Rules of the Road

I don’t want you to subscribe to the Jubak Asset Management (JAM) site unless you feel that you can trust me to do the very best job that I can for you. (That’s true–maybe even more so–to those readers who get a free subsciption to the JAM site because they’ve invested in my Jubak Global Equity mutual fund JUBAX.)

Trust is what will preserve this relationship through the inevitable bad times in the markets. Trust is what will make it possible for you to stay on board for the long term.

And trust is what will get you to keep reading, to eventually renew your subscription, and to recommend this site to your friends.

Trust is the best policy for you and for me.

But I don’t assume that you’ll just grant me your trust because I ask for it.

I expect to have to earn it in the way that I run this site.

Here are some explicit promises to you from me.

When I publish any idea it goes here first.

As you probably know, I do a lot of writing and speaking. But my duties to the Jubak Global Equity Fund come first. (They have to. I’ve got a fiduciary duty to investors in the Jubak Global Equity Fund.) My best specific stock ideas will be enacted in the Fund before they’re published (or spoken about) anywhere–even here. But as soon as I can write about any specific stock, I’ll write about it here first.

I eat my own cooking.

I’ve got a big chunk of my own money wrapped up in the Jubak Global Equity Fund. Not all of it. Not all of my financial goals fit the Fund, just as not all of yours do. But from Day One I’ve invested enough money in the Fund so that my personal interests are aligned with yours. We both want the Jubak Global Equity Fund to do well.

I don’t buy or sell ahead of my investors.

I don’t buy shares in a stock before I buy it for the Fund or write about it here. And I don’t sell shares personally before I sell a stock for the Fund or write about it here.

I don’t own positions in stocks that are in the Fund in personal accounts outside of the Fund.

This took a little doing in the days before the Jubak Global Equity Fund opened for business, but I’ve sold all the shares I held in personal accounts that might have been in the initial Fund portfolio or that I was even thinking about buying for the Fund in the future. I’ve pretty much sold everything in my personal accounts except for stocks that don’t fit the parameters of this Fund and shares in other mutual funds or ETFs.

I don’t short stocks.

Ever. There’s nothing wrong with shorting a stock, but being successful at shorting is an art all its own —and one that I don’t think I’ve mastered. In addition, shorting is a highly emotional issue for many investors and I get more than enough grief as it is, thank you very much, when a purchase goes bad.

I don’t use derivatives of any kind. (No MSG either.)

The Jubak Global Equity Fund is, by design, a very simple fund. I may invest in obscure companies in exotic markets but I only buy and sell stocks and stock-like assets (such as master limited partnerships, for example.) That’s it. That’s true of my personal portfolio as well.