Good morning Reader!

The CNN Fear & Greed Index is showing greed right now in the stock market (yesterday, it was extreme greed!). It calculates this based on seven indicators.

I always find these fascinating because it's similar to the list of previously hit numbers on a roulette table. While true, just the indicators feeding the Fear & Greed Index are true, it's not predictive.

Just because investors are afraid doesn't mean we should listen to Warren Buffet and buy buy buy everything. And just because investors are greedy doesn't mean it's a good time to sell. The market can be greedy for a long time.

But it does tell you where investors' heads are emotionally. The economy may feel weaker if you talk to regular Americans (or CEOs of companies selling to regular Americans), but the stock market feels great.

In the 25+ years I've been investing, this is the first time I recall the stock market feeling great while the economy weakened. We've had plenty of times when the stock market recovered much faster than the economy (after dot com, financial crisis, and the pandemic), but it's the first going the other way.

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. I won't change what I'm doing (I'm in my mid-forties, we're still accumulating, and we aren't nearing retirement). If I were closer to retirement, I might make some changes (or, more accurately, ensure I'm keeping up to date schedule on my asset allocation changes).

💲 Best Bank Rates (as of 5/13):

💰 High Yield Savings - 4.00% APY + $400 from SoFi​

🏛️ Short Term Treasury - VBIL 3.59%, SGOV 3.55%

📀 Certificates of Deposit (see all 40k+ rates)

🔍 We list nationwide rates, CD Valet has local rates which can be higher so click through to double check for your state.

• Best: 9% from American Airlines FCU (9mo Anniversary Special)
• 6 months: 4.15% from TBO Bank​
• 12 months: 4.15% from Credit One Bank​
• 60 Months: 4.20% from First National Bank of America​

💵 Bank Bonuses - $450 US Bank, $300 Sofi, $500 Bank of America, $400 BMO, $1500 Raisin & more​

​(View this email as a webpage)​

🧑‍💻 Canvas Breach Last Week

If you have kids, chances are their school uses Canvas, a cloud based education/communication platform that got breaches last week.

9,000 schools and universities were affected, fortunately not a lot of personal information was revealed... but there was enough to put your kids at risk.

It's important to talk to them about fake emails/phishing and other potential future attacks as a result of this, but we aren't yet at the point where they need to freeze their credit reports... unless we learn that somehow it was breached too.

Here's what I'm doing to protect our kids:

​👉 How to protect your kids from identity theft​

🧮 Should You Make Extra Mortgage Payments?

If you have a mortgage, you've probably wondered how much an extra payment could save you in interest... right?

👉 I made a calculator to help you find out.​

Enter in your loan details (balance, rate, maturity) plus the payment and it'll calculate your interest savings.

You can also find out how much that amount would earn you in the market over that same time span.

If you play with it, reply and let me know what you think!

🗞️ Money Stuff I Found Interesting

Here are some interesting articles you may have missed:

• ⭐ What You Will Lose When You Retire [Humans vs. Retirement]
• ​Grand Theft Oil Futures [Paul Krugman]
• ​I Want to Live Like Costco People [Taste]
• ​I spent my whole career building passive income. Here’s what I got wrong. [Darius Foroux]
• ​3 Big Questions to Ask Your Aging Parents [Morningstar]

What did you think of today's email?​
✅ I Loved It! 🟨 It Was Okay ❌ Not My Favorite​

Talk to you soon!

Jim

PS. Would you loved ones know what to do if you're incapacitated? If the answer is no, consider putting together an "In Case of Emergency" Binder.

​(see archive of previous emails)​