Image Credit: “George Washington,” Suzanne Roy, from the Index of American Design, The National Gallery of Art One lesson investors never seem to learn: Be wary of companies that tout their own stock. Promotional CEOs almost always create disappointed investors in the end. To remind people of this eternal truth, I thought it would be a good idea to...
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Image Credit: “The Triumph of Patience,” engraving, 1559, Dirck Volckertz Coornhert after Maerten van Heemskerck, The National Gallery of Art By Jason Zweig | Oct. 28, 2015 11:30 pm ET I recently turned up this piece that I wrote more than 20 years ago about one of the most remarkable portfolio managers I’ve ever met: Phil Carret,...
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Image Credit: Christophe Vorlet By Jason Zweig | 12:12 pm ET Oct 23, 2015 One reliable way to mint money is to charge customers hefty prices for your services without ever itemizing the bill. Welcome to the corporate-bond market, where the costs of trading are about as transparent as the waters of the Big Muddy River after a hard rain. Most investors own...
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Image Credit: Christophe Vorlet By Jason Zweig | 12:42 pm ET Oct. 16, 2015 Crowdfunding is reaching critical mass. In the financial equivalent of a flash mob, this technique rapidly funds projects with relatively small sums from many people. You might already have donated to a worthy cause or a young independent film director through such websites as...
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Image Credit: Christophe Vorlet By Jason Zweig | 2:49 pm ET Oct. 9, 2015 Investors in master limited partnerships have just gotten the jolt of a lifetime. The Alerian MLP Index, a leading measure of the performance of these income-paying energy companies, fell 5.7% on Sept. 28 and another 5.8% the next day. At that point, the index was down 22% for the...
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