Blog

22 Jul 2016

Posted at 12:31h in The Friday Brief by
Imagination is "the greatest creative force in the universe," claimed Albert Einstein. The keys at my fingertips, the computer transforming the clicks into hundreds of 0's and 1's, the copper lines and fibers of light delivering them to the device in front of you with its thousands of tiny light emitting diodes that project the letters you are reading, all started in the imagination. In fact, as you look around, you might be hard pressed to find anything within your reach that doesn't have its origins in the imaginings of creative people.

15 Jul 2016

Posted at 12:00h in The Friday Brief by
unnamed3 Our hearts and prayers go out to the families and friends of those murdered and maimed in Nice, France last night during their celebration of Bastille Day. Since BREXIT, US equity markets have come roaring back and then some. Increasing confidence that the Fed will pause their interest rate increases, a stronger-than-expected jobs report in the US on Friday, and the speedy transfer of power in Great Britain to Theresa May as Prime Minister have all added to the optimism driving stocks higher. The S&P 500 has had four record-high closes this week, yet other indexes have not, notably the Nasdaq, which remains almost 4% below last year's high. It means that most stocks, and significantly many that have driven our economy of late (technology) remain off their highs.

08 Jul 2016

Posted at 12:43h in The Friday Brief by
sunset-summer-golden-hour-paul-filitchkinOne of the major goals we often help clients plan for is financial independence.  Imagine the freedom of knowing you do not have to work.  You would be free to start the company you have always dreamed of, serve an organization you are passionate about regardless of pay or take an extended trip with your family or friends.  Maybe you would worry less about money and the minutia of your daily finances.

24 Jun 2016

Posted at 11:09h in The Friday Brief by
The latest reminder of how divided we are around the world and how poorly our political systems understand and have adapted comes this morning as British citizens voted yesterday 52% to 48% to leave the European Union. The referendum itself was the result of a risky campaign pledge Prime Minister David Cameron made in order to gain re-election. He calculated the referendum was the only way he could placate anti-EU Conservatives in his party, while holding off the growing threat that the U.K Independence Party might fracture his majority in Parliament.

17 Jun 2016

Posted at 13:37h in The Friday Brief by
Are your options wide enough? Have you ever noticed when filming activities like children playing, school plays, or sporting events, how difficult it is to capture the whole story? There's so much going on outside the tight focus of the camera's lens we can't possibly capture it all. Regrettably, the phenomenon also explains a significant part of our lives and how we make decisions and plans. Chip and Dan Heath, in their book Decisive, use teenagers to illustrate how narrow our frames of reference can be for most of our decisions, even the most important ones. They are called single-option decisions. For example, 'should I break up with my boyfriend or not?' is a single option decision.

10 Jun 2016

Posted at 12:04h in The Friday Brief by
A frequent question from both young and old clients is “Will I get my benefits?” You might be surprised to learn that the Social Security Program is not as bad off as you might think. That said, the program will be changing in the next 20 years, so it behooves the thoughtful planner of every age to consider and be ready for possible worst cases, while there's time to replace possible gaps in retirement income.

03 Jun 2016

Posted at 13:03h in The Friday Brief by
The question ‘what-if?’ can be a source of nagging worry, or it can be a proactive tool for improving preparedness and confidence. How we choose to address the question has huge impact on our lifestyle. If we allow ourselves to worry about something, it is said we spend our energy twice; first by worrying today and later when, or if, the thing we worry about actually happens. Corrie ten Boom describes the futility this way; “worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength." Our beloved Mark Twain recognizes how often we do it, “I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them have never happened.”  And Dan Zadra describes its creative waste, “Worry is a misuse of the imagination.”

27 May 2016

Posted at 10:44h in The Friday Brief by
Kids are expensive. They are amazing, and expensive. Expensive enough that all the [somewhat flawed] posts about how, if you start saving 15% of your income when you're 25 you'll have somewhere in the neighborhood of several millions of dollars when you retire--well, all that can kind of fly out the window if you're 30- or 40-something and finding it hard to save because of summer camps, and clothes, and food for a middle-school boy, and sports teams, and college tuition. So then you read all those other posts about how there's such a large retirement savings gap in the US, and then feel deflated and resigned to the fact that you'll be sitting at work for at least fifty more years.

20 May 2016

Posted at 14:06h in The Friday Brief by
Exchange Traded Funds, or ETFs, are the most efficient vehicle yet devised to harness the returns of stock and bond indexes. They capture nearly all of the underlying assets' returns with little or no leaks of taxes, expenses, or under-performance.