Bonds 101: How to Add Stability (and Income!) to Your Portfolio

The world’s greatest investor Warren Buffett read this book when he was 19 years old, and he still calls this “by far the best book about investing ever written.” The Intelligent Investor covers timeless ideas of how the market behaves, how investment is different from speculation, and how to identify profitable investments.

Learn whether you’re a defensive or an aggressive investor, why most trading strategies don’t work, and how to maintain control of your psychology in any type of market condition.

In The Simple Path to Wealth, blogger and financial expert JL Collins offers a simple road map to achieving financial independence and a secure retirement: Spend less than you make, avoid debt, save “F-You Money,” and invest in stock index funds. He demystifies stocks and bonds, as well as a plethora of investment plan options. In addition to explaining basic concepts such as asset allocation, Collins answers key questions such as how to live on your investments and how to avoid major tax hits.

Whether you’re in the wealth accumulation stage of life where you’re growing your investments, or in the wealth preservation stage where you’re living on them, Collins tells you how to use your money to achieve freedom and a more fulfilling life.

With various companies vying to manage investors’ money, investing can feel overwhelming. John Bogle, however, argues that the winning strategy for novice investors is simple: Invest in traditional index funds and hold them indefinitely.

In his 2017 book, The Little Book of Common Sense Investing, Bogle outlines the reasons why investors typically make more money with index funds than the primary alternative—actively managed mutual funds. Because the costs of mutual funds vastly outstrip those of index funds, Bogle argues that mutual funds deliver reduced returns, and those relative losses compound over time.

In this guide, we’ll discuss Bogle’s arguments about the superiority of index funds over mutual funds, in addition to his proposed allocation of stocks to bonds in your portfolio. We’ll also dig deeper into the data that underlie Bogle’s arguments and examine how the book’s predictions have panned out since its publication.

With various companies vying to manage investors’ money, investing can feel overwhelming. John Bogle, however, argues that the winning strategy for novice investors is simple: Invest in traditional index funds and hold them indefinitely.

In his 2017 book, The Little Book of Common Sense Investing, Bogle outlines the reasons why investors typically make more money with index funds than the primary alternative—actively managed mutual funds. Because the costs of mutual funds vastly outstrip those of index funds, Bogle argues that mutual funds deliver reduced returns, and those relative losses compound over time.

In this guide, we’ll discuss Bogle’s arguments about the superiority of index funds over mutual funds, in addition to his proposed allocation of stocks to bonds in your portfolio. We’ll also dig deeper into the data that underlie Bogle’s arguments and examine how the book’s predictions have panned out since its publication.

In The Simple Path to Wealth, blogger and financial expert JL Collins offers a simple road map to achieving financial independence and a secure retirement: Spend less than you make, avoid debt, save “F-You Money,” and invest in stock index funds. He demystifies stocks and bonds, as well as a plethora of investment plan options. In addition to explaining basic concepts such as asset allocation, Collins answers key questions such as how to live on your investments and how to avoid major tax hits.

Whether you’re in the wealth accumulation stage of life where you’re growing your investments, or in the wealth preservation stage where you’re living on them, Collins tells you how to use your money to achieve freedom and a more fulfilling life.

The world’s greatest investor Warren Buffett read this book when he was 19 years old, and he still calls this “by far the best book about investing ever written.” The Intelligent Investor covers timeless ideas of how the market behaves, how investment is different from speculation, and how to identify profitable investments.

Learn whether you’re a defensive or an aggressive investor, why most trading strategies don’t work, and how to maintain control of your psychology in any type of market condition.

With various companies vying to manage investors’ money, investing can feel overwhelming. John Bogle, however, argues that the winning strategy for novice investors is simple: Invest in traditional index funds and hold them indefinitely.

In his 2017 book, The Little Book of Common Sense Investing, Bogle outlines the reasons why investors typically make more money with index funds than the primary alternative—actively managed mutual funds. Because the costs of mutual funds vastly outstrip those of index funds, Bogle argues that mutual funds deliver reduced returns, and those relative losses compound over time.

In this guide, we’ll discuss Bogle’s arguments about the superiority of index funds over mutual funds, in addition to his proposed allocation of stocks to bonds in your portfolio. We’ll also dig deeper into the data that underlie Bogle’s arguments and examine how the book’s predictions have panned out since its publication.

A massive bestseller now in its 13th edition, Burton Malkiel’s A Random Walk Down Wall Street provides a comprehensive and entertaining introduction to the world of finance. Malkiel leverages his experience as an academic economist and former Wall Street portfolio manager to explain for the lay reader the intricacies of security analysis, asset valuation, and investment theory. He also offers a wealth of practical investment principles that will be useful for novice and seasoned investors alike.

Investing experts and laypeople alike often lament the unpredictability of the securities market—financial markets on which investments like stocks and bonds are sold. However, according to one of the world’s leading investors, Howard Marks, this belief in the market’s unpredictability is unfounded. In Mastering the Market Cycle, he argues that the securities market fluctuates predictably based on recurring business cycles and patterns in investor psychology.

In this guide, we’ll begin by discussing the foundational cycles—the economic cycle, the profit cycle, and the credit cycle—that shape the investing landscape and impact the securities market. Then, we’ll turn to the psychological cycles that arise from these business cycles, examining how investors swing between greed and fear and between risk tolerance and risk aversion. Finally, we’ll discuss how these cycles influence the overall securities market cycle and how understanding the securities market is crucial to earning above-market returns.

The world’s greatest investor Warren Buffett read this book when he was 19 years old, and he still calls this “by far the best book about investing ever written.” The Intelligent Investor covers timeless ideas of how the market behaves, how investment is different from speculation, and how to identify profitable investments.

Learn whether you’re a defensive or an aggressive investor, why most trading strategies don’t work, and how to maintain control of your psychology in any type of market condition.

With various companies vying to manage investors’ money, investing can feel overwhelming. John Bogle, however, argues that the winning strategy for novice investors is simple: Invest in traditional index funds and hold them indefinitely.

In his 2017 book, The Little Book of Common Sense Investing, Bogle outlines the reasons why investors typically make more money with index funds than the primary alternative—actively managed mutual funds. Because the costs of mutual funds vastly outstrip those of index funds, Bogle argues that mutual funds deliver reduced returns, and those relative losses compound over time.

In this guide, we’ll discuss Bogle’s arguments about the superiority of index funds over mutual funds, in addition to his proposed allocation of stocks to bonds in your portfolio. We’ll also dig deeper into the data that underlie Bogle’s arguments and examine how the book’s predictions have panned out since its publication.