FINANCIaL
FIELd NOTES
Roth Conversions When The Market Is Down
When I evaluate Roth conversion plans, I typically wait until the end of the year to complete the conversions so I can ensure that income actually ended up being what was projected.
However, if there is volatility in the stock market, it can be a great benefit to convert while the market is down…
Mixing Investing With Entertainment Is A Bad Idea
I worry that the young adults who are dipping their toes into the investing world for the first time this year will associate investing with a gambling sort of rush.
But I also can understand where they’re coming from. It is exciting to see small investors make out like bandits in companies like GameStop, AMC, and others. But take caution – this has ended badly before…
Why Average Life Expectancy Is Deceptive
When I start working on a financial plan, I sometimes joke “And when would you like to die?” It’s a bad joke that rarely gets a sympathy laugh.
But when we’re planning for a lifetime, we have to make an educated guess on when that life might end. I often get pushback when I suggest as late as age 90 or 95. But average life expectancy can be deceiving…
Why Losing Feels Worse Than Gaining Feels Good
This idea that we feel losses more than we feel gains is commonly referred to as “loss aversion.” Renowned Psychology and Economist Daniel Kahneman says “losses loom larger than gains.”
Here are a few real-world examples…
Why Picking Stocks Is So Difficult
Very few businesses will survive over a lifetime and yet Warren Buffet says that “Benign neglect, bordering on sloth, remains the hallmark of our investment process.”
I wrote recently about how owners of Amazon had to experience a 90%+ decline in order to get the tremendous returns they did.
The only way I could have held a stock down 90% would have been to completely ignore it as Buffet advises. Otherwise, I’m sure I would have thought it was doomed to fail - as is the fate of so many companies.
Cryptocurrency & Railway Mania’s
I was recently reading about the Railway Mania of the mid-1800s in Great Britain and was struck by the similarities between that time period and the expansion of cryptocurrencies, and more broadly blockchain technology, over the past 5 years.
During that time, thousands of tracks were laid as entrepreneurs tried to take advantage of an entirely new technology that promised to change the world. And while it did in fact change the world – there were big winners and big losers along the way…