To Inform: The last couple of weeks have been a rude wakeup call for market participants. After touching an all-time high on February 19th, the S&P 500 through this past Thursday’s close was 6.6% off the recent high. Before getting to the why and what we’re thinking about it, let’s examine the selloff in the […]

To Inform: Like many people who are either approaching retirement or have recently retired, you have likely spent years diligently saving and investing to secure your financial future. However, once you reach a point of financial stability, it’s essential to transition from a mindset of saving to one of spending—enjoying the fruits of your labor […]

To Inform: Warren Buffett, the famed value investor from Omaha, began writing about “economic moats” back in the 1980s. Similar to a castle, the idea of an economic moat is something that protects the company from threats. Put another way, a moat is the source(s) of a company’s competitive edge, that will allow it to […]

To Inform: Many Star Wars fans, me included, think “The Last Jedi” (Episode 8) was a bad movie. At the end of “The Force Awakens” (Episode 7), Luke Skywalker came on the screen creating the anticipation that in the next movie, Jedi warrior Luke would be swinging his green lightsaber, saving the galaxy, and fulfilling […]

To Inform:  If you’ve picked up a newspaper or tuned into financial media lately, it’s not a secret that the stock market is trading at high valuations relative to history. Some of this is no doubt a result of the success many American companies have had over the last several years across a range of […]

To Inform:   Many of our clients, and all future retirees, could benefit from a provision of Secure Act 2.0 that will allow increased 401(k) contributions to a specific subset of retirement plan investors for the first time in 2025. For several years now, retirement investors have been able to take advantage of catch-up contributions […]

To Inform: A question I like to ask money managers and market strategists is “what is your most contrarian opinion?” Howard Marks, the investor who helped pioneer junk bond investing and is one of the “rock stars” in the investment world, wrote, “If your behavior is conventional, you’re likely to get conventional results—either good or […]

To Inform: Earlier this week, we hosted a Portfolios at Your Place event where Partner and CEO Travis Upton and Chief Investment Officer Alex Durbin captured five themes from the past and five new themes, all of which are relevant today. I would like to take this opportunity to focus on one of them titled, […]

To Inform: Early in 2023 we talked about why it was a better time to own bonds than it had been in years prior, especially 2022, the worst year on record for bond returns. That indeed was the case in 2023 as investment grade bond indexes were up a little more than 5% and high […]

To Inform: This Wealthnotes title, “Absolutely Positive, Relatively Frustrating,” reflects both returns and my mood as I look at markets to close out 2024. Investment returns are often described as absolute or relative. Absolute simply means positive or negative, and in the absolute case, every major asset class posted positive returns in 2024 (although some […]