In Response to Samuel's Comment (and maybe this will help some other readers)

I do plead guilty to aiming the level of this blog above that of the novice investor, although I think they will find much useful here.

My objectives are:

1. Not to offer short term market commentary, individual stock recommendations or recommendations among active funds.

2. To reinforce the importance of implementing a well diversified portfolio of low cost instruments and avoiding attempts at market timing.

3. To debunk material from the industry and in the press that touts strategies that don't meet the above.

4. Commentary on evolving trends in academic finance as it applies to investment portfolios.

5. Since I teach a course in investment management for not for profits, I have a special interest in that area and do comment on it. The recent developments in this area btw have great relevance to the overall investment world.

Despite the large number of books that tout the strategies I disagree with, there are a number of good books that at least provide the logic behing the "plain vanilla" version of my approach. A couple recommendations:

anything on investing by John Bogle
the Gone Fishin' Portfolio by Alexander Green and his website
The Wall Street Self Defense Manual by Henry Blodgett
The Four Pillars of Investing by William Bernstein (a bit more advanced)

So to be honest my blog is aimed at those who are pretty comfortable with the content above and probably even the material that would be taught in an introductory finance class and probably someone that reads the money and investing section of the WSJ fairly regularly (and avoids CNBC and especially Cramer).

But please keep reading and post questions in the comment sections, I will try to respond