Industry Biases (Part 1)

Let me start by saying that I have immense respect for these two high profile participants in the Australian investing landscape, Robin Bowerman and Chris Cuffe, and the American forefather of index investing mentioned in the article, John Bogle. However these sorts of articles, and plenty are put out there by the investing industry, are filled with selfish bias and a total lack of understanding and research for doing it any other way but theirs.

The statements by all three that imply (and state) that market timing is not possible are untruths and I question the integrity of the intention behind them. It strongly implies that individuals cannot do it themselves and therefore they just have to hand their investment capital over to the so called professionals – whom by the way are also human beings and suffer from the exact same human investing deficiencies that we all do.

You can read the article here:

Whilst I might be accused that my response here is selfishly motivated I certainly cannot be accused of not understanding or researching the results of their way or saying that the method for which I crusade for DIY investing is the only way. On the former point of motivation, when I write articles such as this and when I have presented over the last 15+ years at numerous seminars and conferences around the country, and indeed even overseas, I speak just as much generically about being a DIY investor as I do about my companies own offerings and have even been criticized for mentioning other products & services before my own.

Look, this type of article boils my blood. It’s the misinformation that upsets me most. Make no mistake, millions upon millions of direct and indirect dollars, which, by the way, originate from the very private investors which the industry misinforms, is invested by the big end of town to convince private investors that they are not capable of DIY investing and that their only option is to outsource and invest their dollars with them, the professionals.

I have a little more to say more on this subject so rather than turn this post into a ‘war and peace’, I’ll continue to share my thoughts on this article and more next week.