Equifax, one of the nation’s three major credit reporting agencies, recently reported a giant data breach. According to the company, between mid-May and July, hackers accessed personal information of 143 million Americans. This information included names, addresses, dates of birth and social security numbers, and in some cases, driver’s license numbers. Additionally, 209,000 credit card numbers were exposed, as was the personal identifying information of 182,000 Americans involved in credit report disputes. First, here’s what you should do to know if you’ve been affected by this breach: Go to equifaxsecurity2017.com/potential-impact/. Sharing your last name and last six digits of your …
The True Costs of Investing: Part 1
The Hidden Costs of Mutual Funds There’s more to the cost of a fund than its “expense ratio”. Much more. The expense ratio, which most people are familiar with, is a number expressed as a percentage, easily found on any financial website or prospectus. This number represents the explicit cost of a fund, which is 0.63% for the average stock mutual fund. What’s missing in this calculation are the hidden costs, all of which typically add up to more than the expense ratio, and none of which are listed anywhere. Here’s a quick explanation of each… Bid/ask spreads: Look up …
A Bear Market Is Coming! Here’s the Game Plan
Let’s define it. A bear market is a drop in the market of at least twenty percent from its highs, lasting at least two months. Think 2008. In fact, there have been 32 bear markets since 1900, or one every 3.5 years, on average1. So, when’s the next one? Definitely, without a doubt, sometime in the future. We guarantee it. Of course, we are being facetious. If you are reading this, you are either a client, or an acquaintance who has read a few of our posts. Either way, you know that bear markets, bull markets, and everything in …
Things That Make You Go “Hmmm”
Let’s take a comparative look at the world’s market cap (i.e. the value of all the stocks), by country. The total value at the end of last year was about $47 trillion. Is China really only 3% of that? Not quite. That’s just the value accessible to non-Chinese investors. Russia, the largest country by area, barely makes it on the map (hint: it’s grey). In fact, Russia’s total value is less than Apple’s. Try to guess what the non-labeled countries are. We hope this made you go “hmmm”. Cheers, John & Bill