Forecasting the long-run return on equities is one of the key challenges in financial planning. Jeremy Siegel, the author of “Stocks for the Long Run,” wrote that he had examined 210 years of stock returns and found that “the real return on a broadly diversified portfolio of stocks has averaged 6.6 percent per year.” Public pension funds make similar assumptions. ...

It looks a victory for aggrieved bondholders. Aviva Plc has had enough bad press and has kicked controversial plans to cancel its preference share class into the long grass. The decision isn’t entirely charitable. The British insurer may also have been influenced by the fact that likely cost of issuing new perpetual debt was beginning to tick up. But this ...

As part of its continuing campaign to prevent China from stealing American intellectual property, President Donald Trump’s administration is considering restrictions on the number of Chinese citizens enrolled at US colleges and universities. Targeting foreign students will undermine US competitiveness, not enhance it. Of the 1 million foreign nationals enrolled at US schools, nearly one-third are from China — double ...