title: Embrace & Preach Nick Murray’s Philosophies description: [AFW M.1.15 & AFW S.5] Michael's Epiphany #15 published: true date: 2026-06-30T08:08:18.511Z tags: editor: markdown dateCreated: 2021-04-23T22:30:13.717Z

"Nick Murray isn't something you have read. It's something you are reading." -Michael

Who is Nick Murray?¶

Nick Murray is the Advisor to Advisors and prolific author. With 50+ years of experience in the investment markets, noted author, he is an expert in the art and science of helping individual investors work toward reaching their investment goals. He is the recipient of the 2007 Malcolm S. Forbes Public Awareness Award for Excellence in Advancing Financial Understanding.

Nick Murray Resources¶

Home page: nickmurray.com.
His newsletter: nickmurraynewsletters.com.
Visit our Nick Murray folder in Proton Drive. It includes videos, audios, PDF, newsletters, presentations etc.

Why Follow "Murrayism"?¶

Watch Commonly Known, Uncommonly Mastered to learn why Nick is the most famous trainer in the investment business, but least imitated (along with American Funds). VIDEO

Nick's philosophy is the most closely aligned investment philosophy to ours I've come across in over three decades. He has a simple, elegant and effective strategy of long-term investment success. It boils down to three essentials:

Invest in a broadly diversified collections of the world's great mainstream, publicly-traded companies by using a portfolio of historically defensible mutual funds.
Buy-and-hold. Don't make the Big Mistake by timing the market or "moving" your money around.
Hire and follow the council of a financial advisor to ensure you adhere to the above.

Four Core Beliefs Nick Would Tell His Younger Self¶

Nick started in this business in May 1^st, 1967 with E. F. Hutton & Company. What would he want his younger self desparately to know? These are the four primary beliefs he would tell himself.

Paraphrased from the article "Here Comes the Sun" in NMI 2022-05

1) This is a profession in which you can build a fortune by helping other people build and protect and bequeath their fortunes.¶

The income you generate, and the wealth you ultimately build for your family, will be limited only by the amount of good you do for other people.

2) Your one critical function — to which all the other functions are subordinate — is to find people who will allow you to do good for them.¶

Your success depends upon relentlessly seeking out people who will accept and even embrace your guidance.

3) Everyone is a Prospect.¶

Between 2018 and 2042, the boomers will leave their personal heirs excluding charities in excess of $60 trillion.

4) Human nature is still, and will forever remain, a failed investor.¶

Immutable human nature dooms investment success without the empathetic but tough-loving advice of a Behavioral Financial Counselor.

Nine Tips to Mastering "Murrayism"¶

Create a Nick Murray Journal for yourself where you catalog his best scripts, sayings and philosophies. Refer to it often, and you will internalize the dialog.

Read Nick Murray's ATY 078 March 19 - Journal What You're Learning PDF

Read Nick Murray's ATY 243 August 31 - Start Keeping A Journal PDF

Read daily from Around The Year with Nick Murray: Daily Readings for Financial Advisors. I post one per day in the "Dailies" AdvisorFirst Telegram Chatroom.
Commit to emailing his Client's Corner newsletters to your clients and prospects. “Even if your clients don’t read every issue, your goal is to stay top-of-mind.”
Watch all of his videos.
Listen to all his audios.
Read all of the Nick Murray's Greatest Hits (see below).
Read all of his books (see further below).
Read all of the Nick Murray Interactive Newsletter issues, in reverse-chronological order. Commit to staying current as each month gets published (it will be announced in the Telegram Dailies Chatroom, MKOM and our weekly Advisor Email Newsletter).
Read, watch and listen to everything else not mentioned in:

Nick's 31 Greatest Hits¶

"I submit this updated list of key essays from the past. The goal is to steep the reader as efficiently as possible in the philosophy the newsletter espouses, as well as in the ways that philosophy may be presented effectively to clients and prospects." -Nick Murray

Thanks to Dave McDanal for hot-linking the articles.

Nick's Forty Six Epiphanies. (Here is the client-version).
“Rebecca’s Riverkeepers,” NMI, September 2011.
“Insist on Being Trusted Implicitly,” NMI, April 2011.
“Thou Shalt Not Read, Neither Shalt Thou Rebut,” NMI, April 2010.
“Dread is Not an Investment Policy,” NMI, April 2011.
“We Don’t Do Armageddon Here,” NMI, February 2015
“A Kinder, Gentler My Way or the Highway,” NMI, December 2011.
“Surprise is the Mother of Panic,” NMI, December 2011.
“Inputs Not Outcomes: Making a Real Plan,” NMI, January 2012.
“The Road to Utopia: What We Believe,” November 2012.
“Fear of Your Fee,” September 2013.
“In the End, We Must Stand on Our Moral Authority,” October 2013.
“A Meditation on Volatility,” NMI, November 2013.
“What It Means to Be Countercultural,” NMI, November 2013.
“Make This the Year You Get to the Truth," NMI, January 2014.
“The Underappreciated Power of Dividend Growth,” December 2014.
Client’s Corner “Skating to Where die Puck Is Going To Be,” NMI, November 2014 .
“Always Go Straight at the Fear,” NMI, August 2014.
“Authenticity above AH,” NMI, November 2014.
“The Capital Markets, Standing on One Leg,” NMI, November 2014.
“A Note on the Commodity Cycle,” NMI, January 2015.
“Diversification: Humility Made Manifest,” NMI, February 2015.
‘The Myth of Instability,” NMI, April 2015.
“The Horror, the Horror: A Litany of Equity Volatility,” NMI, May 2015.
“The Fatal Disconnect,” NMI, August 2015.
“The Ordinariness of Equity Market Corrections,” NMI, September 2015.
‘The Perfect Healing Power of the Equity Market,” NMI, December 2015.
"Notes on the Golden Age" NMI, June 2017.
"Fifty Years On" NMI, May 2017.
"The Determined Primitive" NMI, September 2017.
The Companies We Own, Client's Corner, 2019 March.

Nick's Books¶

Listed in the recommended reading order. Treat them like study books for getting a Ph.D. in "Murrayism" - highlight, underline, make notes, etc.

Simple Wealth, Inevitable Wealth is the best book ever written for investment clients, and a great summary of our investment pilosophy. BOOK

Watch Nick promo for SWIW 2024 VIDEO

The Nick Murray Reader by Nick Murray

Get the PDF book and individual PDFs here.

Watch Nick's video discussing this book (5 minutes).

Gives advisors a system for preventing clients from panicking in down markets, right from the first day of the relationship.

The full permanent premium return of mainstream equities is available only to long-term investors who are prepared to ride out the market’s frequent, sometimes significant but always temporary declines.

Investors who panic out of the market and go to cash during declines doom themselves to long-term regret.

This book lays out a system for training clients, from the very first day of the relationship, to regard the permanent returns and the temporary declines as an inseparable package.

The failing investor’s death song – “This Time Is Different” – is accurate only in the sense that the narrow specifics of every “crisis” are different, and therefore shocking to the point of panic. The dot-com implosion was entirely different from the Global Financial Crisis, which was completely different from COVID. Every serious bear market comes out of deep left field. -But America’s most successful companies work through and around every crisis, ultimately innovating their way to new heights of earnings, dividends and values.

This book says that clients can be systematically trained to see themselves as patient long-term owners of great companies rather than as helpless victims of the stock market’s “volatility.”

The depth of the clients’ trust in their advisor ultimately governs whether they come through bear markets unscathed. This book is, above all, a rigorous system for developing that trust.

► Get the book here

Around The Year consists of 365 10-minute readings: a daily “devotional” for the Behavioral Investment Counselor. BOOK

The Game of Numbers is the best book ever written on prospecting in the securities industry. BOOK

Nick Murray’s Scripts Every important statement you’d ever wish to make to a prospect or client, plus robust responses to questions/objections. BOOK

Behavioral Investment Counseling Its essential premise is that the dominant determinant of long-term, real life financial outcomes isn't investment performance; it's investor behavior. And that, without empathetic but tough-loving behavioral guidance, the investor must ultimately fail, as human nature is programmed to do. eBOOK

The New Financial Advisor is an essential read for anyone who is thinking of becoming a financial advisor. Nick really helps you understand how to build your business properly. BOOK

The Excellent Investment Advisor is the first book I read by Nick Murray and it changed my career. It is still my favorite book of his. (Lots of word-for-word scripts.) BOOK

The Craft of Advice : Essays 1995-1998 contains 34 essays written for “Dow Jones Investment Adviser” magazine between December 1994 and December 1998. It also includes 10 book reviews published in “Dow Jones Assest Management” magazine in 1997 and 1998. BOOK

The Nick Murray Reader is a collection of articles and is intended as a companion and supplement to Nick's The New Financial Advisor. PDF

Gathering Assets: The Best of Nick Murray is a collection of some of Nick's best articles. BOOK

Serious Money: The Art of Marketing Mutual Funds is Nick's first book and what made him famous in the financial planning industry. BOOK

Talking it Over Just the Two of Us this book is written in Nick's and Joan's alternating voices – it is simple, straightforward, non-technical and intensely personal guide to the way in which any committed couple can merge their intelligence, drive and common sense – and find thereby a level of success that the advisor might never achieve “going it alone.” BOOK

Nick's Forty-Six Epiphanies¶

"On my 41^st anniversary in our great profession, I did a piece for Financial Advisor magazine called “Forty-One Epiphanies,” listing that number of great realizations I’d experienced during those years. On May 1, 2013, my 46^th anniversary, I expanded the list." -Nick Murray

If you are still prospecting, no matter what else is wrong with your business, you will yet succeed. If you stop prospecting, in the absence of a steady flow of referrals/introductions, then no matter what else appears to be right with your business at the moment, you are ultimately going to fail.
“Rejection” does not hurt, other than to the extent we allow it to do so. The only way to hear “yes” is to risk hearing “no.”
Most people who invest most of their capital in fixed income investments as they go into retirement will run out of money well within their lifetimes, and will die destitute and dependent upon their children. Equities = life. Bonds = death-in-life.
Optimism is the only realism. It is the only worldview that squares with the facts, and with the historical record.
Get a year's living expenses in a money market fund as quickly as you can, even if you have to live on coffee and rice while you're saving toward this goal. This will allow you to turn down business that doesn't feel 100% right to you. It will give you the strength to tell any prospect to go to the devil, and make it stick.
It is infinitely easier to turn a one-million-dollar client into a two-million-dollar client than it is to turn ten one-hundred-thousand-dollar clients into two-hundred-thousand-dollar clients.
Money is love. The wise advisor will always look for clients who wish to use their money as an expression of love.
Your price is only an issue to the extent that your value is in question.
Every year on your birthday, fire the client who has given you the most grief since your last birthday.
Never take part of an investment account. Win it all, or pass on it all. It's not just the gaps, the overlaps and the lost fee efficiencies that make divided accounts a no-no: it's that you're getting sucked into a performance derby.
When we are telling prospects and clients exactly what they need to do in order to achieve their most deeply-held financial goals, it is not possible for them to counter with valid objections, because there are no valid objections
The origin of all wealth is threefold: personal initiative, hard work, and thrift. Tell me the percentage of your income that you're putting away, and I'll tell you whether you're going to achieve your financial goals.
The world does not end. It only seems to be ending. This time is never different.
Americans say they want safety and income. What they really want is all the income they can get, and the illusion of safety. More money has been lost in the quest for the chimerical combination of safety and high yield than in all the stock market crashes in history.
Stop trying to prove anything. You can't prove the sun's coming up tomorrow, nor that you or your client will be here to see it even if it does. A great advisor never accepts the burden of proof.
There is no such thing as a “standard” deviation. Reality always comes at us out of deep left field. And when enough spaghetti hits the fan all at once, everything is correlated.
The only sane investment objective in retirement is an income that grows at a minimum of the same rate at which one's cost of living is rising.
There is no statistical evidence for the persistence of performance.
Disciplined diversification is a pact with heaven: I will never own enough of any one thing to be able to make a killing in it; I will never own enough of any one thing to be able to be killed by it.
All investment “new eras” end in ruin, because all inventions follow the same arc, from miracle to commodity.
Never take your business problems home with you. That way you can never take them out on the people who love you.
Price and value are inversely correlated. When the price of any investment sector is rising, its value is declining; the converse is also true.
The most fascinating aspect of all financial crises is their essential sameness.
Life is too short to work with anyone you don't like, and/or who doesn't like you.
Get out of debt, and stay out of debt. Keep your nut as low as you possibly can, especially in “good times.”
What goes around comes around, even if it's on a very long, elliptical orbit.
Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon.
The iron law of the commodity cycle is: supply responds directly to price, even as demand responds inversely to it.
The advance is permanent. The declines are temporary. There have been thirteen bear markets with an average decline of 30% since the end of World War II. The first one started on May 29, 1946. That day, the S&P Index closed at 19.5 As I write, thirteen ends-of-the-world later, it is 1,575. Stocks are up nearly eighty times over these seven decades because earnings are up nearly eighty times.
Almost all of life is in the Grateful Dead song “Uncle John's Band.” The rest is in “Box of Rain.”
The dominant determinant of the real long-term returns real people really get isn't investment performance. It's investor behavior.
Every Christmas, assemble your entire family and watch the A&E movie The Crossing, about Washington's attack across the Delaware on Christmas night, 1776. This, and not It's A Wonderful Life, is the true American Christmas classic. Every April 13, assemble them all again, and watch Apollo 13.
Protectionism always raises consumer prices above where they would otherwise be; it also invariably destroys more jobs than it “saves.”
All investments are income investments. They are made for the production either of current income, or of future income, or of income for someone else. The only sane test of an investment's long-term income-producing potential is its long-term total return, not its current yield. By that one sane test, equities are a far better income investment than bonds.
The computer in your cell phone is a million times smaller, a million times cheaper, and a thousand times more powerful than the mainframe computer used by E.F. Hutton & Company on the day I joined that firm, May 1, 1967. This is a billionfold increase in computing power per dollar. In the next quarter century, there will be another such billionfold increase, at which point technology will have essentially solved all our current problems: energy, the environment, poverty and disease. This is the exact worst moment in human history to turn pessimistic.
Freedom is never free.
No one who really understands baseball ever referred to the 1969 World Series champions as the Miracle Mets. They were anything but a miracle. Indeed, from the middle of the 1968 season on, they were well-nigh inevitable.
There is **no completely bad time to be prospecting, but the very best time to be prospecting is when the **market is down 20%. Amateurs will have stopped calling their clients, and your timeless wisdom will never get a better hearing.
The only sure way to be trusted is to be single-mindedly, relentlessly trustworthy. The only way to be sure you're always absolutely trustworthy is to tell the pure, unvarnished truth all the time, and let the chips fall where they may.
Stop asking for referrals. Ask for introductions.
Ten thousand people a day are retiring in this country every day, without a clue that their basic financial challenge is not loss of principal but erosion of purchasing power. This is therefore the best time in the history of the universe—past, present and future—to be prospecting with equities' peerless record of growing income.
Never go into a prospect meeting without already knowing the date of his/her birth, where the equity market closed that day, and what a first class postage stamp cost then. Historical perspective is a huge part of your value proposition. It enables you to show—simply and inarguably—the staggering accretion of purchasing power by the Great Companies in America and the World during the real lives of real people.
Ours is a business of doing, not of knowing. We can always learn by doing, but we can never do by learning.
An advisory practice that isn't growing is dying. If you have had basically the same AUM and income for the last three years, your business has already begun to fail. You're never standing on a “plateau.” You're walking toward the edge of a cliff.
The real work of this profession is done looking into another person's (or a couple's) eyes. When you are not looking into someone's eyes, you are doing something that should be done by someone else, or not done at all.
And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.

Michael and Nick Murray at NY at his Annual Seminar. This photo was taken right before we went stomping in the club!

Index of Nick's Around the Year (Individual Pages)¶

Folder of all PDFs is here.

Index of Nick's Scripts (Individual Pages)¶

| # | Title | Description | Link | Related AFW Module | |--|-|-|-|-|-| | 1 | Discovery, a Menu of Questions | It's a conversation, not an appointment. | PDF | For more details on data gathering visit the AFW S.9. | 2 | Stating what you can and cannot do | We're invesTOR advisors, NOT financial advisors. | PDF | For further details visit AFW S.9. | 3 | Always keep checking for agreement | These are also called Confirming Questions. | PDF | For more on why Questions are the Answer visit AFW P.3. | 4 | The behavioral value proposition | Beautiful and simple. | PDF | For more on YOU, visit AFW S.12.1 | 5 | Equities - a personal statement | This is the best summary of equities I've ever read and a great compliment to our Equities-on-a-Slide. I recommend committing these points to memory. | PDF | For more this fundamental investment philosophy visit AFW S.2. | 6 | An elevator speech | This all you need to prospect 100's of people. It really is that simple, but you have to master it and use it at every opportunity that presents itself. BTW, this is the precursor to the Coffee script. | PDF | For more details on the Coffee script visit AFW S.8.1. | 7 | A 4-minute statement of what we do | Great for one-on-one 'cocktail' presentation as well. | PDF | For more on Group Presentations visit AFW S.8.9 | 8 | Expanding on our equity-based investment policy | Equity volatility isn't a problem, it's a propellant. | PDF | For more on volatility visit AFW S.2.9. | 9 | Volatility is the accumulator's best friend | Another reason PACs are so important for our clients. | PDF | For more on volatility visit AFW S.2.9. | 10 | Equity-based distribution phase | This is one of the most difficult parts of our philosophy for clients to truly grasp, but one of the most important. | PDF | To see how this relates to the withdrawal phase visit AFW S.2.23. | 11 | Estimating a first-year retirement withdrawal need | Crafting the plan, part ¼. This is how simple retirement planning can be. | PDF | For more on designing the finished plan visit AFW S.10. | 12 | Capitalizing the withdrawal need | Crafting the plan, part 2/4. This is part of the Client Conversation. | PDF | For more on designing the finished plan visit AFW S.10. | 13 | Setting specific monthly accumulation targets | Crafting the plan, part ¾. Master this as part of your Client Conversation. | PDF | For more on designing the finished plan visit AFW S.10. | 14 | The withdrawal protocol | Crafting the plan, part 4/4. Withdrawal strategy simplified. | PDF | For more on designing the finished plan visit AFW S.10. | 15 | Active vs passive - a sideshow | Success = 100% equities and proper behavior. 1) The best management of equities is professionally managed. Index funds, are by definition, average. 2) The biggest influence to the client's behavior is the Advisor. | PDF | For more on Index Funds visit AFW S.12.7. | 16 | The ultimate irrelevance of active vs passive | The fable is excellent for making the point of what's really important, independent of the active/passive debate. | PDF | For more on Index Funds visit AFW S.12.7. | 17 | The mindless tyranny of benchmarks | The real risk is whether or not you reach your financial goals. | PDF | For more details on the Fallacy of the Hypothetical visit AFW S.2.4. | 18 | One more look at volatility | His final point is the real answer. | PDF | For more on volatility vist AFW S.2.9. | 19 | Real risk mere volatility | Which end of your investing lifetime do you want your insecurity? | PDF | For more on volatility visit AFW S.2.9. | 20 | The folly of market timing | It is simply not possible for anyone to consistently gain a timing advantage over the market by going in an out of it. | PDF | For more on market-timing visit AFW S.2.11. | 21 | The great three-in-one value proposition question | This applies to all costs of investing: a-share upfront salescharge, annual expenses,fund fees, VA fees etc. | PDF | For how to use this to handle 'Why should I hire you?' visit AFW S.12.1. | 22 | Advocating fiercely for your fee | I prosper as you prosper. I suffer when you suffer. | PDF | For how to use this to handle 'Why should I hire you?' visit AFW S.12.1. | 23 | Your fee in its purest essence | This is the best and most concise defense of what we REALLY do. | PDF | For how to use this to handle 'Why should I hire you?' visit AFW S.12.1. | 24 | Explaining Equity Diversification | Instead of trying to find the needle of the haystack, just buy the whole haystack. | PDF | For more on diversification visit AFW S.2.6. | 25 | Rebalancing - the stand-alone explanation | Rebalancing counter-acts most people's instinct to buy expensive and sell cheap. | PDF | For more on rebalancing visit AFW S.2.14. | 26 | Diversification as the antidote to mania - the general principle | We must always be prepared to walk away from someone who wants to do something we believe may be financially suicidal. | PDF | For more details on Diversification visit AFW S.2.6. | 27 | Diversification as the antidote to mania: an analogy from literature | Stories, fables, metaphors, analogies etc are some of the best way to get explain ideas. | PDF | For more details on Diversification visit AFW S.2.6. | 28 | Diversification: one final caution | Don't oversell. | PDF | For more details on Diversification visit AFW S.2.6. | 29 | Investment Policy Statement: the accumulation phase | This is basically a brief summary of your strategy and principles. You can present this in writing or just recite it to them and get a verbal agreement. | PDF | For more on Presenting the Finished Plan visit AFW S.11. | 30 | Investment Policy Statement: the distribution phase | This is basically a brief summary of your strategy and principles. You can present this in writing or just recite it to them and get a verbal agreement. | PDF | For more on Presenting the Finished Plan visit AFW S.11. | 31 | Client communication protocol | Annual meeting without performance review - GOOD. Quarterly phone call/meent - NOT good. Monthly newsletter - GOOD. | PDF | For more details on client follow-up visit AFW S.15. | 32 | Standard email for entering a market correction | 10 percent drop triggers this email. | PDF | For much more on what to say to clients when the market is going down visit the AFW S.12.11. | 33 | Standard email for entering a bear market | Never analyze to current crisis, instead reaffirm the timeless principles of long-term equity investing. | PDF | For much more on what to say to clients when the market is going down visit the AFW S.12.11. | 34 | This too shall pass - an interim bulletin | Goals - Plan - Portfolio. | PDF | For much more on what to say to clients when the market is going down visit the AFW S.12.11. | 35 | Bear market outreach - the 'cup of coffee and a second opinion' appeal | This is not only the FINEST prospecting script ever, but frankly the only one you'll ever need to master (please do MASTER it). | PDF | For more details visit AFW S.8.1. | 36 | Bear market prospecting: laying down a marker | Excellent for face-to-face and via email. Remember, when others in your industry are fearful you must get greedy. | PDF | For details this visit AFW S.8.14. | 37 | Bear market outreach to current clients | The primary purpose of ALL marketing to your clients is to reassure them that you STILL BELIEVE. | PDF | For more on prospecting in a down market visit AFW S.8.14. | 38 | On the true nature of volatility: another interim bulletin | This edition has a number of 'meme-able' expressions. Master them! | PDF | For more details on volatility visit AFW S.2.9. | 39 | General letter seeking introductions | The two keys to referrals: 1. Deserve them. 2. Ask for them directly and consistently. | PDF | For more on referrals visit AFW S.14. | 40 | Letter seeking introductions post-crisis | Another excellent referral letter. | PDF | For more on referrals visit the AFW S.14. | 41 | Your annual client letter (1): a restatement of general principles | Pre-approved templates of Nick's annual client letter are pre-approved and stored in Google Drive. | PDF | For more details on client follow-up visit the AFW S.15. | 42 | Your annual client letter (2): the current landscape | Pre-approved templates of Nick's annual client letter are pre-approved and stored in Google Drive. | PDF | For more details on client follow-up visit AFW S.15. | 43 | Setting the agenda for your annual meeting | The purpose of this meeting is to build trust and reinforce your philosophy, it is NOT to discuss performance of their investments. | PDF | For more on client follow-up visit AFW S.15. | 44 | Pruning your book: a letter | As an Advisor in the middle-market don't even think about pruning clients until you have 250+ accounts AND are earning 10% over your target-income. | PDF | | 45 | Dismissing a client - a letter | Dismiss client more for personality reasons than low revenue. | PDF | Visit AFW S.12.34 for more on non-cooperative clients. | 46 | How am I Doing? A midyear inquiry | Questions 1 and 2 should be asked right after they become a client, and at the annual review meeting. | PDF | For mor tips on client follow-up visit AFW S.15. | 47 | Our theory of the capital market, on the back of a postcard | Some of the most fundamental factoids to teach your clients. | PDF | For more on Lifeboat Drills visit AFW S.2.19. | 47.1 | Q and A / Objections Handling - Basic Attitudes | Simple. Short. Confident. | PDF | For more details on handling objections visit AFW P.6. | 47.2 | Q and A / Objections Handling - Basic Skills | Answer questions with a question. Pithy but not arrogant. | PDF | For more details on handling objections visit AFW P.6. | 48 | Why do stocks go up? | Because earnings and the appreciation of the stock value goes up. | PDF | For more details visit AFW S.12.3. | 49 | Are you a fiduciary? | Remember, Bernie Madoff was a fiduciary. | PDF | For much more on what to say to clients when the market is going down visit AFW 1.12.4. | 50 | Musn't the burgeoning national debt become a serious problem? | You can use this script for most crisis-type objections. | PDF | For more on how to handle the 'crisis' objection visit AFW S.12.11. | 51 | What if the dollar loses its status as the world's reserve currency? | Issues such as these should not enter into your long-term investment decisions. | PDF | For more on market crises visit AFW S.12.11. | 52 | Gold isn't an investment at all, it just sits there. It doesn't produce anyting. | Gold isn't an investment at all, it just sits there. It doesn't produce anyting. | PDF | For more vist AFW S.12.21. | 53 | If there is going to be a recession / correction / bear market, shouldn't we get out until things settle down? | The answer is always the same. You can't time the market. | PDF | For more details visit AFW S.12.11. | 54 | The economic crisis bear market is upon us; we have already lost x% of our capital, we must get it now. | There has been no permament impairment of your capital, which can only happen if you sell. | PDF | For more details visit AFW S.12.11. | 55 | This time is different. I order you to liquidate my portfolio. | If your client sells after your speech, know that your bond of trust is broken. | PDF | For more on 'Down Market' visit AFW S.12.11. | 56 | Email: Need you to read and rebut the catastrophist 'research report' | We do not read, nor do we rebut. | PDF | For details on this objection visit AFW S.12.36. | 57 | Experts are predicting that equity returns or years to come are going to be lower than in the past. Your response? | I've probalbly seen the same prediction every monthy for my entire career. | PDF | For details on this objection visit AFW S.12.36. | 58 | Why am I paying you for doing nothing? | Most of the time doing nothing is the perfect thing to do. | PDF | For more on this and similar objections visit AFW S.12.1. | 59 | How can you charge twice as much for a $3M account as for $1.5M? | For more on this and similar objections visit KB 1.12.1. | PDF | For more on this and similar objections visit AFW S.12.1. | 60 | Why am I paying you to underperform the SnP? | The issue isn't which runner gets to the Finish Line first. It's whether or not you get across the Finish Line at all. | PDF | For more on this and similar objections visit AFW S.12.1. | 61 | Why don't I just buy index funds? | They're not really asking about index funds, but about your cost. | PDF | For more on Index Funds visit AFW S.12.7 | 62 | I'm buying real estate | Real estate is a business not an investment. | PDF | For more on why equities are a better investment than real estate visit AFW S.12.20. | 63 | If mainstream equity dividends are growing at twice the long-term inflation rate, why don't we just buy the dividend payers? | It's both dividends and capital gains. | PDF | | 64 | Why don't we remortgage our house and invest in equities? | The problem isn't the mathematics of it, but human psychology. | PDF | For details on investing one's home equity visit AFW S.12.14. | 65 | I can't follow the way you got to the capital sum we need at retirement. Is there a short version? | There an excellent summary of the withdrawal strategy as well. | PDF | For more withdrawal strategies visit AFW S.2.23. | 66 | What if two year's living expenses in cash isn't enough? | Withdrawing from equities is for grownups. | PDF | For more withdrawal strategies visit AFW S.2.23. | 67 | When and how does one reload the side fund? | Most of the time trajectory of the recoveries matched and even succeeded the declines. | PDF | For more withdrawal strategies visit AFW S.2.23. | 68 | Invest lump sum or invest gradually? | In all the rolling 12-month periods since 1926 the market's return has been positive 75% of the time. | PDF | Learn how this related to Dollar-Cost Averaging by visiting AFW S.2.15. | 69 | I'm retired already. I don't have time to wait for the market to come back. | The very last thing to worry about on any given day is what one's investments are worth that day. | PDF | Visit AFW S.12.28. | 70 | We don't need to own equities in retirement; our income will more than cover our living expenses. | The essential issue is to create an income that rises ahead of inflation. | PDF | For more on the evilness of bonds visit this Wiki page. | 71 | You're too young/inexperienced to be an advisor. | Never be defensive, instead promote the benefits. | PDF | For more on being to 'too young' visit AFW S.12.29. | 71.1 | A Word About Issues | Your client acquisition discipline - the quest for people who will welcome your help, and who will follow your advice for no other reason than it is your advice. | PDF | | 72 | When you lose an account to the competition | Go out with grace and leave the door open. | PDF | For more on client issues visit AFW S.12.34. | 73 | Only One Advisor | Having two wildly uncoordinated investment portfolios always disserves the clients. | PDF | For details on having just one advisor visit AFW S.12.2 | 74 | Great referral source; bad referral | Tell your client about the bad referral. They will respond in one of three ways. | PDF | For more on referrals visit AFW S.14. | 75 | Overspending | Be brutally honest. If they don't act on your counsel, abandon ship. | PDF | For more details visit AFW S.12.32. | 76 | Underdiversification / concentrated stock positions | If one's overall net worth is riding on one stock it is no longer investing; it is playing Russian roulette. | PDF | For more on investing directly in stocks visit AFW S.12.8. | 77 | Couples | You must deal wit both spouses, and they must be of like mind on the important things. | PDF | Additionals details on AFW S.12.33. | 78 | Only Cash Gets on the Ark | This does not mean that you never do agent-change forms, but only if the client is already in the exact investments that you recommend. If they are not, then insist on a rollover to your investment, or nothing at all. | PDF | For on Agent-Change Prospecting visit AFW S.8.10. | 79 | We do this Professionally | For 401k's I always select the AMF funds. | PDF | For more on AMF visit AFW S.4.

# Index of Nick's This Time Isn't Different (Individual Pages)

Folder of all PDFs is here.

| Date | Title | Description | Link | Related AFW Module | |--|-|-|-|-|-| | 1 | Preface and Introduction | Human ingenuity is the most powerful force on earth, and equities are the only asset class that fully captures it. | PDF | Read TTID 1 ― 'Preface and Introduction' (PDF) | 2 | Part 1.1 - What We Believe | Our philosophy is counter-cultural - and that is a good thing because it works and it separates you from every other advisor. | PDF | Read TTID 2 ― 'Part 1.1 - What We Believe' (PDF) | 3 | Part 1.2 - The Human Nature Problem | The stock exchange is the only place on earth where, when they hold a big sale, everyone runs screaming out of the store. | PDF | Read TTID 3 ― 'Part 1.2 - The Human Nature Problem' (PDF) | 4 | Part 1.3 - Giving Clients a Solid Plan to Hold Onto | We create robust plans by looking back over very long time periods. | PDF | Read TTID 4 ― 'Part 1.3 - Giving Clients a Solid Plan to Hold Onto' (PDF) | 5 | Part 1.4 - The Package | The Package is essentially the Lifeboat Drills. | PDF | Read TTID 5 ― 'Part 1.4 - The Package' (PDF) | 6 | Part 1.5 - The Package Eliminates Surprises | There is a very significant emotional price to be paid for good returns. | PDF | Read TTID 6 ― 'Part 1.5 - The Package Eliminates Surprises' (PDF) | 7 | Part 1.6 - The Package in More Recent Times (2000 - 2024) | You can't start doing the Lifeboat Drills after the Titanic hits the iceberg. | PDF | Read TTID 7 ― 'Part 1.6 - The Package in More Recent Times (2000 - 2024)' (PDF) | 8 | Part 1.7 - We Planned for This | The permanent returns are an efficient market's way of pricing in the sometimes bitter temporary declines. | PDF | Read TTID 8 ― 'Part 1.7 - We Planned for This' (PDF) | 9 | Part 1.8 - This Time Isn't Different | The staggering fundamental strength and resilience of the great American companies is expresed in their seemingly limitless capacity to innovate, to increase their earnings, and to raise their dividends. | PDF | Read TTID 9 ― 'Part 1.8 - This Time Isn't Different' (PDF) | 10 | Part 1.9 - Companies Are Not Stocks | The way investors fail is by assuming their stocks are only worth whatever panic-crazed prices 'the stock market' assigns them on any given day. | PDF | Read TTID 10 ― 'Part 1.9 - Companies Are Not Stocks' (PDF) | 11 | Part 1.10 - The Relentless Opportunism of Reinvested Dividends | We advisors don't talk enthusiastically enough about dividends. Even when stock prices are running on pure emotion, dividends remain essentially a function of the companies' ACTUAL earnings from their operating business - and managements' best estimate of the future prospects for those earnings. | PDF | Read TTID 11 ― 'Part 1.10 - The Relentless Opportunism of Reinvested Dividends' (PDF) | 12 | Part 1.11 - The Quagmire of Current Events | If people change their investment poilicy for any reason when their goals haven't changed they're going to be wrong. | PDF | Read TTID 12 ― 'Part 1.11 - The Quagmire of Current Events' (PDF) | 13 | Part 1.12 - What Superior Companies Actually Do In A Crisis | No power on earth can force a company to continue losing money. | PDF | Read TTID 13 ― 'Part 1.12 - What Superior Companies Actually Do In A Crisis' (PDF) | 14 | Part 1.13 - Talk Less About Current Events - Starting Now. | The more you talk about the economy and the markets on the way up, the more likely your clients will want to inquire sharply about them on the way down. The more the tenor of your everyday communication has to do with 'the news', the sooner you're going to get those 'What's your opinion of this situation?' calls. | PDF | Read TTID 14 ― 'Part 1.13 - Talk Less About Current Events - Starting Now.' (PDF) | 15 | Part 1.14 - The Guiding Principle of Client Communication: Vitamin C | What we do: 1. We create a robust plan and portfolio that will historically achieve our clients' most cherished long-term goals. 2. We work to prevent human nature from blowing that plan up. | PDF | Read TTID 15 ― 'Part 1.14 - The Guiding Principle of Client Communication: Vitamin C' (PDF) | 16 | Part 1.15 - The Communication Protocol: General Statement | It should go without saying that your communication protocal with clients has to be specifically established before you and they get up from the table on Onboarding Day. | PDF | Read TTID 16 ― 'Part 1.15 - The Communication Protocol: General Statement' (PDF) | 17 | Part 1.16 - Your Annual and Semiannual Letters | Nick kindly enough writes the for us and all we need to do is send them twice a year (July and January) along with our Client Newsletter. The Client Letters are divided into two sections: General Principles followed by Current Commentary. Our primary focus should always be on the timeless, unchanging essentials. | PDF | Read TTID 17 ― 'Part 1.16 - Your Annual and Semiannual Letters' (PDF) | 18 | Part 1.17 - What We Do, and How We Earn Our Fee, on the Back of an Envelope | A large part of our value proposition is helping our clients not make the Big Mistake. We are long-term investors. We do not engage in market timing, stock picking or tactical asset allocation on any level, and we do not react to market movements or economic news. | PDF | Read TTID 18 ― 'Part 1.17 - What We Do, and How We Earn Our Fee, on the Back of an Envelope' (PDF) | 19 | Part 2.1 - Tear Away the Curtain | Your ability to cause clients to remain steadfast at the moment of truth will be a pure and absolute function of the personal relationship you have with them. | PDF | Read TTID 19 ― 'Part 2.1 - Tear Away the Curtain' (PDF) | 20 | Part 2.2 - Our Goal in All This | People fire their financial advisors all the time. They rarely fire their friends. Friends become clients and clients become friends. | PDF | Read TTID 20 ― 'Part 2.2 - Our Goal in All This' (PDF) | 21 | Part 2.3 - Start Weaning Yourself Off Intellectual/Statistical Demonstrations | Make charts the least important part of your appeal - overshadowed by the power of what you say, and the confidence with which you say it. | PDF | Read TTID 21 ― 'Part 2.3 - Start Weaning Yourself Off Intellectual/Statistical Demonstrations' (PDF) | 22 | Part 2.4 - The Pain That Never Stops | By far the most painful emotion in investing is long-term regret. | PDF | Read TTID 22 ― 'Part 2.4 - The Pain That Never Stops' (PDF) | 23 | Part 2.5 - Friends Don't Let Friends Panic Out | A true friend is someone who will tell you the truth, even when you don't want to hear it. We are vitally iinterested in saving our friends and clients from themselves. | PDF | Read TTID 23 ― 'Part 2.5 - Friends Don't Let Friends Panic Out' (PDF) | 24 | Part 2.6 - The Long-Term Regret Issue: Even Scarier Than It First Appears | If this cautionary speech doesn't help them from bolting, nothing will. And if they do indeed bolt, your responsibility to them comes to an end. | PDF | Read TTID 24 ― 'Part 2.6 - The Long-Term Regret Issue: Even Scarier Than It First Appears' (PDF) | 25 | Part 2.7 - Wear Your Heart on Your Sleeve | Nobody outside your family will ever wish for your financial success more than I do. That's why I'm advising you as I am. I'm recommending you do the exactly what Ayla and I are doing. | PDF | Read TTID 25 ― 'Part 2.7 - Wear Your Heart on Your Sleeve' (PDF) | 26 | Part 2.8 - And If All Else Fails, Try a Little Gentle Humor | Advisors transmit serious information to clients seriously. Friends remember to make their freinds smile, even at tense moments. | PDF | Read TTID 26 ― 'Part 2.8 - And If All Else Fails, Try a Little Gentle Humor' (PDF) | 27 | Part 2.9 - Friends Know and Interact with Both Spouses | For the rest of your career, you will be dealing with more and more widows who have more and more money. | PDF | Read TTID 27 ― 'Part 2.9 - Friends Know and Interact with Both Spouses' (PDF) | 28 | Part 2.10 - Becoming and Staying Friends with the Spouse | Script to spouse: Does it make sense for me to include you both in my emails - at least until you decide you'd like me to stop. | PDF | Read TTID 28 ― 'Part 2.10 - Becoming and Staying Friends with the Spouse' (PDF) | 29 | Part 2.11 - Caution: Your Reserves of Time and Energy Are Finite | When you are expending significant quantities of time and energy on clients who are in danger of bolting, you're taking those resources away from your better clients. | PDF | Read TTID 29 ― 'Part 2.11 - Caution: Your Reserves of Time and Energy Are Finite' (PDF) | 30 | Part 2.12 - Some People Just Aren't Going to Make It | The time and energy you waste on someone who's demonstrating that he's never going to make it NOT cost-free. | PDF | Read TTID 30 ― 'Part 2.12 - Some People Just Aren't Going to Make It' (PDF) | 31 | Part 2.13 - Congratulate Your Friends When They Come Through Unscathed | This is just a personal note to express my appreciation to you both for hanging in there. | PDF | Read TTID 31 ― 'Part 2.13 - Congratulate Your Friends When They Come Through Unscathed' (PDF) | 32 | Part 2.14 - Red Flags in the Sunset: Three Couples Cautions | The most toxic iteration of the couples problem takes place when you yourself somehow become the focus of the disagreement. | PDF | Read TTID 32 ― 'Part 2.14 - Red Flags in the Sunset: Three Couples Cautions' (PDF) | 33 | Part 2.15 - The Miracle of Modern Technology vs. the Immutability of Human Nature | The dominant determinant of long-term, real-life financial outcomes is investor behavior. | PDF | Read TTID 33 ― 'Part 2.15 - The Miracle of Modern Technology vs. the Immutability of Human Nature' (PDF) | 34 | Part 2.16 - Optimism Is the Only Realism | With the exception of love itself, human ingenuity is the most powerful force on earth. Yet we always underestimate it. | PDF | Read TTID 34 ― 'Part 2.16 - Optimism Is the Only Realism' (PDF) | 35 | Epilogue - Toward an Antifragile Investor | You must be a constant beacon of rational optimism, by always relating to them as friends and not just clients. | PDF | Read TTID 35 ― 'Epilogue - Toward an Antifragile Investor' (PDF) | 36 | Addendum 1 - The Other Big Mistake | You'll never own enough of any one idea to make a killing in it. And you'll nevr own enough of any one idea to get killed by it. | PDF | Read TTID 36 ― 'Addendum 1 - The Other Big Mistake' (PDF) | 37 | Addendum 2 - Managing Sequence of Return Risk | My answer: variable annuity with an income rider. | PDF | Read TTID 37 ― 'Addendum 2 - Managing Sequence of Return Risk' (PDF)