August, 2023

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Investing is the Study of Human Decision Making

The Big Picture

Most people believe that investing is the science of generating a return on capital. That is an accurate but incomplete assessment. I believe it is more useful and comprehensive to define investing as the decision-making behavior of human beings as they interact with money: What their financial desires are, the risks they embrace, how they think about wealth, and what emotional pain they willingly suffer in order to generate that return on capital.

Investing 246
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Thursday links: impulsive and irreverent

Abnormal Returns

Strategy Some neglected aspects of investing including 'The influence of luck in outcomes.' (investmenttalk.co) The story of a top investor's mistake holding a stock too long. (morningstar.com) Banks How is the integration of First Republic going for JP Morgan Chase ($JPM)? (theinformation.com) More capital would not have saved SVB. (ft.com) Finance A handful of big IPOs are queued up after Labor Day including Instacart, Arm Holdings and Klayvio.

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TD Ameritrade To Schwab Conversion Tips For Financial Advisors

Nerd's Eye View

The announcement of the merger between Charles Schwab and TD Ameritrade in November 2019 kicked off a marathon of preparation for advisory firms to transition their clients on the TD Ameritrade custodial platform to Schwab. And with the final conversion of clients scheduled to take place over the upcoming Labor Day weekend of 2023, the marathon is approaching its final sprint toward the finish line.

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Apple hits big oversold levels, now what?

The Reformed Broker

The Relative Strength Index or RSI is typically expressed as a 14-day reading to determine the degree to which a stock or an index is overbought or oversold, if at all. It was created in 1978 by J. Welles Wilder Jr. (here’s the book) who was a mechanical engineer by trade before turning his mathematical mind to stock and commodity trading, subsequently developing some of the most widely traded tools in technical ana.

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Less Stress, More Success: Accounting Best Practices & Processes for 2025

Speaker: Duke Heninger, Partner and Fractional CFO at Ampleo & Creator of CFO System

Are you ready to elevate your accounting processes for 2025? 🚀 Join us for an exclusive webinar led by Duke Heninger, a seasoned fractional CFO and CPA passionate about transforming back-office operations for finance teams. This session will cover critical best practices and process improvements tailored specifically for accounting professionals.

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A Closer Look at Risk & Reward in Bonds Right Now

A Wealth of Common Sense

Jonathan Novy, one of our advisors and insurance experts at Ritholtz Wealth, joined me this week to discuss questions about emergency funds, investing when you don’t have a 401k, annuity yields and long-term care insurance. Further Reading: Why I’m More Worried About the Bond Market Than the Stock Market 1The same is true of CDs. I looked at 5 year CD yields at Marcus today.

Insurance 140

More Trending

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Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index: +0.2%

The Big Picture

The Fed’s favored inflation report was a 2.1% annualized (3 months through July) and 3.3% year-over-year. Here is BEA: Personal income increased $45.0 billion (0.2 percent at a monthly rate) in July, according to estimates released today by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (table 3 and table 5). Disposable personal income (DPI), personal income less personal current taxes, increased $7.3 billion (less than 0.1 percent) and personal consumption expenditures (PCE) increased $144.6 billio

Food 264
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Tuesday links: over-optimized content

Abnormal Returns

Strategy How (and where) to hold cash in your portfolio. (morningstar.com) For alternatives, Is illiquidity a feature or a bug? (savantwealth.com) Don't underestimate how weird the world can be. (mr-stingy.com) Crypto Grayscale won a victory against the SEC raising the prospects of a spot Bitcoin ETF. (blockworks.co) The entire crypto space jumped on the news.

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Crafting More Equitable Advisor Non-Solicit Agreements With The ACRES Agreement

Nerd's Eye View

Non-compete agreements (where a company prohibits an employee from working for competitors, at least for a certain period of time) are often used to help companies protect their investment in the employee (e.g., the time and money spent training the employee) as well as preventing the employee from taking the company's best practices to a new job at a competitor.

Clients 246
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Trading Legend Mark Fisher on What it Takes

The Reformed Broker

We had a lot of fun with Joe Terranova and Mark Fisher on the show this week. Mark shared a lot of behavioral stuff about what it takes to make it as a trader. It’s not for everyone and it costs a lot to find this out. I was fascinated by the discussion and judging for the feedback we’ve gotten, a lot of our listeners were as well. You can watch the full episode here: Or find it on your favorite podcast ap.

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Avoiding Lease Accounting Pitfalls in 2025: Lessons Learned from Spreadsheet Errors

Speaker: Abdi Ali, Sr. Lease Accounting Consultant

Join this insightful webinar with industry expert Abdi Ali, who will discuss the challenges that can arise from managing lease accounting with spreadsheets! He will share real-world examples of errors, compliance issues, and risks that may be present within your spreadsheets. Learn how these tools, while useful, can sometimes lead to inefficiencies that affect your time, resources, and peace of mind.

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MBA: Mortgage Applications Increased in Weekly Survey

Calculated Risk

From the MBA: Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest MBA Weekly Survey Mortgage applications increased 2.3 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending August 25, 2023. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, increased 2.3 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier.

Marketing 122
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Family Offices Look Ready to Step Up Real Estate Investment. What Are They Looking for in Their Partners?

Wealth Management

Transparency in financial reporting, favorable partnership structures are taking on more importance for family offices in a riskier investment climate.

Investing 130
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10 Thursday AM Reads

The Big Picture

My end of August, morning train WFH reads: • Money Is Pouring Into AI. Skeptics Say It’s a ‘Grift Shift.’ The move from crypto to artificial intelligence has fueled the markets this year, but some are questioning how much of it is real. ( Institutional Investor ) • What to Do With a 45-Story Skyscraper and No Tenants : HSBC’s plan to leave its Canary Wharf tower for a smaller site shows the global challenges ahead in repurposing unwanted office space for a post-pandemic world. ( Citylab ) see al

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Personal finance links: accumulation vs. decumulation

Abnormal Returns

Podcasts Peter Lazaroff talks with Tyler Olsen about strategically paying down student debt. (peterlazaroff.com) Captain FI talks financial independence with Jonathan Clements. (captainfi.com) Frazer Rice talks longevity and aging with Phil Pearlman of the Pearl Institute. (open.spotify.com) Morgan Housel on the difference between intelligence and smarts.

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Back to Basics with Reconciliations

Join us in this webinar, where we share best practices on how to think about the reconciliation work each month, when best to do reconciliations, how they should be prepared, and some common pitfalls to avoid. Learning Objectives: This course objective is to understand how to properly prepare and review balance sheet reconciliations and its impact on the financial statements.

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Kitces & Carl Ep 119: Navigating Succession Plans When Founders Are Having Second Thoughts On Retirement

Nerd's Eye View

For many next-gen financial advisors who start with or move their careers to an established firm, eventually earning an equity stake in that firm can be an exciting prospect and is often a major career goal that many advisors aspire to achieve. However, when these aspirations are delayed or blocked by senior advisory firm partners who choose to delay their retirement plans, it can leave younger advisors frustrated and in a place of uncertainty about their futures with their firm.

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Will There Ever Be Another Warren Buffett?

The Reformed Broker

Welcome to the latest episode of The Compound & Friends. This week, Michael Batnick, Guy Spier, and Downtown Josh Brown discuss lunch with Warren Buffett, value investing, managing a hedge fund, Berkshire after Buffett, the bull case for Ferrari, and much more! You can listen to the whole thing below, or find it wherever you like to listen to your favorite pods!

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Realtor.com Reports Weekly Active Inventory Down 6% YoY; New Listings Down 8% YoY

Calculated Risk

Realtor.com has monthly and weekly data on the existing home market. Here is their weekly report from Hannah Jones: Weekly Housing Trends View — Data Week Ending Aug 26, 2023 • Active inventory declined, with for-sale homes lagging behind year ago levels by 5.9%. This past week marked the 10th consecutive decline in the number of homes actively for sale compared to the prior year, however the gap narrowed for the fourth week in a row. • New listings–a measure of sellers putting homes up for sale

Sales 119
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Focus Closes on Sale to CD&R in Take-Private Deal

Wealth Management

Two private equity players take Focus private in an all-cash deal; the firm’s stock has ceased trading on the NASDAQ.

Sales 122
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2024 Lending Outlook: Innovations and Evolutions in the Financial Sector

As we step into 2024, the lending landscape evolves rapidly with technology, regulations, and market dynamics driving change. For banks and financial institutions to stay competitive and meet the evolving needs of their customers, these drivers must be understood and engaged with. Lenders can anticipate significant transformation fueled by technological advancements, regulatory shifts, and changing consumer behaviors.

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Forget the iPhone: BlackBerry is still the one to beat

The Big Picture

How little do we know about the future? A great way to figure that out is to look to our past, to see what we previously thought about what the future will hold. To wit: 26 years ago, the image above came from the cover story of Fortune magazine: “There’s a lot of buzz in the smartphone business lately, with Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone turning the mobile world upside down and Nokia’s (NOK) upcoming phone announcement providing a new challenge.

Media 246
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Wednesday links: opening the vault

Abnormal Returns

Strategy Why the low interest rate era has come to an end. (ft.com) Generating alpha is more than just stock selection. (flyoverstocks.com) Who is to blame for the behavior gap? (ritholtz.com) ETFs 2023 is on track for a record number of ETF closures. (wsj.com) The SEC's logic in the Grayscale case was flawed. (ft.com) Economy The labor market is not all that tight.

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Weekend Reading For Financial Planners (August 26-27)

Nerd's Eye View

Enjoy the current installment of "Weekend Reading For Financial Planners" - this week's edition kicks off with the news that a recent CFP Board survey indicates that consumers do not expect AI tools to replace human financial advisors, but rather supplement advisors' work. Further, 87% of respondents said they would trust advice from human advisors, more than any other source of advice surveyed, and well above the 37% who said they trust generative AI tools.

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Clips From Today’s Halftime Report

The Reformed Broker

Arista Networks upgraded to a buy from CNBC. The post Clips From Today’s Halftime Report appeared first on The Reformed Broker.

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Banking on Loyalty: Holistic Financial Advice for Unparalleled Business Growth

Speaker: Joe Buhrmann, MBA, CFP®, CLU®, ChFC® Senior Financial Planning Practice Management Consultant eMoney Advisor

During an era of evolving consumer preferences, the banking sector is undergoing a profound shift. As customers continue to broaden their perspectives, banking professionals must support their customers' financial wellness by providing holistic financial advice that aligns with individual goals and circumstances. Without adapting, financial institutions will find that loyalty may crumble amid uncertainty.

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Bitcoin Historical Annual Returns (10 Years, 5 Years, 3 Years, 1 Year)

Good Financial Cents

From its humble beginnings in 2008 to today, Bitcoin’s history has been relatively short but very eventful. The original protocol for this popular digital currency was created in 2008 by Satoshi Nakamoto , believed to be a pseudonym for an unknown developer or group of developers. Nakamoto launched the Bitcoin network just a year later and began mining the currency— an estimated 1 million bitcoins were mined in the early years.

Assets 119
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Incorporating Life Settlements into Your Client Strategy

Wealth Management

A policy that performs justifies the premium costs and liquidity constraints. Unfortunately, it's all too common for life insurance to use and hold value that's better deployed elsewhere.

Clients 119
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Lessons for Investors from Mini-Panics

The Big Picture

The first post-pandemic presentation I pulled together for my pal Joe Fitzgerald (we worked together in the late 2000s) was a new deck titled: Biggest Mistakes Made by UHNW Investors. In the intervening year, I updated and refined the deck, adding more examples and specific advice. below is my discussion of what the presentation will be like at the MoneyShow in Orlando on October 30.

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Personal finance links: the myths of aging

Abnormal Returns

Real estate A house is a place to live, not an investment. (bestinterest.blog) Baby Boomer wealth is concentrated in real estate which they will leave to their children. (awealthofcommonsense.com) A mortgage is only one of many costs of home ownership. (thomaskopelman.com) What it's like to return to apartment living after owning a house. (dwell.com) Another example of the challenges of rental real estate.

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Navigating Financial Storms: Strategies for Building Resilient Balance Sheets

Speaker: Carolina Aponte - Owner and CEO, Caja Holdings LLC

In today's rapidly changing business environment, building a resilient balance sheet is crucial to the survival of any business. A resilient balance sheet allows a company to withstand financial shocks and adapt to changing market conditions. To achieve this, companies need to focus on key strategies such as maintaining adequate liquidity, managing debt levels, diversifying revenue streams, and prioritizing profitability over growth.

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“Legacy IRA” Rollover To A Charitable Gift Annuity: Using This New Tax-Advantaged Opportunity To Help Clients Achieve Charitable And Retirement Goals

Nerd's Eye View

Charitable Gift Annuities (CGAs) have long been a popular way for individuals with charitable intentions to plan their legacies. By contributing a lump sum to a charity in exchange for fixed recurring payments for life (with any leftover funds after the donor's death going to the charity), the individual can ensure that their funds are directed towards a purpose that aligns with their values, while also retaining a steady source of income for the rest of their life.

Taxes 246
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Clips From Today’s Closing Bell

The Reformed Broker

Final Trades: Alphabet, Transocean & more from CNBC. The post Clips From Today’s Closing Bell appeared first on The Reformed Broker.

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Inflation Adjusted House Prices 3.9% Below Peak; Price-to-rent index is 7.6% below recent peak

Calculated Risk

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Inflation Adjusted House Prices 3.9% Below Peak; Price-to-rent index is 7.6% below recent peak Excerpt: It has been over 17 years since the bubble peak. In the June Case-Shiller house price index released yesterday, the seasonally adjusted National Index (SA), was reported as being 65% above the bubble peak in 2006.

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