November 28, 2022
A Missing Piece of the SBF Puzzle
There’s been excellent coverage of the ongoing public drama surrounding Sam Bankman-Fried and FTX, but there’s an important piece of the puzzle that’s remained under the radar.
July 7, 2022
Bitcoin is Nothing Either Good or Bad, but Sizing Makes It So
Bitcoin isn’t an inherently good or bad investment – but said investment can turn sour quickly if you’re not paying attention to sizing.
May 23, 2022
Hassan and Ali Finsplain the $50 Billion Rise and Fall of Terra-Luna
It can feel like 2022 has been a pretty bad year for investing so far – but, in terms of what really matters, most investors are better off than they were at the end of 2021.
May 3, 2022
How I Learned to Stop Worrying, and Love the (Interest Rate) Bomb
It can feel like 2022 has been a pretty bad year for investing so far – but, in terms of what really matters, most investors are better off than they were at the end of 2021.
October 20, 2021
Golf Guru Scott Fawcett Will Make You a Better Golfer, and a Better Investor Too
What does professional golf have to do with becoming a better investor? As it turns out, a surprising amount…
April 27, 2021
We’re All HODLRs Now
If you’ve been asking yourself the question: “To BTC, or not to BTC?” the market, in its infinite wisdom, may have just decided for you: we’re all HODLRs now, whether you like it or not.
November 19, 2019
Negative Interest Rates and the Perpetuity Paradox
There is wide-ranging disagreement on the long-term impact of negative interest rates, but the real question is: are these rates a fleeting phenomenon, or are they the new normal?
September 25, 2019
Home Biased: A Case for More Indexing
“Home Bias” refers to the trend of investing more heavily in one’s own domestic market than necessary. The question is: if everyone is doing it, does all of that bias cancel itself out?
August 20, 2019
Do US Industry-Sector Weights Explain the Higher Valuation of US vs non-US Equities?
US equities have consistently outperformed non-US equities over the past decade – so, what exactly does this mean for investors?
May 6, 2019
A Conversation with NYU Professor Aswath Damodaran
Victor sat down with NYU Professor Aswath Damodaran to discuss some of the biggest topics in finance today: from indexing, to factor investing, to why investors ignore momentum.
March 12, 2018
Sensible Investing in a Nutshell: Robin Powell, The Evidence-Based Investor, interviews Victor
In this video: Robin Powell, the Evidence-Based Investor, in his “journey to uncover the truth behind investing” interviews Victor.
January 17, 2018
New Year, New CEO, New Home
The New Year brings good news: not only does Elm have a new headquarters in the City of Brotherly Love, but we’re proud to announce James White as our new CEO!
December 20, 2017
A Brainteaser Double-Feature for the Holidays
Here are two little puzzles that we discussed at an Elm dinner last week in London – our guests were sufficiently tickled, so we thought we’d write them up to share with you.
December 11, 2017
Discussions on Risk Parity and the Sharpe Ratio
In our ongoing writing on the topic of investment sizing and portfolio choice, we recently published two articles that discuss the use of Sharpe Ratio in building portfolios.
November 20, 2017
HHHHHHHHHHHH: Is there a message in there?
The 12-month winning streak of the stock market through the end of October reminded me of a Friday afternoon on the Salomon trading floor…
November 9, 2017
The Chemistry of 10% More
In a world with two classes of assets – cash and equities – how can investors in aggregate increase their allocation to equities (given that, for every buyer, there has to be a seller) and so cash can’t come into or leave the market?
September 26, 2017
Elm coin-flipping Research discussed in Economist Buttonwood article
From The Economist: “Who wants mediocrity?”
January 24, 2017
A Sharper Lens for Sizing Up Nickels and Steamrollers
In today’s world, it’s natural that many investors are looking for ways to earn a good return with limited equities exposure. Are the more common strategies working, or is there a better solution?
December 9, 2016
How much of a good thing is best for you?
You can invest in only two assets: a risk-free asset and public equities. Your choices are: A) 100% risk-free, or B) 10% risk-free and 90% equities. What sort of returns would make you choose B?
September 5, 2016
What I learned from my daughter (about investing)
My daughter Jessica, a cognitive science major at university, caught me with a fun brain-teaser courtesy of Professor Phil Tetlock, author of “Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It?”
July 27, 2016
What’s up with REITs?
There are several plausible explanations for REITs’ recent strength – one intriguing explanation that you may have heard about involves an upcoming change in how REITs are classified in indexes.
January 5, 2016
Why Wyoming?
We’re often asked why Elm Partners’ US office is in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Below is a short video shot by my son using his quadcopter a few days ago, all within a few miles of JHHQ – the answer will be obvious after taking a look.
June 24, 2015
Vanguard’s sweeping index changes (adding China A-shares & small caps)
Vanguard announced that it will be changing its approach to both capitalization stocks and the weights of Chinese equities. How will this affect the rest of the industry?