Nerd's Eye View

JANUARY 15, 2024

For financial advisors, an ongoing client service model often means finding ways to keep clients engaged and progressing toward their goals outside of the 1 or 2 typical client review meetings each year. For clients, more frequent communication can be a source of behavioral coaching and helpful information that can better equip them to stay the course through rocky markets.

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Clients Communication Financial Advisor Wealth Management 223

Abnormal Returns

JANUARY 14, 2024

Top clicks this week Six reasons to bullish. Six reasons to be bearish. (ritholtz.com) The periodic table of commodity returns over the past decade. (visualcapitalist.com) 34 hard-earned lessons including 'People are busy, distracted, and tired. Always follow up.' (thefp.com) Stock markets around the world are at or near their highs. (downtownjoshbrown.com) Good luck trying to pick the best performing asset class on a year-by-year basis.

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Valuation Assets Investing Investments 290

The Big Picture

JANUARY 16, 2024

The transcript from this week’s, MiB: Cathy Marcus, co-CEO, global COO of PGIM Real Estate , is below. You can stream and download our full conversation, including any podcast extras, on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , YouTube , and Bloomberg. All of our earlier podcasts on your favorite pod hosts can be found here. ~~~ This is Masters in business with Barry Ritholtz on Bloomberg Radio. 00:00:09 [Barry Ritholtz] This week on the podcast I have an extra special guest.

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Assets Investing Investments Management 261

A Wealth of Common Sense

JANUARY 14, 2024

Bonds have had a rough go at it these past few years. 2021 was a down year. 2022 was the worst year in history for bonds. 2023 was better although rates were so volatile that the ride certainty wasn’t much fun to be on. In the 10 years ending 2023, 10 year Treasury bonds had an annual return of just 1.5%. The annual inflation rate over that same time frame was 2.8%, meaning you lost money on a real basis in the benc.

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Speaker: Amanda Adams, Fractional CFO, CPA

Are you ready to elevate your accounting processes for 2025? 🚀 Join us for an exclusive webinar led by Amanda Adams, 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.

Accounting

Nerd's Eye View

JANUARY 19, 2024

Enjoy the current installment of "Weekend Reading For Financial Planners" - this week's edition kicks off with the news that a recent study has found that while total financial advisor headcount across all channels only increased by 0.3% in 2023, the RIA space showed significantly more strength, with 10.4% growth, as breakaway brokers and new advisors see the potential benefits of the RIA model.

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Financial Planner Fiduciary Duty Retirement Retirement Planning 241

The Big Picture

JANUARY 19, 2024

 This week, we speak with Shomik Dutta , founder and managing partner at Overture , a venture capital firm focused on climate tech and sustainability startups. He is also co-founder and General Partner of Higher Ground Labs. He previously worked on both Obama presidential campaigns and served as a Special Assistant to the White House Counsel. Dutta discusses why Climate Investing is a for-profit opportunity, and not as it is so often portrayed as “Woke Investing.” The 2023 COP resu

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Startup Investment Advisor Investing Investments 176

A Wealth of Common Sense

JANUARY 18, 2024

A reader asks: Ben, I love reading your work. Stocks, bonds, and cash are the categories to compare but it hit me as a “boomer” retired, what about home ownership as a comparison? Stay warm! This question was in response to my recent piece on the historical returns for stocks, bonds and cash: There are typically a fair number of requests for other asset classes whenever I post this kind of data.

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Retirement Numbers Assets 134

Nerd's Eye View

JANUARY 16, 2024

Welcome back to the 368th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast ! My guest on today's podcast is Thomas Kopelman. Thomas is the co-founder of AllStreet Wealth, a financial planning firm for millennial business owners and those with equity comp based in Indianapolis, IN, that has quickly grown to more than $500,000 of run-rate revenue generated from serving 70 ongoing client households.

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Media Financial Advisor Financial Planning Planning 232

Abnormal Returns

JANUARY 19, 2024

Crypto Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund ($FBTC) has surpassed $1 billion in AUM. (theblock.co) Why the churn at the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ($GBTC) matters so much for Bitcoin. (ft.com) Vanguard made the right call. (morningstar.com) Companies Airbnb ($ABNB) didn't end up killing the hotel (stocks). (paulrlamonica.substack.com) Meta ($META) now wants in on the AGI game.

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Financial Advising Media Economy Sales 276

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.

Accounting

The Big Picture

JANUARY 13, 2024

The weekend is here! Pour yourself a mug of coffee, grab a seat by the fire, and get ready for our longer-form weekend reads: • Two centuries of vibecessions : When recessions were just part of the weather, people shrugged them off more easily, but nowadays every one is cause for existential national angst. Perhaps we’ve all just become economic snowflakes?

Portfolio Management 157

Portfolio Management Economy Economics Portfolio 157

Advisor Perspectives

JANUARY 17, 2024

I asked our authors and guest contributors the following question: Given the availability of spot bitcoin ETFs, would you recommend them (or any other cryptocurrency allocation) to your clients?

Clients 128

Clients 128

Nerd's Eye View

JANUARY 17, 2024

In late 2022, OpenAI launched ChatGPT, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) driven, natural-language processing tool that offered the public the ability to conduct seemingly human conversations with a chatbot and generate a seemingly endless array of sophisticated content, including essays, emails, computer code, meal plans, fictional stories, and song lyrics, to name just a few.

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Financial Advice Financial Planning Planning Clients 130

Abnormal Returns

JANUARY 15, 2024

Podcasts Michael Kitces talks about starting over with Kimberly Enders who is the Lead Financial Planner and Managing Partner of Enders Wealth Management. (kitces.com) Thomas Kopelman and Jacob Turner talk Roth IRA conversions with Steven Jarvis. (podcasts.apple.com) Hiring RIAs need to think more broadly when it comes to hiring. (riabiz.com) Why women are still struggling to make progress in the world of financial advice.

Financial Planner 275

Financial Planner Wealth Management Retirement Planning Financial Advising 275

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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.

Accounting

The Big Picture

JANUARY 17, 2024

 At The Money: Meir Statman on What Investors Really Want , (January 17, 2024) What do investors really want? Long-term capital appreciation and income are the obvious answers. But, it turns out, they actually want a lot more than that. I speak with Professor Meir Statman of Santa Clara University — he is an award-winning expert on investor behavior and financial decision-making.

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Portfolio Investing Investments Retirement Planning 130

Advisor Perspectives

JANUARY 19, 2024

Consumer sentiment soared in January to its highest level since July 2021, according to the preliminary report for the Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index. The index came in at 78.8, up 9.1 (13.1%) from the December final. The latest reading was above the forecast of 70.0.

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Calculated Risk

JANUARY 17, 2024

On a monthly basis, retail sales were up 0.6% from November to December (seasonally adjusted), and sales were up 5.6 percent from December 2022. From the Census Bureau report : Advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for December 2023, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $709.9 billion, up 0.6 percent from the previous month , and up 5.6 percent above December 2022.

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Retail Sales Food 121

Abnormal Returns

JANUARY 13, 2024

Transport Electric school buses have a number of advantages. (grist.org) Waymo is beginning to test self-driving taxis on the highway. (forbes.com) Comparing the cost of charging an EV vs. gasoline. (grist.org) Energy Despite growth in renewables, fossil fuel consumption is not going down. (coldeye.earth) Students don't want to major in oil and gas engineering.

Food 276

Food Financial Advising Transportation Engineering 276

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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.

Banking

The Big Picture

JANUARY 14, 2024

Avert your eyes! My Sunday morning look at incompetency, corruption and policy failures: • What We Lost When Twitter Became X As a former Twitter employee, I watched Elon Musk undermine one of the Internet’s most paradoxical, special places. ( New Yorker ) • Buying Home and Auto Insurance Is Becoming Impossible : Huge losses from national disasters prompt industry to jack up prices and pull back from some markets; ‘worst possible scenario’ for consumers. ( Wall Street Journal ) see also Thousan

Insurance 130

Insurance Portfolio Management Financial Market Retirement 130

Advisor Perspectives

JANUARY 16, 2024

This article examines the challenges associated with the SEC’s proposed rule, the expected effect on financial services firms, and how firms can prepare now for the new rule.

Financial Services 119

Financial Services 119

A Wealth of Common Sense

JANUARY 19, 2024

Following the Great Financial Crisis, there was a worry the coming tsunami of retiring baby boomers was going to lead to a retirement crisis of epic proportions.1 Their portfolios were down bad. Housing prices had crashed. They didn’t save enough money. People were worried about Social Security. Everyone was predicting lower returns for financial assets going forward.

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Retirement Portfolio Assets 116

Abnormal Returns

JANUARY 17, 2024

Crypto Vanguard's decision to ban the purchase of Bitcoin ETFs should not be all that surprising. (riabiz.com) How Bitcoin ETFs are akin to gold ETFs a couple decades ago. (peterlazaroff.com) Is the spot Bitcoin ETF the beginning of something? (caia.org) Drizly Uber ($UBER) is shutting down Drizly. (techcrunch.com) The demise of Drizly is not the end of booze delivery.

Startup 263

Startup Financial Advising Insurance Media 263

Speaker: Igli Laci, Strategic Finance Leader

In today’s competitive market, pricing is more than just a number — it’s the cornerstone of profitability. The right pricing strategy ensures that you capture the true value of your offering, paving the way for sustainable growth and long-term success. Join Igli Laci, Strategic Finance Leader, in this exclusive session where he will explore how a well-crafted pricing approach balances customer perception with business objectives, creating a powerful tool for securing both competitive advantage a

Numbers

Calculated Risk

JANUARY 18, 2024

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Single Family Starts Up Year-over-year in December; Near Record Number of Multi-Family Housing Units Under Construction A brief excerpt: The third graph shows the month-to-month comparison for total starts between 2022 (blue) and 2023 (red). Total starts were up 7.6% in December compared to December 2022.

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Numbers 115

Advisor Perspectives

JANUARY 16, 2024

Manufacturing activity dropped sharply in New York State, according to the Empire State Manufacturing January survey. The diffusion index for General Business Conditions fell to -43.7 from -14.5 in December. This morning's reading was worse than the forecast of -5.0 and is the index's lowest reading since May 2020.

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Manufacturing 118

Wealth Management

JANUARY 19, 2024

Yieldstreet has been helping hundreds of thousands of investors get access to a wide range of alternative investments for several years. The deal with Luma is "our first big push into the RIA channel," its CEO says.

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Investing Investments 115

Abnormal Returns

JANUARY 16, 2024

Markets Where are real interest rates going to settle? (mrzepczynski.blogspot.com) Domestic equities are expensive relative to international equities. (apolloacademy.com) Strategy Stocks usually beat bonds and cash, but not all the time. (awealthofcommonsense.com) How to identify an investor who has gotten too attached to a stock. (investmenttalk.co) Companies What went wrong at Boeing ($BA)?

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Financial Advising Economy Media Marketing 262

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.

Financial Advice

Calculated Risk

JANUARY 19, 2024

Today, in the CalculatedRisk Real Estate Newsletter: NAR: Existing-Home Sales Decreased to 3.78 million SAAR in December; Months-of-Supply above December 2019 Excerpt: Sales Year-over-Year and Not Seasonally Adjusted (NSA) The fourth graph shows existing home sales by month for 2022 and 2023. Sales declined 6.2% year-over-year compared to December 2022.

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Sales 113

Advisor Perspectives

JANUARY 16, 2024

Travel on all roads and streets increased in November. The 12-month moving average was up 0.2% month-over-month and was up 1.8% year-over-year. If we factor in population growth, the 12-month MA of the civilian population-adjusted data (age 16-and-over) was up 0.1% MoM and up 0.6% YoY.

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Wealth Management

JANUARY 17, 2024

A year of resilience and transformation as Tina Powell, former business owner, faces unexpected challenges in her 'year of health.

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