To Inform: On the ropes in the 1990s, Apple was casting about for a slogan to power a marketing campaign. “We’re back” was tried, but the recently returned Steve Jobs said, “the slogan was stupid because Apple wasn’t back [yet].” The idea of “Think Different” came to a member of the company’s external marketing team. […]
To Inform: Earlier this week The Joseph Group’s CEO Travis Upton and I conducted what has become a tradition – our annual “themes outlook” Portfolios at Your Place event. Travis regularly likes to cite one of the famous quotes from the late founder of The Leuthold Group, Steve Leuthold. Around this time of year, Steve […]
To Inform: Next Wednesday afternoon, TJG Partner and Chief Investment Officer Alex Durbin and I will be hosting our beginning of the year “investment themes” event which we are calling TJG’s Picks for 2026. We have been receiving some questions ahead of the event, so we thought we would tackle a couple of those questions […]
To Inform: I was driving home from a New Year’s Eve party when I began to think about what I wanted to write in the first WealthNotes of 2026. The Joseph Group CEO Travis Upton so succinctly wrote about themes we’re watching in the year ahead recently. An “outlook” thus being ruled out, I began […]
To Inform: It’s an annual tradition at The Joseph Group to identify major themes we think will have the biggest impact on portfolio decisions in the upcoming year. It’s important to note in this process we are identifying themes and NOT making predictions. To quote Leuthold Group founder Steve Leuthold, “predictions are for show, but […]
To Inform: This week The Joseph Group hosted clients and friends of the firm at our final “Portfolios and Pints” event of the year. As is annual tradition we looked back at the year and followed this with an update to TJG’s “Capital Market Assumptions.” That’s a ten-dollar phrase for “this is what we think […]
To Inform: I (Travis) recently had the opportunity to attend a conference in New York City headlined by Rick Rieder, Head of Fixed Income (Bonds) for BlackRock and a candidate who has interviewed with the President to replace Jerome Powell as Chair of the Federal Reserve. Rieder: “We have to cut interest rates.” As […]
To Inform: When a client turns 65, a furry giant suddenly appears in their life – the “Medicare Bear.” It seems simple to understand, but in all reality it’s big, confusing, filled with surprises, and can flash its teeth at you if you take a wrong step. Our job in helping our clients live their […]
To Inform: Markets have surpassed most people’s expectations this year. In the immediate aftermath of the April tariff announcements, many economists were predicting a recession and with it, poor stock market performance. With the gift of hindsight, we can see where those predictions went wrong. The tariff announcements proved to be a starting point in […]
To Inform: Investors are seeming jittery right now. This week I received a few communications from clients wanting to hear our take on a potential major market decline. One client said, “I’m feeling a little jumpy!” Another client sent me an ominous looking chart showing trend lines going back the Great Depression in 1929 with […]