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Why I Just Bought A BlackBerry

In the hunt for returns in the jungle of investing we rarely talk about “quality of life”, but it should be remembered that the whole reason for investing is precisely that; to preserve and improve one’s quality of life, either through retirement savings, covering and planning for education or making purchasing a house feasible. That’s what this is all for.

So it’s easy then to get lost in the mechanics of investing. At the charts (see #MarketGlance) the news and the conferences:

https://twitter.com/Walker_Report/status/515164444604006400

This tends to create a disconnect between how we experience the world and how we want our investments to work. For instance I am a big believer in Apple products. (AAPL). I like their phones and computers, I’m in their ecosystem, and as an investor I am impressed at their success as a company. But as a user of an iPhone I’ve started to wonder just how much time I waste under the pretence of having a highly capable phone.

When the iPhone first came to Canada I was struck by the idea that I could look up directions easily, check the internet quickly for information and have access to my emails. When first introduced the iPhone was a tool of productivity. Since then the smart phone market has been flooded and “feature creep” is definitely a term I would use to describe what many of these phones can now do. Meanwhile productivity has taken a backseat to a host of other competing and primarily entertaining functions. In short, I was tired of wasting time on my phone doing nothing.

And along came Blackberry offering, in some ways, a phone that promises to do less fun stuff, and do more work stuff. And while I had shunned Blackberry for years, based largely on my own terrible experience with the older models and their tiny screens, the new Passport seemed to offer me not simply a useful phone for doing work, but also terrible one to watch Netflix on. Because why am I watching Netflix on my phone in the first place?

Are angry birds really the best use of your time on a $1000 phone?

We live in an age of giant flat TVs with instant movie watching capabilities, but for reasons beyond me I’ve taken to watching stuff on my phone. So while I love Apple, and believe that they have a great company, I’m hoping that I can improve my quality of life by degrading my phone experience somewhat.

Maybe there is hope for Blackberry yet.

Recommended Read: The End of Absence: What We’ve Lost in a World of Connection by Michael Harris

September 29, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

Don’t Be Surprised That No One Knows Why The Market Is Down

Last Friday I watched the TSX start to take a precipitous fall. The one stock market that seemed immune to any bad news and had easily outperformed almost every other index this year had suddenly shed 200 points in a day.

Big sell-offs are common in investing. They happen periodically and can be triggered by anything, or nothing. A large company can release some disappointing news and it makes investors nervous about similar companies that they hold, and suddenly we have a cascade effect as “tourist” investors begin fleeing their investments in droves.

This past week has seen a broad sell-off across all sectors of the market in Canada, with Financials (Read: Banks), Materials (Read: Mining) and Energy (Read: Oil) all down several percentage points. In the course of 5 days the TSX lost 5% of its YTD growth. That’s considerable movement, but if you were looking to find out why the TSX had dropped so much so quickly you would be hard pressed to find any useful information. What had changed about the Canadian banks that RBC (RY) was down 2% in September? Or that TD Bank (TD) was down nearly 5% in a month? Oil and gas were similarly effected, many energy stocks and pipeline providers found themselves looking at steep drops over the last month. Enbridge (ENB) saw significant losses in their stock value, as did other energy companies, big and small, like Crew Energy (CR).

Screen Shot 2014-09-26 at 11.08.02 AM — The S&P TSX over the last five days

All this begs the question, what changed? The answer is nothing. Markets can be distorted by momentum investors looking to pile on to the next hot stock or industry, and we can quibble about whether or not we think the TSX is over valued by some measure. But if you were looking for some specific reason that would suggest that there was something fundamentally flawed about these companies you aren’t going to have any luck finding it. Sometimes markets are down because investors are nervous, and that’s all there is to it.

Market panic can be good for investors if you stick to a strong investment discipline, namely keeping your wits about you. Down markets means buying opportunities and only temporary losses. It help separates the real investors from the tourists, and can be a useful reminder about market risk.

So was last Friday the start of a big correction for Canada? My gut says no. The global recovery, while slow and subject to international turmoil, is real. Markets are going to continue to recover, and we’ve yet to see a big expansion in the economy as companies deploy the enormous cash reserves they have been hoarding since 2009. In addition, the general trend in financial news in the United States is still very positive, and much of that news has yet to be reflected in the market. There have even been tentative signs of easing tensions between Russia and the Ukraine, which bodes well for Europe. In fact, as I write this the TSX is up just over 100 points, and while that may not mean a return to its previous highs for the year I wouldn’t be surprised if we see substantial recoveries from the high quality companies whose growth is dependent on global markets.

September 26, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

Forget Scotland, Canada is Playing Its Own Dangerous Economic Game

In a few hours we will begin finding out the future of Scotland and the United Kingdom, and we may be witness to one of the most incredible social and economic experiments in the history of the Western World.

But while many suspect that a yes vote for Scottish independence may cast an uncertain economic future, it shouldn’t be forgotten that as Canadians we are also going through our own uncertain economic experiment. According to a survey conducted by Canadian Payroll Association and released this month, 25% of Canadians are living paycheque to paycheque, with nothing left in their accounts once their bills have been paid for.

In addition, the majority of Canadians have less than $10,000 set aside for emergencies and these numbers get (unsurprisingly) worse as you look at various age groups. Young Canadians are the worst off, with 63% saying they are living paycheque to paycheque between the ages 18 to 29.

But when it comes to planning for retirement, the numbers are significantly more dire. More and more Canadians are expecting to delay their retirement, citing insufficient funds for their retirement nest egg. Even as people (correctly) assume that they will need more money to last them through retirement, 75% of those surveyed said they had put away less than a quarter of what they will need, and for those Canadians getting closer to retirement (north of 50), 47% had yet to get to even a quarter of their needed savings.

None of this is good news, and it undercuts much of the success of any economic growth that is being reported. While the survey found that people were trying to save more than they had last year it also highlights that many people felt that their debt was overwhelming, that their debt was greater than last year and that mortgages and credit cards by far accounted for the debt that was eating into potential savings.

The report has a few other important points to make and you can read the who thing HERE. But what stands out to me is how economies and markets can look superficially healthy even when the financial health of the population is being eroded. This is a subject we routinely come back to, partly because its so important, and partly because no one seems to be talking about it past the periodic news piece. Our elections focus on jobs, taxes and transit, but often fail to begin addressing the long term financial health of those voting.

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September 18, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

From The Desk of Brian Walker: The Hardest Part of Retirement

The moment you retire you are expected never work again.

Think about that for a minute. Every dollar you’ve ever EARNED has been EARNT. Your bank accounts will never be replenished again from your toil. All of your income from here on will be the result of your Canada Pension and OAS, any private pensions you are a part of and your savings. This is your life and your future boiled down to a number.

And as most companies stopped defined benefit pensions, many Canadians have had to turn (usually out of necessity) to investing in the market to grow and fund their retirement.

I have yet to retire, although I admit to being closer to it now than I was 20 years ago when I started this business, and I have to acknowledge that I find the prospect of retiring frightening. Work has occupied most of my life, and while I enjoy travelling and have a number of hobbies I have developed over the years I wonder if they can fill my days. But the thing that always sits at the back of my mind is about the money.

Because regardless of how well you have done in life there is always the potential to lose money in the markets, but so long as you are working you can replenish some of those losses. Once you have retired however, that’s all there is. A financial loss can be permanent in retirement and its impact will last the rest of you life, defining all your future decisions.

For my currently retired and retiring clients the thing that has surprised me the most is that while these concerns are very present, they sit alongside a concern that should really be receding: market growth. For all the worry about protecting their retirement nest egg from severe downturns and unforeseen financial disasters, many investors are still thinking like they are accumulating wealth and have twenty years until they retire.

When it comes to investing, retirees need to be looking at investments that fit the bill of dependability and repeatability. Dividend paying stocks, balanced income funds and certain guaranteed products offer exactly that type of solution, kicking out regular, consistent income that you can rely on regardless of the market conditions. And as more and more Canadians head towards retirement we are seeing a growing base of useful products that fit these needs beyond the limited yield of GICs and Annuities.

The downside of these products is that they are all but certain to be constrained when it comes to growth. They simply will never grow at the rates of some companies, certain investments or aggressive markets by design. That’s a good thing, but nearly a quarter of a century of investing have instilled in many Canadians a Pavlovian response to the idea that investing must equal growth. But investors will be much better served by looking past desire for an ever expanding portfolio and towards investments that secure their long term income.

I’m not suggesting that once you retire you stop participating in the market, or that having any growth in your portfolio is wrong, or that it represents some kind of fault in your retirement planning. What is at stake though is controlling and protecting your savings and lifestyle by making your investment portfolio subservient to those needs over growth focused market participation. Your retirement could last almost as long as your entire working life, and easily as long as the amount of time you saved for your retirement. There will be plenty of things to worry about in retirement, and lots of other financial needs that must be addressed; from comprehensive estate planning to out-of-pocket health care costs. Why complicate your retirement needs by worrying about whether your are participating fully in bull markets, or worse, bear markets?

If you would like to discuss how we can help your retirement needs, or how we can re-tune an account for retirement please send us a note!

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September 11, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

Super Cool New Device Won’t Fix the Economy

Apple just unveiled its new watch (called the Apple Watch no less) and briefly I watched the stock price climb quickly as the promise of Apple’s great new thing came to life. But before Apple had its big webcast yesterday, I was actually having a look at this nifty thing called NAVDY.

NAVDY seems like a great idea and its one of many many great things that is regularly and constantly being developed by an increasingly connected world that funds great ideas through websites like kickstarter.com. But like many new great things that I see, most of them won’t dramatically change the economy in any significant way. Specifically, none of these new businesses will create a great number of new jobs.

This may seem like a small point to quibble over, however when we look through the prominent industries that tend to occupy the business sections of newspapers, like Apple Computers, you begin to realize that very few of these businesses do much in the way of employment. Improvements in productivity, automation and robotics continue to eat away at an industrial base that forces young people into retail sectors, and an older generation into early retirement.

More people are employed in Canada year-over-year, however it has involved net losses in high employment sectors combined with net gains in high-education sectors. Many of the jobs that employ lots of Canadians present opportunities for automation. Click on the image to view a larger version.

From Stats-Can - the widening gap in unemployment spells. Being employed in manufacturing meant you could be out of work longer in Canada than in non-manufacturing based jobs. — From Stats-Can – the widening gap in unemployment spells. Being employed in manufacturing meant you could be out of work longer in Canada than in non-manufacturing based jobs.

Where there were once middle class factory jobs for thousands of Canadians they are now increasingly rare, and often exist through substantial subsidization from the provincial or federal government.

This story isn’t new. In fact it’s so old now that the first real impact of it dates back to the 1980s. But as time marches on and we are increasingly numb to this reality it may have escaped our attention just how great a challenge this is posing to our society.

For instance, today, Vox.com posted an article about “Why you need a bachelor’s degree to be a secretary“, focusing on how many jobs are “up-credentialing”.

Industrial decline also plays an indirect role in rising housing markets in cities. It’s easy to see that falling employment in traditionally well paying blue-collar sectors may contribute to higher crime rates and stagnant wages, but it also tells us where it makes the most sense to live. Young Canadians finishing university are unlikely to move back to Windsor when the best jobs are now in Toronto, fuelling a condo boom while raising housing prices across the city to the point of being unaffordable to new families.

From the Economist, January 18, 2014: Briefing: The Future of Jobs - Retail services continue to grow as other market sectors decline. — From the Economist, January 18, 2014: Briefing: The Future of Jobs – Retail services continue to grow as other market sectors decline.

All of this speaks to a larger and more looming issue for Canadians, which is that continued improvements in automation place long term pressure on things like infrastructure and wealth distribution and raise other questions about middle class viability. In other words, we seem eager to introduce new technologies into our lives, but each of these technologies doesn’t just reduce jobs, they reduce jobs that employ lots of people. The January 18th, 2014 Economist ran a frightening story about this kind of automation and that up to 47% of existing jobs could come under pressure by new forms of cost effective robotics and computers.

It’s often hard to see changes that are incrementally slow, but changes are occurring, and over the coming years and decades these changes will likely shake out in ways that we aren’t expecting. But for Canadians looking to save and retire in the future, many of these trends are coming together in worrying ways. In the form of higher educational costs, more limited job opportunities, higher costs of living and potential unemployability, and sadly the new industries and businesses we are quick to promote won’t likely be enough to stave off a society that is undergoing a significant shift in how it employs people.

All of this is a lot to explain in a single article. But if you’d like a simple video that does a good job of scaring you, please watch this video by Youtuber CPG Grey, whose excellent video from a few weeks ago got widely picked up and shared on the web. Otherwise, if you’d like to talk about getting set-up with a savings plan, either for yourselves and kids please give me a call!

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September 10, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

Why The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge Made Economic Sense

This week it seemed that much of the media hype around the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge died down as it gradually became eclipsed with other news. In case you somehow missed what this viral sensation was, it went something like this. What started as a youtube video of someone giving $100 to an ALS charity instead of having a bucket of cold water dumped on your head, spread quickly into having a bucket of cold water dumped on your head and also giving money to an ALS charity, followed by the donator/victim challenging several other people. These were filmed and placed on Facebook and youtube and people have been following it.

For the several charities that raise money for ALS research, the challenge has proved to be an enormous windfall, netting more than $100 million in donations in excess of their normal annual fund raising. But all of the cheering and success brought in the professional cynical class of journalists. There must be a downside, and by god they would report it.

I’m not going to go into the details of the criticisms here, but here are some articles you can read if you are so inclined. Instead I want to show why the economics of which charities we give to makes more sense than critics often believe.

The standard argument goes something like this: We contribute far more money to diseases that won’t likely kill us than the ones that do. Humans are clearly illogical and if they had any sense we would direct all our money into charities that dealt with the things most likely to wipe us off the planet. This misalignment of money versus danger is similar to why we are so scared of terrorists than swimming pools, even though you are far more likely to drown in a swimming pool than be killed by terrorists.

Donating.vs.Death-Graph.0

Except that it’s all wrong! People give money to the charities that matter most to them because they understand something about diseases that kill you better than people who just look at statistics.

For instance, Heart Disease is the number one killer in almost every western country, with (I believe) the exception of Portugal. So why aren’t we more scared of heart disease? Because it typically doesn’t kill you until you are already old. While your odds of getting and dying from heart disease start to rise significantly when you reach 60, since 1952 the cardiovascular death rate in Canada has dropped by 75% and nearly 40% in the last decade due to improvements in medicines, surgical procedures and prevention efforts according to Statistics Canada. In other words we’ve already made great strides in reducing unnecessary death from heart disease, and reducing the likelihood that heart disease will strike early is as easy as simply eating a healthier more balanced diet.

Cancer on the other hand isn’t fully understood. We don’t know why some people get it, and why some do not. We don’t know why some people have cancer go into remission and why some do not. If you have survived cancer you have likely been through a hell of an ordeal, as almost every known treatment is as bad as the disease you are fighting. If you’ve watched a loved one pass away from the disease you know how difficult it was and had to watch someone slip away, often in pain and great discomfort, losing control of their bodies and losing even their sense of self.

The mistake that the statistics cover up is this. You must die of something. People do not simply get old and die. They get old, weaker with time, and finally susceptible to something far more likely to kill them. Increasingly heart disease is something that you die of when you are old. Cancer by comparison can strike you down in the prime of your life. You can get cancer in your 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, or 70s. Its a difficult disease to overcome, survivors are acutely aware that they have a high chance of reoccurrence and people who have lost a loved one feel the pain of a prolonged illness. In that context we give money to charities that fight diseases that leave a strong emotional scar, like cancer or in this case ALS, and that does make economic sense.

We took a little time off this week following labour day. We’ll be back next week with regular postings!

September 5, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

Russia Invades Ukraine, Needs Potatoes

This Russian paratrooper crossed the Ukrainian border “by accident”

Last week it looked as though Russia was escalating its engagement in Ukraine, sending supplies directly into Ukrainian territory and potentially starting a full blown war. But things have remained opaque since then, with increasing reports that Russian troops were crossing the border and Russia steadfastly denying it. But after days of reports from the Ukraine that Russia had started a low level invasion to assist with Pro-Russian forces, CNN reports this morning that Russia is now using tanks and armoured personal carriers and is fighting on two fronts within the Ukraine.

Whether this proves to be a false start, or if Russia is going to become more open in its military involvement it’s hard to say. What is clear is that this war in Ukraine is far from over.

Meanwhile this week also saw some evidence about the rising cost of food in Russia as a result of the retaliatory trade restrictions directed at nations like the United States, Canada and most of Europe. Reported in Slate and Vox.com, this graph of rising food costs is actually quite surprising. Potato prices have risen by 73%!

I’m reluctant to say too much about this situation and what it means from an investor standpoint, lest people think I am taking the suffering of people in a war zone too lightly. I will say that as emerging market countries become richer and begin to flex their national muscles, jostling over everything from important natural resources, long disputed borders, and sometimes even national approval, its likely that international events could increasingly be outside of our control. Since much of our manufacturing is now outside of our borders, and often even energy supplies come from nations openly hostile to us, we find ourselves in an economic trap of our own making. How can you act with a free hand against a nation that holds so many of your own economic interests?

Screen Shot 2014-08-28 at 11.39.19 AM — From “The Economist” July 27th, 2013 “When Giants Slow Down”

I sincerely doubt that our sanctions against Russia or high potato prices will bring Putin to his knees, (although his people may get fed up with higher food costs) but in the past it was much clearer how to deal with this kind of brinkmanship. Today we live a world where many of our economic interests are heavily tangled with nations who do not share our same strategic goals. It is said that nations do not have friends, only interests, and as Emerging Markets look increasingly attractive to foreign investors we may have to remind ourselves that Emerging Markets are not simply opportunities for growth, but nations with their own set of interests and goals separate from our own.

August 28, 2014August 28, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

The Real Reason Why Tim Hortons and Burger King are Merging

While I rarely get the chance to watch late night TV anymore, I’m sure there will be a few segments on The Daily Show and Colbert Report about “inversion” – the process by which American companies buy another foreign firm and relocate their head-office there to avoid paying taxes, over the next couple of days.

Screen Shot 2014-08-26 at 4.15.26 PM — Click on this picture to see John Stewart make fun of “tax inversion”

The arrival yesterday of the Burger King/Tim Horton’s deal has a number of lawmakers and journalists screaming about lack of loyalty, tax dodging and America’s uncompetitive corporate tax rate. But being quick to anger isn’t the smartest way to understand why one company might wish to purchase another and pull up stakes.

For instance, despite claims that Burger King intends to avoid substantial taxes in the United States in favour of Canada’s more moderate tax rate isn’t actually that true. As reported this morning by the Financial Times, the two companies both pay a very similar effective tax rate, literally only points apart from each other. So relocating a company like Burger King may indeed yield some benefits in taxation, but likely so small as to not make the deal worth while.

So why do it? It may have more to do with the Burger King itself and how it was acquired in 2010. According to the Financial Times, Burger King was purchased in a leveraged buyout, meaning that those doing the buying borrowed a great deal of money to do so. But interest expense is tax deductible. Since 2010, Burger King has been restructured and deleveraged, and since it went public in 2012 has had an 85% return in stock value. In other words, the people who own Burger King have done well. But buying Tim Hortons means that the consortium will once again have to borrow substantially to do the buying, creating further tax right-offs for the newly merged company.

Burger King's share price since it went public in 2012 — Burger King’s share price since it went public in 2012

There are other reasons for this merger that actually make sense. Burger King is struggling to gain market share and is under pressure from the growing business of “fast-casual” restaurants like Chipotle. But despite that it has a strong operating margin, 52%, which shows that the restructuring has been effective at making the business profitable. Meanwhile Tim Hortons has an operating margin of only 20%, an opportunity for improvement in the eyes of Burger King. Together they will form the third largest fast food business in the world and open a new front into the coveted and notoriously difficult breakfast market.

Operating Margin and Effective Tax Rate for Burger King and Tim Hortons. Courtesy of the Financial Times

There may be other synergies and reasons for this merger and subsequent inversion, and the tax benefits that come from borrowing could do with some scrutiny, but it would seem from the outset that avoiding taxes is hardly the exclusive driving force behind this deal.

August 26, 2014August 27, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

California could be at a tipping point…

I’ve been quite vocal about how one day we will have to accept that things we get for free may not be free forever. Water is of particular concern for everyone not simply because it’s a necessity, but because almost none of us live with water scarcity anymore its often hard to connect the dots when it comes to facing real water shortages.

Take for instance California, whose three year drought has reached new and frightening proportions. There are some excellent articles about what impact the drought is having here and here, but take a look at these images of water reserves from 2011 and then the same locations from 2014. Running out of water is a frightening prospect, but 30 million people don’t just pack up and move because water has gotten a little scarce. What happens instead is you begin paying more for water while getting less back in economic benefits.

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I highly recommend Elizabeth Renzetti’s excellent piece in the Globe and Mail today, and I suggest everyone have a read of it. Its an excellent reminder that the biggest issue we face in managing serious economic and environmental problems is not a lack of skill, knowledge, or imagination, but a simple willingness to face the problem. The outcome of which is usually higher costs for everybody immediately, and possibly disastrous results in the future.

August 25, 2014August 27, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc

Why it’s so hard to see a financial correction when its staring you in the face

If you’ve been following this blog, you’ll have noticed how I am regularly concerned about the state of the Canadian economy. And while I maintain that I have good reason for this; including fears about high personal debt, an expensive housing market and weakening manufacturing numbers, the sentiment of the market isn’t with me. As of writing this article the TSX is up just over 14% YTD, spurred on by strong numbers in the small cap, energy and banking sectors.

All this illustrates is the incredible difficulty of understanding and seeing the truth in an economy. Is an economy healthy or unhealthy? How do we know, and which data is most important? Economies produce all kinds of information and it’s frequently hard to see the forest for the trees. But even with all the secrecy around the bank’s and regulators financial misdeeds prior to 2008, the writing was on the wall that the US housing market was over inflated and that savings rates were too low and debt rates too high. And while you could be forgiven for not really understanding the fine points of bundled derivates and just how far “toxic debt” had spread, it wasn’t as though the banks had hidden the size of their balance sheets or the number of outstanding loans. It was all there for anyone to see. And people did see it and then shrugged.

One of the big fallouts of the financial meltdown was extensive criticism directed at the professional class of economist and business reporters who give regular market commentary and missed the total implosion of the financial and housing sectors. After all, how good could these “professionals” be if they can’t see the financial freight train like the one that just came through? . But I would chalk that up to overly positive market sentiment. It’s not that they didn’t see the bad news, they just assumed that other better news was more important.

Look at these two articles from yesterday’s (August 20th, 2014) Globe and Mail:

Canada losing steam in its push for an export boom

&

Bump in shipping a boon to Canada

While these two articles aren’t exactly equal, (one is talking about Canada right now, the other is talking about prolonged growth of Canadian shipping over the coming decades) it’s interesting to note that they sit side by side on the same day in the same newspaper. For investors (professional and individual alike) it is an ongoing challenge to make sense of the abundant information about the markets without resorting to our “gut feelings”. Do we tend to feel good about the market or bad? Which headline should be more important? Here is a third article from the same day: (Click the image to see the full size article).

Its plain to see how I feel about the state of the Canadian market (and which news I place value on), but its also possible that I’m the crazy one. Lots of Canadians disagree with me quite strongly and it is shown everyday the TSX reaches some new high. Which brings us back to investor, or market sentiment. Described as the “tone” of the market, it might be better thought as human irrationality in assessing odds and errors in estimating value. Investor sentiment plays a significant role in valuing the market over the short-term, far in excess of hard financial data. And it isn’t until that sentiment turns sour that we begin to see corrections. Coincidentally, holding an opinion contrary to the popular sentiment is quite lonely, and many portfolio managers have been criticized for their steadfast market view only to be proven right after they had acquiesced to investor complaints about poor performance.

Following a correction, once the positive market sentiment has been washed away, it seems obvious to us which information we should have been paying attention to. But that doesn’t mean being a contrarian is automatically a recipe for investment success. I may be wrong about the Canadian market space altogether (it wouldn’t be that shocking), and in time I will regret not placing more value on different financial news. What is far more valuable to investors is to have a market discipline that tempers positive (and negative) sentiment. An investing discipline will reign in enthusiasm over certain hot stocks, and keep you invested when markets are bad and the temptation is to run away. Sometimes that means being the loser in hot markets, but that may also mean better protection in down markets.

August 21, 2014 by The Walker Report of Walker Wealth Management and Aligned Capital Partners Inc