Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for one of my columns at the Value Walk site:
Rob, you are so far behind everyone else, you need a massive windfall to even put yourself in the same zip code. Shall we share the details of your retirement and investment plan? I am sure they would love to see all the details by the world renowned expert, Rob Bennett.
The market determines value, Rob. Value changes every day. It is like me telling you that my assets are really worth 65% more today because of how I interpret data. It is like selling a home. It is worth what someone today is willing to pay, not what I want it to be.
Spare me your tired lines of 35 years of research. You have little clue as to interpreting research.
The market determines value properly in the long term and improperly in the short term, Sammy. That’s what Shiller’s “revolutionary” (his word) research shows.
If you are looking at today’s market value and you want to know the true market value, you need to adjust for valuations. The P/E10 metric tells you how off the mark today’s market price is, the extent to which it is determined by investor EMOTION rather than economic realities.
Buy-and-Hold numbers are fantasy, pretend numbers. Valuation-Informed Indexing numbers are real numbers. They include the adjustments for valuations that Buy-and-Hold numbers do not include.
That’s it. That’s the entire deal here. Millions of words have been spilled and it all comes down to this — Valuation-Informed Indexers adjust for valuations and Buy-and-Holders do not. It’s so simple. One model gets the numbers right and the other does not.
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These are numbers-based models. So this is important. In a numbers-based model, you must get the numbers right or you are going to cause a lot of people a lot of pain.
I always adjust for valuations. You never do. We are working at cross purposes. That’s why we are always talking past each other. You start from a different assumption than the one that I start from. So naturally we always end up in a different place.
My best wishes.
Rob
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Anonymous says
Rob,
I have left you a lot of caustic response messages over the years. While I still feel you are wrong about so much, mostly your approach to them but also on the facts, something totally unrelated has just happened in my life that made it clear how petty is has been to hold a running anonymous argument with someone on the internet for a decade about personal choices on approaches to retirement funding! You have a right to be wrong, and to still state your views all you want. Always have, of course. But I do hope you find the peace that would almost certainly come from not having this crazy obsession in your life any longer. Anyway, while I do think your claims of illegality for those who wrote in opposition to your claims, snarkily or not, politely or not, are not just unsupportable but ridiculous, I would like to offer you an apology for any psychic pain my own barbs might have caused you. I’ll give you this, Rob, you are one exasperating son of a gun, but after all that, I still do hope you find your own personal peace and happiness. I’m going to go seek to perfect my own, now. Take care.
Rob says
I am grateful to you for posting those words, Anonymous. I knew all along that you had a soft spot hidden away somewhere deep inside of you!
You are an exasperating son of a gun as well! I mean that in the way that I believe you meant it when you directed those words to me. You believe in what you are saying and you believe that you are helping by making the strongest possible case for what you believe. I have learned important things as a result of your persistence in making your case and I am grateful.
I am being entirely sincere when I say that I wish you the best of luck in all your future life endeavors, my old friend.
Rob