January 25, 2023 Welcome to another part of my Safe Withdrawal Rate Series. Today’s topic: Bucket Strategies in retirement. As you know, my blogging buddy Fritz Gilbert has written extensively on this topic at his Retirement Manifesto blog, for example: And likewise, I have written about my skepticism of bucket strategies in Part 48 of … Continue reading Discussing Retirement Bucket Strategies with Fritz Gilbert – SWR Series Part 55

December 7, 2022 The number one story in the crypto world this year (or decade? or century?) must be the FTX crypto platform collapse. It’s mindblowing how quickly FTX went from one of the largest crypto exchanges with a 150-second Superbowl commercial in February 2022, naming rights to sports arenas, numerous A-list celebrity endorsements, etc., … Continue reading A Post-Mortem for a Crypto Exchange: Is FTX worse than Bernie Madoff?

November 2, 2022 In my post three weeks ago, I happily declared that the 4% Rule works again, thanks to the much more attractive equity and bond valuations. It’s always fun to deliver pleasant news. But keep in mind, everyone, that this refers to today’s retirees with their slightly depleted portfolios. But how about the … Continue reading Could 2022 be worse than 2001?

October 12, 2022 As promised in the “Building a Better CAPE Ratio” post last week, here’s an update on how I like to use the CAPE ratio calculations in the context of my Safe Withdrawal Rate Research. I have studied CAPE-based withdrawal rates in the past (see Part 11, Part 18, Part 24, Part 25) … Continue reading The 4% Rule Works Again! An Update on Dynamic Withdrawal Rates based on the Shiller CAPE – SWR Series Part 54

October 5, 2022 After a bit of a hiatus from the blog – thanks to our ambitious summer travel schedule – it’s time for another post. Over the years, I’ve gotten a lot of questions about the Shiller CAPE Ratio and if it’s still relevant. If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you’ll likely … Continue reading Building a Better CAPE Ratio

June 15, 2022 With the recent confirmation of a Bear Market finally taking hold, I’ve gotten some requests to comment on the situation: Are we going to have a recession? What’s my inflation outlook? What to expect from the Federal Reserve? What does this all mean for us in the FIRE community? Let’s take a … Continue reading The Bear Market is here. What Now?

April 25, 2022 If you remember my April Fools Day post from a few weeks ago, I poked fun at the proliferation of new crypto coins. Most of them are scams. But what about the mainstream crypto coins, like Bitcoin, Ethereum, etc.? Are they a good investment? What’s not to like about a 100%+ annualized … Continue reading Crypto is probably a bad investment!

April 1, 2022 If you’re familiar with my work on Safe Withdrawal Rates, you’ll know that the number one concern for retirees is Sequence of Return Risk. Well, hopefully, this will soon be a thing of the past. I’m now ready to announce the complete “retirement” (pun intended) of my Safe Withdrawal Rate Research because, … Continue reading Introducing the ERN-approved Crypto Coin

February 28, 2022 What a difference a year makes! In late 2020, only about 16 months ago, I felt the urge to comment on the then-fashionable discussion of how low inflation would impact retirees. See Part 41 – Can we raise our Safe Withdrawal Rate when inflation is low? of my SWR Series. Feels like … Continue reading Retirement in a High-Inflation Environment – SWR Series Part 51

January 13, 2022 According to the most recent inflation numbers that came out yesterday (1/13), CPI inflation is now running at 7% year-over-year. From September to December we saw a 2.2% increase, which is a 9.1% annualized rate. And it’s not all energy and food inflation. The core CPI is also elevated at 5.5% year-over-year. … Continue reading Inflation at 7%! Here’s why I’m not running for the hills (yet)!

November 16, 2021 My Safe Withdrawal Series has grown to almost 50 parts. After nearly 5 years of researching this topic and writing and speaking about it, a comprehensive solution to Sequence Risk is still elusive. So today I like to write about another potential “fix” of Sequence Risk headache: Instead of selling assets in … Continue reading Using Leverage in Retirement – SWR Series Part 49