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.

Their slide in terms of performance and behaviour coincided with a big slide in their solvency.
Speaking from experience, having to make payroll will focus the mind tremendously, and sometimes trigger unfortunate decisions.

It is indeed sad that they have become the exact thing they mocked in the 1990s. Their emails are now astounding examples of the "shrill shill".
But I guess they have to make a living, and it is a fine demonstration how natural evolution in business models favours the most remunerative, not the most respectable.

Jim

As a totally unrelated aside, a bubble is a terrible thing to waste.
For those who miss it, I have an investment system very well suited to bubble times like that : )

Anybody remember super high growth / momentum investing?
Totally the wrong board, but maybe it has entertainment value

It can't get much simpler than this:
* Start with the ~1700 stocks in the Value Line database.
* Find the 40 stocks with the highest reported five-year rate of sales growth per share. (this field is updated only annually for each stock)
* Of those 40, buy equal dollar amounts of the 10 stocks which are currently furthest above their respective 52 week low prices. (measured one day before your trading)
* Hold those 10 stocks for a month, repeat.

Unsurprisingly, this likes exuberant markets, including bungee rebounds.
The surprising thing is that it does not that badly on average the rest of the time, too.
Final result 28.8%/year 1997 to date versus 9.0% for the S&P 500, at least in backtest.
On relatively sane risk metrics (size and frequency of rolling years having a shortfall below a reasonable return), this 10 stock portfolio is only a tad riskier than the S&P 500.
Mixing a little of this yeast into the "loaf" of your portfolio wouldn't be so crazy.
Come to the dark side!

Figures after trading costs, includes dividends, no provision for tax.

Year    Screen      S&P
1997      43.3     27.9
1998      86.1     34.5
1999     172.5     18.4
2000      19.3    -10.8
2001       7.3     -8.0
2002     -45.9    -18.9
2003     154.5     23.0
2004      32.0      8.9
2005      14.2      7.5
2006      28.1     13.8
2007      -2.4      1.9
2008     -29.9    -32.9
2009     144.0     25.5
2010      25.5     14.2
2011      -1.0      2.5
2012      -4.0     17.1
2013     106.8     27.6
2014      23.8     12.9
2015       9.9      1.9
2016      28.1     14.4
2017      36.8     21.8
2018      -8.1     -3.5
2019      12.4     29.9
2020     127.3     16.9
2021      36.5     30.5
2022     -10.9    -19.0
2023      18.4     17.5 (half year not annualized)