The lead article in this mass is by John Haslem of the University of Maryland.

The lead article in this mass is by John Haslem of the University of Maryland, Kent Baker of American University, and David Smith of the University at Albany, SUNY They investigate the commodity-like nature of retail S&P 500 index stocks The authors find that these retail index stores have a wide range of outlay ratios, inconsistent with their commodity nature. They also determine that store performance is sensitive to expenditure level, as higher-cost index stocks tend to under-perform their lower charge counterparts. The implications of this consideration are that some investors are uninformed and overpay for index capital management. Given the explosive vegetation of index funds, this research is critically important. I am pleased to add it to the line of papers in Financial Services Review examining the relevance of outlays for investors.

The other article is by Gene Stout and John Mitchell of Central Michigan University. They examine retirement withdrawal planning, simulating one as well as the other investment returns and mortality. The authors find that including mortality considerations terminates in a significantly lower probability of portfolio ruin. This paper moves both strong academic intuition and practical relevance as it joins the growing line of academic research in Financial Services Review in succession investing in retirement.

The third article is at Steven Dolvin and William Templeton of Butler University. They provide a clinical close attention to examine the effect of employee education upon asset allocation choices. The authors find that after attending retirement planning seminars, employee keep to reallocate toward more efficient portfolios. The dataset and analysis thus present an interesting experiment on the relationship between financial education and investor decision-making.

The fourth article is through James Grant and Emery Trahan. Dr Grant is from JLG Research and the University of Massachusetts. Professor Trahan is at Northeastern University. Their paper examines tactical asset allocation around presidential elections. The authors find that neither Democrats nor Republicans provide superior risk-reward opportunities athwart the entire range of asset allocations. The former party attends to offer better risk-reward tradeoffs for stock-heavy portfolios, while the latter's superiority is more in the balanced (stock-bond-cash) range.

The last article is by way of Joel Gold, Charlotte Pryor, and Philip Jagolinzer of the University of Southern Maine. They scrutinize business schools to ascertain what is being taught in the introductory personal financial planning course. The authors then compare the scan results to the Model Curriculum provided by dint of CFP Board and determine that there is a wide disparity between the prototype and what actually is taught. The paper furnishs useful insights to schools offering and considering personal financial planning curricula.

Thanks again to those who make the journal possible. Please consider membership in the Academy of Financial Services and submission to Financial Services Review. Financial Services Review is the oldest and best-recognized academic exit for articles related to individual financial management. I welcome articles across the range of areas that comprise personal financial planning. While our articles are certainly eclectic in denominations of topic, data, and order they are focused in space of times of motivation. We exist to bring into being research that addresses issues that matter to individuals and that have relevance to the emerging academic discipline of personal financial planning. I remain committed to maintaining the journal's reputation as the best academic exit in this specialty area.

Conrad Ciccotello

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