Subject: Re: OT: big companies
I do agree that survival bias has a major, misleading effect on TMF's self-reported returns in its advertising. You add all the dumpstered stuff to the current database and the reported numbers would not be what they are.

I don't trust the motley fool, and I will tell you why. When I was just getting started with investing, I remember they had two portfolios. I think it was rule makers, and rule breakers. We had the 90s boom, and they very proudly showed how they were beating the market. Then we had the .com crash and they started trailing the market.

What did they do? They stopped publishing their results and claimed there was some problem with their data provider. This went on for a very long time.

That says a lot about their character.