Insights

Is rising inflation souring your financial plans? Protecting the bulk of your wealth is mostly about building and maintaining a well-structured investment portfolio with a few anti-inflation elements. Outside of your core portfolio, there is also a potentially sweet deal for turning some of inflation’s lemons into lemonade. We’re talking about U.S. Series I Saving Bonds (“I Bonds”). I Bonds are not a cure-all for inflation. And there is a thing or two to know about them before you decide whether to proceed.

In our last piece, we covered fund management costs. Next, let’s take a step back from the mutual funds, ETFs, or other holdings you decide to invest in. Where do these holdings live—and what does it cost to buy, sell, and hold them?

What are your investments really costing you? If you’re not sure, you’re not alone. It’s not like you’re handed a menu of charges to choose from when it’s time to place your order. Even when you know where to look for investment costs, the information can be difficult to digest. Let’s fill in some of the blanks by covering two significant sources of investment costs: fund management fees, and custodian/brokerage (trading) costs. Today, we’ll talk about fund management fees.

How do you invest your money over the long-term? If you've read much of our work, you've probably noticed we embrace evidence-based investing. But what does that mean?

Third Quarter 2021|Jim Williams| This is a brief revisit of some basics of personal finance. Consider this cash flow paradigm: Income, less taxes, less consumption equals investment. A different statement of the formula is that money from income can only go one of three places: taxes, consumption, or savings/investment. This is not higher math. It is arithmetic. Let's examine the elements of the formula.

Second Quarter 2021|Jim Williams| We have heard and seen a good bit about inflation lately. A modest general inflation rate is mostly seen as a stabilizing force in the economy and is likely a consequence of an ever-increasing money supply which may be necessary to accommodate an ever-growing economy. As the economy emerges from the effects of lockdowns and restrictions, the economic damages caused by those actions are becoming manifest.