Topics: Risk management, index limitations, yield dangers, retirement savings rate? working in retirement, Vancouver housing swoon, Ontario’s (Canada’s) ‘junk pensions’, restructuring a signal of pension troubles, CPP on-track and not too big? end of mutual funds? bullion problems, JPMorgan to drive Volker adoption? not just “too big to fail” but also “too big to manage”! […]

Topics: Long-term care insurance, retirement location factors, mutual fund fees destroy retirements, lack trust, Canada in real estate bubble? realtor rip-off, not-for-profit pensions, CPP vs. PRPP, “financial repression”, insurance company demutualization? Fama: efficient markets and passive vs. active investing. Personal Finance and Investments In Kiplinger’s “Navigate a course for long-term care” Kimberly Langford looks at […]

Topics: GMWBs, fee-only planners, work longer, junk & emerging market bonds, hybrid debt-no, retirement questions, prospect theory, scam warnings, housing bubble, no recovery for US house prices, sell and rent? Pensions: fiduciary duty & cooking the discount rates, Nortel pensioners screwed again? Inflation coming? US household formation down, hedge funds out-perform? Personal Finance and Investments […]

Topics: Longevity risk, risk-free short-term rates, stock-picking robots, real estate: US and Canada down, Canada needs pension reform, longevity insurance option in CPP?  Social Security stress, pension problems disappear if you make more convenient assumptions, multiemployer pension plans an invisible crisis, Nortel bankruptcy mediation started, active management dying, financial crises caused by greed/stupidity not criminal […]

Topics: ETFs vs. ETNs, plain vanilla vs. synthetic ETFs, long/short funds, Pimco’s BOND ETF, real estate: Toronto-up/Vancouver-down/Canada-down, to tame Toronto RE ban foreign buyers? retirement start should track longevity, a public pension bankrupt, Nortel mediation, risk and return don’t track, VIX products irrational, dangers in life settlements, demutualization of Canadian P&Cs? Bay Street theft. Personal […]

Topics: Dividend-funds? long-term care insurance? tax rate, uninsured home-business, timeshares=$1, buy a house? PRPP-Not, longevity insurance take-off, civil service pensions, volatility-linked products, ban speculative energy investments, sell-bonds buy-stocks, prepare to retire later.   Personal Finance and Investments In the WSJ’s “The dividend-fund dilemma” Jason Zweig warns dividend investors who are piling into dividend funds chasing […]

Topics: Fiduciary cost, commissioned fiduciary? retirement ‘black holes’ and ‘quicksand’, diversification vs. hot sectors, currency hedging? valuation based asset allocation, shadow inventory release to affect US housing, tax treatment property, Justice Winkler on Nortel bankruptcy and the legal ‘profession’, pension plans reduce equity, stocks: time to buy or not, assault on indexes, wealth destruction in […]

Topics: Advisor fees-conflicts-‘regulation’, ETNs? mortgage rate stress test, Chevreau moving. House prices: US down and Canada up, global house prices, OAS moves to 67, Ontario pans PRPP, equities vs. bonds, your advisor a lemon? Personal Finance and Investments In the Globe and Mail’s “Revealed the lowdown on advisor fees” Rob Carrick quotes fee data from […]