Memorial
to all those who gave it all so we could see Congress avoid doing its job
Graduation gift that lasts a lifetime
Show your teen the easy way to compound their money to a $million tax-FREE fund. Make sure you teach your kids how to create wealth the easy way. My parents were not investors. At my first job, I had no clue which investment option to use for my 401k contribution and company match. The HR person told me to put it into the “safe” stable value fund. That was the worst choice at my age I learned later when I got my securities licenses. If I had followed their advice I would have ended up with about $150,000 instead of a Wealth Reserve of $877,233 about 33 years later. I have used this 'Wealth Reserve' as I call it to have funds to buy low-cost insurance, to help buy two homes and 5 cars with higher down payments or cash, and now to receive $2,900 a month in retirement supplement. Now your child can build an account that provides tax-FREE education and retirement income too. The stock market provides about 11% a year over time: double your money every 7-9 years. Only the buy and hold strategy works; market timing pays the advisor/broker’s fees.
Time is on their side: https://www.amazon.com/Give-your-child-leg-up-manage/dp/1096505355
Why use a simple
low-cost 500 index fund?
The best retirement
outcomes seem to be a fund that provides 1, 3, 5, 10, 15 year returns near 10%:
8.71, 14.08, 10.90, 11.64, 9.53. Many advisors and fund managers would be
happy with this outcome for their fees. Unfortunately, they can’t work for
nothing. Their firm needs your money too. Some
of us put our long-term retirement money in this kind of index fund because
we learned the hard way that advisor costs reduce our gains dollar for dollar.
If the advisor takes their annual percent of your portfolio plus buys and sells
securities for your account, they will take more of your money. Studies show
that over time ‘managed’
equity accounts only produce 3.79% annually vs 11% from a low-cost S&P
500 fund. You can see that you will have a hard time reaching your retirement
fund goal using an advisor. Less than 10% of Americans are taking advice from a
financial advisor and for good reason. Some give the advisor a small portion of
our portfolio to see if they can find the ‘needle in the haystack,’ a huge hit.
The money the advisor takes in fees and trades may pay for their advice.
However, remember that advisors are employed to make their firms money not to make you rich. Their legal
standard of conduct is to “act in investor’s best interest.” However, if
they really did that they would put every client into a low-cost market index
fund. The
advisor and firm would be out of business in a month.
Pay less keep more: https://www.amazon.com/New-American-Retirement-System-ReserveTM/dp/1461030072
Are “interval funds”
right for you?
With high interest
rates and volatile equity markets roiling portfolios, allocations are shifting
with cash, fixed income, private credit and other alternatives. As credit
conditions tighten, alts look very attractive. It’s a trend that could
accelerate further with the rising popularity of “interval
funds.” An interval fund is a type of Investment Company that
periodically offers to repurchase its shares from shareholders. That is, the
fund periodically offers to buy back a stated portion of its shares from
shareholders. Shareholders are not required to accept these offers and sell
their shares back to the fund. High yields are the main reason
investors are attracted to interval funds. Because of the restricted selling
opportunities, an interval fund should
be considered a long-term, mostly illiquid investment. Minimum
investments are often between $10,000 and $25,000 and have expense
ratios as high as 3%. These are very expensive “bond” funds. If you
have not been paying attention, low-cost
equity funds are up over 9% so far this year. Volatility creates value for
“long-term mostly illiquid” investors. “Intervals” are how advisors make their
money; not yours. Ignore the “noise”
that feeds financial firms. Study: when investors believe prices are bound to
fall, markets
actually reward the brave.
https://www.amazon.com/You-Can-Beat-Wall-Street-professionals/dp/1986031373
Best investment
strategy
Dollar-cost
averaging: buy more when price is low and buy less when price is high. The logic
of this approach appeals to long-term investors as they say, aha! Studies
show that DCA works best using the power of compounding—you are not buying and
selling. This strategy may
help more women feel comfortable investing since you don’t have to “bet the
ranch” on one tip to create a great retirement fund. Vanguard
research shows that the same process and logic that investors instinctively
use to choose everything from a toaster to a surgeon simply doesn’t
work when it comes to the investment markets. Buying the BEST funds over
the past 1, 3, 5 years usually
means your choices will under perform in the next few years. Diversification is
probably a necessary evil. But by sticking with the same diversified
funds—buying more when the price is low—assures you of picking up bargains for
the next cycle. The only way to make sure you follow the strategy is to
have your mutual fund trustee debit your checking account on the same day every
month automatically.
https://www.amazon.com/Money-Ball-Investing-Winning-unfair/dp/1548831409
Use your Social
Security supplement
In case Treasury
holds your benefit in June, use your emergency SS supplement for at least part
of the missed income. The last time this political game happened, readers asked
me how we can prepare for next time. Since Congress and the president get paid
no matter what they decide, I told them to act now to build a Build Your Own “Lifestyle” Security Fund.
Most retirees tell me that they wish they had a supplement fund so they felt
more secure in retirement emergencies. What is this fund? Social
Security will exhaust its funds in about 2034. Most workers retire with
less than $100,000 for retirement. The largest asset owned is a personal
residence. Social Security is the major source of income for retirees. The
average benefit is $1,076 per month--$12,912 a year—less if they started early! Income
taxes will climb because the size of government obligations will never shrink.
Ten years of tax cuts and two wars have to be paid for by someone. 44 million
Americans have pension plans that may be at risk. Why wait for disaster? It is
time for us to build our own financial system.
https://www.amazon.com/Forget-Social-Security-Medicare-Lifestyle/dp/1466394285
?**********ACCOUNTABILITY**************?
Like 1776, this
period is a test
of democracy—We
rejected an "American
fascist" once
The
Path to Dictatorship: 2010-2030
Parallels of this era in the past
may hint at our future: democracy breaks apart legally
Billionaires
paid $881 million for votes in 2022
midterm elections
Nov 2020 Wealthy
discredit election process
Jan
6 2021 Direct
govt overthrow failed: guns
& bombs ready
Trump
engaged in a "criminal
conspiracy" to stop Biden
“I
don’t f—ing care that they have weapons”
Trump was “detached
from reality”
Trump
used mafia-style intimidation on the defenseless
Trump still terrorizing
election woman
Parscale: “a
sitting president asking for civil war.”
Trump:
“Just
say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me”
GOP fascism: “RINO
hunt armed; no bagging limit” J6
comm threat
January
6, 2021 “A
date which will live in infamy”
Trump’s Supremes END
personal rights & state
laws except for weapons
WMDs
Fascism: GOP
to stop women leaving state for abortion
It’s
not a court. It’s a junta: Two Americas
Trump: President
Biden is 'enemy of the state'
Christian
Nationalist Party (CNP) replaces
GOP
Apr 9 Illustrated
Anne Frank book removed by Florida school
Apr 21 Trump: “I
am your justice”
Jan 2025 Dictator
pardons himself: his Supremes agree
How Govt wastes our money:
Media
plays up deficit doomsday routine to create heroic battle for our hearts
and minds
I know why
postage costs up: NJ neighbor sent card 12 Jan; got here 5/22:
Richest
nation in the world wants to stiff us and the rest of the
world: absurd
game
GOP head: Default
could bode “Very Well” for us: seniors, vets, poor pay the price
Uvalde
officers who botched response face few consequences: still in job of
inaction
Deficit solution: stop
overpaying Defense contractors: $ Billions to corp elites
The Supreme Court
just gutted
the Clean Water Act. It could be devastating.
SCAMS/SPINS:
D.C. police arrested, accused of leaking
info to Proud Boys leader: police as terrorists
Terrorist
not TX militia who attacked police in Trump-led govt overthrow gets 5 years
KY
man shot roommate after accusing him of eating the last Hot Pocket
Jones
trying to avoid paying Sandy families for their loss: transfers $billions
to family/friends
School
librarians face a new penalty in the banned-book wars: Prison
FL
‘has become hostile to Black Americans’: NAACP travel warning
FL
school bans poem read at Biden inaugural: 1 parent says: contained
"hate messages" ?
Excessive
and Risky Artery Procedures on Veterans
Hospitals
create own police forces to stem growing violence against staff?
We
skipped medical treatment last year because of costs rose substantially: GOP
to cut benefits
More than 450 IL Catholic
clergy sexually abused nearly 2,000 children: clergy need sex!
Terrorist
failed gov overthrow for Leader Trump: Oath Keepers Rhodes gets 18 years
Most books banned in 37 states were the
result of complaints by just 11 people:
Texas House passes bill to end
diversity, equity and inclusion offices in higher education
Texas
pushes Protestantism into state with bills on school chaplains, Ten
Commandments
Target removing goods anti-gays object to: capitalism
has been captured by prejudice
Fox Fake News: immigrants displacing
veterans from hotel is a lie to hurt most vulnerable.
Fake Celebrity Endorsements: Most don’t use the
thing: Oprah
doesn’t use gummies
Fake
Pentagon explosion spreads: election at
risk by fake candidate shooting/disaster/lies
Scammer AI fake tricks money out of victim by imitating a trusted friend on a video call.
Managers
took $10 million pay to run Republic into bankruptcy: no accountability
Citizens Bank caught
failed to manage customers’ credit card disputes and fraud claims.
Crypto giant Binance caught
commingled customer funds and company revenue
StubHub advertises
ticket prices without 23%+ service fees: only the elites like 1700s
5 financial firms caught
violating your rights and required notices: sloppy work can cost
Ofer Abarbanel CA caught
fraud $16 million: promised safe and liquid investments
Oak
Lane Advisors caught failed to stop $29 million scheme: never invested by
dead broker
Shawn Edward Good NC caught:
stole $7.2 million from clients: promised 10% low-risk
Jobs
My linkedin: ‘You appeared in 17 searches’: many financial services jobs
unfilled
Why
we need immigrants: Some GOP
states want kids in danger, hours, bartenders
The share of foreign-born workers in
the
Who owns your account now?
Can you live on
yield in retirement? Check
what you could receive at least part of time.
529
College Savings Plans: which is best for you? Some have great benefits.
Buying new can be a colossal
waste of money:
Miracles:
Manhattan
is sinking: flooding makes it worse; glaciers raise ocean level: move?
Microsoft signed the
world’s first contract to purchase
fusion-generated electricity
Double
amputee Gurkha veteran reaches summit of Mount Everest
Cost Plus drugs:
Mark Cuban sells some
drugs at 50% off: real or stunt?
12
year-old picks up 5 degrees: going for his pilot
license at age 16.
Wrangler on
horseback lassoes runaway
animal on MI highway: vote for cow
What did Earth’s first animal
look like? Scientists solve 700-million-year-old puzzle
Minnesota Dems won
big and gave
voters what they wanted: schools, abortion, tax credit
Free lighthouses for
the asking/auction: your
dream comes true: CT, RI, MI, etc
@
Our Universe is Mind-Blowing
Light is both
a particle and a wave depending on how we look at the light.
I
don’t think that there is any such thing as a position or a velocity of a
particle.
Everything (galaxies
to stones) in universe made of subatomic
energy ‘vibrations’
A subatomic ‘particle’
is the smallest possible vibration (quantum) of a quantum field.
Mass–energy
equivalence: E=mc^2. At the smallest
level; Everything is moving
Energy into matter: scientists
converted light energy directly into matter in one step
In place of atomic
lattice, light
waves used to create an optical lattice with same geometry
Physics Nobel Prize:
“entanglement” 2
particles share info instantly at a distance
Quantum
mechanics violates local realism: two objects behave as single system at
distance
“It may be that gravity and quantum mechanics are
exactly the same thing,” Leonard Susskind
Gravity
might induce the collapse of quantum vibrations into 1 quantum state—our
world
Strange state
of physics that allows energy
to flow frictionlessly through a material.
Bending light from
extreme gravity reveals largest black hole
so far
Curved
SpaceTime: heavy masses and simultaneously quantum effects become visible
There is no TIME at this
level because of force fields come and go in all directions.
Universe expanding: events
may not come together like they did before: created our time.
Inside protons,
neutrons, it
is the fields of the virtual particles that creates its mass.
Gold
made from neutron stars: collisions produce more neutrons:79 protons,118
neutrons
The proton
is so complicated science still finds new energy entities/forces every
year.
“Empty space is a
boiling, bubbling brew of virtual
particles that pop in and out of existence in a time scale so short that you
can’t even measure them.” Space expanding.
The electricity we use comes
from the field around the wire not from electron itself.
Scientists
build 'baby' wormhole as sci-fi moves closer to fact: inside quantum
computer
starts-with-a-bang/universe-expansion-not-accelerating/
@
We can apply for
Medicare online: https://blog.ssa.gov/apply-for-medicare-online
We can apply for Social
Security online: https://www.ssa.gov/benefits/retirement/
We can apply for
health care online: https://www.healthcare.gov/
IAN
973.746.2014
http://www.theinsidersguides.com/
Alerts available at http://dankeppel.blogspot.com/
