Media & EventsWall Street Journal: Pimco's Gross Cuts Back on MBS
By Min Zeng, December 19, 2012 The writer quotes Jon R. Orcutt in his article: “I like his recent moves in preparation for the coming year”, said Mr. Orcutt, adding that barring any dramatic downturn in equities, he will at year end “be adding more money” to both the fund and its exchanged-traded fund version, which debuted in late February. Read the full article in PDF NASDAQ Community: These ETFs Could Soar in November
By Benzinga, November 1, 2012 The writer quotes AllocationForLife in his article: ”And like the telecom sector, health care has a penchant for performing well in November. The sector has climbed in 17 of the past 25 Novembers, according to Allocationforlife.” Read the full article at NASDAQ Community Wall Street Journal: Time for Caution as Bill Gross Pulls Back On Treasurys
By Min Zeng, October 23, 2012 The writer quotes Jon R. Orcutt in his article: "Long-term risk is on Gross's mind and I think the reduction in Treasnrys is a good start to addressing the concern of rising yields," argues Jon R. Orcutt, an individual investor who holds Mr. Gross's funds and is the author of Master the Markets with Mutual Funds. Read the full article in PDF August And YTD S&P 500, Asset Class And Sector Performance
Jon R. Orcutt, September 1, 2012 The S&P 500 Index (SPY) posted very good gains for the month of August. The index finished with a total return gain of 2.25%. I was a bit surprised that the strong start to the month was so confusing for some of the financial networks. We actually received some pretty good economic numbers for the month of July, such as... Read the full article at Seeking Alpha September Historical Sector Analysis: Not Kind
Jon R. Orcutt, August 27, 2012 This month's historical sector analysis of September felt very much like I was attending a history class. I lived through this history, but it was still painful to look back over the last 25 years. The market has had to deal with a wide range of historical September events, from its strange September performance leading up to the '87 crash; to its' reaction to the August 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait; to the despicable terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001; to the mortgage crisis becoming a household name in 2008; to the downturn due to the European debt crisis in 2011. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha S&P 500: Tail That Wags The European Dog
Jon R. Orcutt, August 21, 2012 I am often asked about investing opportunities in Europe. With the European debt crisis dominating the headlines over the last two years, savvy investors have been looking for value investment opportunities. Who can blame us after seeing the rebound in our own markets, especially the S&P 500's (SPY), off of the lows reached as a result of our own banking sector meltdown. Although I'm sure there are value plays in Europe, when you look at the returns of broad-basket European equity investments you are not exactly seeing the same carnage as you did with U.S. equities during our own crisis. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha July And YTD S&P 500, Asset Class And Sector Performance
Jon R. Orcutt, August 1, 2012 The S&P 500 Index (SPY) posted yet another positive month in July. The index finished up 1.39% for the month which compared favorably with its twenty-five year historical mean return of 1.13%. Real estate securities continued their strong historical July performance with an average gain of 1.80%, which pushed the sector to an industry leading return of 16.34% for the year. The average technology fund lost .81% in the month of July which was in-line with its historical twenty-five year trend of being the worst performing sector in the month. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha August Historical Sector Analysis: Gone Fishing!
Jon R. Orcutt, July 26, 2012 This month's historical sector analysis for the month of August shows that over the last twenty-five years the month has been pretty flat. It is not surprising being that most money managers go on vacation during the month of August, but I believe there has been enough volatility to take advantage of if you decide not to take a vacation from investing. Thus far the 2012 market is being compared to 2011 with new fears arising in Europe and somewhat lackluster earnings. However, the S&P 500 and many of the sectors that comprise our economy have been showing considerable resilience, and are still posting very good gains for the year. Strong earnings from Caterpillar (CAT) this morning suggests that things have not been as bad as the analyst have projected. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha The Total Return Approach
By Jon Orcutt Are you investing in individual bonds, bond mutual funds or bond ETFs to stabilize your portfolio throughout retirement? If so, you are not alone. Asset allocation once again became important to investors after the market meltdown of 2008. Reducing volatility throughout retirement is the ultimate goal for most investors. However, if you think all bonds are created equal then you may get caught on the wrong end of the yield curve. If this happens, then a whole new generation of individual investors will find out that their asset mix, which was designed to reduce volatility, actually may become very volatile. Read the full article at LearnBonds Get Rich With Knowledge Olean Native Makes Investing Money Easy
Jon Orcutt emphasizes how emotions play major role in success
By Jason Cohen, Olean Times Herald OLEAN - One of the most difficult things to do in life is invest money. With the economy slowly recovering from a downward spiral, being careful with one’s finances is of utmost importance. Former financial advisor and Olean native Jon Orcutt recently published a book, “Master the Markets with Mutual Funds,” a common-sense guide to investing success. Read the full article in PDF Vanguard Domestic Equity Value/Growth ETFs: Low Cost And Stellar Performance
Jon R. Orcutt, July 3, 2012 The debate between ETFs and Mutual Funds and which is better to own will never end. This article is not meant to try and solve that argument, but rather is simply meant to point out the outstanding performance of Vanguard's domestic asset class ETFs. The fact is, over the last five years these ETFs have done an outstanding job versus the average mutual fund performance within each of their asset classes. With Vanguard continuing to lower expenses (the average expenses for the six ETFs I will be sharing with you is just over .11%) I feel Vanguard should be strongly considered when designing an asset allocation strategy... Read the full article at Seeking Alpha July Historical Sector Analysis: Big Hits And Little Misses
Jon R. Orcutt, June 22, 2012 This month's review of historical sector analysis for the month of July has yielded pretty solid results for the overall market throughout the last 25 years. After eliminating the high and low returns for statistical analysis the results showed that the S&P 500 Total Return (SPY) has had an average return of 1.13% for the month of July over the last 25 years. Interestingly, the positive years have yielded a much greater return than the negative years move to the downside. This is why the mean return is impressive despite the index only finishing in positive territory 12 times in the last 25 years in the month of July. When the market is right it has been really good... Read the full article at Seeking Alpha June Historical Sector Analysis: Weak!
Jon R. Orcutt, May 21, 2012 Sometimes I feel non-investors think Wall Street just creates a bunch of cute nicknames and phrases for trading activities and investment time periods. My research shows that the nicknames and phrases are generally based on facts. Take for example the phrase, "Sell in May and go away." After I share with you the historical performance for sectors and the S&P 500 (SPY) for the month of June over the last 25 years, I think you will see that this phrase has been well earned... Read the full article at Seeking Alpha Energy Stocks Lead Historical April Sector Trends
Jon R. Orcutt, March 28, 2012 The domestic equity markets continue to be strong. When markets tend to move in one direction, either up or down, it can often make historical data worthless. Nonetheless, just as I do every month I like to look back at historical sector performance for the upcoming month... Read the full article at Seeking Alpha Reader Views Literary Awards Winners - 2011
by Reader Views Business/Sales/Economics: Master the Markets with Mutual Funds by Jon R. Orcutt
View the award and read the review at Reader Views Consumer Stocks Stand Tall In March
Jon R. Orcutt, March 1, 2012 Throughout the many years I have researched sector cyclical moves, I have never come across such a high level of sector historical performance for a specific calendar month than I have for the month of March. The consumer has clearly stood atop the mountain in the month of March over the last twenty-five years. Consider the following category average returns... Read the full article at Seeking Alpha Book Review: Master the Markets with Mutual Funds: A Common Sense Guide to Investing Success
by Olivera Baumgartner-Jackson for Reader Views, December 2011 Anything to do with stock markets has always been scary and completely foreign to me, and I will be the first to admit that I never understood any of the financial mumbo-jumbo connected to investing. Therefore I was even more surprised that I actually enjoyed reading “Master the Markets with Mutual Funds” by Jon R. Orcutt, and that it just might have given me the little push needed to gather the courage and one day take a step in the direction of investing. Read the full book review in PDF News Article: New book aimed at understanding markets
by Rachel Repard, Messenger Post Media, Canandaigua December 2011 Jon R. Orcutt says there is plenty of media giving financial advice, but he has found that most of it was aimed toward financial professionals. CNBC, a network that features stock market news, was originally aimed at traders, and looking through his collection of over 100 books on the subject, Orcutt couldn’t find any that the average investor would understand. Read the full news article in PDF It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year
Jon R. Orcutt, November 7, 2011 Well another holiday season is upon us. At least that is what I have been told by all of the commercials on television this weekend. Hope seems to spring eternal during the holiday season and I have to admit that over the last 15 years I have noticed a similar feeling of optimism, regardless of current market conditions, when it comes to the stock markets. Hysteria will soon begin the day after Thanksgiving as Americans celebrate that unofficial holiday called "Black Friday". I have to admit, I have never shopped on Black Friday but I do enjoy the excitement that the day provides. This led me to wonder if the optimism is for real, and if so, is there a way to make a little profit. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha ETFs Vs. Mutual Funds: Is Cheaper Better?
Jon R. Orcutt, November 2, 2011 This weekend, while scrolling through the various financial websites I frequent, I saw a statement that made me question my own portfolio. That statement was, "Anyone who owns mutual funds instead of ETFs is a bumbling idiot." Being that I own and prefer mutual funds to ETFs I started to wonder if I too was an "idiot." I certainly agree that the rise in popularity of ETFs has been a good thing for individual investors. I encourage all investments that provide more access to the markets for everyone. The question is, does the performance of the ETFs hold up against mutual funds? I do not rely on words to tell us the story so I thought it would be interesting to look at the data with an apples-to-apples comparison. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha | 
