Financial Repression
The Federal Reserve's policy of zero short-term interest rates and balance sheet expansion - mainly through purchasing bonds, i.e. quantitative easing - has denied investors the opportunity to lock in reasonable, low-risk, real rates of return through traditional bond purchases (QE was designed to support borrowers, both individual and corporate). This is the had investors have been dealt - economist Carmen Reinhart recently called it 'financial repression' - and we can find no domestic, high credit quality fixed income investments that offer attractive real returns. Such investments had been plentiful for most of the last 30 years, resulting in the rule of thumb that investors at or nearing retirement should have a bond weighting equal to their age, i.e. 'your parent's portfolio'. We strongly reject this rule of thumb in today's interest rate environment.

David Fuller's view I agree.

For yield, Fullermoney would consider government bonds in some of the growth economies but our main preference is for high-yielding equities, particularly multinationals with a strong presence in the world's growth economies. These are reviewed by Eoin periodically and include the 'Dividend Aristocrats' which have at least a 5-year record of annual dividend increases.