A tomorrow more certain than today?

Posted on October 25, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

Suppose I asked you what you would be doing in 5 minutes. Odds are, you would be able to answer that question with some high degree of certainty. After all, it will probably look a bit like what you are doing at the time you were asked. Now, let’s move the goalpost back a bit and imagine that I asked you what you would be doing five weeks from now. It would certainly be exponentially harder to pinpoint, but your calendar may give some clues as to how you will be engaged at that time. Now imagine you were asked to forecast your actions five months, five years, or even fifty years from now – damn near impossible, right? Of course, it is because, in our quotidian existence, the present is far more knowable than the distant future.

What complicates investing then, is that the exact reverse is true. We have no idea what will happen today, very little notion of what next week holds, a slight inkling as to potential one-year returns but could take a pretty solid stab at 30 years from now. Consider the long-term performance of stocks by holding periods: a tomorrow more certain than today

Over short periods of time, returns are nearly unknowable. Stocks are up about 60 percent of the time and down about 40 percent of the time, but the highs and lows are both very dramatic. Over a period more reflective of a long-term investment horizon, however, the future becomes far more certain. Returns average just over 10 percent per year, with the worst case being around 6 percent and the best case being nearly 15 percent. Not so scary anymore, but it does require a fundamental rethinking of reality, something that seems not to be happening. As statistician extraordinaire Nate Silver says in The Signal and the Noise:

“In the 1950s, the average share of common stock in an American company was held for about six years before being traded – consistent with the idea that stocks are a long-term investment. By the 2000s, the velocity of trading had increased roughly twelvefold. Instead of being held for six years, the same share of stock was traded after just six months. The trend shows few signs of abating: stock market volumes have been doubling once every four or five years.”

Intuition tells us that “now” is more knowable than “tomorrow” but Wall Street Bizarro World (WSBW) says otherwise. As Silver points out, more access to data and the disintermediary effects of technology make our tendency toward short-termism even greater. But the growing impatience of the masses only serves to benefit the savvy investor. As Ben Carlson says in A Wealth of Common Sense, “Individuals have to understand that no matter what innovations we see in the financial industry, patience will always be the great equalizer in financial markets. There’s no way to arbitrage good behavior over a long-time horizon. In fact, one of the biggest advantages individuals have over the pros is the ability to be patient.”

The Center for Outcomes, powered by Brinker Capital, has prepared a system to help advisors employ the value of behavioral alpha across all aspects of their work – from business development to client service and retention. To learn more about The Center for Outcomes and Brinker Capital, call us at 800.333.4573.

The views expressed are those of Brinker Capital and are not intended as investment advice or recommendation. For informational purposes only. Brinker Capital, Inc., a Registered Investment Advisor.

Making sense of recent market volatility

Posted on October 12, 2018 by Brinker Capital

This past week has been a very unsettling time for markets and investors. To help inform conversations, Jeff Raupp, CFA, Brinker Capital’s CIO, recorded a podcast that examines the recent market correction, including the catalyst for the sell-off and where we see the market heading into 2019.

The correction: causes, concerns, and the path forward

Additionally, Dr. Daniel Crosby, Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital, provides information to better understand market volatility and how to best react to the changes:

We hope you find these tools helpful and appreciate your continued confidence in Brinker Capital.

Brinker Capital, Inc., a registered investment advisor.

45 things smart investors never say

Posted on September 7, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

1. Fear of political strife – “I don’t like the President”

2. Concentrated position – “My grandfather gave me this stock”

3. Impersonal benchmarks – “Why am I down versus the S&P 500?”

4. Market timing – “Is now a good time to invest?”

5. Home bias – “Europe? I prefer the Red, White, and Blue!”

6. Tangibility bias – “I like to invest in things that I can hold”

7. Friendship bias – “I like to invest in people I know”

8. Anchoring/ “breakevenitis” – “I’ll sell when it gets back to what I paid for it”

9. Selling winners too quickly – “You never go broke taking a profit”

10. Mere exposure effect – “Buy what you know”

11. Zero risk bias – “I’ll keep this dry powder for a rainy day”

12. Performance chasing – “This has been hot…”

13. IPO investing – “Have you heard of this new company…?”

14. Shifting risk tolerance – “I’m a high-risk high-reward person”

15. Ostrich effect – “Why mess with a good thing?” (complacency)

16. Confirmation bias – “All of my friends say…”

17. Overconfidence – “It won’t happen to me…”

18. Hindsight bias – “How did you do in 2008?”

19. Restraint bias – “I’ll jump on the next March 2009”

20. Self-serving bias – “Why aren’t my returns higher?” (two-way street)

21. Affect heuristic – “I’m going with my gut on this one…”

22. Appeal to authority – “But Jim Cramer said…”

23. Status quo bias – “Rebalance? Why bother?”

24. Hyperbolic discounting – “I’ll start saving later…”

25. Gambler’s fallacy – “I’m on a roll!”

26. Herding – “My friend told me to check out…”

27. New era thinking – “Yeah, but this time is different…”

28. Representativeness – “This will be the Great Depression all over again”

29. Bias blind spot – “But I would never do that!”

30. Ambiguity aversion – “Why can’t you just give me a straight answer?”

31. Babe Ruth Effect – “Why did you have me in last year’s big winner?”

32. Dread risk – “I’m gonna buy gold”/ “What about the zombie apocalypse?”

33. Fundamental attribution error – “Why aren’t you beating the market? I could do better myself!”

34. Illusory pattern recognition – “This chart looks just like 1929!”

35. Money illusion – “I’m a millionaire! What do you mean keep working?”

36. Myopic loss aversion – “Excuse me, I have to make some hedging trades.”

37. Sunk cost fallacy – “Well, we’ve already gone this far so…”

38. Turkey illusion – “Recession? Never heard of it.”

39. Fetish for complexity – “I need hedge fund exposure! What am I paying you for?”

40. Declinism – “The way I see it, the world is just going to hell”

41. Framing – “Save 10%? Impossible.”

42. Illusory truth effect (believing a market myth frequently repeat) – “Sell in May and go away”

43. Information bias – “Let me just turn on CNBC”

44. Outcome bias – “You told me not to buy individual stocks and it went up. Ha!”

45. Post-purchase rationalization – “I mean, I NEEDED that.”

You will never regret your vacation

Posted on August 7, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

Bronnie Ware is an Australian nurse who has spent her career in a palliative care unit, caring for those with very little time to live. As someone who interacts with the dying, she has had the privilege of speaking with these people about the things that make their life worth living, as well as what they wish they’d done differently. Ware summarized the top five regrets of those about to pass on in her excellent blog, “Inspiration and Chai.” The “Top Five Regrets of the Dying” are:

I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
I wish I had let myself be happier.

Notice, not one mention of money and the only mention of work is to say they (especially male patients) wished they had done less of it. If you are like me (and perhaps like most people), you are chasing the wrong dream and setting the wrong goals. As you sit and evaluate your life as it draws to a close, I promise you that you will never regret the year your portfolio underperformed the benchmark, but you may well regret lost time spent living a life that confused money with what matters much more.

The Path Forward
In a money-obsessed world that has socialized us to chase the almighty dollar, it can be weirdly unsettling to learn that money isn’t everything. As much as we whine about money, having something that is the physical embodiment of happiness is nice. We can hold it, save it, get more of it, all while mistakenly thinking that getting paid is how we “arrive.” Realizing that money does not directly equate to meaning can leave us with a sense of groundlessness but once we’ve stripped away that faulty foundation, we can replace it with things that lead to less evanescent feelings of happiness. Breaking your overreliance on money as a substitute for real joy is a great first step, here are two ways to move forward upon having made this important realization:

Spend money in ways that matter – Let’s be balanced in the way we talk and think about money. It’s not the key to happiness, but it’s not nothing either. A lot of our troubles with money stem from the way we spend it. We think that buying “things” will make us happy. We engage in retail therapy which is quickly followed by feelings of regret at being overextended. Before we know it, we’re surrounded by the relics of our discontent; the things we bought to be happy become constant reminders that we’re not.

Instead of amassing a museum of junk, spend your money on things of real value. Spend a little more on quality, healthy food and take the time to savor your new purchases. Use your money to invest in a dream – pay yourself to take a little time off and write that novel about which you’ve always dreamt. Give charitably and experience the joy of watching those less fortunate benefit from your wealth. Finally, spend money on having special experiences with your loved ones. It’s true that money doesn’t buy happiness, but it can do a great deal to facilitate it if you approach it correctly.

Find a new metric – Part of the appeal of money as a barometer for happiness is that it’s so…well…quantifiable. Meaning, joy, happiness, and fulfillment are all abstractions that can be hard to get our hands around. Thus, we aim for something we can count (but end up sadly disappointed). So, take things that really will make you happy and try to come up with metrics for those things instead. Maybe you enjoy painting and you could set a goal to complete three new pieces by the end of the summer. Perhaps you want to be more service oriented and you could set a goal to engage in a charitable act each week. The impulse to measure happiness is a natural and good one, let’s just make sure we’re using a yardstick that delivers on its promises.

Is there any wisdom in the crowd?

Posted on June 26, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

“Anyone taken as an individual is tolerably sensible and reasonable – as a member of a crowd, he at once becomes a blockhead.” – Friedrich Von Schiller

I travel roughly once a week to conferences where, in addition to eating overcooked chicken, I am typically asked to speak to financial advisors about the foundations of behavioral finance. As anyone who travels for business well knows, it can be tricky in a new city to try and determine where best to eat, sleep, or watch a show. And while many nice hotels provide a concierge to guide you, the concierge’s advice is ultimately limited by the fact that it is just one person’s opinion. Having been steered amiss more than once by a concierge with a palate less sophisticated than my own (for surely it could not have been MY taste that was in question), I quickly learned to harness the power of the crowdsourced review. Apps like Yelp, Urban Spoon, and Rotten Tomatoes provide aggregated reviews that guide diners and moviegoers to restaurants and films that have received consensus acclaim.

While I may not always agree with the taste of any individual concierge or my local newspaper’s movie reviewer, I have never been disappointed with a movie or dish that has received widespread approval. In things that matter most (i.e., food and movies), there is wisdom in the crowd.

But the power of crowd thinking is not limited to picking out a tasty schnitzel or deciding whether to watch Dude, Where’s My Car? (18% on Rotten Tomatoes) – it is the bedrock upon which the most successful political systems are built. Sir Winston Churchill famously opined that, “The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter,” a sentiment heard in many forms at election time. So why then has democracy proven to be so successful (or at least not entirely unsuccessful) over long periods of time? Why is it, paraphrasing Churchill again, “the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time”? The answer is once again in the tendency of the crowd to be more wise, ethical, tolerant, and gracious than the sum of its parts. The alternatives, political systems like oligarchy and monarchy, live and die with the strengths or weaknesses of the few, which is a much higher risk/reward proposition than democracy. The average voter may be unimpressive, but the average of the averages tends to be the best game in town.

If crowd wisdom can help us solve complex decisional problems and provides us with good-enough government, it seems intuitive that it has something to offer most investors, right? Wrong. Once again, the rules of Wall Street Bizarro World turn conventional logic on its head and require us to operate from a different set of assumptions.

Why is it then that a qualitative gap exists between investment and culinary decisions? Richard Thaler, behavioral economist par excellence, has identified four qualities that make appropriate decision-making difficult. They are:

We see the benefits now but the costs later
The decision is made infrequently
The feedback is not immediate
The language is not clear

Choosing a nice meal consists of clear language (“Our special tonight is deep-fried and smothered in cheese”), immediate feedback (“OMG! This is so good”), is made frequently (3 times daily, more if you’re like me), and has a mix of immediate and delayed costs (“That will be $27” or “I should have quit after three rolls”).

An investment decision, on the other hand, violates every single one of Thaler’s conditions. It consists of intentionally confusing language (What does “market neutral” even mean?), has a massively delayed feedback loop (decades if you’re smart), is made very infrequently (thanks for the inheritance, Aunt Mable), and has benefits that are delayed to the point that we can scarcely conceive of them (36-year-old me can scarcely conceive of the 80-year-old me that will spend this money). The crowd can provide us excellent advice on selecting a meal because it is a decision that is frequently made with results that are instantly known. Conversely, the wisdom or foolishness of a given investment decision may not be made manifest for years, meaning that the impatient crowd may have little wisdom to offer.

As we might expect from Professor Thaler’s research, the crowd gets it all wrong when deciding when to enter and exit the stock market. They enter at the time of immediate pleasure and long-term pain (bull markets) and leave at the time of immediate pain and long-term pleasure (bear markets). In A Wealth of Common Sense, Ben Carlson relates a study performed by the Federal Reserve that examined fund flows from 1984 to 2012. Unsurprisingly, “they found that most investors poured money into the markets after large gains and pulled money out after sustaining losses – a buy high, sell low debacle of a strategy.” Yet again we see that preferring the rules of every day to those of Wall Street Bizarro World means trading cheap emotional comfort for enduring poverty.

Jared Diamond’s book Collapse recounts the story of a people who tried to do what so many investors attempt in WSBW – inflexibly imposing their preferred way of life on an incompatible system. Diamond tells the story of the Norse, a once powerful group of people who left their homes in Norway and Iceland to settle in Greenland. The Vikings, who aren’t exactly known for their humility, doggedly pushed forward – razing forests, plowing land and building homes – activities that robbed cattle of grazable farmland and depleted the few extant natural resources. Worse still, the Norse ignored the wisdom of the indigenous Inuit people, scorning their ways as primitive compared to what they viewed as a more refined European approach to farming and construction. By ignoring the means by which the native people fed and clothed themselves, the Norse perished in a land of unrecognized plenty, victims of their own arrogance.

Like a Norseman in Greenland, you find yourself of necessity in a land with bizarre customs, some of which make little sense. This land is one in which less is more, the future is more predictable than the present and the wisdom of your peers must be roundly ignored. It is a lonely place that requires consistency, patience, and self-denial, none of which come easily to the human family. But it is a land you must tame if you are to live comfortably and compound your efforts. The laws of investing are few in number and easy enough to learn, but will initially feel uncomfortable in application. It won’t be easy but it is surely worth it – and it is all within your power.

Why outcomes beat fear

Posted on May 9, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

It seems to be human nature to be fascinated by pathology. Sigmund Freud began his study of the human psyche by outlining how it was broken (hint: your Mom) and the discipline continued down that path for over a century. It was roughly 150 years before the study of clinical psychology was offset at all by the study of what we now call “positive psychology” – the study of what makes us happy, strong, and exceptional. Perhaps it is no surprise then that behavioral finance too began with the study of the anomalous and is only now coming around to a more solution-focused ideal. While a thorough review of the transition from efficient to behavioral approaches isn’t why we are here, it’s worth considering the rudiments of these ideas and how we can improve upon them.

For decades, the prevailing economic theories espoused a view of Economic Man as rational, utility maximizing, and self-interested. On these simple (if unrealistic) assumptions, economists built mathematical models of exceeding elegance but limited real-world applicability. It all worked beautifully, until it didn’t. Goaded only by a belief in the predictability of Economic Man, The Smartest People in the Room picked up pennies in front of steamrollers – until they got flattened.

On the strength of hedge fund implosions, multiple manias with accompanying crashes and mounting evidence of human irrationality, Economic Man begin to give way to Behavioral Man. Behavioral proponents began to document the flaws of investors with the same righteous zeal with which proponents of market efficiency had previously defended the aggregate wisdom of the crowd. At my last count, psychologists and economists had uncovered 117 documented biases capable of obscuring lucid financial decision-making. One hundred and seventeen different ways for you to get it wrong.

But the problem with all this Ivory Tower philosophizing is that none of it truly helps investors. For a clinical psychologist, a diagnosis is a necessary but far from sufficient part of a treatment plan. No shrink worth his $200 an hour would label you pathological and show you the door, yet that is largely what behavioral finance has given the investing public: a surfeit of pathology and a shortage of outcomes.

To consider firsthand the futility of being told only what not to do, let’s try the following.

“Do not think of a pink elephant.”

What happened as you read the first sentence of this section? Odds are, you did the very thing I asked you not to do – you imagined a pink elephant. How disappointing! You could have imagined any number of things – you had infinity minus one option – and yet you still disobeyed my simple request. Sigh. Oh well, I haven’t given up on you yet, so let’s try one more time.

“Do not, whatever you do, imagine a large purple elephant with a parasol daintily tiptoeing across a highwire connecting two tall buildings in a large metropolitan area.”

You did it again, didn’t you?

All feigned anger aside, what you just experienced was the very natural tendency to imagine and even ruminate on something, even when you know you oughtn’t. Consider the person on a diet who has created a lengthy list of “bad” foods. He may, for instance, repeat the mantra, “I will not eat a cookie. I will not eat a cookie. I will not eat a cookie.” any time he experiences the slightest temptation.

But what is the net effect of all his self-flagellating rumination? Effectively he has thought about cookies all day and is likely to cave at the first sign of an Oreo. The research is unequivocal that a far more effective approach is to reorient that behavior into something desirable rather than repeat messages of self-denial that ironically keep the “evil” object top of mind. Unfortunately for investors in a panic, there are far more histrionic “Don’t do this!” messages than constructive “Do this instead”, which is where The Center for Outcomes comes in. At the Brinker Capital Center for Outcomes, we have taken behavioral finance out of the textbooks and are putting it in the hands of advisors where it belongs. By utilizing our empirically-based, four-step process, advisors are given specific tools for communicating with clients in a persuasive manner. Click here to learn how to say “Yes” to outcomes.

The views expressed are those of Brinker Capital and are not intended as investment advice or recommendation. For informational purposes only. Opinions represented are not intended as an offer or solicitation with respect to the purchase or sale of any security and are subject to change without notice.

Brinker Capital, Inc., a registered investment advisor.

The financial advisor as emotional coach?

Posted on March 16, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

One of the reasons psychologists can charge $200 per hour to ask, “How does that make you feel?” is because we have become great at putting fancy-pants labels on things that would otherwise be very intuitive. Take for instance the tongue-twisting “affect heuristic,” which is simply a reference to our tendency to perceive the world through the lens of whatever mood we are in.

For example, when giving a seminar on risk assessment, I often ask participants to write down the word, that if it were spelled phonetically, would be “dahy.” Go on, write it down and don’t over think it. It turns out the way you spelled the word has a lot to do with the kind of day you are having. Those that spelled the word as “die” may need a hug, while those that spelled the word “dye” are probably doing fine.

Ask someone having a bad day (those that wrote “die,” I’m looking at you) about their childhood and they are likely to tell you how they were chubby, had pimples, and never got picked first for kickball. Conversely, ask someone having a good day about their childhood and they are likely to recall summers in Nantucket and triple dips from the Tastee Freeze. Memory and perception are moving targets colored by our mood, not infallible retrieval and evaluation machines through which we make unbiased decisions.

So, what is the moral of all of this psychobabble? Think back to the last time you went shopping when you were hungry. Once you’ve brought that to mind, think back on the contents of your shopping cart. If you’re like me, you probably had a whole mess of HoHos, DingDongs, Nutty Buddies and Diet Coke (you don’t want to get fat, after all), but nothing very healthy or substantive.

The same rules apply to any life decision requiring risk assessment; if you try to make decisions when you are happy/sad/angry/in love/anxious/worried/euphoric, you are likely to end up with a life full of junk. When speaking to investors about the affect heuristic, I borrow an acrostic from the addiction literature – H.A.L.T. – which stands for hungry, angry, lonely or tired. The 12 step and other programs encourage those in recovery not to make decisions when they are in any of the emotional states described in H.A.L.T. and this advice is just as sound for investors. You do not view investment risk independent of your emotional state and so making long-term financial decisions in a short-term elevated emotional state should be avoided altogether. For help avoiding excessive emotion, try one of the following:

Exercise vigorously
Redefine the problem in terms of longer-term goals
Limit intake of caffeine and alcohol
Talk to a friend or your financial advisor
Don’t react right away
Shift the focus of your attention
Label your emotions
Write down your thoughts and feelings
Challenge catastrophic thoughts
Control whatever aspects possible including diversification and fees

The Center for Outcomes, powered by Brinker Capital Holdings, has developed an educational program to help advisors employ the value of behavioral alpha across all aspects of their work – from business development to client service and retention. To learn more about The Center for Outcomes and Brinker Capital, call us at 800.333.4573.

Brinker Capital is a privately held investment management firm with $21.7 billion in assets under management (as of December 31, 2017). For 30 years, Brinker Capital’s purpose has been to deliver an institutional multi-asset class investment experience to individual clients. Brinker Capital’s highly strategic, disciplined approach has provided investors the potential to achieve their long-term goals while controlling risk. With a focus on wealth creation and management, Brinker Capital serves financial advisors and their clients by providing high-quality investment manager due diligence, asset allocation, portfolio construction, and client communication services. Brinker Capital, Inc. is a registered investment advisor.

The do’s and don’ts for periods of market volatility

Posted on February 6, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

We know it has been a stressful week for everyone involved in the market. In times like this, knowing what not to do is just as important as knowing what to do. Therefore, we created a list of things you should and shouldn’t be doing in periods of market volatility.

Do:

Do know your history
- Despite what political pundits and TV commentators would have you believe, this is not an unusually scary time to be alive. Although you would never know it from watching cable, the economy is growing and most quality of life statistics have been headed in the right direction for years! Markets always have and always will climb a wall of worry, rewarding those who stay the course and punishing those who succumb to fear. Warren Buffet expressed this beautifully when he said, “In the 20^th century, the United States endured two world wars and other traumatic and expensive military conflicts; the Depression; a dozen or so recessions and financial panics; oil shock; a flu epidemic; and the resignation of a disgraced president. Yet the Dow rose from 66 to 11,497.” Such it has ever been, thus will it ever be.
Do take responsibility
- Which of the following do you think is most predictive of financial performance: a) market timing b) investment returns or c) financial behavior? Ask most men or women on the street and they are likely to tell you that timing and returns are the biggest drivers of financial performance, but the research tells you another story. In fact, the research says that you – that’s right – you, are the best friend and the worst enemy of your own portfolio. What happens in the financial markets in the coming years is absolutely out of your control. But, your ability to follow a plan, diversify across asset classes, and maintain your composure is squarely within your own power. At times when market moves can feel haphazard, it helps to remember who is really in charge.
Do work with a professional
- Odds are that when you chose your financial advisor, you selected him or her because of his or her academic pedigree, years of experience, or a sound investment philosophy. Ironically, what you likely overlooked entirely is the largest value he or she adds – managing your behavior. Studies from across the industry put the added value from working with an advisor at 2 to 3% per year. Compound that effect over a lifetime and the power of financial advice quickly becomes evident.

Don’t:

Don’t equate risk with volatility
- Repeat after me, “volatility does not equal risk.” Risk is the likelihood that you will not have the money you need at the time you need it to live the life you want to live. Nothing more, nothing less. Paper losses are not “risk” and neither are the gyrations of a volatile market.
Don’t focus on the minute-to-minute
- Despite the enormous wealth-creating power of the market, looking at it too closely can be terrifying. A daily look at portfolio values means you see a loss 46.7% of the time, whereas a yearly look shows a loss merely 27.6% of the time. Limited looking leads to increase feelings of security and improved decision-making.
Don’t give into action bias
- At most times and in most situations, increased effort leads to improved outcomes. Want to lose weight? Start running. Want to learn a new skill set? Go back to school. Investing is that rare world where doing less actually gets you more. James O’Shaughnessy of “What Works on Wall Street” relates an illustrative story of a study done at Fidelity. When they surveyed their accounts to see which had done best, they uncovered something counterintuitive: the best-performing stocks were those that had been forgotten entirely.

There will never be a perfect time to invest

Posted on January 19, 2018 by Brinker Capital

Dr. Daniel Crosby Executive Director, The Center for Outcomes & Founder, Nocturne Capital

Consider something you’ve always wanted to do but that you’ve put off doing because it scares you. In fact, just think of something you’d eventually like to do but haven’t yet, since you may not even be aware of all your reasons for not having embarked on that journey just yet. Maybe that something is having a child. Maybe it’s starting a business. Or perhaps it’s writing a book, getting serious with a romantic partner, or any number of other aspirations you’ve yet to reach. Let’s say for discussion’s sake that the thing you are considering is starting a business. You ask yourself…

“Should I or shouldn’t I start a business?”

Easy enough, right? You make a t-chart, list the pros and cons and then make a decision! Well, let’s examine how you go about dissecting this question. You do your best to dispassionately weigh the pros and perils, but if you’re like most folks (and you are, remember, you’re not special) there is a flaw in the system. Drawing on his background in evolutionary psychology, James Friedrich has concluded that as we evaluate important decisions in our life, our primary aim is to avoid the most costly errors. That is, we make decisions that make us “not unhappy” rather than “blissful.” We want to be “not broke” more than we want to live abundantly. To use the above-mentioned example, you’re far more likely to focus on the potential perils of failing at business than you are the happiness and freedom that might accrue to you.

The evolutionary roots of this system of self-preservation make sense. It was not all that long ago (in terms of evolutionary time) that our forebears were called upon daily to make life and death decisions. For people living on the savannahs of Africa, choosing to zig when you should have zagged could spell the end. Historically, decision-making has been very wrapped up in preserving physical safety and ensuring that physical needs were met. In this life-and-death scenario, minimizing risk at the expense of self-actualization is only logical. However, in the intervening millennia, things have changed and our thought patterns have not kept pace. At least in the US, we now live in a service economy that produces more ideas than it does “things.” We have moved from an agrarian to an industrial to a knowledge-based economy and our ability to cope with personal stressors has not kept pace.

What we are left with is a brain and a decision-making modality that is ill-suited for our modern milieu. We are programmed to choose safety, even at the expense of joy, in an environment where safety abounds and joy is hard to find. Daniel Kahneman and others have shown that people are twice as upset about a loss as they are pleased about a gain. Unless we learn to train our brains to evaluate risk and reward on a more even keel, we will remain trapped in a life of risk-aversion that keeps us from taking the very risks that might make us happy.

Because of the asymmetrical means by which we evaluated risk, it could be truthfully and plainly said that there is never a good time to invest…or have a baby…or start a business…or fall in love. After all, each of these requires us to make ourselves vulnerable, either personally, financially or both, to an unknown future with a very real downside. Markets crash, kids talk back, and businesses fail. But a life lived in shades of grey is the only thing less satisfactory than a life lived at risk of loss. There will always be worries, some founded, others not and investors who are paying attention will never have a sense that it is “all clear.” This uncertainty, this pervasive not knowing, is the hallmark of both life and capital markets and those that have mastered both come to love and embrace it.

Brinker Capital Blog

Tag Archives: Dr. Daniel Crosby

Top blog posts of 2018

A tomorrow more certain than today?

Making sense of recent market volatility

45 things smart investors never say

You will never regret your vacation

Is there any wisdom in the crowd?

Why outcomes beat fear

The financial advisor as emotional coach?

The do’s and don’ts for periods of market volatility

There will never be a perfect time to invest