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I have been writing about money for nearly 20 years and believe that personal finance is one of those subjects that is made complicated because it benefits a select few. Our aim is to help make it easier to understand so that regular folks can use what we teach to take control of their money and build wealth.
Good morning Reader! The stock market is doing well but regular Americans aren't. The S&P 500 is up nearly 9% year to date but... ... consumer confidence is not good. And as long as the Iran war drags on, the longer oil prices will remain high. And high fuel prices are bad for consumers. I read someone make the claim that for ever week of the Iran war, we'll have a month of high inflation. While the equation is never that simple, we're seeing inflation and it's heavily influenced by higher...
Good morning Reader! If you want to know what interest rates will do and we're far from a Fed meeting, the best place to look is the 10-Year Treasury yield. When there's news (or even just before!), you can see it reflected in the changing yield of the 10 Year. For example, the 10-Year jumped to 4.595% this week on the news of new Fed Chair Kevin Warsh's confirmation and inflation data. When the yield goes up, interest rates go up. When it goes down, interest rates go down. You're probably...
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...