IBJ Articles

How Colts QB Andrew Luck’s retirement explains the inverted yield curve Mickey Kim / September 13, 2019 The talking heads have been aflame about the recent surprise retirement of Andrew Luck (29), the Indianapolis Colts’ 4-time Pro Bowl quarterback and the inversion of the yield curve, both “sure” [...]

Study shows “behavior gap” continues to destroy investor returns Mickey Kim / August 16, 2019 We clearly can’t control trade wars, the markets or White House tweets, but our behavior is up to us. Suppose you got spooked last December and sold your stocks as the market’s collapse [...]

Is “Unicorn” IPO Beyond Meat’s valuation “Impossible?” Mickey Kim / June 21, 2019 There is no better indicator of sentiment or “animal spirits” than the state of the market for initial public offerings (“IPOs”) and, except for a couple high-profile stumbles (Lyft and Uber), investors are partying like [...]

Happiness is getting get off the ‘positional treadmill’ Mickey Kim / May 17, 2019 You know what’s worse than judging a book by its cover? Judging a book by its cover…AND THEN making financial decisions based on what you guess the book might tell you. And yet, we [...]

Stocks’ recovery from December massacre holds important lessons Mickey Kim / April 19, 2019 The following is an excerpt from Kirr, Marbach & Co.’s first quarter client letter. "Way back” in December, stock prices collapsed as investor anxiety reached a fever pitch over the Federal Reserve raising short-term [...]

Kraft Heinz debacle proves not even Buffett immune to mistakes Mickey Kim / March 22, 2019 While Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett has achieved well-deserved mythical stature among investors, even the “Oracle of Omaha” makes huge mistakes. Exhibit A is the recent debacle involving his investment in Kraft [...]

Buffett extols “The American Tailwind” and urges “forget the trees” Mickey Kim / March 8, 2019 Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett’s annual letter to shareholders (posted on the last Saturday of February) always contain valuable historical perspective and timeless investment advice. The 2018 edition certainly didn’t disappoint. Focus [...]

“Free” money on the table for savers, but you have to pick it up Mickey Kim / February 22, 2019 In my last column I wrote how lack of savings is a financial crisis in our society and argued the recent government shutdown was a wake-up call shouting [...]

Shutdown highlights urgent need for ‘Uncertainty Fund’ Mickey Kim / February 8, 2019 Unlike with a technology start-up, you know you’ll never get rich working for the government, but it’s about as stable and risk-free a paycheck as you can get. As 800,000 federal employees and 1.2 million [...]

Have index funds become “Frankenstein’s monster?” Mickey Kim / January 25, 2019 That’s the issue raised by John C. “Jack” Bogle, who invented the first index mutual fund in 1975. Just weeks before his death on January 16 at 89, he said now that index funds had become [...]