Real Treasury bond yields fell into deeply negative territory in 2021.
The Northern Trust Economics team shares its outlook for key markets in the month ahead.
Many of you are struggling to decide whether you should breakaway and form your own RIA. I confronted the same decision many years ago. Here’s my story.
Depending upon the annuity that is being recommended and its purpose, your discovery process should include these questions. This article is written for clients and can be forwarded to them using our Premium Membership Service.
Viral success stories of people who used the post-pandemic stock market to trade their way out of mountains of student loan debt keep inspiring do-it-yourself investors.
Millennials took one look at their financial future and, early on, realized it was bleak. The YOLO generation started saving for retirement — stuffing away money in 401(k)-type accounts — nine years earlier than their baby boomer parents did, according to a new study.
An often overlooked and underutilized fixed-income alternative, preferred securities offer investors compelling diversification and income opportunities in today's volatile, rising interest rate environment. With yields and returns comparable to high-yield fixed income, today's preferred securities have evolved into a distinct and attractive income-generating asset class.
Someone who wouldn’t dream of betraying their spouse or partner by having an illicit affair is risking the relationship in another way: by committing financial infidelity.
Something in the market changed about a half-year ago. A dandy old “truism” that had made the rounds for ages got scrapped.
Recession chatter has picked up increasingly for numerous reasons, not least being the spike in oil prices, slowdown in economic growth estimates, and the Fed's transition from accommodative to tighter monetary policy.
If your tax planning makes your clients’ life more difficult, you’re doing something wrong.
Can I afford to retire? Is it the right time? Here is how I answer those questions from my clients.
We’ll tackle IRMAA in this article. I’ll provide you with information to teach you how you might be able to get rid of IRMAA.
If you are under 45 and live in America or Europe, the odds are this past year has been your first real experience with inflation. Other than a blip in 2008, inflation has barely topped 3% in the last 30 years.
Long-maturity Treasuries are contending with their biggest drawdown on record, at least according to their most popular exchange-traded fund.
Does the scenario below sound likely? If so, you are among the thousands of RIAs who are likely to lose significant assets over the next decade.
While the lower fees associated with GLWB Lite products make them seem more attractive, the expected income is significantly lower than other annuities.
In this article, I will explain how to structure an income strategy that best serves the needs of constrained investors. Demographic, economic, cultural, and social forces argue for a new approach to retirement planning.
RIAs must align their communications, planning methodologies, and product set with the needs of retirees, especially women, whose chief priority is reliability of income more than return on investment.
The war in Ukraine has further complicated the investment backdrop, and fears of a recession are rising now that the U.S. yield curve has inverted. Given so much uncertainty, we are focusing on what we can control and maintaining a defensive posture
Will the cloud drive massive increases in productivity and wealth – as the internet did before it? That is the central question asked by Mark Mills in his stunning new book, The Cloud Revolution.
You have to feel sorry for active managers.
The last decade and a half rewarded investors with healthy stock and bond returns. But high valuations, low interest rates and high inflation are signals to reassess risk tolerance and asset allocations.
It’s hard to imagine a social program more dysfunctional than America’s morass of retirement-saving accounts. It costs hundreds of billions of dollars a year, excludes tens of millions of workers, and fails to ensure a comfortable old age for many who do participate.
Blank-check companies have taken an epic battering, but for patient investors, the collapse creates a chance to make some easy money from a quirk in the structure of these vehicles: their holdings of Treasury bills.
The fastest inflation in decades and the resulting rush by central banks to raise interest rates are stoking recession fears in financial markets -- worries that are being compounded by the impact of aggressive coronavirus lockdowns in China and the war in Ukraine.
An unusually strong tug of war between economic forces is playing out in global markets, with a booming economy and low unemployment offset by the effects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and expanded inflation. Expectations over the timing and magnitude of Fed interest rate increases rapidly evolved as clarity began to emerge around central bank responses to inflation.
Value has trounced growth this year, and high dividend companies have outperformed. Matt Wagner discusses the global dividend investment opportunity: emerging markets.
Audits are a risk that all should heed, but especially the lowest-income earners. The IRS looked at their returns at a rate five times greater than all other taxpayers in the 2021 fiscal year, according to data from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University.
U.S. retail sales picked up in March, helped by a surge in gas station receipts that masked mixed results in other large spending categories as consumers contend with decades-high inflation.
What does baseball have in common with exchange-traded funds (ETFs)?
To start, let’s discuss what diversification is and what it is not.
While Beijing has set an ambitious growth target this year with a generous fiscal stimulus plan, new COVID-19 waves are adding to mounting headwinds amid a slowing global economy.
China’s currency, the renminbi (RMB), remains strong even though many of the factors that have driven its performance over the last two years have weakened.
The war in Ukraine is shifting the conversation on what a post-COVID-19 world will look like.
Central to my market and macro outlook at present is the likelihood we are amid a growth cycle downturn that is looking to decelerate meaningfully in the coming months.
In his federal budget for fiscal year 2023 that he unveiled earlier this month, President Biden proposed a huge new tax increase on America’s wealthiest citizens.
ICYMI: In this roundup, we’re highlighting the five most popular pieces of content from the previous week.
It’s the next big market call that could enrich traders across Wall Street: The raging global energy crisis and ever-more hawkish central banks knock key economies into 1970s-style stagflation. It’s a long shot for now, but anxiety is building among money managers that this market scenario -- out-of-control inflation just as growth slumps -- will eventually come to pass, especially in Europe.
Here’s how to customize your calendaring system so that you weed out unqualified prospects and spend your time talking to qualified ones.
I’m going to focus on getting tax information from prospects and demonstrating how working with you will prevent them from overpaying the IRS.
Covid-19, global supply-chain disruptions, frictions in reopening economies worldwide and now Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are spawning many winners and losers in economies, financial markets and political structures. Six of them are driven by transfers of incomes and assets. Five more are fundamentally the result of repricing goods and assets that I’ll cover in a separate column.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has added pressure to the inflationary cycle that began in late 2020.
Markets rebounded in March, but it was not enough to offset earlier losses in January and February.
Did Goldman Sachs destroy a persistent myth about investing in stocks? Sam Ro recently suggested such was the case for the “sacred CAPE ratio.”
Rising rates are a direct shot at your bond portfolio. But there's a real opportunity to address your equities and position them optimally for a rising rate environment.
Federal student loan borrowers have been granted another reprieve, but for those who can afford it, the most prudent thing to do is to just fork over the money. Almost everyone has been taking advantage of the moratorium, which allows borrowers to press the pause button on payments without any interest accruing. Just 500,000 borrowers out of 43 million, or 1.1%, were still making payments a year after the freeze was initiated in March 2020 as part of pandemic relief efforts.
Most Americans say the most important problem facing the country is inflation — and President Joe Biden just made it worse. His administration announced last week it would extend yet again the emergency suspension of student loan repayments, even as his frenemies on the left are urging a program of complete forgiveness of all student debt.
As expected, on March 16, the Fed signaled its intention to hike the Fed Funds rate by 25bps. My guest today, Matt Dines, the CIO of Build Asset Management, sees three big takeaways from its report. First, the Fed’s guidance on the path of the policy rate telegraphed its commitment to addressing the rising price levels afflicting the economy. Second, the FOMC’s guidance on the Fed Funds rate joined other key and important rate curves in the global financial system in inversion – i.e., the level for longer-dated maturities lies below those that come before them. Third, the strong rally across financial assets after they digested the FOMC's report was an understanding that the "Fed Put" will be in play the next time trouble arises.
A look at the recent shift in bank loan and high yield bond correlations and why it matters for fixed income investors.
