“Monday’s madness is a reminder that investing in stocks doesn’t automatically make people rich. Twice in the past 20 years—between 2000 and 2002, and again between 2007 and 2009—the stock market has cut investors’ wealth roughly in half,” writes Jason Zweig at the WSJ. When you think about the mathematics of investment losses (see chart below), you quickly realize how difficult it becomes to get back to square one, especially for retirees. And when you think about it in terms of real dollars—seeing $1 million decline to $500,000—imagine how many hours you have to work to make that kind … [Read more...]
Will the Powell Fed be Steady-as-she-Goes?
Jay Powell is the new chairman of the Federal Reserve. Janet Yellen's term was marked mostly by her continuance of Ben Bernanke's policies. Now, will Powell be a steady-as-she-goes chairman who continues the plan of rate normalization set in place by Bernanke/Yellen? Or will he chart his own course, either ratcheting rates up faster than expected to fight any potential inflation, or putting the pedal to the metal by lowering rates again to combat any drop in asset prices? The FT's Sam Fleming discusses Powell's future: Jay Powell received a brutish welcome from the stock market on his first … [Read more...]
Investors Wary of Google’s Partnership Fees
It's getting more costly for Alphabet (formerly known as Google) to buy friends in the tech world. Currently Alphabet pays companies like Apple to setup its Google service as the preferred search engine in their browsers. The costs for this privilege are rising, and Alphabet's investors aren't very happy about it. Dan Gallagher writes for the WSJ: For Alphabet, the main issue for investors is the rising costs that Google has to pay partners to direct traffic to its sites. Those traffic acquisition costs totaled $21.6 billion in 2017—up 29% from the previous year. That outpaced the 20% revenue … [Read more...]
Dow Down Over 1,000 Points
What great news for me and for you if you are actually an investor. I mean a real, seasoned investor. One who embraces common sense, patience and the acuity that comes with decades studying the power of consistent cash flow matched with the most powerful word in investing: compounding. My business is, as are my own portfolios, based on exactly these concepts. Market volatility has zero to do with dividends, interest (the source of cash flow), or compounding. Absolutely zero. In that I have no plans to sell my major holdings (many owned for decades), I am not concerned about short-term … [Read more...]
Dow Down 1600 Points, Websites Crash, and Vanguard GNMA
When stocks were down 1,600 points yesterday, “The websites of two of the country’s biggest robo-advisers—Wealthfront Inc. and Betterment LLC—crashed,” reports Bloomberg. I’ve never been comfortable with the idea of robo-advisers. What if the technology ends up not working? Will the so called robos have the skill and patience that I know I have? Who knows? The same is true with stop losses. I will never trust my hard earned money with program trading. I’ve never been comfortable with the idea, especially when it comes to stop losses. With stop losses sell orders are placed when a … [Read more...]
Bitcoin is Interesting, But It’s Not the Next Gold
Last year the word bitcoin became part of the everyday lexicon in America, and many parts of the world. The phenomenon "investment," was being traded by grandmas and kids. Coverage of bitcoin's rises and falls has been on TV every day for months now. If there was ever a classic bubble, this was it. Olga Kharif reports at Bloomberg: Bitcoin tumbled for a fifth day, dropping below $7,000 for the first time since November and leading other digital tokens lower, as a backlash by banks and government regulators against the speculative frenzy that drove cryptocurrencies to dizzying heights last … [Read more...]
Bitcoin Down 70% from High
A central bank official quoted by the Wall Street Journal's Steven Russolillo and Andrew Jeong referred to bitcoin as the combination of a bubble, a Ponzi scheme, and an environmental disaster. That trifecta is only a symptom of the frenzied buying of bitcoin in recent months, followed by the somewhat predictable sell-off. Central banks are likely to cut short any attempt to make bitcoin great again. The WSJ writes: “If authorities do not act preemptively, cryptocurrencies could become more interconnected with the main financial system and become a threat to financial stability,” said … [Read more...]
Is There a Cloud Backlash Brewing in Tech?
Despite what seems to be relentless drive toward cloud computing by most of the major tech companies, including most importantly Microsoft and Amazon.com, there appears to be a backlash coming. The backlash is broken down into two parts: The first part is a backlash against the large cloud computing providers. Smaller firms working on what has become known as "edge" computing, are making their mark in the industry. The second part of the backlash to big cloud computing is a focus on local computing, being pushed most notably by Apple. Richard Waters explains the trend in the … [Read more...]
No Forgiveness for UPS from Wall St.’s Short-term Crowd
UPS has been racing to keep up with demand for home delivery that has exploded with the revolution in e-commerce. Despite the positive attitude given to Amazon.com for its low profit, fast growth strategy, the Wall St. crowd has looked askance at UPS for daring to spend money on investing in its business. UPS is working hard to keep up with the major secular shift in demand, but investing money in expanding its facilities has eaten into earnings. The short-term focused Wall St. crowd is upset. Paul Ziobro writes: United Parcel Service Inc. UPS -2.54% will spend up to $7 billion this year … [Read more...]
Illinois’ Answer to Saving too Little? Borrow More and Hope
After years of under-funding its state pension programs, Illinois has come up with an idea that can be described as risky at best. Illinois plans to borrow money, and then invest that money, in the hopes of earning more than it must pay back in interest. If you don't see the danger in using money invested in volatile markets to pay fairly predictable pension payments, you're probably an elected official in Illinois. The Wall Street Journal's editorial board highlights something that I have been discussing for years here on YourSurvivalGuy.com (see here, here, here, and here). The … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 396
- 397
- 398
- 399
- 400
- …
- 637
- Next Page »