 6.5 months? Frankly, I'm not aware of any good options for investing money over such a short period as Puddenhead specified. Seems to me that's what the many respondents said - each in his own way.
4. As I've often stated in this forum: I'm not qualified to give investment advice. My education is liberal arts. I've never had an investment/business class in my life (but with great effort have mastered the calculator). Often I state my lack of qualifications clearly when responding to queries from other posters. Somehow (see points #1, 2, 3) it didn't seem necessary in this case.
I did share an investment option I elected recently - qualifying it in numerous ways as probably not being the best or only alternative, and definitely not intended to constitute a recommendation. (Let's assume Puddenhead can read.) If you feel it wrong or inadvisable for members to share their own personal investment choices, than make that clear. Such a prohibition would certainly allow more time devoted to the time-worn questions of the attractiveness of index investing, doing MonteCarlo simulations, and the poor record amassed by forecasting gurus.
Wow!!!! There's a huge pile of emotion and venom in your reply to my post. I hope your venting of that emotion gave you some peace.
You did not properly capture the essence of my reply. I fail to see the correlation between what you posted and what I posted. Your ill-tempered submittal puzzles me greatly.
Why the antagonisms? I made what I believed were innocuous general observations. They were NOT directed at you or anyone else on MFO. A ton of bad investment advice is given everywhere. I'm sure that comment shocked no one on this board.
I made no claims about MFO board members intelligence or knowledge. I made no claims about the magnitude of the investment sums quoted; for some it is a major investment while for others it is a small matter. I did not take an obvious opportunity to once again extol the virtues of Monte Carlo analysis for the question quoted although that tool would help the decision making process
Your posting reveals much about your hard feelings towards me. Why? You seem to harbor a grudge because I often propose Monte Carlo analysis for some investment decision making. In the past, others have expressed similar reservations about that tool. That's okay by me. To each his own poison.
I suggest that you're wasting your time "editing" my submittals. They are not worth the effort, and I guarantee you that I will not change in my advocacy for Monte Carlo analysis. Just to irritate you a little more, here is a second Link to an easy to use, free Monte Carlo simulator:
MJG: Here's the edited version of your earlier post again. If my editing (for brevity) somehow distorted your intended meaning please explain. (I won't waste time responding to your other spurlous allegations.)
MJG said: - Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate
- Offering financial advice is hazardous duty for those offering the advice, and even more hazardous for those accepting and acting on it. The pitfalls are numerous and potentially deadly to wealth accumulation or protection.
- ... the advice offered here is well intentioned. (But) the credentials and experience of those offering the advice is unknown.
- The danger here is that a fair assessment of active investments is troublesome because most folks have difficulty judging (their) investments fairly. They overestimate the positive aspects and underestimate its shortcomings.
- These are some of the reasons I don't seek Internet advice.
When this was first posted by the Pud, I did not take it that he was seeking advice; but, if one (any one of us) had a 100k over the next six months where would they invest it. My answer has not changed. Since, I am currently invested within my asset allocation ranges along with the current market climate, for me, it would be a six month CD. I was not suggesting others should do as I would do. Simply stating what I'd do: and, what I have done.
I felt the Pud was making this post to create discussion on the board as many of us have done. Nothing more ... nothing less.
I felt the Pud was making this post to create discussion on the board as many of us have done. Nothing more ... nothing less.
That was in the back of my mine too skeeter, but the post was confusing and open to interpretation. Does the guy want to invest short term safe money or "hit a home run" by the end of the year as mentioned? You are not going to get all answers directed towards the real intent IMHO if the responder has to guess at the intent. It sounds more like the question should have been "I'm getting a buy out which will give me $100k to invest. What are your suggestions in doing so?"
Any how, this was just a very confusing post all in all, and discussion it got.
You completely failed to address my question with respect to your acrimonious posting. If your second submittal on my original post is your takeaway so be it.
However, it is a too simplistic interpretation. It fails to recognize my admitted shortcomings in the investment arena. For example, my original post stated that:
" Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate mostly because I'm nowhere near informed enough about your particular circumstances to make any really meaningful suggestions."
Those qualifiers are important. Any further discussion is indeed non-productive.
Again, the title of the post is "What Would You Do?" not "What Should I Do? With this I answered as to what I'd do if I had an extra 100k come my way. In no way did I feel I was giving advice for someone else to follow. Generally, my post on the board are for information purposes only and they center around what I am doing and not what others should be doing. I felt the question was a brain teaser of sorts to encourage board discussion. And, that is what it has done; but, perhaps not in the form first intended.
Hopefully, the curling remarks directed towards others will cease for they are distructive not only for those that receive them but for other readers as well. I feel it ok to call someone out as that has been done of me and I have done of others; but, let's be civil in how we do it.
It's time to move on folks to something more constructive.
Hi guys! I was venting on the second post. The thread was just for fun. My venting turned this into something it was not meant to be......I do apologize. Being over-caffeinated and sitting in front of a computer is trouble, I think. God bless the Pudd
I would hate to think that, at least for the regulars, anyone here would hesitate to play the game of "what if you had a windfall". I know I enjoy looking at people's opinions and solutions and thinking about the diversity and similarities.
I would hate to think that, at least for the regulars, anyone here would hesitate to play the game of "what if you had a windfall". I know I enjoy looking at people's opinions and solutions and thinking about the diversity and similarities.
Agree with Anna (and Ol'Skeet above).
What I regret not mentioning in my earlier statements is that some highly qualified individuals offered insights into investing in the thread (myself excluded of course). Without naming them, two in particular have contributed to Fund Alarm and MFO for well over a decade and demonstrated their financial acumen time and time again - helping many of us along the way.
So, rather than selectively "picking through" the various ideas and weighing in on their merit (as discussion members ought to do) one individual decided to unilaterally indict the entire potpourri of suggestions, rejecting it as potentially "hazardous". Sorry I didn't point that out in my earlier heated remarks.
@hank- Well, ol' MJG is what he is: seemingly oblivious to the fact that his sometimes pedantic, repetitive, and dismissive comments occasionally irritate folks. He is evidently incapable of understanding that more than a few board contributors sometimes take offense at his tone, taking refuge in the belief that we are "acrimonious", "vituperative", "emotional", etc, etc, etc. We've all seen this for years on end, and he will never understand the obvious cause-effect connection.
That being said: I was just recently thinking how pleasant the board has been since the exclusion of the last really obnoxious poster. Going way back to the FundAlarm days, there have fortunately been very few of those who posted in a manner deliberately calculated to ignite animosity and provoke anger... not more than 3 or 4 as I recall in some ten years or more.
While MJG may be occasionally irritating, he is generally well-intentioned, and certainly nowhere near to being truly obnoxious.
And that being said: I will continue to exercise my first amendment right to throw a few barbs MJG's way from time-to-time as seems indicated.
It"s not entirely clear to me why I became the subject of assessment in this discussion. I present my perspectives in my own style. Why not challenge substance, and not style? My submittal was sincere and rather commonplace. No secret disrespect or message was intended.
Old Joe said: " While MJG may be occasionally irritating, he is generally well-intentioned, and certainly nowhere near to being truly obnoxious." I suppose I thank him for that somewhat convoluted endorsement. I am not generally well-intentioned; I am always well-intentioned.
Please allow me to present my recollection of why Old Joe is motivated to toss a few barbs my way. It goes back to an exchange Old Joe and I suffered in FundAlarm days. It shouldn't surprise anyone that it was initiated with one of my many Monte Carlo recommendations.
I had posted Links to a few Monte Carlo websites and commented that I was greatly helped in my retirement decision by using a Monte Carlo code that I had developed myself. Old Joe responded by saying he didn't see much need for that approach, and had made his retirement decision with several spreadsheet calculations.
My mistake was to reply with a post that asked Old Joe how he estimated and entered his annual yearly returns as he worked his way down his spreadsheet analysis. I observed that he was really doing a very limited number of Monte Carlo calculations with these yearly estimates. Unfortunately, I likely said that the 10,000 scenarios that were embedded in my Monte Carlo code simulations were more informative than his several spreadsheet calculations.
It would have been smarter to have been silent on that assessment. I was really only trying to introduce Old Joe and all FundAlarmers to the advantages that Monte Carlo simulators offer. It was never intended as a personal attack. Personal attacks never do good! But my comment was probably perceived as such. My mistake.
I try to write in a very straight forward manner. I say what I mean with no hidden agenda or no secret meaning. During my professional career I was a major contributor to my employers reply to our government's Requests for Proposals. Our corporate submittals had to be precise to win these Proposals and to be ultimately successful. In those winning proposals, over-promising would be a disaster. I learned to write carefully and to prudently promise. I try to duplicate that style here. I guess I'm not as successful as I hoped.
I am not a professional investor although I have been investing since 1960 with mixed outcomes. I am in a constant learning process. I surely do not have all the answers or insights, never will have, and never will claim to own those attributes. No one does.
@Maurice- Yes, I was quite pleased that the Supremes told the gov't to back off on that one. I may be somewhat of a liberal on certain issues, but politically correct I aint at all.
\\\ Constitution doesn't prevent our ruling elites from trampling on our rights. And sometimes it gets corrected. This week the US Supreme Court overturned by 8-0 an Obama administration trademark ruling against a music group. The Trademark Office didn't like the name for reasons of political correctness,
Oh, please. Too much low-information, reactionary talk radio. The arguments are subtler and more interesting, and more various too:
Actually the US Supreme Court sustained the ruling. That lower court ruling had already ruled that the statute, 15 USC 1052(a) violated the constitution. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1052
BTW, the last tweak to that statute was in 2006, so it's hard to hold Obama responsible for that. Of course the appellate court ruling (striking down the statute) leading to this SC case came during Obama's term.
I had to smile at this excerpt from the SC ruling (NYTimes link above):
“If the federal registration of a trademark makes the mark government speech, the federal government is babbling prodigiously and incoherently,” he wrote. “It is saying many unseemly things. It is expressing contradictory views. It is unashamedly endorsing a vast array of commercial products and services. And it is providing Delphic advice to the consuming public.”
ISTM that's a pretty good description of the executive branch these days, right down to the endorsing of commercial products.
There's a more serious concern with the ruling. As noted in the politico article, there were (at least) two ways to void the statute. One was by regarding it as viewpoint regulation. This is where the government allows you to say things on topic only so long as it likes the viewpoint you're expressing. This cuts to the very core of free speech and such regulations are just about always unconstitutional on their face.
The other way was to recognize that this is commercial speech (which typically is afforded less protection than political speech). But then, despite the normally weaker protections for commercial speech, the court could make a ruling that seems to expand protections for commercial speech.
That could be a more activist ruling, since it would seem to unnecessarily tinker with the what sort of regulations on commercial speech are allowed.
>> in my view it was an attempt at punishment for not knuckling under to what the Obama administration found to be acceptable speech
Well, it's that view of yours which is underinformed, to put it politically correctly. Although it's clear also that actual information would not help.
Hi Catch! What a call! PIMIX...PONDX is like playing Billy Ball. Healthcare ....you're spanking it out of the park now. Duke wonders if your contract is up this year as you're putting up big numbers. Looking for the contract next year, eh? Gotta go. Duke wants to play catch. God bless the Pudd
Comments
Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate mostly because I'm nowhere near informed enough about your particular circumstances to make any really meaningful suggestions. My guesstimates in that direction would be of little value. Your special circumstances should dominate any recommended investment.
Offering financial advice is hazardous duty for those offering the advice, and even more hazardous for those accepting and acting on it. The pitfalls are numerous and potentially deadly to wealth accumulation or protection. I'm sure you will assess that advice with considerable caution.
Everyone has their own set of goals and timeframes. These must be carefully defined before an investment action plan can be generated.
I'm equally sure that the advice offered here is well intentioned. But how good is it? That's a tough question to assess. The credentials and experience of those offering the advice is unknown. The time the responder committed to address your question is similarly unknown. The issue is complex enough that some deep thinking time is really mandatory.
The recommendations were likely to reflect the investments that the responder has himself already exercised. The danger here is that a fair assessment of active investments is troublesome because most folks have difficulty judging these investments fairly. They overestimate the positive aspects and underestimate its shortcomings. That's a very common human bias.
These are some of the reasons I don't seek Internet advice. The information one can collect on the Net is most needed as an integral part of the decision making process. All that information can be overwhelming. But the bottomline is that the final investment decision is your responsibility. The good news is that changes can always be made to adjust for the dynamics of the marketplace.
Good luck and good decision making!
Best Wishes
Wow!!!! There's a huge pile of emotion and venom in your reply to my post. I hope your venting of that emotion gave you some peace.
You did not properly capture the essence of my reply. I fail to see the correlation between what you posted and what I posted. Your ill-tempered submittal puzzles me greatly.
Why the antagonisms? I made what I believed were innocuous general observations. They were NOT directed at you or anyone else on MFO. A ton of bad investment advice is given everywhere. I'm sure that comment shocked no one on this board.
I made no claims about MFO board members intelligence or knowledge. I made no claims about the magnitude of the investment sums quoted; for some it is a major investment while for others it is a small matter. I did not take an obvious opportunity to once again extol the virtues of Monte Carlo analysis for the question quoted although that tool would help the decision making process
Your posting reveals much about your hard feelings towards me. Why? You seem to harbor a grudge because I often propose Monte Carlo analysis for some investment decision making. In the past, others have expressed similar reservations about that tool. That's okay by me. To each his own poison.
I suggest that you're wasting your time "editing" my submittals. They are not worth the effort, and I guarantee you that I will not change in my advocacy for Monte Carlo analysis. Just to irritate you a little more, here is a second Link to an easy to use, free Monte Carlo simulator:
http://www.moneychimp.com/articles/volatility/montecarlo.htm
I don't take these negative exchanges too seriously! I encourage MFOers to have fun.
Best Wishes
MJG said:
- Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate
- Offering financial advice is hazardous duty for those offering the advice, and even more hazardous for those accepting and acting on it. The pitfalls are numerous and potentially deadly to wealth accumulation or protection.
- ... the advice offered here is well intentioned. (But) the credentials and experience of those offering the advice is unknown.
- The danger here is that a fair assessment of active investments is troublesome because most folks have difficulty judging (their) investments fairly. They overestimate the positive aspects and underestimate its shortcomings.
- These are some of the reasons I don't seek Internet advice.
I felt the Pud was making this post to create discussion on the board as many of us have done. Nothing more ... nothing less.
Any how, this was just a very confusing post all in all, and discussion it got.
You completely failed to address my question with respect to your acrimonious posting. If your second submittal on my original post is your takeaway so be it.
However, it is a too simplistic interpretation. It fails to recognize my admitted shortcomings in the investment arena. For example, my original post stated that:
" Well you did get plenty of investment suggestions, but none from me. I elected not to participate mostly because I'm nowhere near informed enough about your particular circumstances to make any really meaningful suggestions."
Those qualifiers are important. Any further discussion is indeed non-productive.
Best Wishes
Again, the title of the post is "What Would You Do?" not "What Should I Do? With this I answered as to what I'd do if I had an extra 100k come my way. In no way did I feel I was giving advice for someone else to follow. Generally, my post on the board are for information purposes only and they center around what I am doing and not what others should be doing. I felt the question was a brain teaser of sorts to encourage board discussion. And, that is what it has done; but, perhaps not in the form first intended.
Hopefully, the curling remarks directed towards others will cease for they are distructive not only for those that receive them but for other readers as well. I feel it ok to call someone out as that has been done of me and I have done of others; but, let's be civil in how we do it.
It's time to move on folks to something more constructive.
Peace.
Skeet
I was venting on the second post. The thread was just for fun. My venting turned this into something it was not meant to be......I do apologize. Being over-caffeinated and sitting in front of a computer is trouble, I think.
God bless
the Pudd
What I regret not mentioning in my earlier statements is that some highly qualified individuals offered insights into investing in the thread (myself excluded of course). Without naming them, two in particular have contributed to Fund Alarm and MFO for well over a decade and demonstrated their financial acumen time and time again - helping many of us along the way.
So, rather than selectively "picking through" the various ideas and weighing in on their merit (as discussion members ought to do) one individual decided to unilaterally indict the entire potpourri of suggestions, rejecting it as potentially "hazardous". Sorry I didn't point that out in my earlier heated remarks.
That being said: I was just recently thinking how pleasant the board has been since the exclusion of the last really obnoxious poster. Going way back to the FundAlarm days, there have fortunately been very few of those who posted in a manner deliberately calculated to ignite animosity and provoke anger... not more than 3 or 4 as I recall in some ten years or more.
While MJG may be occasionally irritating, he is generally well-intentioned, and certainly nowhere near to being truly obnoxious.
And that being said:
I will continue to exercise my first amendment right to throw a few barbs MJG's way from time-to-time as seems indicated.
It"s not entirely clear to me why I became the subject of assessment in this discussion. I present my perspectives in my own style. Why not challenge substance, and not style? My submittal was sincere and rather commonplace. No secret disrespect or message was intended.
Old Joe said: " While MJG may be occasionally irritating, he is generally well-intentioned, and certainly nowhere near to being truly obnoxious." I suppose I thank him for that somewhat convoluted endorsement. I am not generally well-intentioned; I am always well-intentioned.
Please allow me to present my recollection of why Old Joe is motivated to toss a few barbs my way. It goes back to an exchange Old Joe and I suffered in FundAlarm days. It shouldn't surprise anyone that it was initiated with one of my many Monte Carlo recommendations.
I had posted Links to a few Monte Carlo websites and commented that I was greatly helped in my retirement decision by using a Monte Carlo code that I had developed myself. Old Joe responded by saying he didn't see much need for that approach, and had made his retirement decision with several spreadsheet calculations.
My mistake was to reply with a post that asked Old Joe how he estimated and entered his annual yearly returns as he worked his way down his spreadsheet analysis. I observed that he was really doing a very limited number of Monte Carlo calculations with these yearly estimates. Unfortunately, I likely said that the 10,000 scenarios that were embedded in my Monte Carlo code simulations were more informative than his several spreadsheet calculations.
It would have been smarter to have been silent on that assessment. I was really only trying to introduce Old Joe and all FundAlarmers to the advantages that Monte Carlo simulators offer. It was never intended as a personal attack. Personal attacks never do good! But my comment was probably perceived as such. My mistake.
I try to write in a very straight forward manner. I say what I mean with no hidden agenda or no secret meaning. During my professional career I was a major contributor to my employers reply to our government's Requests for Proposals. Our corporate submittals had to be precise to win these Proposals and to be ultimately successful. In those winning proposals, over-promising would be a disaster. I learned to write carefully and to prudently promise. I try to duplicate that style here. I guess I'm not as successful as I hoped.
I am not a professional investor although I have been investing since 1960 with mixed outcomes. I am in a constant learning process. I surely do not have all the answers or insights, never will have, and never will claim to own those attributes. No one does.
I will continue to post.
Best Wishes
Regards,
Ted
@MJG- Well, I certainly hope so. Great entertainment at times.
Oh, please. Too much low-information, reactionary talk radio.
The arguments are subtler and more interesting, and more various too:
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/19/supreme-court-rules-slants-case-239711
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/19/us/politics/supreme-court-trademarks-redskins.html
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1052
BTW, the last tweak to that statute was in 2006, so it's hard to hold Obama responsible for that. Of course the appellate court ruling (striking down the statute) leading to this SC case came during Obama's term.
I had to smile at this excerpt from the SC ruling (NYTimes link above): ISTM that's a pretty good description of the executive branch these days, right down to the endorsing of commercial products.
There's a more serious concern with the ruling. As noted in the politico article, there were (at least) two ways to void the statute. One was by regarding it as viewpoint regulation. This is where the government allows you to say things on topic only so long as it likes the viewpoint you're expressing. This cuts to the very core of free speech and such regulations are just about always unconstitutional on their face.
The other way was to recognize that this is commercial speech (which typically is afforded less protection than political speech). But then, despite the normally weaker protections for commercial speech, the court could make a ruling that seems to expand protections for commercial speech.
That could be a more activist ruling, since it would seem to unnecessarily tinker with the what sort of regulations on commercial speech are allowed.
It's also indicative of the current court tending to side with business interests, as described in this Reuters article: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-patents-idUSKBN19A34I
P.S. I'm just killing time in an airport now, so I may not be able to follow up. Apologies in advance.
Well, it's that view of yours which is underinformed, to put it politically correctly. Although it's clear also that actual information would not help.
What a call! PIMIX...PONDX is like playing Billy Ball. Healthcare ....you're spanking it out of the park now. Duke wonders if your contract is up this year as you're putting up big numbers. Looking for the contract next year, eh? Gotta go. Duke wants to play catch.
God bless
the Pudd