Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffet, released his annual letter to shareholders on February 23rd, 2019.
While the entire 15-page letter is great reading for all investors, here are a few snippets to incorporate into how you think about investing (and maybe even your life). Here’s the link to the full letter: http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/2018ltr.pdf
As a business owner, you have invested a great deal of time and effort into building your company over the years. You know the amount of planning needed to maintain daily operations and grow your business. Now, you may be ready for retirement. But, the planning does not end. What you do next, and how you navigate potential tax issues and regulatory pitfalls, can make a big difference in the long-term success of your retirement.
Preparing a child for college may be a rewarding, but worrisome, time for you and your family. Although you know that an education is “priceless” you cannot help but notice how large the price tag actually is. This may leave you with many questions regarding college financing for your child. The U.S. government has established an Internet resource for such a need. The website, https://www.ed.gov/college , gives information on college costs, and you can even apply for financial aid online.
After years of saving and planning for their golden years, many people nearing retirement fail to consider the tax burden they may face on income they receive after they stop working. While you may see a reduction in the amount of taxes you owe after the age of 65, you still need to plan ahead if you want to minimize your tax bill from the IRS.
The belief that you, or a particularly talented financial manager, can foresee the direction of the stock market is a seductive one. Some investors are confident that, with proper research, they can make money by snapping up equities when prices are low, and shifting their investments into cash or bonds when the market hits its peak. Even worse, they believe they can pay someone else can do it for them. But longitudinal studies have shown time and time again that no one can consistently predict the direction of the market in the short run.
As 2019 approaches, and with US stocks outperforming non-US stocks in recent years, some investors have again turned their attention towards the role that global diversification plays in their portfolios. For the five-year period ending October 31, 2018, the S&P 500 Index had an annualized return of 11.34% while the MSCI World ex USA Index returned 1.86%, and the MSCI Emerging Markets Index returned 0.78%. As US stocks have outperformed international and emerging markets stocks over the last several years, some investors might be reconsidering the benefits of investing outside the US.
In October, the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College published a research paper showing how policies in the Netherlands that delay retirement can increase longevity, especially for men. The working paper, “How Does Delayed Retirement Affect Mortality and Health?” was written by research economists Alice Zulkarnain and Matthew S. Rutledge. The authors observed that older Americans have been retiring later for a number of reasons, including because work is becoming less physically demanding, employers have shifted from defined benefit to defined contribution pensions, and Social Security’s incentives are changing. The researchers cautioned, however, that understanding the implications of working longer for mortality and health is complicated, because people who are healthier tend to work longer than people who are less healthy.
Seth Godin recently wrote a book entitled This Is Marketing and these are the 5 things that I really liked from reading it. I’ve paraphrased from the book my 5 subtitles.
My mission is to help 80 households be more generous over their lifetime. And that’s it.
What’s a household? Partly it’s a way for me to measure how many people I’m helping. So it’s a family, a unit, it could be a husband and wife and their kids. Or, it could be an individual whose committed to the process of working together to make wise financial decisions.
Why just 80 clients?
