By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN Published: September 6, 2011 Kishore Mahbubani, a retired Singaporean diplomat, published a provocative essay in The Financial Times on Monday that began like this: “Dictators are falling. Democracies are failing. A curious coincidence? Or is it, perhaps, a sign that something fundamental has changed in the grain of human history. I …
Tag: retire
Trusts and What They Are – Part Two
In Part One we ended talking about Revocable Family Trusts and what they are. Continuing that conversation, the next step is... Asset Protection for Trust Beneficiaries A revocable trust provides no asset protection for the trust maker during his or her life. Upon the death of the trust maker, however, or upon the death of …
Be Careful What You Put Into Your IRA
Individual retirement accounts (IRAs) exist in many forms. In general, if you have income from working for yourself or someone else, you may set up and contribute to an IRA. Most of the more than $3.4 trillion held in IRA accounts are held by the major brokerage firms and invested in stocks, bonds and mutual …
The Risk of Loss
It is a given that when someone invests money there is a potential for loss. How much loss and when is an absolute unknown. The only protection against such a potential loss is a contractual guarantee, and even then it may not be. (See the recent debt crisis in Washington) What is possible, however, is …
Capital Market Insights – August 29, 2011
Here is your Weekly Insights update from Curian’s Asset Management Group. This informative capital market update is designed to help you stay informed about important developments in economics, the markets, and … CONTINUE
The Case for Alternative Investments – Part XI
This is a continuation of my recent argument in favor of a different approach to how you, as a consumer of financial advice, and we, as advisors, need to manage your retirement money. Or any money you have for that matter. In 2008, U.S. equities were gutted. 99.8% of all U.S. equity mutual funds had …
Continue reading The Case for Alternative Investments – Part XI
The Cost of Long Term Care Insurance Goes UP
MetLife, which has been selling long-term care insurance for 25 years, recently announced that it would no longer sell LTC policies. The decision, apparently, does not affect current policyholders. Meanwhile, John Hancock, another major player in this game, has announced price increases of 40% for many of its existing LTC policies. (Affected policyholders will be …
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The Coming Retirement Wave
Are Americans financially prepared for life after work? By Jeff Schlegel. Timely article that appeared on the Financial Advisor website August 17, 2011. It helps contrast what I am doing for my clients today with what the industry as a whole is focused on (or not focused on, if that makes sense). A recent Google …
Capital Market Insights – August 15, 2011
Here is your Weekly Insights update from Curian’s Asset Management Group. This informative capital market update is designed to help you stay informed about important developments in economics, the markets, and … Continue reading...
Comments from Ric Edelman
Ric Edelman runs a company from whom I contract investment management services for my clients. Ric has build an organization that now has over $4 billion under management. That alone says something about his skills and reputation. The following is from an email he sent out to all of us earlier this week. It confirms …
Helping Define Your Financial Future 