Joe Day | January 11, 2023

LOOKING BACK It’s difficult to know what the future will hold without understanding the past. 2022 was a difficult year in the market. An unprecedented, rapid increase in interest rates by the Federal Reserve, created significant market volatility and negative returns for the year: Consequently, the S&P 500 finished down -19.44% and investors experienced the risk side of the “risk/reward” relationship. What was different about 2022 was that the negative…

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Joe Day | June 14, 2022

Inflation is an economic indicator we discuss heavily with clients during our planning sessions to project future income needs. For years, inflation has been benign, to say the least. Over the last decade, policy makers have been attempting to increase inflation, to ensure it stays close to their preferred target of 2%. Anything lower than their 2% target, risks stagnation in an economy, or worse deflation, which is difficult to…

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Joe Day | April 5, 2022

During times of high market valuations and following long-periods of strong market returns, we are often asked where we think the market is “going from here”. The real question behind this inquiry is “is it time to sell?” When markets go up, it’s natural to be excited about the gains, while feeling nervous about giving back those same gains in the next market downturn. The crux of the question is…

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Riley Nichols | August 17, 2021

Investing trends don’t start out of nowhere. Usually, some event happens and pushes investors towards a certain area of the market. In the case of the last year, the pandemic left a lot of people stuck in their homes with more time on their hands than normal, so many turned to the stock market. The retail investor had a resurgence. The rise of the “meme stock” captured the headlines, but…

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Joe Day | August 18, 2020

Many people have been caught off guard by the recent market volatility. Most have been surprised to see asset prices increase so quickly after hitting bottom in March. We’ve seen unexpected price movements before, but this was quite extreme given the fact that we are still very much in the middle of a pandemic, with no immediate end in site. What has been driving the recent recovery? Government intervention has…

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Joe Day | December 19, 2018

  It’s official. As of earlier this week, all three major indexes (Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq) all ended in correction territory. What is a correction? A correction is when the stock market experiences a 10% drop from it’s highs. Is it notable? Yes. Should it be worrisome? No. Let me explain. Over the last 50 years, the S&P 500 has entered into a correction 29 times. That is…

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Luke Collova | June 8, 2018

  Our clients often ask us about real estate, and what we think about buying or selling a primary residence, a vacation home, or an investment property. This is hardly surprising—for many of our clients, their family home is by far their largest asset. What’s more, most of our clients live in either the Seattle or San Francisco areas, both of which have experienced extraordinary real estate appreciation in recent…

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Joe Day | March 13, 2018

Congress and the President recently passed the biggest tax reform in over 30 years. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 aims to make the United States corporate tax rate more competitive and therefore increase corporate investment domestically. The bill also provides for individual tax breaks beginning in 2018, that will expire at the end of 2025. What Does This Mean For My Portfolio? Corporations will now be taxed…

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Joe Day | March 12, 2018

  For decades, it has been conventional wisdom in American business that the one proper objective of corporate managers is to increase the company’s share price. That is the principal behind stock options, which tie compensation to share price. Other considerations, such as worker satisfaction, civic engagement, or environmental impact, have been perceived as irrelevant, except to the extent that they bear on profitability, and thus on share price. The…

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Luke Collova | December 8, 2017

  Many people are aware of the benefits of a Roth IRA: you put your after-tax money into it, after 20 or 30 years when you retire, you pull all of the money out tax-free.  This can be a big benefit when you consider the effect of compounding returns over time. There are other benefits such as that you may be in a lower tax bracket when you pay taxes…

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