IAN PRYOR

What is it, and why should you consider using this strategy?

To answer the second part of the question is easier. In short, it seems to have led to better returns than the general stock market over a long period of time and is investing in its most simplest form.

Is the current bull market coming to an end, or about to resume? …….

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Investing is a long term exercise.  Many have cited that the current bull run has been going on for too long and a bear market is now inevitable.  I disagree, the back drop to the current stock surge was the GFC (Global Financial Crisis) which was a once in a 100 year event and a banking crisis.  Today we do not have that, we are not even in a recession.  The bull market post the Great Depression lasted 13.9 years and saw a total return of 815.30%.  Currently we are 9 years into a bull market with a total return of less than 400%.  More to come, I think so!  To see the past bull and bear markets for the S&P500 in the last century – click below.

Warren Buffett once said "What we learn from history is that people don't learn from history". He was referring to fear and greed and the most common mistake repeated consistently - thinking that "this time it's different"! So is it different this time? I'm not sure that's the right question at this particular moment in time. As I wrote in my 2018 market outlook back in January, there are lots of positives in the world and economic data is strong, however a correction was very much needed. 

We're Getting old! - What Singapore can learn from the developed  world

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The peace of mind at knowing that you have started saving for your future is nice and the sooner you start to save, the sooner it can start to grow.

To quote Donald Rumsfeld, the former US defence secretary: “There are known knowns. These are things that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. These are things we don’t know we don’t know.”

Will the Greeks be using the Euro or the Drachma?  We will have a clearer picture tomorrow.  Let's have a quick look though at the proposals put forward by Greece, and what's the difference compared to the previous ones? Manage Items.

Greece defaulted on its payments back to the IMF and joined the ranks of Zimbabwe and Sudan, and its European bailout expired.  Not a great day!  The failed payment of $1.7 billion to the global lender of last resort meant that Greece became the first advanced economy to default.  Alexis Tsipras, the Greek Premier called for a referendum, to be held on 5th July on further budget cuts and austerity proposals.

The US economy beat analyst expectations and grew more than expected in Q3. The Commerce Department had last month predicted a Q3 GDP growth rate of 3.5%, taking into account upward revisions both for consumer spending and business spending.