There has been much discussion about what period in the past our capital markets resemble. Is it 1987, a period of  rising rates in the Spring, currency misstatements, and a giant controversial tax act that led to a crash in October? Is it 1973-74, where the resignation of a President, a tripling of oil prices [...]

Late last year, I predicted in September that 2013 and 2014 would the year of the buyout and to prepare for it by brushing up how to use social media to track job changers .  ERISA provides substantial benefits having been enacted in 1974 to protect against employer abuses of defined benefit pension plans. For [...]

If you put a group of 60 year old chronologically gifted, calendar endowed wise advisers in a room and asked them about using their planner website as a marketing tool along with social media, there would be some saber rattling about its effectiveness.  Apparently not even with the leader of the Catholic Church bowing out [...]

I am reminded about the chiropractor who adjusted the backbones of an avid but duffer golfer. After the crack in the back, the patient asked the doctor if he felt the relief would help his game. The chiropractor answered the patient, Joe, “I can heal the sick but I can’t raise the dead.”   After [...]

The most widely followed stock index in the world is the Standard and Poor’s 500, a capitalization- weighted index followed from sea to shining sea and around the Globe from Wall Street to Wallyworld.  It covers a wide variety of companies from Apple to Big Lots.  It is still after 18 years, by far the [...]

In a world that is challenging to find assets that zig while others zag, Real Estate Investment Trusts or REITS,  have provided an effective way to invest in the housing and commercial property recovery while outperforming the broader equity market, and the S&P 500 index the last 4 years. The performance of REITS have been significantly [...]

With BNP Paribas upgrading AVIVA, it’s beginning to appear that analysts are beginning to see rreal value in Private Equity’s entrance into the Annuity Industry. I am reminded, however, that their estimates of hidden value are like a bikini. What they reveal is important. What they conceal is vital. As AVIVA’s U.S. operations are divested [...]

According to Carmine Gallo, author of Presentation secrets of Steve Jobs, people retain about 10 percent of your yellow pad presentation but when you add stories and imagery, the client retains an incredible 65%! The three critical phases of lifetime retirement and income planning, accumulation, consolidation and distribution encompass our lifetime if we are blessed [...]

It follows that if what goes up must come down then what goes down, like interest rates and market volatility over the last 14 months, must go up like interest rates at banks and insurance companies will be going up soon, right?  Not likely, as both sectors see perfect opportunities to expand compressed margins with [...]

Now that the recent merger and acquisition activity over the last week shows that banks are beginning to loosen up their vaults a little bit. The old saying that a banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining and wants it back the minute it begins to rain. Now [...]