» Posted by Martin Weil on April 27, 2006

Every year, Berkshire Hathaway's chairman writes a letter to his shareholders that should be required reading for investors. This year's is no exception.

My favorite part begins on pg. 17 and is entitled "How to Minimize Investment Returns." In it, Buffett has less than kind things to say about the usefulness of financial intermediaries, e.g. brokers, investment advisers (yours truly!), and asset managers (Buffett himself). My take-away. If all these professionals are adding fees but no value, why do investors keep employing them?

» Posted by Martin Weil on April 20, 2006

Did you know that gas prices in the US are among the least expensive in the world? The US is ranked 102nd out of all nations, with prices that are 20% lower than the world average and less than half those in the countries with the highest-priced gas.

And I did not know which country consumes the second greatest amount of oil after the US. That would be China, which consumes about 6 million bbls of oil per day compared to 20 million bbls for the US. Japan is a close third, followed by Russia, Germany and India.

» Posted by Martin Weil on April 06, 2006

Help may be here.

Cosmeo is a new website developed by the Discovery Channel tailored to the K-12 curriculum for all states but Iowa. A quick look shows it to be easy to navigate, exceptionally comprehensive, and rich with explanatory articles and video. Cosmeo is offering a 30-day free trial. Subscription is about $100 per year. (Thanks to the WSJ for the tip)

» Posted by Martin Weil on April 05, 2006

So suggests the annual retirement survey by the Employment Benefit Research Institute. The study paints a generally dismal picture of the average American worker's preparedness to retire.

The one helpful suggestion: "employer plans could be further enhanced by adding automatic options. A majority of employed workers favor automatic enrollment (69 percent), automatically increasing the percentage of salary contributed when an increase in pay is received (65 percent), and automatically investing contributions for the employee (59 percent).

Thanks to Daniel Gross for the pointer.