Russ discusses why economic conditions (for now) support low volatility in the markets.

One of the big pieces of news in the financial world today focuses on General Electric (GE). The iconic American conglomerate has been removed from the Dow Jones Industrial Average, and its stock will no longer be included when the index is calculated. It will be replaced by the drugstore chain Walgreens.

The economic calendar is modest. Volatility is lower even with plenty of news. The summer doldrums have arrived! It provides time for introspection to fill those empty timeslots and pages.

Let's take a long-term view of household net worth from the latest Z.1 release. A quick glance at the complete data series shows a distinct bubble in net worth that peaked in Q4 2007 with a trough in Q1 2009, the same quarter the stock market bottomed. The latest Fed balance sheet shows a total net worth at an all-time high — 83.5% above the 2009 trough. The nominal Q1 net worth is up 1.0% from the previous quarter and up 7.0% year-over-year.

Often, prospects and clients don’t want your advice. Here’s why.

The Q Ratio is a popular method of estimating the fair value of the stock market developed by Nobel Laureate James Tobin. It's a fairly simple concept, but laborious to calculate. The Q Ratio is the total price of the market divided by the replacement cost of all its companies. This update includes the latest Z.1 data.

Here is my “5M” approach that deepens client relationships, stimulates new referrals and attracts new prospects during volatile markets.

There’s an incredible paradox in wealth management: Successful advisors help clients plan for retirement. But many of those same advisors lack a solid retirement plan for themselves.

I typically read about successors who came in and they didn’t know as much as or were less capable than the original founder. In our case we prefer the son to his dad.

PepsiCo (PEP) is a Dividend Aristocrat, Champion and blue-chip stalwart that has increased its dividend for 46 consecutive years. Therefore, it should be no surprise that just as we saw with Procter & Gamble in part 5, this blue-chip stalwart has traditionally commanded a higher valuation (earnings multiple) than the average stock.