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Q: I have an appointment with a prospect, a 60 year old senior executive of a ...
A: You used the TNFA script to get an appointment, presumably to ask the ...

Q: I will have an annual review with a client of mine on Tuesday. They are a 65 ...
A: I think they're depressives, and it seems pretty clear that they're not listening ...

Q: I like your formula for systematic withdrawal: two years' living expenses in a ...
A: Beats me. I don't think there's some objectively valid number, and my guess ......keep reading

Just eleven years ago at this time--in the waning weeks of 1999--the world was working itself up into an apocalyptic frenzy over the imminence of the new millennium....keep reading

The two "Ask Nick" questions in this issue, and one from last month about getting out of the market when it's "too high," prompted me to look at my approach to answering questions/objections primarily having to do with the apocalypse du jour - whatever economic or market condition is currently being cited as the source of the next major decline....keep reading

In the seven months since it recorded its panic low close of 676, the S&P 500 has risen over 60%, and stands substantially higher than it did a year ago....keep reading

Q: Your suggested reading list is always helpful and leads me to my question. ...
A: I have to confess that I don't see the problem, here. (I don't deny the existence ...

Q: Things are going well but there are certainly a few areas I need to improve. ...
A: Let me try to break this answer down into component parts, because there's a ...

Q: I generally recommend that clients have two to three years of income needs ...
A: Since you may have to start withdrawing it at any moment, and since -- once ...

Q: My subscription started just a couple of months ago, and I seized on the ...
A: It's in the June 2005 issue, but that's not obvious from the title of the piece, ...

Q: I'm drowning in a sea of print and electronic periodical literature. I get too ...
A: Your question is the right one, but it can only be answered if you have a pre-...

Q: I've followed your "Eisenhower" dictum that I have to manage the whole ...
A: Having your...keep reading

It is a fundamental law of investing that you can (and must) act your way to investment success, and can never react your way to it....keep reading

Early last month, the pension fund of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, with over $50 billion in assets, fired Legg Mason Capital Management and four other long-only equity managers....keep reading

I've made something of a study of advertising by automobile insurers, and have concluded that, assuming they're all telling the truth, each and every automobile insurance company in the United States offers lower premium rates than do all the others....keep reading

1. Under the general heading of giving the devil his due, ...
2. Speaking of things all clients should probably get from you, the best short treatment of global energy situation....
3. I'm signed up to do a national conference call, with live Q&A...

Howard Ruff...keep reading

The Economist's July 5th, 2003 issue carried an extended special report on the state of the asset management industry. By and large, it was about what you'd expect, and it didn't tell you much that you didn't already know from your own experience....keep reading

"With election mania winding down, the market's focus should soon switch back to fundamentals. In our opinion, a key variable in the quest for alpha in the coming years will be dividends. Indeed, their importance to total equity returns over the long term cannot be overstated....keep reading

I've had a spate of related inquiries lately (see both this and last month's "Ask Nick," as well as the website) about how to handle bad referrals from good referral sources....keep reading

(My Behavioral Strategies Conference, which was announced in the January issue, and very quickly oversubscribed (see February), took place at the Marriott East Side Hotel in New York City on October 2....keep reading

Ask Nick...keep reading

Beginning at about half past two in the afternoon of Thursday, May 6, and for roughly the following sixteen minutes, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell very nearly 1,000 points. It was, in percentage terms, the fastest, deepest decline in stock prices in living memory....keep reading

As all of this newsletter's readers must know by now, the whole arsenal of my default methods of handling--or, more accurately, of declining to handle--catastrophism in all its innumerable incarnations may be found in the essay "Thou Shalt Not Read, Neither Shalt Thou Rebut" in the April 2010 issue....keep reading

1. David Mamet is one of the most acclaimed playwrights, screenwriters and film directors of our time....
2. The Domino Project is Seth Godin's joint venture with Amazon to create a series of essentially self-published books that succeed virally....
3. It is ironic that the last, and in many ways the best, book on the late financial crisis that you'll see reviewed here is by a New York Times reporter,...
4. Though it will almost certainly pass without much notice, August 5 is the thirtieth anniversary of one of the most significant events in American history,...
5. Wouldn't it be great, in this era of 9.1% unemployment, if "some big corporation would suddenly show up and offer a shovel-ready,...

Ask Nick...keep reading

The November issue of Financial Advisor magazine carried an ominous squib under the headline "Investors Look To Real Estate To Outperform."...keep reading