What Can Nature Teach Us About the Markets
“A long summer always meant a long winter to come.” – George R. R. Martin The daffodils started blooming early this year. It was unseasonably warm, and I rushed out to take pictures before the inevitable cold snap took out the blooms. It was a flash of color against an otherwise colorless backdrop and an early preview […]
Why Isn’t Winning More Fun?
“We don’t have to be smarter than the rest; we have to be more disciplined than the rest.” -Warren Buffett Being a sports fan, I like many others, have been starved for the excitement of watching champions at work: Watching a crushing hit, a spectacular goal or an amazing play that many others may not […]
What’s The Best Benchmark?
For those clients who attended our most recent Forecast event, Jeff Weniger, CFA and Market Strategist for Wisdom-Tree was most entertaining. Our thinking continues to be very similar and I thought I’d share some of his recent reflections. Jeff recently wrote, “There are 34-year-olds who have been in the business for 12 years and haven’t seen […]
Seeing Past the Headlines
RATES RISE AGAIN Ever since Jerome Powell took over as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, U.S. Markets have reacted shakily. The day he took over on February 5th of this year, markets sold off dramatically and the markets suddenly changed from incredibly calm under Yellen to increadibly volatile under Powell. Today our Federal Reserve Chair […]
Where are the Buyers?
THE MARKET HATES UNCERTAINTY There are plenty of Sellers out there who are concerned about the upcoming election, trade wars, rising interest rates and the like. As one market commentator put it last week, “The perfect storm was caused by a trifecta of news. First, China wanted to hurt the U.S., defend its currency (the […]
Hidden Costs, Expenses & Penalties
Just about every month I come across someone who claims that their investments don’t cost them anything or someone who doesn’t seem to understand all they are paying in internal expenses. All too often (in the case of those buying commission based products) they have been told that something they bought does not contain any […]
It’s Good to be the Banker
Even when Not Playing Monopoly Thinking more like a banker can provide us many benefits from a tax re-positioning perspective and a loaning vs borrowing / cash flow perspective. Not too long ago, I and a client were interviewed by a reporter at Forbes about the benefits of making serial conversions to Roth IRAs over […]
Never Buy This in December
It seems that every year in December we get a multitude of calls from clients regarding a pretty common occurrence for certain types of investments.This month, most pooled investments pay out their capital gains to shareholders and the value of the associated account falls for a few days until the money is reinvested or paid […]
How Goldilocks Keeps the Bears at Bay
Our “Goldilocks” by the campfire. She’s not too worried about the bears. This past Fourth of July weekend, we enjoyed a dad’s and daughter’s camping trip at Fall Creek Falls. As Sydney is getting older it seems we have less opportunity for daddy, daughter time, so I jumped at the chance to spend the weekend […]
Are You a Believer?
According to legend, experts said for years that the human body was incapable of running a four minute mile. It wasn’t just dangerous; it was impossible. During the 1940s, the record was pushed to 4:01 where it stood for nine years but on May 6, 1954, Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute barrier with at […]
