The future is, by definition, uncertain, as are financial markets. To prosper in such an environment, we need to be emotionally agile in order to align our values and actions and, in turn, help investors achieve their financial goals.

Two recent academic papers focus on how advice provided to investors might be distorted. The first relates to the disposition effect; the second looks at the impact compensation on advice given.

Against the backdrop of legislated increases in financial adviser education, standards and ethics, finology must be seen as central to the curriculum of what financial advisers learn and how they practice, for professionalism to be complete.

Practitioners demand a trifecta from fund managers - performance, simplicity, connection. But many great investments are contrarian and uncomfortable.

Too much of our communication with end investors is either irrelevant, unintelligible to the average investor - or worse still, both.

Managed accounts have become increasingly popular with approximately A$40bn in assets. Prepare to ride the managed accounts tsunami or be left in its wake.

“Nobody cares how much you know, until they know how much you care,” cautioned Theodore Roosevelt. This is especially true when risk is involved.

While robo-advisors have been the big buzz as replacement humans, they’re not (and data proves it). Technology alone is not enough (otherwise everyone with a FitBit on their wrist would be healthy).

Behavioural biases - substitution, aggregation, and feedback risks, overconfidence, and limited attention and availability bias - distort money managers' perceptions and lead them to take risks they don’t see.

Government incentives may help to encourage downsizing but the decision itself may not be purely financial as recent research reveals.

Trust – the belief that those to whom we are vulnerable are both willing and able to act in our interests – is the no.1 factor in the decision to select and retain an asset manager.

The combination of man and machine - tech-augmented humans or "cyborgs" - can be more effective than either alone, posing the greatest opportunity to human financial advisers in the long run.

Three recent research papers continue to grow our understanding of how behavioural traits impact on markets. The first provides insights into Warren Buffett's success; the other two examine the markets' response to earnings information.

While some still firmly believe that values and ethics have no part to play in investing, the tide is turning. Values play a vital role in investment and business decisions - and, increasingly, investors care about more than just financial returns.

Portfolio insurance - invented over 40 years ago - has experienced the renaissance that it very much deserves. Trend (momentum) investing dates back over 40 years, too - the success of which is traced back in this paper to over 100 years.

Two recent studies provide evidence that issues unrelated to the fundamental operation of a firm impact their market valuation.

While some still firmly believe that ethics has nothing to do with investment, the tide is turning. Increasingly, clients are demanding ethical portfolios.

Managers must both develop and implement an investment process - but we seem to be determined to deny them recognition for the former and to judge their performance on the latter.

Game theory, econometrics and distributed computing power can reveal a client's true preferences for risk, loss, uncertainty, time and goals – with scientific precision and in terms that clients can understand.

Two recent studies shed light on retirement income planning. One proposes a framework to avoid the pitfalls of shortfall probabilities. The other finds biological age impacts spending rates.