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Q&A with Daniel Crosby, the author of "The Behavioral Investor" book (Link)
"I, along with many others in the industry, now believe the primary benefit of financial advice to be behavioral. The tricky thing about good financial decision-making is that education is a fairly weak predictor of behavior. There are all sorts of educational resources available to the retail investor today – blogs, white papers, all the way to robo-advisors that will automatically create a near perfect asset mix – but none of these things can prevent the panicked investor from being their own worst enemy. I liken it to nutritional information which is widely available and widely ignored. In fact, some research suggests that restaurants that list calorie counts on the menu actually lead diners to eat slightly *more* than those that don’t list them. Investors do not need an advisor to tell them how to invest; a long weekend of reading the right books would point the average investor in a good direction that could be implemented simply and cheaply. However, that very same investor is highly unlikely to stick with that plan through thick and thin, which is the only thing that matters in the long-term."
From the EdgePoint archives....June 24, 2016 - The pros of hiring a pro (Link)
