I'm reading a great book at the moment called The Little Book of Behavioural Investing by James Montier - forum regular Jeremy Bosk recommended it on a recent discussion (http://www.citywire.co.uk/money/what-s-on-your-summer-reading-list/b418655) and there was a copy lying about on a colleague's desk so I snaffled it.
It's all about how the traits we acquired while dodging predators in the savannah have left us ill-equipped for survival in the world of modern finance. Emotion, instinct, confirmation bias, over-confidence, optimism, and a host of other characteristics very well understood by psychologists but less well understood in the City, mean we're more or less hardwired to make bad investment decisions.
Anyway, one of the many interesting nuggets in the book concerns the whole Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus issue. We menfolk like to presume we understand weighty matters like global economics, and are thus suitably equipped to do manly things like play the stockmarket.
Women, on the other hand, are generally more risk averse, less cocksure, and consequently less likely to invest actively.
The punchline of course is that women typically achieve much greater returns, mostly because they don't incur the costs of frequent trading.
Men, the conclusion is clear - if you want to be rich in retirement, you need to hand over the password for your fund supermarket account to the missus.
So, readers (of both genders): does this tally with your experience? And how have you married couples tackled this potentially rather fraught issue?
