Get Wall Street Out of Your Pocketbook by Removing the Intermediaries

Just when we thought we were through hearing about the Wall Street hooligans and their criminal vices our “untouchable” friends at Goldman Sachs made the news twice. The Wall Street Journal revealed that the SEC has found criminal doings at Goldman. With one hand secretly cramming worthless mortgaged backed securities into their valued clients accounts, the other hand was placing big bets against that very same market. And if that wasn’t enough, one of Goldman’s directors is being implicated as part of the Galleon hedge fund insider trading racket — the biggest ever in America.

Sadly, it was no surprise to learn the Goldman Sachs threw their clients “under the bus” by deceitfully selling them mortgage securities while at the same time making a killing on shorting the housing market. Their slogan, “Helping clients build and preserve their financial wealth” needs a minor adjustment. “Helping clients build and preserve OUR financial wealth.” This is a paragon of the Wall Street ethic – make money (hmmm – a lot of money) even if you must trample your client under foot. When you manage your own diversified portfolio of ETFs through a MarketRiders account, you truly get Wall Street out of your pocketbook by removing the intermediaries.

The Wall Street gurus seem to have a closet full of tricks to help investors outperform the market. Unfortunately, most of this advice is unproven and ineffective. In this MoneyWatch article, James Picerno points out one of the ONLY scientifically proven secrets to boost portfolio returns year-upon-year – disciplined rebalancing. Mr. Picerno underscores that rebalancing can deliver a 0.5 to 1.0 percentage point annual bonus compared to what you’d earn on the same portfolio that’s left alone. Our research shows that by using MarketRiders’ advanced rebalancing algorithms rather than a simple calendar based approach, investors add up to 2% additional growth in some portfolios and market conditions. We have more on this topic here: “How Often Do I Need to Rebalance?”.

When it comes to retirement investing, remember that you don’t have as many friends in the financial services industry as you think. By taking the time to learn the virtues of low cost indexing, global diversification and disciplined rebalancing, you will truly build and preserve YOUR wealth.