Barry is a fellow "evidence-based investing expert" and includes a note he wrote to an interested party that said they wanted "4-5% return above the averages".   I appreciate his direct common sense note which we have provided below.  

 

Here's the letter he wrote.

 

Dear XXXXX

 

I wanted to follow up to the automated reply you received from me yesterday. You noted that you were looking for "perhaps looking for 4-5% greater than the averages."

 

The best doctors I know never mince words, and I agree with that philosophy, so here goes: YOU ARE HURTING YOURSELF WITH THIS PURSUIT.

 

The data on this is overwhelming and incontrovertible. Nearly all investment managers under-perform; of the ones that out-perform, few do it consistently year to year, and of those who do, once you take into account fees, they become average.

 

Earlier this Summer, I gave a presentation to a room full of public pension trustees at Harvard (about 1.7 trillion dollars worth, not counting Calpers). Its called "Romancing Alpha, Forsaking Beta".

 

The takeaway is that the mad dash for out-performance almost always leads to UNDER-performance. The huge public pension funds and many of the large Foundations are slowly coming to realize the truth of this.

 

If you are looking for someone who is going to find you the magic hedge fund that turns dross into gold, we cannot help. What we can offer you is a way to figure out what your needs and goals are, along with the healthiest, lowest risk way to achieve those goals.

 

O'Reilly Wealth Advisors could not have written the letter better.

 

Our clients will tell you that they love the investment returns we provide.   Just like "common sense is uncommon"; "market returns are uncommon", because as Mr. Ritholtz points out, pursuing bigger returns inevitably leads to under-performance.