Benjamin Felix, Cameron Passmore, and Dan Bortolotti

The Rational Reminder Podcast

Business EN ↓ 453 episodes

A weekly reality check on sensible investing and financial decision-making, from three Canadians. Hosted by Benjamin Felix, Cameron Passmore, and Dan Bortolotti, Portfolio Managers at PWL Capital.

Be sure to visit the podcast's website and support the creator: www.pwlcapital.com

Author

Benjamin Felix, Cameron Passmore, and Dan Bortolotti

Category

Business

Podcast website

www.pwlcapital.com

Latest episode

Oct 8, 2026

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Episodes

Risk Parity, Rental Properties, and the Smith Maneuver (EP.76) 12.12.2019

Welcome to another episode of the Rational Reminder Podcast. We kick off the show today with some great listener feedback before diving into the content of a new podcast by Dr. Laurie Santos called The Happiness Lab. In a recent episode of her show, she gets into the idea of human adaptability to fortuitous or catastrophic events. Our capacity to regulate back to a default state has big implicatio...

Money & Behaviour: Understanding Investing from a Psychological Perspective with Daniel Crosby (EP.75) 05.12.2019

On today's episode, we have Dr. Daniel Crosby joining us for an insightful discussion about the psychology behind investing behaviour. Dr. Crosby is a behavioural finance expert and asset manager who applies his study of market psychology to help people better understand the financial decisions they make and to shed some new light on our ability to be rational. We talk about the inevitability of o...

Playing with FIRE, Having a Belief System, and Term Life Insurance (EP.74) 28.11.2019

Thanks for joining us for another episode of the Rational Reminder Podcast. We are proud to say that last week's show received our highest amount of downloads yet, with 10 000 in its first week, so a big thank you to our listeners for that. We begin our discussion this week with some takeaways from the  Playing With FIRE  documentary about doing affordable things that feel good as a way of cutting...

Finance for Physicians: Personal Finance for High Income Earners with the Loonie Doctor (EP.73) 21.11.2019

In today's episode, we are joined by an exciting guest, The Loonie Doctor, of  The Loonie Doctor  blog to talk about his work not only on physician finance but also on holistic wealth. A physician by training, The Loonie Doctor has scaled back his practice to put more work into the blog and financial education. He masterfully balances precise technical advice on topics like tax alongside 'softer'...

Interest Rates, Optimal Asset Location, and Reverse Mortgages (EP.72) 14.11.2019

Today on The Rational Reminder Podcast, we talk about the relationship between asset allocation and outcome, the ins and outs of reverse mortgages, and finally, life insurance (or lack thereof) in Canada. However, we begin by sharing some interesting points covered in a recent Barry Ritholtz interview with Eugene Fama and David Booth for his Masters in Business show. We talk about how Booth starte...

Everything that you could ever know about ETFs with Dave Nadig (EP.71) 07.11.2019

Today we welcome Dave Nadig onto the show, who joins us off the back of a brilliant presentation he gave at the Wealth Stack conference last month in Scottsdale. Dave is the founder of  etf.com  and has had key positions at FactSet, Barclays Global Investors, and Cerulli previously. Today Dave sits down to talk about the difference between ETFs and mutual funds, EFT product saturation, the coming...

Fee-only Financial Planning, Home Country Bias, and Big RRSPs (EP.70) 31.10.2019

On today's episode, we cover a variety of topics, such as some tips for DIY investors, highlights from a conference Cameron recently attended, home country investment bias and whether it's possible to have too much money in your RRSP. We begin first by talking about what DIY investors can do to ensure that they are investing to the best of their abilities. As people who work in investment daily, w...

Quantitative Investing: The Solution to Human Bias with Wes Gray (EP.69) 24.10.2019

Today we are joined by Wesley Gray who is the CEO of Alpha Architect, a firm in the US that specializes in concentrated factor strategies. Having completed his MBA and PhD at the University of Chicago – the Harvard of the finance world – Wes is an authoritative voice when it comes to quantitative research and factor investing. Incredibly, he took a 4-year break during his PhD, joined the marines a...

Listener Questions and Re-Framing Risk (EP.68) 17.10.2019

Welcome back to the podcast everybody, we have another great round-up episode for you where we field questions that you sent in and cover a bunch of things we think you need to hear! We discuss how you should weight your stocks and bonds ratio and times that you could think about changing it, we also talk about index funds, Michael Burry and why his reputation is a bit overstated. Then we get into...

The Pursuit of Finances and Fun with Jill Schlesinger (EP.67) 10.10.2019

From a trader on Wall Street to a financial advisor with her own firm, our guest today, Jill Schlesinger, has accumulated a lifetime of knowledge in the investing and financial world. Today she is a household name and well-known media personality, appearing on a variety of CBS shows and hosting her own podcast called Jill on Money .  But she is far more than an investment expert: she also has a to...

Asset Allocation Funds, Private Equity IPOs, and The Efficient Market Hypothesis (EP.66) 03.10.2019

Welcome back to Rational Reminder Podcast! We kick off today's episode with a discussion about the gap between investor performance and fund performance, the potential reasons why asset allocation funds produced a positive gap and the role that timing and volatility play in a negative behaviour gap. IPOs have been in the media a great deal lately – and not for particularly positive reasons and we...

Investing Based on the Evidence Pyramid: A Few Lessons from the Medical Profession with Dr. Wendall Mascarenhas (EP.65) 26.09.2019

Our guest today on the Rational Reminder Podcast is Dr. Wendall Mascarenhas. Wendall is a listener, DIY investor a medical professional. He actually reached out to us on Twitter and suggested this episode, a listener-centric discussion as well as one comparing the different approaches to evidence from the medical and the financial communities. We thought this was a great idea and the perspective t...

Back to the Basics: Dividends and Explaining Factors to Benjamin's Mom (EP.64) 19.09.2019

Michael Burry says we should get out of indexing. Jim Cramer says it's time to jump in. These are interesting times in the world of investing! On today's episode, we discuss Burry's recent claims about passive investing and advise on a plan of action should he turn out to be right. Benjamin recently posted a new video on dividends, and we have a conversation about the responses the video triggered...

Sustainable Investing: A Philosophical and Environmental Perspective on Your Money, with Tim Nash (EP.63) 12.09.2019

We have a really special episode in store today as we welcome Tim Nash, the Sustainable Economist! Tim shares a vast amount of knowledge and ideas with us on how investors wishing to put their money where their heart is can go about investing more ethically and sustainably. We hear about Tim's journey into investing and economics and how he wound up doing the work he currently does, helping invest...

The Rational Round Up: Tax Loss Selling, Gold, Michael Burry and More! (EP.62) 05.09.2019

Welcome back to another episode of the Rational Reminder! We are doing another variety show for all of you and this week we cover some news, current affairs, questions and of course our staple bad advice of the week! We start the show looking at the restructuring of swap-based ETF's from Horizons before looking at Michal Burry's latest commentary and predictions. From there we move onto John Reken...

Ted Seides: Much More Than a Betting Man (EP.61) 29.08.2019

We have another phenomenal guest joining us on the podcast today. You might know Ted Seides from his famous bet with Warren Buffett or, more recently, from his widely successful Capital Allocators Podcast. Ted is what we would call a classically impressive guy, having studied at both Ivy League frontrunners Yale and Harvard and having founded Protégé Partners, an asset management and advisory firm...

Valuation Theory and the Imminent Recession (EP.60) 22.08.2019

Welcome back to the Rational Reminder everybody! We are taking this episode to round up all the recent goings-on and tackle a few residual issues that we believe need some attention. We start off by contemplating how much we have both been learning with the wealth of guests that come through our doors. We would never be confronted with this many ideas and inspiration if it were not for this great...

Financial Economics and Annuities: Rational Planning for Retirement (EP.59) 15.08.2019

Welcome to another episode of the Rational Reminder Podcast! We have a fantastic guest joining us today to talk about annuities, or in more general terms, pensionization. Alexandra Macqueen is certified financial planner, who is also a financial author, editor, York University educator, consultant, and speaker. Alexandra co-wrote a book with Dr. Moshe Milevsky called Pensionize Your Nest Egg: How...

The Ins and Outs of Real Estate: Mortgage Rate, Rentals, REITs and Variable Annuities (EP.58) 08.08.2019

On today's episode, Benjamin and Cameron are talking real estate, specifically mortgage rates and REITs. For the first time since the early 90s, fixed mortgage rates are lower than variable ones, which have always been the popular choice. However, due to the fact that Canada's yield curve is inverted, short term rates higher than their long-term counterparts. This is not usually the case, which ma...

A Masterclass in Business: Money Philosophy with Barry Ritholtz (EP.57) 01.08.2019

On today's episode we are so happy to be joined by none other than Barry Ritholtz! As the founder and CIO of Ritholtz Wealth Management, host of the Masters in Business Podcast and regular financial blogger for more than 15 years, Barry is someone we have been dying to speak to on the show and who we have taken loads of inspiration from over the years. We talk to Barry about his own podcast which...

GIC's, Portfolio Questions and Education Saving Plans: What's Right for You in Your Retirement and Education Preparations? (EP.56) 25.07.2019

On the show today we are going back to basics, just Cameron and Benjamin going through some useful topics for your financial benefit! We start talking about GIC's and the article on MoneySense that led to this conversation. GIC's have a somewhat mix and match reputation, one which we believe has been often misunderstood and misrepresented. We try to show in which ways people have been misled into...

Being Frugal: The Crux of Financial Happiness (EP.55) 18.07.2019

Joining us on the podcast today is Jonathan Clements, former Wall Street Journal columnist, founder of HumbleDollar and author of From Here to Financial Happiness , How to Think About Money and several other books. Jonathan is a well-known name in the world of personal finance as he has been giving financial advice for more than 20 years. Today he talks about the role of stories in shaping people'...

The S&P Dow Jones & S&P 500: A Brief History (EP.54) 11.07.2019

Today on the Rational Reminder Podcast we have joining us Dr. David Blitzer who is the Managing Director and Chairman of the S&P Dow Jones index committee. He has been there from the time when indexes were barely even being traded and the first time S&P Futures began trading, and since then, indexing has turned into the massive phenomenon we all know today. Indeed, S&P indexes were (and still is)...

The Real Value of Financial Advice: An Empirical Perspective (EP.53) 04.07.2019

Live in the studio with us today is Preet Banerjee, renowned speaker, personal finance expert, consultant and author of Stop Overthinking Your Money. He is also the founder of MoneyGaps, a hybrid-advisor platform designed to help financial advisors make financial planning accessible to more Canadians. Having done a reality TV show and with a popular YouTube channel, Preet is on the forefront of th...

What drives the value premium? (EP.52) 27.06.2019

Welcome to this week's Rational Reminded Podcast! Today we're diving into the recent CPPIB report that portrays actively managed funds in the most optimistic light. But before you trade in your index funds, we look at the methodologies and calculations employed by the report and show why there are a number of issues with their findings. Benjamin shares his proposal for an alternative analysis that...

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