The market is an effective information-processing machine. Millions of market participants buy and sell securities every day and the real-time information they bring helps set prices. This means competition is stiff and trying to outguess market prices is difficult for anyone, even professional money managers.

Financial markets have rewarded long-term, disciplined investors. When you try to outwit the market, you compete against the collective knowledge of all market participants. By harnessing the market's power with a low-cost, diversified, and risk appropriate portfolio for your financial goals, you'll put their knowledge to work for you.

Historically, the odds of selecting an investment fund that was still around 20 years later are worse than a flip of a coin (50/50). The market’s pricing power works against fund managers who try to outperform through stock picking or market timing. For those funds that do survive, the odds for outperforming the market are even worse.

Few US-domiciled funds have survived and outperformed the overall market, about as many as we expect by pure chance alone.

Some investors select funds based on their past returns. Yet, past performance offers little insight into a fund’s future returns. For example, most funds in the top quartile of previous five-year returns did not maintain a top-quartile ranking in the following five years.

Persistance is difficult. Few conventional mutual funds continue to outpeform.

It’s tough, if not impossible, to know which stocks, funds, or market segments will outperform from period to period. Accordingly, allowing opinions about short-term market conditions to impact your long-term investment plan can lead to disappointing results.

Holding securities across many market segments can help manage overall risk. But diversifying within your home market may not be enough. Global diversification can broaden your investment universe.

Investors cannot control the markets, but they can control what they pay to invest. The only thing that cost-generating gimmicks like market-timing, stock picking, frequent trading, and other conventional strategies guarantee is that more wealth will trickle up from your account to the pockets of your broker/advisor. No one has a crystal ball. Don't pay for gimmicks and proven myths. And research has actually shown that disciplined investing with lower cost investments, like a globally diverse portfolio of index mutual funds, has in the long run outperformed conventional, speculative strategies.

Let's assume that your portfolio averaged 10% annually over the last 25 years. If you payed 2% in fees and commissions each year, your financial services firm, broker, and advisor would have pocketed almost half (43%) of the total investment returns. Even though you put up 100% of the capital and take 100% of the risk, you end up with only half (57%) of the returns.

Many people struggle to separate their emotions from investing. Markets go up and down. They can be turbulent and seem out of control. Reacting to current market conditions may lead to making poor investment decisions for your long term financial health.

Certainly, what doesn't help is the daily market news and commentary that challenge our investment discipline. Some messages stir anxiety about the future, while others tempt you to chase the latest investment fad. When headlines unsettle you, consider the source and maintain a long-term perspective. The financial news media is motivated by their bottom line, not by your best interest.