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www.insideHALTON.com | OAKVILLE BEAVER | Thursday, May 29, 2014 | 14 A Reminiscing on the `best hour of music' experienced n article outlining the fees assorted monster musical acts charge recently made the rounds online, with some acts apparently topping the mark of a million dollars per show. A friend boasted about how many of these top-charging artists he'd seen. I wasn't as impressed as he thought I'd be. Bruce Springsteen aside, I'm not a big fan of monster musical acts. I'm even less a fan of the venues in which those goliaths ply their trade. With rare exception, arenas and stadiums suck the soul out of music. And face it: if you're up in the nose-bleed section, you're really just watching a concert on the arena's big screen. In compiling a list of my favourite concerts in recent years, I found that only two were in large facilities: The Police (Reunion Tour) at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto in July 2007; and Springsteen at Rogers Centre in 2012, with the dome open on a hot summer night, the venue was as favourable and forgiv- That's Life Andy Juniper Guest Contributor ing as it gets. For me, a prerequisite for a night of memorable music is the kind of intimacy you get when you pair a small venue with a hungry, up-and- coming (or alternative) act. These venues allow artists to connect with an audience in a way that is near impossible in the big venues. Expectations also play a part -- great expectations are too often dashed while low expectations are frequently exceeded. Speaking of low expectations, last month, I reluctantly went to see The National at Massey Hall in Toronto. I say reluctantly, even though the band is one of my favourites, because I saw them (with great expectations) in 2010 at the same venue Dollars & Sense Peter Watson Guest Contributor I Human nature affects poor buy, sell decisions nvestors get a failing grade when investing their money. Research over the past several decades has shown they are consistently getting inferior returns on their investments. Now, we have new data expressing the same old problem. A new 30 year study in the U.S. compared investor returns to the underlining market in which they invested. It is surprising just how poorly their investments performed. The U.S. stock market, as measured by the S&P 500 stock index, returned 11.1 per cent annually over the past 30 years. Individuals investing in U.S. stock funds earned 3.7 per year for that same time frame. This study, completed by Dalbar, has been repeated every year since 1994. Dalbar is a research rm located in Boston, MA. Results vary slightly every year, but the fundamentals are always the same. This year's survey shows individuals earned only 3.7 per cent annually by investing in U.S. stock funds. This was 7.4 per cent lower than the yearly growth of U.S. stocks. A similar study has been completed in the past using Canadian data and the results are similar. Canadians are as poor at investing as Americans. There are three reasons for underperformance. Most stock funds in which they invest underperformed the market by about one per cent. and they were horrible -- de nitely disengaged and with a sound that overwhelmed instead of intrigued. Second time around, it was like a completely different band. And the show was incredible. It was without any expectations that I saw The Avett Brothers in May 2012. Honestly, I didn't know much about the band at the time, although the songs I'd heard were wonderful. Turns out they are way more altcountry than expected -- a hootenanny broke out at the Danforth Music Hall -- and they're now one of my favourite bands. While Massey and the Danforth are impressively intimate venues, if you want other-worldly intimacy, try the Jackson-Triggs Amphitheatre in Niagara-on-the-Lake. Wherein, on one sultry summer night a few years back, we sipped wine under the stars and listened to Kathleen Edwards attempting, in her words, to "out-sing the crickets." It's a night my wife and I still rave about. So, what is my favourite concert? Wilco would de nitely be up there (any of the ve shows attended). Crowded House back in 2008, too. But, No. 1? That's easy. That's recluse Jeff Mangum, enigmatic founder of Neutral Milk Hotel, emerging from selfimposed exile to play a solo show on a sweltering August night in 2011, in the un-air-conditioned con nes of Trinity Church in Toronto. Appropriate, that the concert was in a church, considering it was a spiritual experience. Brief (65 minutes, including encore) and beyond beautiful. A guy with a guitar and his music, opening his heart and baring his soul. Best hour of music of my life. -- Andy Juniper can be contacted at ajjuniper@gmail.com, found on Facebook www.facebook.com, or followed on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ thesportjesters. MEMBERSHIP CARD Fees and expenses account for at least one additional per cent. That leaves about ve per cent of annual underperformance attributed to investor behavior. How is this possible? How can investors who are motivated to earn a good return have investments perform so signi cantly below the average return of the market in which they invest? This is a serious problem. But the problem is not the investments; it is the investors. Understanding investors as human beings is needed in order to explain their dismal investment performance. Behavioral nance has taught us most people are very poor at investing because of the normal human tendencies of fear and greed. People wait for the stock market to appreciate in value until the "greed" factor kicks in. Then they want to participate in the rising market. Then after the stock market value declines, the same investor is overcome by fear and sells to avoid further loss. The timing is backwards. Most people have heard of the common mistake of buying high and selling low. That should be replaced by the opposite and correct strategy of buying low and selling high. Ilia Dichev is an accounting professor at Emory University in the U.S. He has studied investment performance. The professor has explained how individuals get poor investment results. Money ows into hot markets and when the markets are down, investors get scared and leave the market. Dichev`s research shows from 19262002, stock investors lagged behind the stock market annually by 1.3 per cent. Surprisingly, sophisticated inves- tors, including pension plans, underperformed the market by at least three per cent yearly versus the hedge funds they purchased. We have documented proof individuals are consistently poor investors. This applies to both sophisticated and unsophisticated investors. The challenge for every investor is to try resisting the normal human tendencies of being emotional when making investment decisions. -- Submitted by Peter Watson, MBA, CFP , R.F .P ., CIM, FCSI., Certi ed Financial Planner