Recently, a money manager that I otherwise greatly respect, said this rather despairing, if not delusional, statement: “Ultimately, there may be no such thing as a safe asset anymore and investors may want to take a diversified approach to something as mundane as cash.” [Emphasis added] The Rising Dollar Myth by Axel Merk. I know (Continued)
It is always dangerous to quote someone since one is likely to get labeled with the same calumnies that are heaped upon the principal author. This is even more the case when one quotes G. K. Chesterton, a writer whose incisive views and powerful reasoning always cause distress (or rapturous joy) in the reader. Chesterton, (Continued)
I apologize ahead of time for this somewhat “downer” blog, but today, I am fighting with my own industry and product providers about a new “interpretation of the rules” that could have deleterious effects on my clients. If we continue to allow the “rules of today” to mean something different tomorrow, then we will soon (Continued)
Perhaps the most important thing to know about finance is what are the unintended consequences of a proposed course of action. Unfortunately, these are very rarely discussed. What is discussed, rather, are over-simplified, numerical projections often with faulty inputs to boot. Then, armed with this false information, the consumer draws erroneous conclusions…often with devastating results. (Continued)
Last year I attempted to examine the real reason for the “commercialization” of Christmas. Today I am going to consider the act of giving and why such a thing makes us happy. If you plumb the depths of any action or profession, you will always find a great paradox (or several of them) that seems (Continued)
At the risk of being misconstrued, I will be short and to the point in this blog: There are no quick fixes to the problems plaguing our society, its government or our economic system. Just as the sky did not fall in the morning after we re-elected the one who is arguably the worst president (Continued)
Recently a client (and good friend) posed a question to me after hearing a sermon preached on the gospel story of the rich, young man, where Christ tells this man to “go, sell what you have and come follow me.” One of my friend’s questions was this: Am I not supposed to save, but (Continued)
When most of us hear the word “economy” we think of the national economy…and somewhat despair as we daily witness the news of its perilous state. Things are bad to be sure, however, even on the national level, the fixes are EASY to start if we but had the will to do so. For example, (Continued)
In Nelson Nash’s book, Becoming Your Own Banker, he mentions 4 “human problems” that would cause the system to fail. Now the “system” was how to grow one’s wealth. So who would want that to fail? Of course the answer is no one, but oddly, many people do indeed fail to increase their savings via (Continued)
For this month’s blog, I am going to use an excerpt from the book, Money! Questions and Answers by Fr. Charles Coughlin circa 1935. Chapter VI of this book, Effects of a Dishonest Money System, offers 15 rather chilling prophecies when looked at with the benefit of 75+ years of hindsight. And while Fr. Coughlin (Continued)