Short-sighted. Impulsive. Terrible idea. Robbing your own retirement. These are just some of the things you will hear in the financial media when it comes to borrowing money from your 401(k) plan. How much of this is reality and how much is myth? We are going to explore how 401(k) loans really work and when…
The biggest news in markets across the world was the British vote to pull out of the European Union after some 43 years as a participant in the EU (and the former Common Market). It’s estimated that global markets lost the equivalent of $2 trillion in value on June 24, when the results of the…
Mutual funds started to become popular back in the 1980s. However, there was one problem. Lack of information. While stock investors could get information on individual companies, mutual funds were comprised of up to hundreds of companies in different allocations, so individual holding research was futile. Then along came Morningstar founder Joe Mansueto, who formed…
The Congress at Work series of articles is designed to give you a glimpse of various types of legislation currently under consideration. While either the Senate or the House of Representatives may initiate a bill proposal, be aware that many bills never become law; they may never make it out of committee, be blocked by…
Identity theft remains one of the most pervasive crimes in the United States. As technology gets smarter, so do the scammers. Here are the most common warning signs that your personal/confidential information may have been stolen. You see charges you don’t recognize (or companies you don’t know) on your credit card bill Withdrawals you haven’t…
There are no fast fixes that will guarantee your online security, but here is a simple checklist that can help keep your data and your identity secure. Stay current on all software and OS updates. Updates appear frequently—always in response to some new vulnerability or malware. If you use Windows 10, go to “Settings” and…
In the traditional sense of financial markets, they are cyclical. Sectors get hot, industries bank on trends, and companies ebb and flow on the whims of consumerism. But at the micro level, innovation always persists. Even during a decline across nearly every asset class, some cool concept is created and developed. For example, Airbnb was…
The Congress at Work series of articles is designed to give you a glimpse of various types of legislation currently under consideration. While either the Senate or the House of Representatives may initiate a bill proposal, be aware that many bills never become law – they may never make it out of committee, be blocked…
Perhaps one of the biggest headaches for owners of small businesses involves dealing with the yearly changes to the tax code and trying to leverage tax breaks that have an expiration date. Strategic tax planning can be difficult and is frequently complicated. Here’s an overview of some of the new rules that should simplify matters…
Investors saw the market continue to slide throughout February, as stocks followed the downward trajectory of oil prices – a pattern which began in January. Not surprisingly, investment experts were puzzled, as well as unhappy, to see this unmistakable correlation between stock valuations and oil prices. This connection is a recent one; we have not…
