Never having had kids, I’ve sidestepped a pretty daunting financial obligation. Obedience training for our one dog doesn’t come close, cost-wise, to raising and educating several children. I have a mild and manageable amount of guilt about this. In the short term, my siblings have burdens I don’t. But, in…
Going back a few decades, the idea that one could (or should) closely manage their credit report was not mainstream. For the most part, the data in your file was accessible to companies who subscribed to reporting services. People could, for a relatively robust outlay of money, purchase their report,…
Faced with uncertainty in markets and the economy, asset managers, when possible try to hedge away unwanted risk. They… uh, WE… focus on areas where we can add value through smart decisions; using all of the analytical tools we have at our side. Sure, we get paid to take risk,…
We’re getting down to ‘crunch time’… just a few weeks to go before April 15 (or for those of us in the states that recognize Patriots’ Day as a holiday, April 16.) It’s around this time that advisors across America start to get a steady stream of calls that go…
“Like money in the bank.” That phrase has become synonymous with the height of safety – as much of a sure thing as can be had in life. Most people alive today have never experienced a ‘run on the bank’ and, as such, we look at banks as being the…
In 22 years of working with clients, I have yet to have a single person tell me that they want to pay more taxes. Indeed, the objective in managing assets is not to maximize returns, but rather to maximize AFTER-TAX returns. The cardinal rule of investing: “It’s not what you…
Unlike many routine transactions, the inheritance of an IRA is usually a once-or-twice-in-a-lifetime event. On top of being fraught with complexity and deadlines, the process also generally takes place during a period of emotional stress. Let’s face it – someone who cared for you enough to include you as a beneficiary…
I’m really looking forward to attending the 2019 CFA Institute Annual Conference, in May. Beyond offering an unmatched lineup of speakers and workshops, the conference is usually held in a fascinating city. This year, the conference is in London, one of my favorites (if only because I can read the menus…
Hey, I love living in Maine and I love winter as much as the next guy. But somewhere around the middle of February, I start to scan for cheap flights to… well, anywhere I can go outside with a t-shirt. (Okay, if I were a ‘true Mainah’, I’d be in…
There’s a kind of trite saying attributed to most financial advisors in the world: There’s no such thing as a risk-free investment. Like most trite financial advisor sayings, this is TRUE. But it does take some consensus on how we define two things: Investment and Risk. Meriam-Webster’s Dictionary has several…
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