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22 January 2025
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Technology makes our lives easier but our dependency on it makes us fragile. See why I might need to embrace cash again, and why I think investor preferences look set to become more polarised than ever before.
Rising prices have a big impact on retirement outcomes yet our most common gauge of inflation – the consumer price index – misses several important household costs for retirees.
A self managed super fund can offer investors more control and, in many cases, greater choice over their retirement investments. But are the extra costs and admin burdens worth it?
Facing up to a terminal diagnosis can also lead to worries regarding financial stability. People in this situation could have a number of options regarding their super assets.
Australia faces a wave of retirees at a stage where the superannuation system is still maturing. Better and fairer policy on the role of the family home as a retirement asset might help.
The dominance of mega-cap stocks in the US has led to strong index performance and a new wave of passive investors. Australia's markets might not be so suited to this approach.
Global and Australian private credit are different and shouldn't be lumped together. Investors also need to be wary of more complex and lower quality securities as the asset class grows.
People are hard-wired to make poor financial decisions under conditions of uncertainty. A new research paper explores whether a strategy built to exploit these biases in financial markets could succeed.
Last year, I wrote an article suggesting returns from ASX stocks would trample those from housing over the next decade. One year later, this is an update on how that forecast is going and what's changed since.
The housing market was subdued in 2024, and pessimism abounds as we start the new year. 2025 is likely to be a tale of two halves, with interest rate cuts fuelling a resurgence in buyer demand in the second half of the year.
This examines the performance of key asset classes and sub-sectors in 2024 and over longer timeframes, and the lessons that can be drawn for constructing an investment portfolio for the next decade.
The renowned investor has penned his first investor letter for 2025 and it’s a ripper. He runs through what bubbles are, which ones he’s experienced, and whether today’s markets qualify as the third major bubble of this century.
Key lessons include expensive stocks can always get more expensive, Bitcoin is our tulip mania, follow the smart money, the young are coming with pitchforks on housing, and the importance of staying invested.
Check out the most-read Firstlinks articles from 2024. From '16 ASX stocks to buy and hold forever', to 'The best strategy to build income for life', and 'Where baby boomer wealth will end up', there's something for all.