Newsletterama - Review of the Hulbert Financial Digest

Hulbert Financial Digest

by Marco den Ouden
Editor, The Break Out Report

The Hulbert Financial Digest is published towards the end of every month and mailed by post or email to subscribers (your choice - add $10 a year for snail mail).

Every new subscriber receives a twelve page Introductory Booklet which explains in great detail Hulbert's methodology and suggestions on how to effectively use the newsletter. This is a must read.

Each eight page issue starts off with a two page article on some aspect of investment analysis based on Hulbert's study of newsletters.

For example, in April 2000, he examined whether the 35% drop in the NASDAQ constituted a bear market. He argued that a bear market is primarily a psychological phenomenon that occurs when virtually no one is willing to buy.

In another issue, a look at newsletter writers who are market timers showed that they were more likely to buy than sell during 1999's bull run.

The lead article is followed by one-page profiles of four different newsletters. Each review includes basic contact and subscription information, a portfolio analysis, a graph showing the newsletter's performance against the Wilshire 5000, year-by-year and average compounded performance tables, and a half page of commentary.

This is followed by a page containing a performance scoreboard for mutual fund letters, a list of the most popular and least popular stocks, and the most popular funds. At the bottom of the page is a bar chart showing the level of market exposure among market timers in the stock, bond and gold markets.

And the final page contains the rankings of the top newsletters and their returns over five years, ten years, fifteen years and twenty years. Parallel to this is a similar risk-adjusted ranking.

Twice annually (in January and July) Hulbert publishes a sixteen page supplement to the monthly issue which contains complete risk-adjusted and non-risk-adjusted performance information on all of the over 450 portfolios tracked. New subscribers receive the most recent edition along with their first issue.

Performance exceeding the Wilshire 5000 is highlighted in blue for quick reference.

The Hulbert Financial Digest is renowned for its trenchant analysis and objectivity. It celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2005.

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