I love learning math tricks that help me calculate a number quickly. One math trick that’s particularly helpful in the investing world is called The Rule of 72. Basically, if you have an investment that is growing at X% – let’s say 7% – then you take 72 and divide it by 7 and you…
It’s the one constant in the markets, the cycle of fear and greed. Fear is healthy for stocks since it gives firmer footing for the short term going forward, since the fear index usually drops to lows like this only after a good chunk of people who are already are afraid have sold. Once this…
As of yesterday, with the S&P 500 hitting all-time highs and extending the Longest-Ever Bull Market in history, I found this troubling statistic from CNN’s Fear & Greed Index: Just as the sentiment pendulum swung all the way to Extreme Fear back in February during the correction, it has now swung back to the other…
One of the ironclad truths of investing is that with higher reward comes higher risk. I’ve been thinking a lot, years actually, about how to bend that relationship to earn higher returns while simultaneously lowering risk. Covered calls, which protected clients from significant downside risk during the February correction, had some promise as a method…
It’s been said that markets take the stairs up and the elevator down. Now that the market has fallen another 1,000 points and hit correction territory (a fall of 10%) within just one week, fear has come roaring back after being in hibernation for what seemed like years. This is a good thing, because historically,…