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survey: who do you trust, who do you read

edited May 2011 in Off-Topic
I had a nice chat with Chuck Jaffe, of CBS Marketwatch, some weeks ago, about ways that the Observer might be more deeply helpful to folks. He asked if it might be possible to generate a list of links to, and commentary on, sites that folks routinely turn to when they need to know . . . what the outlook is for Asian markets, how high gold might go, what steps a parent might take to raise a money-smart kind, whether hedge fund replicants have too much tracking error . . .

Do you trust the U.S. News site? Is Yahoo useful? Does Seeking Alpha make you bang your head on the table? Are you happiest in the company of the Bogleheads? Is there any alternative to Morningstar?

And so, if you'd like to suggest resources -- who you</> read, who you trust, and why -- we'll try to make them available in a friendly and easily usable format for folks.

As ever,

David
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Comments

  • I read "The Big Picture" at http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/

    It provides strategic considerations in addition to data affecting the market. In general it does not mention particular funds, ETFs or stocks.

    -- Larry
  • edited May 2011
    bloomberg and wsj -- not completely trust, but find helpful info.
  • edited November 2011
    .
  • King World News, Bloomberg. Sometimes Denninger at Market Ticker.
  • edited May 2011
    The user and all related content has been deleted.
  • edited September 2012
    Don't trust anybody telling you where an investment is headed and where to put your money. Case in point: In February 2001 one of Barrons' fine editors, Cheryl Strauss Einhorn, wrote in that esteemed publication: “It’s difficult to find any positive news in the depressed gold market, ... At around $260 an ounce, the metal continues to trade near its cost of production and almost no one believes it will rally soon.”

    http://dailyreckoning.com/gold-again/

    I'll learn about different funds here or somewhere else. First step is to check out its company website and scour everything can find there. Usually several hours reading. Download & read prospectus, annual/semi-annual reports, and more. Also helps to enter the ticker of a potential fund on your tracker and watch for a few months. Will look at Morningstar, Lippers, and Max Funds. But dont take too seriously. Categories are subjective and subject to change. Moving a dog out of "moderate allocation" and into "long-short" will make it shine like a thoroughbred.

    Stay informed and decisions come alot easier. Broadband is expensive and unreliable in our area. So the daily read arrives on a Kindle with AT&T connectivity. A staple is the Reuters business news blog updated several times daily. Also - "All Things Digital" is an inexpensive blog from the WSJ. Does nice job on trends and developments in technology. IBD (Investors Business Daily) is a decent read for only a few $$ monthly (Skip the ultraconservative editorials-:) Dont forget David Snowball's excellent Fund reviews.
    -------
    (Note 9/1/12) - Corrected some grammar and deleted one Kindle read: Wharton School of Business. In its place, added IBD which replaced it. ... BTW- this thread is very old. We actually do have decent broadband today, though still love reading the Kindle.

  • Oops, looks like this belongs here. I'll re-post.

    Who do I read and who do I trust? No one.
    When the best of the newsletters are ranked right 50% of the time it kind of hints that they are wrong just as often. Many years ago I subscribed to the popular mags. Quickly learned that the money was better off invested. I used to take those "Ten Funds To Buy Now" and track them along with the ten to avoid. The funds to avoid would have been the better choice 90% of the time. Same for stock recommendations.

    A few of websites I use:
    http://online.barrons.com/mktlab?mod=BOL_hpp_tnav_market
    http://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog#Tables
    https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/
    http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/national_economy/nationalindicators.html

    I tried signing up but after being asked to re-type the security check numbers 5 or 6 times I decided to just remain anonymous, an adequate alternative.
  • minyanville.com is insightful and has an overt mission to be open-minded. However, I don't find much actionable information, since the founder and the core audience are active traders and I'm not.
  • edited November 2011
    .
  • Cullen Roche's blog, "The Pragmatic Capitalist", has a provocative selection of commentaries, graphs and opinions from a variety of sources. While he makes his views known, he also posts contrary views. What's especially rich about this blog is the excellent comments added by readers and the debates among them. The blog focuses on macro issues at least as much as on markets.

    http://pragcap.com/
  • I like to read Bob Chapman’s The International Forecaster for insight and to get the brain working.
    http://theinternationalforecaster.com/
  • I trust in God....."His Book" has great financial advice...........

    One of my favorites: ""The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender." ~Proverbs 22: 7

    Other that that, I read wide and far, but without "trust", only "curiousity".

    Cee
  • Correction:

    "curiousity" = "curiosity"

    Cee
  • edited May 2011
    I read a broad range of sites. The following is not a complete list and does not convey a particular preference:

    News, etc:
    Bloomberg: http://www.bloomberg.com
    Reuters: http://www.reuters.com
    Market Watch: http://www.marketwatch.com
    Google News: http://news.google.com

    Economic Reports:
    Econoday (for weekly recap)
    Ned Davis Research (for interpretation of most recent economic data)
    I used to like Argus Research reports as well but not available free anymore at my broker:(

    Blogs:
    Calculated Risk: http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/
    Econbrowser: http://www.econbrowser.com/
    Capital Spectator: http://www.capitalspectator.com/
    The Big Picture: http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/
    MISH'S Global Economic Trend Analysis: http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/
    Pragmatic Capitalism: http://pragcap.com/
    Random Roger: http://randomroger.blogspot.com/
    Bespoke Investment Group: http://www.bespokeinvest.com/
    Abnormal Returns: http://abnormalreturns.com/
    CXO Advisory: http://www.cxoadvisory.com/

    Misc:
    Fund Advice: http://www.fundadvice.com
    Morningstar: http://www.morningstar.com
  • If you login and post, you could edit your own posts.
  • I have checked out - and saved as "Favorites" over 100 links I checked out from Forum members. Found lots of great ones - but only problem is not enough time to check them regularly, even if I wanted to spend my life that way.

    But one of the suggested links I found here I followed up by subscribing to receive free weekly email updates.

    It is [email protected]

    I really like their updates - very concise updates of Sectors, Styles and International with nice brief charts showing best-to-worst within each category - some interesting facts, sometimes with a little humor. Short excerpt from last one (hope that is ok)

    "We have good news and bad news for U.S. stock investors. The good news is that your market is now on top of the world. The bad news is that the world doesn’t look so good. Only five of the eleven categories we track show positive momentum, and even those are in single digits. Dollar strength combined with a global setback in stock prices pushed the U.S. benchmark to the top of an unimpressive list."

    Thank you to whoever gave that link (was quite a while ago) - and to all of you who are kind enough to share some of your favorite investment web sites.
  • Try assetcorrelation.com if you want to check out the correlation between 2 funds or if you want to prepare a correlation matrix for your portfolio.
  • Folks have named a number of credible sites for gleaning information. To be honest, I get a lot of quality information from mutual fund web sites, especially things like market commentaries, economic outlooks, sector strategies and expectations. Among the more educational and challenging are Loomis, BlackRock, U.S. Global, Eaton Vance, Goldman Sachs, and Wasatch. Keep in mind that some sites have some literature and commentary restricted to institutional access (unfortunately).

    Some of the other very good sites that I visit or receive material from regularly include
    Bloomberg
    Consumer Price Index
    InvestorInsight
    Frontline Thoughts
    Stratfor Global Intelligence
    Federated Investors
    Dundee Wealth Economics
    Seeking Alpha
    Guild Investment Management

    Needless to say, we are inundated with articles, e-mails, magazines, and newsletters most every day. Most are indeed worth very little. But occasionally we find a gem or two that is worth investigating a bit more.
  • I read Jeremy Grantham's newsletters. For economics, I read Project Syndicate (especially Shiller & Stiglitz) and Krugman's articles and blogs. Articles by Arnott and Berstein.
  • Fleck, John Hathaway, and interviews on King World News are some of my favorite reading and listening. I think Jim Grant is brilliant and read Bloomberg Business Week every week.

    I read all of you here everyday also.

    DPN
  • Grant's Interest Rate Observer, Jeremy Grantham (although rather pessimistic), Howard Marks from Oakmark (when he decides to write), Doug Kass (through seabreeze website or real money), Steve Leuthold (gives a nice mix of technical and fundamental), also John Hussman (also a permabear)
  • Apologies for answering a question with a question. Years ago AAII (American Association of Individual Investors) provided me with good, basic info about investing. I let the subscription lapse but wonder if others continue to find their info useful: http://www.aaii.com/
  • Favorite "unusual" sites for daily reading


    Silicon Investor: BUY AND SELL SIGNALS, AND OTHER MARKET PERSPECTIVES
    http://www.siliconinvestor.com/subject.aspx?subjectid=57934
    I am not a day trader, but I enjoy the discussion that has loads of good charts and data with a moderator, Ground Zero, who keeps it friendly.

    Silicon Investor: Valence Tech & Market Talk With Don Wolanchuk
    http://www.siliconinvestor.com/subject.aspx?subjectid=52296
    He's a permabull but fun to read and it helps keep perspective that in the long run, you want to be in stocks.

    Kirk's Market Thoughts
    http://kirklindstrom.com/Articles/2012/index.html
    Newsletter writer with free articles and a facebook group:
    Investing for the long term at https://www.facebook.com/groups/IFTLT/

    "unusual" meaning not the normal sites "everyone" seems to know about.

    I also read the daily emails from Schwab and SeekingAlpha plus the weekly email from Vanguard.


  • The fact is that I read from several sites, many of those already listed, but have yet to find one that consistently 'nails' it. I also find most often that I get the most useful information from the comment section at the end of the article but it takes digging through a lot of nonsense as well. Trust, but verify.
  • I like Steve Goldberg because he is not afraid to take a stand and explains why in simple terms. I first became impressed with him after reading his article questioning Bruce Berkowitz's heavy move into financials in late 2010.

    I like Bob Johnson because he presents a calm voice of reason, research, and tempered optimism against the rants, unqualified opinions, and ubiquitous pessimism often broadcast. Click here for link to his article archive at Morningstar.

    I like James Stack because of the technical perspective he rigorously applies and then consistently provides in his InvesTech newsletter.

    And, of course, I like David Snowball, his staff, and the many other insightful contributors of MFO, which represents a grassroots yet generous source of fund information without commercial agenda.
  • edited July 2013
    Sorry about the delayed response.

    I used to like reading Paul B. Farrell, author of "The Lazy Person's Guide to Investing" where he liked to keep it simple, not market time, etc. but his more recent articles seem to indicate he's changed. Maybe he found there was little money to be made in writing about passive investing via low cost index funds.

    Some of the writers on Seeking Alpha are pretty good also but it is hard to tell who writes just for page hits (they are paid per view) and who actually has something valuable to say. You get a lot of articles about the big stocks that don't say much new.

    I need to come here more often as there is some good stuff as Charles pointed out.
  • Reply to @Rocky: Thanks for the suggestion and the kind words, Rocky.

    Like you, I'm a bit concerned about perverse structural incentives: if your incentive is to generate the greatest number of clicks, certain messages become economically suicidal for you. "Take a deep breath, make a sensible plan, focus on the long-term, keep your expenses - in investing and elsewhere - low, then go enjoy life" is the recipe for a one article career.

    Jonathan Clements had an interesting valedictory column when he left the Wall Street Journal. He said he had about three messages for his readers and he'd repackaged them into 1008 columns: "Forget spending more money at the mall -- and instead spend more time with friends. Your bank account may still be skimpy, but your life will be far, far richer."

    David
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