According to comprehensive scientific studies there is no convincing evidence that  financial newsletters or market experts exhibit stock picking and market timing abilities that would enable them to outperform the markets over time.

Andrew Metrick of Harvard University finds - based on analysis of the 'Hulbert Financial Digest' - that the newsletters tracked show no significant evidence of superior stock-picking ability. Mark Hulbert himself suggests that only 5% of analysts (at best, if any) consistently outperform the Wilshire 5000 Index.

Now consider the fact that the average of all trades on record here outperform the S&P 500 by 57%, and that 79.7% of all ranked Tipsters have outperformed this index over time (per April 2006).

So what gives? Maybe it's the fundamental thesis that experts will always be most comfortable with sharing their safest picks. Maybe it's the rigid trading disciplin that will limit losses and lock in profits. Quite likely it's in part because only the best Tipsters are ranked in the first place. Most probably it is a combination of all.

Even so, unless you subscribe to the somewhat flawed Efficient Market Hypothesis and believe that the market cannot possibly be beaten, the question comes to mind:"Who then is the best Tipster right now?"
The rankings list may give a clue, but it is tied to all-time performance and does not reveal how long or how often a high score has been achieved. Also, some Tipsters have been followed longer than others, and that may skew the results. In order to somehow objectively decide who is best this year, we need to take a look at what else is in the data. We will try to give the answer based upon the performance in 4 categories, "All-time Performance", "Year Return", "Accuracy", and "Ideal Value". In the end we will name our favorite Tipster as the one best positioned in all 4 categories.

As usual, scores are updated daily. At the end of the year we will name the "Tipster of the Year 2008" and reset the counters for next year.

Timing
To qualify for this and the next categories Tipsters must have a total of at least 18 positions on record at the end of the year - f.ex. 6 at the start of the year and 1 per progressing month.

These are not compounded returns. The averaged annualized return is calculated using the average return percentage and the average number of days positions are held.

Only positions opened or closed this year are evaluated. Positions open at the beginning of the year are evaluated using the close price per December 30, 2008.

Reward
Finally, in fairness to those Tipsters who are fuming over our trading methodology, we take a look at how well you could have done with a Tipster's picks, assuming that you had no exit strategy, no profit lock, and the talent to sell a stock at the absolute high within 6 months.

The outcome is displayed as the average of all ideal returns, as always assuming equal dollar weighting.