Here is an interesting video from Canada's BNN (Can't ignore the growth):
https://www.bnn.ca/can-t-ignore-the-growth-canopy-forces-bay-street-to-take-notice-1.953896

Many of the pot stocks in this ETF have been on an absolute tear the last 3 or 4 months. Canopy Growth (TWMJF) was up 12% yesterday (12.27) and is up another 6% today, perhaps due to this new ETF starting on 12.26. This sector is still incredibly speculative. Many of the top holdings in this ETF are traded OTC with nosebleed p/e's. Kinda tough to value these companies as the pot market in Canada and elsewhere simply can't be valued just yet. An intriguing space to follow though ...

FYI: I think there are three big ideas in the wealth management industry that will never change. There may be others, but to me, these are the big three.
Regards,
Ted
http://thereformedbroker.com/2017/12/27/three-things-that-will-never-change-in-wealth-management-2/

@DS,
k, point taken, I guess.
I did not read Rice Delman so episodically and implicatively and glossily as you, but maybe that's because for years I have been hearing him whinge on about the long term.
>> From 2000-2010, the market's net return was zero
We have to be careful about, hmm, what's a good word for larger-scale cherrypicking?
For some reason the decade you cite was a decisive argument for active management. SP500 sucked majorly, yes, but when you look at some big favorites sometimes cited here at MFO --- FCNTX, FLPSX, TWEIX, FPACX, PRWCX, VWELX, DODGX, and WEMMX, say --- the total from a $10k investment ranges from just under $14k to more than twice that (the two Fido funds, coincidentally). Those results only improve if you include 2010 rather than ending 1 Jan 2010.
Naturally you had to have held them for the long term. (Many bailed out of FCNTX sometime in 01 or 02, and even more did likewise with all of them save First Pacific in 08-09. )
So sleep through volatility if you have faith. Easy to prescribe. And right, no glossing, no ill prep.

Hi David.
Hmmm ... my concern is the implication that your total return in the current market cycle is 231%. That comes about because the bull market is disconnected from the bear portion of the cycle. From 2000-2010, the market's net return was zero which is not evident from the chart.
You, and he, are right: markets go up in 3-4 times as many years as they go down. But if you gloss over the ugly fact that the recovery periods for many funds was five or six years (DODGX took 63 months to return to zero following its max drawdown in the current cycle), you're ill-preparing them to be the long-term investors you might seek.
David

FYI: On this week’s Animal Spirits with Michael & Ben we discuss:
.How the new tax reform impacts your paycheck with a helpful summary from tax expert Bill Sweet.
.The biggest winners from the new tax bill.
.Why happiness declines for most people until their 50s and then improves.
. Why investors in 401ks are better behaved than most assume.
. Why charlatans & hucksters are sure to flock to cryptocurrencies.
.Our favorite books, movies, TV shows and podcasts from 2017.
.Why life was so terrible pre-1900s and more.
Regards,
Ted
http://awealthofcommonsense.com/2017/12/animal-spirits-episode-10-the-happiness-smile/

A Big Warning to those of us who used to do multiple IRA/401K to Roth conversions and then pick the best of the litter to keep as Roth and throw the runts back into the Traditional IRA/401K via a recharacterization... I am not a tax attorney, but it sure looks like the Trump-Republican tax bill recently passed takes the ability to do recharacterizations completely off the table for Tax Year 2018 and the future...
Once you do a conversion, it is irrevocable.
Plan accordingly. Don't get trapped pushing yourself into a higher bracket or Medicare Surcharge area.
Per Vanguard:
" IRA recharacterizations of conversions are going away.
Chief among the bill's features affecting retirement savers is the elimination of an investor's ability to recharacterize a conversion to a Roth individual retirement account (IRA) after the 2017 tax year."
[ https://advisors.vanguard.com/VGApp/iip/site/advisor/researchcommentary/article/IWE_InvComVanguardOnTaxBill ]

FYI: Many individual investors and financial advisers consider equal-weighted index funds to be a sure-fire way of beating the stock market.
They’re wrong. In fact, equal-weighted funds, which give the same percentage allocation to each of the stocks they own, are more likely to lag their capitalization-weighted peers — which weight each stock according to its market valuation — on a risk-adjusted basis over the long term.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/these-top-ranked-index-funds-arent-built-to-handle-the-next-stock-market-crash-2017-12-26/print

@MikeM
On the other hand, rather than rebranded beverage companies, maybe something along these lines is a place to look.....
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-26/blockchain-pumping-new-life-into-old-school-companies-like-ibm

Looks like the Linkster checked out early for Christmas so here’s the gift of a link to one and all: http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.aspx?id=841911

This is the year to beef up one's donor advised fund. Because the standard deduction will be so much higher next year, far fewer people will be able to itemize. One is more likely to be able to deduct those charitable contributions this year. The DAF provides a way to retain those deductions, while caching the cash for contributions you'd be making anyway in subsequent years.
To Lewis' concern about DAFs slowing down the transfer of money to charities. That is a real problem. We prefer making our routine donations directly, and use our DAF primarily to handle appreciated securities and to serve as a reservoir for non-routine larger donations, generally disaster relief. However, the tax changes seem to make a 2017 DAF contribution the better way to go, at least until the laws are changed again.

FYI: Writing checks to charity from your taxable account isn’t always the best giving strategy.
Merry Christmas,
Ted
http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.aspx?id=841455

FYI: Chinese stocks dropped by midday Monday after opening higher, led by smaller, more tech-focused markets, in slim Christmas trading.
Japan and Taiwan were the only other regional markets open for the holiday. Japan’s Nikkei index NIK, +0.16% was recently down 0.1% while Taiwan’s stock benchmark Y9999, -0.14% was flat.
Merry Christmas,
Ted
U.S.: (Closed)
Europe: (Closed)
Asia: (MarketWatch)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/asian-markets-lag-in-meager-christmas-trading-2017-12-24/print
Asia: (Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/japan-stocks-close/nikkei-edges-up-helped-by-hopes-for-c-bank-purchases-of-etfs-idUSL4N1OP1K0
Asia: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/24/asia-markets-christmas-day-trading.html
Currrent Futures: Negative
https://finviz.com/futures.ashx

Another great article that goes more into 1999 Janus - what a time to be investing...
https://www.thestreet.com/story/880027/1/janus-extraordinary-1999-powered-by-small-group-of-favored-stocks.html

FTHNX fund has performed well, and anyone who owns it is surely happy. But I have 4 reasons for not buying it. 1) They've got, as @slick mentioned, a "sister fund" using this strategy, also in the small cap space, with $6.2 billion in assets 2) That sister fund's performance has been strong, but it underperformed pretty significantly in 2007-2008. Which is fair for a SV fund, and I don't mind volatility along the way, but it's something to keep in mind 3) Isn't every value fund trying to take advantage of other's behaviorial mistakes? Isn't that what Graham talked about nearly a century ago with his voting machine vs weighing machine metaphor? 4) If Barron's is writing about it, it's probably too late to jump on the bandwagon.
In short, seems like a fine SV fund, but one that suffers from asset bloat within the family and probably doesn't have a secret sauce, just smart managers.

Hi guys!
Have been kicking around some funds for 2018. Between FLPSX or LCEAX. What do you think? I've owned both before. They both have cash....I like that a lot right now. LCEAX lags which could be good for 2018. Also, anybody own MAPIX? I've been thinking about that for more Asia owned it long ago. Also am looking at PSHDX to hold cash that will do better than money markets.
God bless
the Pudd

@MFO Members: The two faces of god rebuilt How I remember from the FundAlarm days
Regards,
Ted
https://www.forbes.com/forbes/2007/0129/080.html#3b6484781988