Sound Investing

Weekly podcasts with Paul Merriman. Strategic planning for investing at every stage of life.

Sound Investing is a business podcast hosted by Paul Merriman, with 560 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Paul Merriman hosts Sound Investing, a business show with 560 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

• 

  Sound Investing

  Paul Merriman and Rick Ferri: A Conversation Decades in the Making

  Aug 19, 20261h 33m

  Watch the video here. Paul sits down with Rick Ferri — not for a debate, but for the kind of honest conversation two people can only have after spending their careers chasing the same goal from different directions. Rick makes the case against tilting: the small cap premium largely disappeared once the research went public around 1980, and he believes value stopped working around 2006. Paul counters with Table G1b, which shows the results of blending small cap value and the S&P 500 in 10% increments from 1970 through 2025 — returns alongside the worst drawdowns each combination had to survive. Then Rick does something unexpected — he crosses to Paul's side of the table and builds a strong argument for small cap value, framing it as a way to capture the return of private companies that represent half of the economy. Where they land is less about who's right than what it costs to be wrong. If you go down the factor road, Rick says, it's a lifetime commitment — not three years. Also covered: lump sum versus dollar cost averaging, what an hourly advisor can do to help do-it-yourself investors implement their new portfolio, the new Trump accounts for newborns, and why VT may not be your best choice in a taxable account. Both Paul and Rick will be at the Bogleheads Conference, November 13–15 at Green Valley Ranch Resort and Spa in Henderson, NV, near Las Vegas. Registration: boglecenter.net/2026conference Table G1b — Fine Tuning Table: S&P 500 vs. US Small Cap Value: View the table Stay tuned for next week's podcast, a discussion with Chris Pedersen about this interview with Rick.

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Sound Investing

  Preparing for an upcoming debate with Rick Ferri: Total Market portfolios

  Aug 12, 202614 min

  This Friday I'm sitting down with my friend Rick Ferri for a debate that I think matters a great deal, even though — or maybe because — Rick and I agree on almost everything. We both believe in diversification, low costs, index funds, ignoring predictions, and staying the course. Where we part ways is what happens after that. Rick's case is that you should simply own the whole market. A total stock market index fund gives you thousands of companies at an extraordinarily low cost, and adding complexity rarely pays. My case is that the academic research — Fama, French, and decades of market history — shows that greater exposure to small and value companies may raise long-term expected returns. Rick calls that factor tilting. I call it better diversification. He'll argue I'm not adding diversification at all, just changing the weights, and he's right that this is exactly what we're doing. The question is whether it's worth doing. We also take on a second question that gets far too little attention: if you do want small and value exposure, where should you get it? Vanguard, Fidelity, DFA or Avantis — traditional indexing or systematic portfolio management? Differences that look trivial today can compound into very large ones over 40 or 50 years. Neither of us is trying to win. Rick may be right. I may be right. Ask us again in 50 years. What I hope you take away is the process — examining evidence, understanding the alternatives, admitting what nobody knows, and committing to a strategy you can stick with. Because every strategy disappoints you eventually, and what you do in that moment matters more than which one you chose. The podcast and video of my conversation with Rick will be available Wednesday, August 19, 2026. If you have any questions for Rick, send them to Paul@paulmerriman.com.

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Sound Investing

  Finding the Perfect Advisor, a Battle Over Words and VT vs. AVGE

  Aug 5, 202638 min

  Paul returns from three days at the Garrett Planning Network retreat with a lesson that has almost nothing to do with investments — and everything to do with getting your money's worth from professional advice. Garrett advisors work by the hour, a business model Paul believes eliminates the conflicts of interest built into assets-under-management relationships. For $1,000 to $8,000, he's convinced most families can get extraordinary value from five to ten hours with a thoughtful, trained hourly planner. But there's a catch: the value of those hours depends almost entirely on your willingness to tell the truth. Inspired by a Seth Godin observation — people lie in focus groups, on surveys, and to themselves — Paul explains why the most valuable planning meeting isn't the one where you look financially successful. It's the one where you're completely honest. Paul and his wife are putting this to the test with an hourly planner of their own, and he'll report back in the weeks ahead. Next, Paul shares a private conversation with his longtime friend Rick Ferri, who challenged an idea Paul has taught for decades: that small cap value, large cap value, and international are equity asset classes at all. Rick argues there's only one equity asset class — the total market — and everything else is a segment or style. Paul takes the challenge seriously, does some digging, and explains why the answer matters far more than a debate over definitions. How you think about asset classes shapes the portfolio you'll live with for the next 60 or 70 years. Finally, Paul digs into AVGE, the Avantis globally diversified all-equity ETF, and how it compares to Vanguard's total market approach (VT and VTI). He walks through the meaningful differences: 70/30 U.S./international at Avantis versus 60/40 at Vanguard, and substantially larger positions in mid cap value, small cap value, and small cap blend. He looks at what those tilts have meant historically — including Vanguard's own mid cap value fund turning $10,000 into roughly $160,000 versus $102,000 for the S&P 500 — and why he believes the extra 0.17% in expenses may be money well spent. For investors who don't want to go all-in, Paul offers simple combinations, like a third VT, a third AVGE, and a third AVUV. CHAPTERS 00:00 – Introduction: three topics from the Garrett retreat 01:56 – Why hourly advisors have fewer conflicts of interest 05:52 – The catch: your willingness to tell the truth 06:38 – Seth Godin: "People lie... and they lie to themselves" 08:04 – What planners can't fix if they don't know about it 13:00 – Paul's debate with Rick Ferri: what is an equity asset class? 18:05 – Why the definition shapes your lifetime portfolio 21:34 – AVGE vs. VT: U.S./international balance 23:07 – Comparing value, blend, and growth exposure 25:00 – Mid cap and small cap: what history shows 30:15 – Expense ratios and what you're paying for 31:35 – Simple combinations: VT + AVGE + AVUV 33:15 – Stay the course: closing thoughts Learn more about the Garrett Planning Network

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Sound Investing

  Is it possible that factor investing won't work?

  Jul 15, 202627 min

  A longtime listener wrote in after watching a Ben Felix video making the point that factor investing may not beat the S&P 500 by the end of an investor’s lifetime — and could even do worse. His question was simple: is factor investing really worth the effort? Paul’s answer turned out to be two answers, so he’s splitting it into two episodes. This week is about the thinking. Next week is about the evidence — including new data Daryl Bahls just sent over. Paul also tries something new: using AI to canvas the writings of the Truth Tellers and surface what they would say about this exact question. What emerges is a point they all agree on — good decisions do not guarantee good outcomes, and bad decisions sometimes produce wonderful ones. Bill Bernstein, Larry Swedroe, Ben Felix, Mike Piper, Christine Benz, Rob Berger, Jim Dahle and Jack Bogle each frame the same distinction: expected returns are not realized returns, and probability is not certainty. Investing is one long series of forks in the road — save or spend, stocks or bonds, index or active, buy-and-hold or market timing — and none of them come with a guarantee. What they come with is a probability. The job is to choose thoughtfully, accept the uncertainty, and have the courage to stay the course while the evidence still supports the plan. LINKS • Meet the Truth Tellers: paulmerriman.com/truth-tellers

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Sound Investing

  Back from the Baltic and 12 of your questions

  Jul 8, 202656 min

  Paul returns from a two-week Baltic cruise refreshed and ready to dig into the numbers. He opens with a 12-month performance review of the recommended portfolios at Avantis, DFA and Vanguard — Avantis averaged 31.1% across the 10 equity asset classes in the Ultimate Buy and Hold, versus 27.7% at DFA and 26% at Vanguard — and explains why the non-traditional index funds keep outperforming traditional cap-weighted indexes. Paul also revisits Ben Carlson’s look at the ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK), which grew to $30 billion under management before falling 65% while the S&P 500 gained more than 60% — a costly lesson in performance chasing, with an estimated $7.5 billion in shareholder losses. Then Paul answers 12 listener questions, with a special deep dive into table G1B — 56 years of S&P 500 vs. small cap value returns, one year at a time, plus every combination in 10% increments. QUESTIONS COVERED 1. Funds that match the international and U.S. small cap value asset classes 17:18 2. Keep investments at Fidelity or move to Vanguard? 18:51 3. Is the Vanguard money market fund a good long-term emergency fund? 20:19 4. Pairing the S&P 500 with small cap value — the G1B fine-tuning table 21:46 5. Why the Four Fund worldwide portfolio uses U.S. small cap value only 31:17 6. Should geopolitical tension make you cash out? 33:57 7. Why has small cap value historically produced higher returns? 36:47 8. Can you get rich from investing? The Rule of 72 and $100 a month 41:51 9. Is the all-value worldwide portfolio better than the other strategies? (Table H2) 44:03 10. Where to find the 10 Fund portfolio allocations 48:39 11. Paul’s take on DFA’s micro cap fund (DFMC) 49:16 12. Lump sum or dollar cost average when switching funds in a Roth? 51:57 LINKS • Table H2 — Sound Investing Portfolios Comparison (Worldwide All Value) • Table H1a — Sound Investing Portfolios Asset Allocations • Fine-Tuning Table G1B — S&P 500 vs. Small Cap Value • Fine-Tuning Table G1C — S&P 500 vs. SCV, 2025 Returns • Best-in-Class ETF Recommendations

  ListenShow Notes

Based on semantic analysis of episode topics and host coverage, this show is a strong guest fit for executives in:

Industry fit is computed by PitchCentric using vector embeddings of the show's episode catalog.