Will the Market Catch the Coronavirus?
Coronavirus is spreading around the globe and the world stock market has pulled back from the recent strong rally that started in the second half of 2019. It’s natural to be concerned from a health and wealth perspective. We have seen similar experiences in the past with SARS, bird flu, [...]
The Virtue and Value of Embracing Simplicity
Albert Einstein once said “If you can’t explain something simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” From time to time people will compliment me on my column. My favorite thing to hear is that I have broken down a complicated subject to something even they could understand. Perhaps it is [...]
What Ever Happened to Diversification? Part II
Last week I opined concerning the dangers of the supposedly conservative strategy du jour, that of having only guaranteed, fixed income investments such as bonds, CD’s, or fixed annuities. Today we will look back at relative performance of different assets during the Teens decade to see if, even during the [...]
What Ever Happened to Diversification?
Perhaps there have always been preachers of one solitary investment asset class. I remember Howard Ruff with his Ruff Times touting gold, silver and survival tips. He was correct about inflation in the later 1970s. (According to Dr. Mark Skousen, millions of dollars went through his hands in the 1970s [...]
The Decade that Was, and the One to Come
What a difference a year and a decade make! Last year at this time the market had quickly dropped 20% lower over recession and trade war fears. Fast forward a year and we are at all-time highs with record holiday spending, signed a newer version of NAFTA, and about to [...]
The Choices You Make Matter Greatly
According to a recent study conducted by BankRate, low-income individuals spend nearly half of their annual income on vices. The findings of this study really shocked me. In my opinion, it serves as further evidence that irresponsible personal behavior is the leading cause of long-term poverty in the United States. [...]
Too Late To Benefit?
In the past year or more, we have met with a growing number of folks, ultraconservative in their current investment philosophy. They explain that they jerked their money from any stock or diversified investment portfolio years ago, some before and some after the sub-prime mortgage fiasco of 2008-09. They have [...]
Giving and Serving is What the Season is All About
Like many of you, over this past weekend I joined with the masses scrambling to get the best price on all the useless junk my kids hope to find underneath the tree this coming Christmas morning. Being the cheapskate and treasure hunter that I am, Black Friday is one of [...]
Reasons For Thanksgiving
(The following is obviously my personal opinion from my Christian worldview. If it offends you, then I apologize for the disturbance, but not for my content.) If you have ever been on a mission trip to a lesser developed country, you probably witnessed that native people, especially children, seem to [...]
Be alert, calm and vigilant to stop scammers
According to the Senate Special Committee on Aging, financial exploitation cost seniors nearly 3 billion annually. Although it is hard to obtain exact numbers because according to Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt only 1 in 24 cases gets reported. Since scammers are constantly changing their tactics, a comprehensive list of [...]