New Builders Dispatch

14/09/2024

was in the Capital Spectator last spring (I'm just noticing it now). Endorsed by some of the most respected investors of the last 50 years, including Burt Malkiel and Chamath Palihapitiya, the book is the latest in the respect Wiley book series.

https://www.capitalspectator.com/book-bits-16-march-2024/

Qian Liu

Book Bits: 16 March 2024 ● The Price is Wrong: Why Capitalism Won’t Save the Planet Brett Christophers Review via Financial Times Why is it so difficult to wean renewable energy off public support? While higher interest rates and steel prices clearly haven’t helped, Christophers argues we’ve...

23/08/2024

If trading is your idea of investing, you might think you can cope with the bear by selling quickly when the market falls and buying quickly when it climbs. Studies show nobody is that smart. For instance, one study from Bank of America found an investor who missed the S&P 500’s 10 best days in each decade since 1930 would have earned a total of 28%. The investor who held steady through ups and downs would have earned 17,715%.

Some people fall for the opposite trap: They’re so fearful of bear markets that they don’t investi at all. But if you had owned an S&P 500 index fund in 2008 and 2022, the two worst bear markets in recent memory, you would have lost 37% in 2008 and 18% in 2022. That hurts, but because you were diversified in a broad basket of stocks, it’s not a wipeout. During the Great Recession in 2008, if you had had an ever further diversified portfolio, 60% in an S&P 500 fund and 40% in U.S. Treasury bonds, your loss would have been 14%.

The two authors of The Little Book of Robo Investing share two damaging but common misconceptions about investing.

25/06/2024

Next up on the Little Book of Robo Investing: How To Make Money While You Sleep mini-tour: Barnes & Noble in , Pa. It's at 1 p.m. this Sunday.

I'll talk about the most important question people are asking me lately: What is robo investing? About 10 million Americans use robo investment platforms. This is an elevated style of index investing that minimizes your taxes and helps you see your wealth holistically.

Any old newspaper friends around? Hoping we can meet for coffee after the book event and maybe at Longs Park for music Sunday evening. DM me if you want to join!

https://stores.barnesandnoble.com/event/9780062170797-0

22/06/2024

Had a great time at The Company of Books in . Here are three interesting questions I got from young people.

Q: Should I sign up for my company's 401(k) plan and will it move with me when I quit my job? A: Yes and yes. It helps teach you the ease of saving; and If your company offers a match, this is free money, which is the best deal in investing. And you can roll over the plan into an IRA when you leave.

Q: What is robo investing? A: An elevated form of index investing that is even less expensive than most traditional financial advisors offer, and that manages your portfolio maintenance and taxes better over time.

Q: What should I know as a high school student? A: At this stage of your life, you should get in the habit of thinking about how to maximize your income and live below that income.

Q: Does money buy happiness? A: For that, you'll have to buy the book to see what the research says! Still a few books left at The Company of Books in Del Ray!

19/06/2024

Try Alexandrian Modern Mediterranean Cuisine at Elaines!

Elaine's Restaurant

02/06/2024

Excited to say our book is on the shelves at TCB in . I love local bookstores -- and reading on the page is still by far my preference! Watch for an event designed for young graduates and their parents coming up the weekend of June 15h ! Qian Liu

Here are some of the questions our book answers:

• Should graduates pay off debt or start investing?
• Career choices and whether money makes most people happy (the answer may surprise you).
• How much do you need to start investing?
• What are the best investment platforms for young people?
• How to check the right boxes on your 401(k) sign up form
• The single biggest mistake young investors make

07/05/2024

This is the kind of experience that I wouldn't have written about when I was younger. But the older you get, the more you see the pattern, and feel comfortable in the observation of what, after all, are just the facts.

Scenes From The Journalists’ Dinner
"At a dinner for journalists, meanwhile, I was seated near another writer who shall remain nameless. When the latter heard I’d just published The Little Book of Robo Investing, he immediately launched into a series of counter-factual statements about robo-investing, pushing far beyond the realm of polite conversation into mansplaining. I countered him, point after point: on the potential returns for this style of index-based investing (easily top quartile), on the growth of the companies, on the history of the movement. Last year, I literally co-authored a book on robo-investing, the latest in a prestigious Wiley series that has also included, as an author, Jack Bogle, the founder of Vanguard. And this dude at the table still thought he knew more than I did. One of the other men at the table asked me about it afterwards. “That guy seemed to be talking down to you,” he said.
Yep.

Doha, Qatar, is a crossroads of a world that we hardly see from the United States.

22/04/2024

Charley Ellis -- an investing giant and author -- wrote this glowing review of The Little Book of Robo Investing: How To Make Money While You Sleep. Charley was a board member of Vanguard and the Yale Endowment and still one of the most highly sought after advisors in the world.
Qian Liu

Secret To Success
Low costs, low fees, low taxes:

“Don’t do stupid stuff!” and avoid the many all too human mistakes almost everybody makes when trying to “do better.”
These two secrets have created a wonderful opportunity for Robo Advisors
as this little book so beautifully explains.

– Charles D. Ellis, author of Winning the Loser’s Game

The Little Book of Robo Investing: How to Make Money While You Sleep (Little Books. Big Profits)

22/03/2024

Bring your investing questions to Alexandria's Queen Street library tomorrow (Saturday) at 2 p.m.
717 Queen Street.

Come meet local author Elizabeth MacBride as she explains the concept and benefits of robo investing from her new book. Copies will be available for purchase and signing.

18/03/2024

If you are in the Alexandria area, we would love for you to join us at this book talk at the library. It's at 2 p.m. at the Kate Waller Barrett Branch, on Queen Street, on Saturday March 23.

The Little Book of Robo Investing debunks one myth about investing in each chapter. Here's the first myth:

Investing means trading stocks. In this book, we offer a better definition: Investing means building your wealth over the long term, meaning three years and longer. And we offer clear, low-cost advice for how you can do that while minimizing your risk.

Join us at this free event to find out more. Books will be available for purchase and signing.

Come meet local author Elizabeth MacBride as she explains the concept and benefits of robo investing from her new book. Copies will be available for purchase and signing.

12/03/2024

Today is the launch of The Little Book of Robo Investing: How To Make Money In Your Sleep. The latest in Wiley's acclaimed Little Book series, it is a guide to the new world of investing by two experts in finance and technology.

"This gem of a book should be required reading for everyone seeking to enhance their financial security."
–Burton G. Malkiel, author of A Random Walk Down Wall Street (50th anniversary edition, 2023)

More than 8 million Americans now use robo investing platforms to invest with ease, minimize their risk and achieve superior returns. These platforms didn’t exist 15 years ago. The Little Book of Robo Investing: How To Make Money While You Sleep is already named by investment giants as an essential guide to the new world of investing. The Little Book of Robo Investing offers:

– an entertaining and easy-to-read guide to robo investing, including the three pillars of good investing implemented by the platforms: diversification, low cost and keeping taxes low.
– a list of today’s largest robo investment platforms, how you should decide on one, how you can start investing easily and how you can benchmark your return
– 18 misconceptions about investing that hamper investors from achieving their best financial outcome and how robo platforms help you avoid them
– surviving and thriving during bear markets and volatile markets and how robo platform help you stick to your investing plan for the long run
– wisdom from behavioral finance about budgeting, thinking through what’s important to you, and graduating from budgeting to saving to investing in your personal financial journey
– the value of time and balance

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR THE BOOK:

Robo Investment Advisers provide investors with everything professional wealth managers dispense at a fraction of the cost. MacBride and Liu explain, in an accessible and user-friendly style, how Robo Advisers enable investors to achieve optimal investment fund selection, broad diversification, rebalancing, and tax loss harvesting, and to gain unconflicted investment advice. This gem of a book should be required reading for everyone seeking to enhance their financial
security.
– Burton G. Malkiel, author of A Random Walk Down Wall Street (50th anniversary edition, 2023).

Here are two secrets to success in investing. The first is to focus on low cost, low fees, low taxes indexing (which also gives you top quartile results over the long term). The second is, as President Obama famously said, “Don’t do stupid stuff!” and avoid the many all too human mistakes almost everybody makes when trying to “do better.” These two secrets have created a wonderful opportunity for Robo Advisors as this little book so beautifully explains.
– Charles D. Ellis, author of Winning the Loser’s Game

This accessible book gives a roadmap beginner investors can use to build wealth and achieve financial freedom over time. The authors did a great job informing readers how to use robo investing platforms with ease to start small, invest for the long term, avoid psychological traps and live a financial life consistent with one’s values
– Chamath Palihapitiya, founder and CEO of Social Capital, philanthropist, co-host of All-In podcast, and former executive at Facebook and AOL.

“This wonderful ‘little’ book is full of big insights — like the fact that fees, fear, and needless complexity are bigger threats to your investments than the next market downturn — and simple, actionable advice for harnessing the power of robo platforms. Armed with this book, individual investors at any level have the tools to tune out overpriced sales pitches, and turn small, steady contributions into meaningful financial security for the long run. An indispensable guidebook for today’s Intelligent Investor.”

Ambassador Joe Torsella (Ret.) Former State Treasurer of Pennsylvania

10/03/2024

This week is the launch of The Little Book Of Robo Investing: How To Make Money While You Sleep. There are lots of people to thank (I hope I remember them all in events, interviews and posts over the next few months) but I want to take a minute in the calm before the storm to thank Jack Bogle, the founder of Vanguard, who died a few years ago. He encouraged me as a writer when I was just starting out on a freelance career. It's a big honor to walk in his footsteps and to be asked to write a book in Wiley's Little Book series. Smooth sailing this week, . Qian Liu

08/02/2024

We are thrilled with the early reception of Little Book of Robo Investing: How To Make Money In Your Sleep.

This is the latest in the acclaimed Wiley series. The book explains the new world of investing and new players in it: robo advisors. The Little Book of Robo Investing helps people understand whether a robo advisor is right for them and how to use the platforms well. The book is for everyone who wants to learn more about how to achieve superior returns with the least amount of risk and work. Our reviewers – including Dr. Burt Malkiel -- are calling it a “gem” and a “must-read.” We are so honored by that.

Financial literacy and financial education are long-standing passions of mine. You don’t need to be a billionaire, but you do need to have enough, and to feel secure about what you have. Financial security is one part of the foundation of a happy life. Each chapter in the book begins with one misconception about investing and goes on to give readers the straight story.

Here’s the first misconception: Investing means trading stocks.

Here's the pre-order link:

If you preorder the book and write to me at [email protected] I’ll send you Chapter 1.

The Little Book of Robo Investing: How to Make Money While You Sleep (Little Books. Big Profits)

25/01/2024

Save the Date: Tuesday, March 12, for my book launch event at Elaine's on Queen Street in Old Town Alexandria, Va. 4:30-7 p.m. Wine, other drinks and mezze available for purchase (and of course the books, to be provided by a local bookstore!)
I'm so grateful to Elaine's for this great space they provide to local authors. We'll have a fireside chat and then a Q&A session -- so bring, your investing questions!


________________
“Armed with this book, individual investors at any level have the tools to tune out overpriced sales pitches, and turn small, steady contributions into meaningful financial security for the long run. An indispensable guidebook for today’s Intelligent Investor.”
―AMBASSADOR JOE TORSELLA (Ret.), Former State Treasurer of Pennsylvania

05/01/2024

Leadership rule #8 of 8

Back in 2015, I interviewed Jack Bogle founder of Vanguard, which grew to be a $7.2 trillion asset management behemoth. He shared eight insights about leadership, which I've been posting here this week. Here's #8 of 8.

8. Leaders have a sense that doing the right thing is a privilege.

When he was in college, his mother and two brothers were living in a rented apartment above the garage of a mansion in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. The apartment was a pool room, where his brothers slept, a bedroom for his mom, a hot plate in the hallway, and a bathroom, where they also washed dishes.
When Bogle came home from Princeton for the holiday, there wasn’t room, so he made another bedroom out of the dirt-floor garage on the estate.

He got a job working at the post office in the center of town. It started at 4 a.m.
“I remember walking down from this mansion, this garage,” he said. “I walked down the street in the dead of night. Streetlights on. Not a car in sight. Once in a while, it would be snowing. And I thought, ‘Oh, my God, I’m in heaven.’ The snow is falling, and everything is quiet, and I’m going to work, looking forward to the day. I never thought I was anything but the luckiest person on the face of the Earth,” he whispered.
“Go figure.”
____________________________________________
It was a great interview -- we both cried -- and when it was over, he inscribed a book to me. In the inscription, he encouraged me to write -- which surprised me a little bit, but he must have read some of my earlier pieces. Jack, who was 86 when I interviewed him, died a few years ago.

When Wiley approached me about writing a book in its Little Book series, I realized Jack had written a Little Book, too -- Little Book of Common Sense Investing. So, almost 10 years later, I feel like I've lived up, partway, to his encouragement to write. And the Little Book of Robo Investing, which I wrote with Qian Liu, is very much in Jack's vein -- it's about how individual investors can access the world’s most sophisticated investing, for very low fees. It comes out March 12.

04/01/2024

This is day 7 of the 8 leadership tips I gleaned in a 2015 interview I did Jack Bogle, for a CNBC story. Jack was born in 1929, so some of his earliest memories were of the Great Depression. I think that helped him be empathetic toward others.

Though not many young people know Jack’s story today, he founded Vanguard, one of the most important American companies in history. Today, it’s a $7.2 trillion asset management company that is shareholder-owned and that brought the costs of investing down for middle-class Americans. He was also one of the advocates of index investing for everyday investors to build wealth, a strategy that today’s robo advisors use to good effect.

At some point, one of the editors at CNBC must have taken out what Jack actually told me that day, which is that his dad was an alcoholic (the current story online doesn't contain that information). I don’t think Jack would agree with a perspective that alcoholism is shameful – he told me the stories of his dad’s drinking point-blank, with sympathy for his father.

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Here's #7
7. A leader can't be afraid to show emotion.
“A leader is someone people look to for help and encouragement and maybe a little sympathy and empathy,” said Bogle.
He’s not afraid to show emotion himself.
The grandson of a wealthy family and the son of a poor one, Bogle worked his way through school after the Bogles lost their money during the Depression. His father was, he said, a pl***oy and an alcoholic, and his mother held the family together.
“She could charm the skin off a snake and often did,” Bogle said, tearing up. “You just can’t imagine the burden she had, day after day. But I don’t recall her complaining. Life has a lot of burdens. She never showed them. ”
As for his father, Bogle said, he loved him and still does. “He just didn’t have the strength. He did his best.”

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.