According to a certain slice of Wall Street, each year we hear that this is the year of the stock picker. The latest is Goldman Sachs stating that this is the year that “alpha” returns. Alpha is a calculation that differentiates the value that an investment strategy brings to an investment strategy or stock picking (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/alpha.asp). Every year, we hear this same analysis! Why and who proclaims this? Well, it is the Wall Street analysts...
In our work, because our relationship with clients is more than about the data and outcome of financial planning scenarios, we talk about many issues. This has been our practice since the beginning and because I have an M.Ed. in counseling and experience as a therapist, psychology and mental health are always concerns of ours. We are financial planners with a strong interest in mental health and many of our conversations with clients and each other involve issues of mental health.
The big news today after the stock market closed was a major disappointment on Metaverse or Facebook earnings with an after-hours decline in the stock price of 20%. Spotify joined Meta in disappointing earnings and also dropped after hours. This is one day after Alphabet or Google reported blow-out earnings and moved the market higher in general today. Volatility continues on a daily basis as measured by the Volatility Index or VIX that uses options...
There have been two consistent messages from the Federal Reserve since the last quarter of 2021-rates are heading higher and the economy is growing.
Lo and behold the first two weeks of 2022 are testing the “best investment strategy” of 2022 as articulated by Jason Zweig from the WSJ and quoted by us last week. Buying the dips because stocks will bounce back has not worked so far. That might change tomorrow but so far “don’t fight the Fed” is dominating market action. Markets decline faster than they go up and, sure enough, market averages are facing sharp declines...
Stocks have sold off in the first couple of weeks in anticipation of the Fed following through with either 3 or 4 interest rate raises in 2022 based on concern about inflation and confidence that the economy is in sound shape-whatever that means. Does their analysis include the omicron impact on the economy? So many questions and few answers. Jason Zweig in his weekly column in the WSJ says “I think the best investment for...
Happy new year and thank you for being valued clients for another year. Whew! We made it and it feels good that we can say our goodbyes to 2021. My wife reminded me that although we had many problems in the past year, there was good happening too. We have some stability and predictability with our government. The political chaos at the top is calmer. A vaccine that is very effective, with booster shots has...
Growth: Markets Economic uncertainty has increased from high to off-the-charts this week. Key events: As the Federal Reserve announced an accelerated reduction in bond purchases as well as the strong possibility of accelerating interest rate increases, the Omicron variant of Covid-19 descended upon the United States. The original cause for tightening money at an accelerated rate was the persistent increase in inflation through the consumer price index and producer price index. As of today, 73%...
When I was a stockbroker in 1984 markets were moved each month with the M-1 numbers emphasized by Milton Friedman. M-1 relates to the liquid money supply. Next were monthly inflation numbers, monthly GDP numbers, unemployment, and oil prices, and so on. Positive news for the economy would impact markets negatively. Negative news would move markets higher. This leads to the good news is bad news, the bad news is good news and the good...
There are few decisions in life that do not involve finances on some level. Our interest: advising SAS clients by introducing and collaborating on the most appropriate frameworks so that clients can make the best decisions at the time those decisions will be or need to be made. Being happy is up to each of us and our goal at SAS Financial Advisors is to make our clients happier by giving them confidence and control...
What is all this stuff? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Many of us have too much stuff. Often, we buy bigger spaces or storage lockers to accommodate more stuff rather than, or in addition to, making the hard choice to dispose of some of this stuff. Here is an article to help you make progress on getting rid of excess stuff, a good end-of-year purge so to speak. Look forward to some very interesting frameworks that may give you...
This is the time of year when we reflect on our lives and reach to provide donations to causes and non-profit organizations that reflect our goals to do better, be better, or do more for others. We have discussed Donor Advised Funds (DAFs) in previous newsletters and this week we will offer another option for giving. Charitable giving can be done by way of Required Minimum Distributions, such as RMDs from pre-tax retirement accounts such...
