May 2003 Issue
Asset Allocation
Reach Your Retirement Goals By Following 10 Basic Axioms
These principles provide the critical cornerstone for making decisions. When any of the axioms are violated, you risk being derailed from the ultimate objective of accumulating a more-than-adequate fund for retirement.
Insurance Products
A Life Settlement Update; and Life Insurance in Pension Plans
Life settlements involve the selling of unneeded or no longer affordable life insurance policies. If selling is the decision, you need to be aware of how to deal with the various types of life settlement firms.
Investment Newsletters
The Price-Value Relationship: Do You Get What You Pay For?
Direct mail marketers say that in head-to-head tests of two investment newsletters that differ only in price, the higher-priced one often receives more responses. Do more expensive newsletters provide better returns?
Investing Basics
The 10 Fundamental Axioms for Effective Retirement Investing
These principles provide the critical cornerstone for making decisions. When any of the axioms are violated, you risk being derailed from the ultimate objective of accumulating a more-than-adequate fund for retirement.
Portfolio Manager Interview
An Interview With Patrick J. English, Portfolio Manager, FMI Common Stock Fund
Investing in the mid caps: A search for good businesses at value prices.
The Markets
Telling Curves: What Bond Yields Reveal About the Markets
Studies have shown that the overall pattern of interest rate movements can provide an indication of the direction of future economic activity, as well as the markets themselves.
Stock Screens
The Muhlenkamp Stock Screen: High ROEs at a Reasonable Price
Muhlenkamp uses a bottom-up approach to selecting stocks, but adjusts his benchmarks based upon the broad economic environment, using prevailing inflation and interest rates to help establish his investment hurdles.
Portfolio Strategies
Bear Market Strategies: Watch the Spending, Hold the Stocks
The asset allocation decision in retirement can be critical depending on your withdrawal rate and time horizon. Recent analysis shows that retirees should keep at least 30% to 40% in equities.