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How much passive investing is too much?
Warnings that index funds have broken the stock market all imply a threshold: a share of the market at which price discovery fails. Nobody making the argument names it. Owen Lamont, writing in the Financial Analysts Journal, argues that no such number exists short of complete passive ownership, and that what actually determines whether prices stay informative is who is left doing the trading. His case, the strongest peer-reviewed research against it, and what the performance
Robin Powell
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Why gold's inflation hedge fails in a crisis
Gold is the world's most popular inflation hedge — and one of the least reliable. Drawing on 126 years of data and the 2026 Strait of Hormuz crisis, this article examines why the gold inflation hedge fails precisely when investors need it most, and what actually protects purchasing power instead.
Robin Powell
Apr 138 min read
Why policy uncertainty is a terrible guide to investing
Thinking about creating an optimized excerpt featuring a primary keywordPolicy uncertainty feels terrifying, but the academic evidence shows it's a poor guide to what your portfolio will actually do. Here's how to tell the difference between the forecast and the real risk.
Robin Powell
Apr 98 min read
Wealth management underperformance: the exposed secret that could cost you millions
Y TREE's analysis of 550 portfolios found that 84 per cent of wealth managers underperformed in 2025. Wealth management underperformance cost investors up to a third of their expected returns — and most don't even know it's happening.
Robin Powell
Apr 710 min read
Why stock picking is even harder than you think
City of London skyscrapers including the Gherkin — the financial district reshaped by Big Bang in 1986, after which stock picking became a structurally losing game as research shows only 3.1 per cent of UK stocks generated all the market's real wealth over 50 years
Robin Powell
Apr 38 min read
Are government bonds really safe?
Are government bonds safe? Three centuries of UK and US data show they protect in recessions but fail during wars and pandemics — precisely when investors need them most. Here's what the evidence says, and two things you can do about it.
Robin Powell
Mar 309 min read
Collectible investments: the hidden cost of owning what you love
New research has put a price on the emotional pleasure of owning collectible investments. The cost is roughly 2.6 percentage points of annual return, and it doesn't stop at art and wine. From property to employer stock to ESG funds, the same invisible fee may be silently eroding your portfolio.
Robin Powell
Mar 2410 min read
Passive investing and market volatility: why the calmest investors aren't the bravest
The investors who stay calmest during market volatility aren't the bravest. They hold passive investing products that don't ask them to make decisions. Research from Morningstar, Vanguard, and academic studies shows that product design, not temperament, explains why passive fund investors trade less, hold longer, and capture more of their returns. UK flow data from the current Iran-driven selloff confirms the pattern in real time.
Robin Powell
Mar 2310 min read
100 years, 29,000 stocks, 46 winners: the case for indexing just got stronger
New research covering 100 years of US stock market data shows that just 46 firms out of nearly 30,000 drove half of all shareholder wealth creation — down from 89 in the original study. With wealth increasingly concentrated in fewer winners, the case for indexing has never been stronger. Here's what the numbers mean for your portfolio.
Robin Powell
Mar 208 min read
Nobody warns you before a bubble bursts
New research from Harvard Business School reveals that during every stock market bubble, the experts aren't sceptics being drowned out — they're true believers. Analyst forecasts soar, short sellers vanish, and the media barely whispers the word 'bubble'. Worse, the degree of optimism actually predicts crash probability. If nobody warns you before a bubble bursts, what can you do? Build a portfolio that doesn't depend on the alarm working at all.
Robin Powell
Mar 187 min read
HALO stocks: a new investment strategy or just the latest Wall Street story?
A glowing golden halo hovering above an ordinary cardboard box on a warehouse shelf, representing how HALO stocks are standard investments dressed up with compelling marketing
Robin Powell
Mar 168 min read
How much of your portfolio should be in stocks?
How much of your portfolio should be in stocks? It's one of investing's most important questions — and the standard answer is costing the average investor the equivalent of 2% of their lifetime consumption. Yale economists have finally built something better, and it fits in a spreadsheet.
Robin Powell
Mar 138 min read
The hidden cost of trading in retirement
New research suggests that trading in retirement increases after people stop working — and that the extra activity quietly erodes returns. Here's what the evidence shows, and why having more time isn't the advantage most investors assume.
Robin Powell
Mar 117 min read
Does AI accentuate investor biases?
Investors are turning to AI hoping it will cut through the emotional noise and deliver clearer, more rational financial decisions. But two recent studies suggest these tools don't neutralise investor biases — they absorb them. And the more advanced the model, the worse the problem may get.
Robin Powell
Mar 107 min read
Your fund family has outperformed? Yeah, right
Every year, some active fund families respond to the SPIVA scorecard with their own numbers — and those numbers always look better. They choose the start dates, benchmarks, and fee treatments that flatter them most. Here's how to see through it, and the one test that exposes what fund family marketing routinely hides.
Robin Powell
Mar 66 min read
Should you have private equity in your pension?
Private equity is heading into UK pension funds — backed by government policy and industry enthusiasm. But the evidence for ordinary savers capturing meaningful returns, after fees and illiquidity costs, is far weaker than the sales pitch suggests. Before your retirement savings are redirected, here's what the research actually shows.
Robin Powell
Mar 510 min read
Scott Adams: cartoonist, divisive commentator, scourge of active managers
Scott Adams damaged his own reputation in his later years. But long before that, the creator of Dilbert was using satire to make a serious, evidence-aligned case against active fund management — reaching tens of millions of readers along the way.
Robin Powell
Mar 26 min read
Why expected returns matter more than index concentration
The fund industry says index concentration is the big risk. But the evidence points elsewhere. Compressed expected returns are what really threaten your long-term wealth — and the right response is simpler and cheaper than the industry would have you believe.
Robin Powell
Feb 279 min read
The case against concentrated funds: new evidence on the downsides of conviction
A major Morningstar study of more than 5,800 funds has delivered a clear verdict on concentrated funds: they charge higher fees, deliver lower returns, and suffer deeper losses than their more diversified peers. The evidence suggests most investors would be better off on the main road.
Robin Powell
Feb 238 min read
Personal finance is broken — and deregulation won't fix it
Two leading economists argue that personal finance is broken at a structural level — and the UK government's response of deregulation and a cartoon squirrel won't fix it.
Robin Powell
Feb 209 min read
S&P 500 concentration: the scare story that's costing investors money
The fund industry warns that S&P 500 concentration makes your index fund dangerous. A major new study covering nearly a century of data tells a very different story — and suggests the real risk is listening to people who profit from your fear.
Robin Powell
Feb 189 min read
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