Forgotten Towns, High Times and Revenge

(Bloomberg View) -- My easing-back-into-it morning train reads:

• The 99 best things that happened in 2017 (Quartz)
• Passive funds can “smooth the ride” of an active portfolio (Vanguard); see also Stockpickers' fees set to suffer from ETF price war (Financial Times)
• The $100 Billion Venture Capital Bomb (Institutional Investor)
• The Dividend Disconnect: Behavioral Finance Strikes Again (Alpha Architect)
• "It's a giant present to the tax lobbying community" (Politico) but see Clobbered by new tax code, blue states -- and pundits -- plot their revenge (MarketWatch)
• What to Watch on the Fiduciary Front in 2018 (Wall Street Journal)
• Almost 80 percent of battery-powered vehicles in the U.S. are leased, not owned (Bloomberg)
• America's forgotten towns: Can they be saved or should people just leave? (Washington Post)
• For marijuana users, it's high times as California makes recreational use legal (Los Angeles Times)
• At Age 101, She's a World Champ Runner (NPR) but see Scientists have created a drug that replicates the health benefits of exercise (Quartz)

Factor Olympics: 2017 Was a Positive Year for Most Factors 

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Barry Ritholtz is a Bloomberg View columnist. He founded Ritholtz Wealth Management and was chief executive and director of equity research at FusionIQ, a quantitative research firm. He blogs at the Big Picture and is the author of “Bailout Nation: How Greed and Easy Money Corrupted Wall Street and Shook the World Economy.”

To contact the author of this story: Barry Ritholtz at britholtz3@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Brooke Sample at bsample1@bloomberg.net.

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