Happy Monday. Hope you had a nice Easter weekend. Your Survival Guy enjoyed the last hurrah of skiing with our college-aged children at our home mountain Attitash. Now owned by Vail, they’re replacing the old triple to the top with a detachable quad during the off-season. And sure enough, Monday morning, it’s all over. The kids go back, and it’s an empty nest again. Just the two of us. It’s never a good feeling being left. And every time, it’s like doing it all over again. Saying goodbye and seeing you all soon. In my conversations with you, we talk about family. We talk about how much … [Read more...]

With tax bills due and family gathering for Easter, it’s money talk that’s on the table. Unexpected tax bills from mutual funds that lost money are never fun. Headline statements about the banking disaster are going to come up. But is anyone paying attention to how this could lead to digital currencies? It’s easy to shrug off the subject of money. But sometimes some honest advice is what’s needed. When “Mr. Smart Guy” starts talking about ChatGPT, you don’t have to go along for the ride. Be nice, of course. But it might be worthwhile noting stocks have already been down 20% four times this … [Read more...]

Is your lazy cash sitting around eating all your Easter candy? Murdering Peeps and defenseless chocolate bunnies? Well, after this weekend, that needs to stop. No más. With Fidelity’s Treasury Money Market (FZFXX) yielding close to 4.5%, it’s time to get your lazy cash off the couch. A little spring cleaning, if you will. If you’ve been living in a cave, and I don’t fault you for that, then you know the village is in an uproar over the banks. This is nothing new to Your Survival Guy, and I hope to you. Since the beginning of time, the “smartest guys” in the kingdom have been reckless with … [Read more...]

Imagine you’re walking through the wreckage of a dystopian city. An empty financial district. Streets littered with white papers. Forgotten studies about ESG, woke capital, and DEI. You pass the shuttered storefronts of banks that were supposed to be too big to fail. Net Zero and WEF membership stickers are coming unpeeled, next to signs that read “FDIC Insured” and “CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currencies) Only.” It’s a ghost town. And then there’s you. My hero in this story. The lone survivor. Standing amidst the carnage while the so-called experts are gone away. They failed to … [Read more...]

You have every right to wonder what’s going on with Charles Schwab. Its stock is off 30% this month. Its banking unit’s sweep account is bleeding deposits. Thankfully, dear reader, you’ve been with me through thick and thin, and by now, you know the deal. Schwab is a publicly traded company. It gobbles up smaller companies to help it grow. To help it meet quarterly earnings estimates. Sometimes they don’t pan out. Your Survival Guy doesn’t think you need your broker to “grow.” Just keep the money safe. And forget a broker/wealth manager. I want you to be with an advisor held—by law—to a … [Read more...]

Another habit of highly successful and fairly wealthy people is this: delegation. You didn’t get to where you are without a little help from your friends, staff, and loved ones. You learned habit #1, saving money, at an early enough age, and you saved til it hurt. You delegated that task. Did you set it and forget it? You didn’t forget. Not really. It was always on your mind. “Will we have enough to retire on?” you wondered. But it was basically on autopilot. Now, as you approach retirement (work for as long as you can, dear reader), there’s more to think about. You can’t afford to make a … [Read more...]

Your Survival Guy’s number one habit of fairly successful people is saving money. Done. Simple. Easy to understand. Hard to do. Because, like all habits, it can be hard, initially, that is, but then it’s quite a bit of fun. Compounding money—the eighth wonder of the world. Don’t just take Your Survival Guy’s advice; go back in time and ask Albert Einstein. Life’s lessons seem to be the same no matter when you are born. If you’re a saver, you have a good handle on risk. You don’t like it. It’s a bad four-letter word. You don’t like staring at the ceiling in the middle of the night, wondering … [Read more...]

Happy Friday. It’s tax season. Unfortunately for mutual fund investors, this can be the time of year you realize your fund was down, but you still owe taxes. Because of its structure, a mutual fund puts you in the same boat as other investors. If some head for the exits, the manager is forced to liquidate positions to raise cash. Some of the positions he sells could be at a long-term gain creating a taxable event. It’s a lot like going out to dinner with ten of your college friends, and then two of them leave before helping with the bill. Not cool. When Vanguard founder Jack Bogle … [Read more...]

  Sitting in my cave today. Looking out at the beautiful landscape. Thanking myself for peace of mind. Knowing it’s my own decision to take shelter. It’s been a long time. Independent thinking is a lonely journey. Yes, it helps knowing this storm, too, will pass. But when? Will they ever learn? Because it’s in times like these, I appreciate the wisdom of my elders. Thinking about the fireside chats they shared with grace. Learning to tread lightly and to avoid the eager man looking to tread on me. I don’t like eager. I don’t like exciting. I’m fine preserving myself. … [Read more...]