Yesterday’s blog entry reported on an e-mail that I sent to Academic Researcher Wade Pfau on April 6, 2012. Wade responded a few hours later.
He said: “Thanks for sharing. And I’ll keep plugging away at this. I’m not sure if you saw the news before, but I recently became the curriculum director for the Retirement Management Analyst designation, which focuses on the post retirement period. I was surprised to learn that CFPs don’t learn about post retirement, and their curriculum doesn’t even cover things like the Trinity study. The role of valuations in affecting SWRs will definitely find its way into the RMA curriculum.”
I responded the next day. The text of my response is set forth below.
Wade:
Please take good care. You’re the best.
I will send you an e-mail when I post the articles. My intent will
obviously not be to stir things up. I just feel better if you hear
news that you might consider unpleasant coming straight from
me rather than finding out about it through some other means.
Rob
Wade responded the same day. He said: “As I am in the early stages of hoping to return to a job in the United States, I do request that you tone down a bit whatever you will be writing about me. I’m just concerned about what potential employers may see when they google my name.”
He added: “About that first email I sent you in our exchange, please under no circumstances try to summarize or excerpt from it. If you must use it, please include the entire message with nothing left out. I think that is only fair, because you will then have free reign for your rebuttal, and I won’t be around for further rebuttals to that.”
Evidence Based Investing says
He added: “About that first email I sent you in our exchange, please under no circumstances try to summarize or excerpt from it. If you must use it, please include the entire message with nothing left out. I think that is only fair, because you will then have free reign for your rebuttal, and I won’t be around for further rebuttals to that.”
Obviously at this stage Wade realizes the sort of person he is dealing with. It is instructive that he feels he needs to explain to you how to behave with integrity.
Rob says
I think it is instructive that Wade is concerned about what will happen to his employment prospects if his e-mail correspondence is reported.
Did he do something he is ashamed of?
He showed that Buy-and-Hold has been a losing strategy for 140 years.
Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
I see it as a wonderfully good thing. Once we bury the smelly Buy-and-Hold garbage 30 feet in the ground, where it can do no further harm to humans and other living things, it becomes possible for us all to explore the true research-based strategies that really do work.
Wade is ashamed of having published research that merits a Nobel prize. That shows how messed up InvestoWorld has become in the Buy-and-Hold Era.
Rob
Evidence Based Investing says
All his published research remains in the public domain. He is not ashamed of it.
His only worry is that he will be publicly associated with you.
Rob says
That makes a lot of sense, Evidence.
Rob
Drip Guy says
Making these continued posts of yours about these personal emails just to extend your vendetta, which is based on nothing more than your own case of one-sided butt-hurt, Rob, is wrong.
In fact, it’s way more than wrong.
It’s literally evil.
You are truly despicable.
Rob says
Good point, Drip Guy.
I wish you all good things.
Rob
Drip Guy says
So are you going to retract them?
Or will your own sons someday wander across this hell-hole and rue the name attached to their own lives, because you besmirched it so horribly?
Rob says
I’m going to start posting dishonestly on SWRs and all other critically important investment-related topics at the close of business today, Drip Guy.
I’ve been waiting for just the right moment.
Rob
Canyon wanderer says
Have you no shame?
Rob says
That question suggests to me that we are getting close to it being just the right moment, Canyon.
Peace, man.
Rob
what says
Haha, the chances of anyone ever associating with Rob Bennett with their real identity ever again is so close to 0 it is astonishing.
Of course Wade is ashamed. He is absolutely ashamed that he got himself mixed up with a nut job and is embarrassed he didn’t figure it out until it was far too late. Now he has to deal with said nut job’s repeated ongoing slander. What a nightmare, I feel terribly for Wade.
Rob says
Hard to argue.
Rob
Diversified Investor says
Does this posting bring your sad and vindictive persecution of Wade to a close?
Rob says
Tomorrow’s blog entry is the last one reporting on my e-mail correspondence with Wade.
Then I will be doing a series of blog entries in response to points that Wade made in “defense” of his behavior. And there will be two articles posted to the “The Buy-and-Hold Crisis” section of the site. One will link to every blog entry I have made on Wade and the other will tell the story of how the Goons silenced him in narrative form (with links to the blog entries reporting on the e-mail correspondence that relates to the various points made).
My expectation is that my Wade-related posting will come to a close sometime near the end of July or the beginning of August. If I were forced to pick a date, I would say perhaps the last one will go up on August 7. But that’s just a guess. I’m still writing the articles.
Of course, we will all be discussing the Wade Pfau story for many years to come. The corruption of the Investing Advice Field is the most important political and economic story of any of our lifetimes. This one ain’t going away any more than the story re the errors in the Old School SWR stories is going away.
The Goons will disagree. We all know that.
The Goons were singing “Ding, Dong, the wicked witch is dead!” in May 2003, when I was banned from the Motley Fool site.
Why do you think we call them “Goons” in the first place? I think it would be fair to say that they are not the brightest bulbs on the Christmas tree.
Rob
canyon wanderer says
what’s this ‘we’ stuff? you call those you don’t like ‘goons’, because they hold different views on saving and investing, and in large part, have all successfully retired from the working world, unlike you, who didn’t save enough.
goon is your word, own up to what you say.
Diversified Investor says
When do you plan on publishing your emails to Morningstar regarding Mel Lindauer?
what says
This is just too funny!
Evidence Based Investing says
Yes, Yes !! We want to see the Lindauer emails.
Rob says
When do you plan on publishing your emails to Morningstar regarding Mel Lindauer?
Thursday through Sunday.
Rob