What if the most important investing decisions weren’t about predicting the market — but about understanding the math behind it?

Each year, we update our Boot Camp, built from nearly 100 years of academic research and hundreds of tables and charts designed to answer one question:

How do investors actually improve their long-term results?

This week, we tackle one of the biggest forks in the road: stock and bonds.

Here are just a few of the takeaways:

• A small increase in return — even 0.5% — can mean millions more over a lifetime
  
• Bonds offer safety, but very limited long-term growth
  
• Stocks are volatile, but historically reward patient investors
  
• Different equity asset classes take turns leading — unpredictably
  
• Broad diversification reduces risk while improving expected returns

One of the most powerful lessons comes from seeing how random annual returns really are — and why trying to time markets or pick the “best” asset class almost always backfires.

Instead, the data consistently points to a simple truth:

Diversification works — across companies and across asset classes.

📊 Highly recommended: Download the PDF of charts and tables  watch the companion video. Seeing the numbers makes all the difference.

Next week, we’ll continue Boot Camp by exploring the ultimate buy-and-hold strategy and the equity asset classes academics believe belong in a long-term portfolio.

As always, this is education — not personal advice — but it’s designed to help you make smarter decisions with confidence.

Thanks for being here, and thank you for sharing this work with people you care about.