This week we are going to do something a little different. I am in Bermuda taking a little weekend R&R after a speech, as well as working on my book. There is not the time for the usual letter this week, but I have asked Barry Ritholtz to write about his new trading program, FusionIQ, for reasons I will talk about below.

But first, and quickly, if you are planning on attending my Strategic Investment Conference this April 2-4 you need to act soon. You can get more details at the end of the letter. And the first of the "Conversations with John Mauldin" is up. We recorded it this week, with Ed Easterling and Dr. Lacy Hunt. I thought it went very well for an inaugural talk. The transcript is there already. For those who have subscribed, you should have received an email and be able to log in and listen or read the transcript. And I welcome feedback as we launch this new service. And I want to thank Tiffani, Ryan, and Anne in my office, who have worked long hours getting this ready. There is a lot of back-room work that has to be done to make something like this available, and I am happy to have their support.

Warning: This e-letter is about a new trading platform that I think is interesting. While not trying to be promotional, it will offer you a product at the end. As I write below, there is reason to think about what tools other are using when you are trading against them; but for those of you who are looking for economic analysis, skip this and wait till next week, when I am back in the office. For the rest of us, let's jump right in.

It is Christmas, and I frankly don't feel like writing a letter about why there will be a slowdown in 2007, or that the stock markets should see a retreat. This is the season for feeling good. And looking at the forecasts of the vast majority of my fellow prognosticators, some of them are feeling very good indeed. So, no bearish thoughts this weekend.

We will depart instead from the recent litany of problems I have written about and look for something new. I get several letters every week from readers asking how I feel about missing the recent bull market, sitting on the sidelines in cash. Except that I am not in cash. Others ask about where I am actually invested. I have never written about my personal portfolio; but this week I discuss my investments in general, review their performance, and offer a few thoughts on investing and creating wealth. But first...

This week we look at index funds, and specifically at problems that certain types of capitalization weighted index funds have. It is intuitively obvious that capitalization-weighted indexes have a larger proportion of their assets in the larger stocks. (Capitalization-weighted means that larger stocks are given more "weight" or proportion of the index or fund.) But is this what a rational investor should actually want? I think the information we look at today will surprise many.

On my way in to Las Vegas last Wednesday, I read a very interesting op-ed piece by Professor Jeremy Siegel of Wharton Business School. Basically, he says that "Fundamentally weighted indexes are the next wave of investing." On May 13 of 2005, I highlighted new research by good friend Rob Arnott, where he laid out the intellectual and practical arguments for a new type of fundamentally weighted index. By that, I mean that he says stock indexes and the funds associated with them should be based upon the underltying fundamentals of the companies and not just the size of the company. At that time I said his work would be the basis for a revolution in investing and would become hugely successful. The last year has proven me right. And now, these ideas are becoming mainstream enough to make the Wall Street Journal .

Is being lazy the secret key to riches? Can you grow your portfolio 2,000 percent with just one decisions? Did I spend 432 pages and 200 footnotes [in Bull's Eye Investing] trying to give readers the tools they need to be thoughtful, successful investors when just one page with no troublesome research would open up to them the secret of the ages? With all my study, how could I miss such wisdom?

Today we explore the problem with "single derivative" thinking. It is in my experience perhaps the single biggest mistake investors make. We enter full-tilt, no-holds-barred into the debate as to whether you should mindlessly buy and hold, or whether you should apply some more thoughtful criteria to your investments and retirement portfolios. This is one of the most critical issues with which investors have to deal. Along the way I will explode a few well-worn Wall Street myths, tell you when it will be safe to get back into the water of the S&P 500 (yes, that day will come) and give you some of the more interesting set of statistics I have come across in four years.

"The ability to see that some things cannot be foreseen is a very necessary quality." -- Jean Jacque Rousseau.

It's the season when so many analysts participate in a group masochistic ritual: the annual yearly predictions. Like lemmings, they rush to the edge and leap. That they are so often wrong does not seem to deter them from making the same mistake the next year. And there they differ from lemmings, in that they live to repeat the act every year.

Today begins a two part series on a framework for investing when the economy starts to recover. It is my belief that investors need to have a consistent philosophy of investing when choosing investments, otherwise your portfolio looks like the local dog pound: a few lonely purebreds mixed in with a lot of mutts. Some of the mutts end up becoming your best friend, but mostly they just mess up the place.