Big sigh of relief! The White House has just released the $1.75 trillion framework for its social and climate-related Build Back Better plan and clients will be relieved to hear that, as of now, it does not contain the disruptive tax, retirement or estate tax measures that they may have been fearing. One caveat. Let’s […]
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Women Edge Out Men When It Comes To Investment Returns
Fidelity’s 2021 Women and Investing Study shows that women edged out men when it comes to investment returns over the last decade. After analyzing over 5 million customer accounts from 2011 to 2020, Fidelity calculated that women achieved slightly better results than men (0.4% higher returns per year) due to their disciplined and consistent investment approach. That’s […]
Quote Of The Week: Is The S&P 500 Index Giving You The Diversification You Need?
“Like most indexes, the S&P 500 is weighted by capitalization: The bigger the market cap a company has, the more its influence on the performance of the index. Any cap-weighted index fund is a heavy bet on larger companies. Lately, that bet has become extremely heavy because a few stocks have become gigantic. All by themselves, Alphabet (GOOGL), […]
3 Reasons To Give International Equities Another Look
Most investors have a serious case of home country bias. That means that, all things being equal, they prefer to invest in companies based in their own backyard and tend to underweight companies based overseas. That’s true of America investors as well as those in other countries. Everyone likes rooting for the home team. If […]
Retiring? Avoid This Big 401(k) Rollover Mistake
Three-quarters of retirees “de-risked” their portfolio by reducing stock exposure when they quit working and rolled their workplace 401(k)s to an IRA. The de-risking dilemma That may seem like a good idea. But unfortunately, in some investment environments, making big, sudden changes to your fund mix at retirement can be a major mistake, according to […]
How To Protect Your Nest Egg From Inflation
Thank you again to CNN’s Jeanne Sahadi for the chance to talk about how to protect your nest egg from inflation and why there is no age at which you can say, “I don’t need growth.” Today’s budding inflation fears remind us how a well-designed portfolio can help protect us from the effects of rising […]
Quote Of The Week: Explaining The Impact Of Inflation To Clients
“By failing to adequately explain how inflation, compounded over time, significantly reduces spending power, we leave people vulnerable to the false assumption that the income they have today will still be adequate in 10 or 20 years. This is especially dangerous for people living on fixed incomes.” Sarah Newcomb, behavioral economist at Morningstar, “Explaining inflation […]
Does Gold Really Hedge Inflation?
It’s not your imagination. Prices are going up. You may have heard that inflation numbers came in hotter than expected last month. The Federal Reserve maintains that inflation is “transitory,” meaning it concedes that prices are going up as the economy rebounds after COVID, but does not believe that those price hikes will be repeated […]
Quote Of The Week: The Risk Of Surrendering To Cash
“While it might feel safer going to cash when markets are volatile, cash positions don’t work like they used to. If you went to cash during the 1987 stock-market crash, you were still making 4.75% to 5.5% interest. If you had gone to cash in the dot-com crash you were making around the same—3.5% to […]
Investing In The U.S. Only? That Could Be A Big Mistake.
Are your top investments only in the U.S.? If you’re a U.S.-based investor, it’s normal to want to concentrate your investments in U.S. companies. After all, that’s where you live and work, and U.S. companies have dominated the international competition over the past few years. But if you invest exclusively in the U.S., or neglect […]
About Mari Adam, CFP®
Mari Adam, Certified Financial Planner™ has helped hundreds of individuals and families build wealth and plan for a more secure financial future for over 30 years. Her advice has appeared in publications such as Wall Street Journal, Kiplinger’s, Money Magazine, Business Week, and CBS MarketWatch.
