Panskeptic

Passive Investing Wisdom from Taylor Larimore

Welcome to Jurassic Park!

"Mr. (John) Bogle has stated that he never met anyone who can time the stock market successfully and consistently."

I'm sorry he's never met George Soros, Paul Tudor Jones, Julian Robertson or any other of several hundred private investors and hedge fund managers who have done just that. Mr. Bogle should get out more.

Even people who say they don't market time, like Warren Buffett, wind up timing their entries and exits anyway.

Mr. Larimore's quasi-religious claptrap is utterly useless. Blind repetition of slogans doesn't make them true, but I suppose if you don't want to worship a tree or a rock, you can worship Mr. Bogle instead. And Mr. Malkiel's orthodoxy has a tough time explaining exactly what happened in the markets this year. "Random" it was not, and hasn't been for a long time.

For a 25 year period not so long ago, the markets had virtually zero return. We're just coming out of what many are calling "A Lost Decade." If you've got 10 or more investing years to waste doing nothing while the market vainly searches for a trend, good for you, but those of us with realistic actuarial estimates aren't limited to passive buy-and-die. "Stay the course" as a piece of advice has a well-deserved reputation of being utterly disastrous.

Do many people overtrade? Sure, without a doubt. Is this particular set of mantras a recipe for success? Hell, no.

P.S. The astronomical turnover in Cubes comes from institutional investors, the ones Jack Bogle has never met, not from individual white-shoe'd retirees in Florida.