WELL......it is really hard work doing nothing. You have to sit there and watch money come and go in your account. You have to sit and watch and listen to all the traders talk about their big trades and profits. It takes a lot of mental energy and toughness to sit and do nothing. I do nothing all the time. I have perfected it.....and....it is an art. Not many people can do it. Tn fact as I type this....I am siting and doing nothing.....and.....I am exhausted.
With inflation being the rage in the news lately.....it seems like the gold and silver commercials are back......again. Nope, Today’s Inflation Doesn’t Call for Gold True inflation hedges don’t fall when inflation accelerates. https://www.fisherinvestments.com/en-us/marketminder/nope-todays-inflation-doesnt-call-for-gold (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "In recent weeks, from Internet banner ads to television commercials to radio and podcast spots, we have heard a clarion call: Put your IRA in gold now to protect against inflation! We are told gold is the only insurance policy against a devaluing dollar. That converting your IRA or 401(k) to store physical gold is wise, low-cost and risk-free—seemingly ignoring that the courts have cracked down severely on the process, costing some people hundreds of thousands of dollars. Aside from the potential costs, low liquidity and other fine points, we see a giant problem with this alleged inflation hedge: It just doesn’t work. As we now know, courtesy of December’s CPI report, US consumer prices rose 7% last year.[ii] For something to work as an inflation hedge, it would have to rise by more than 7%. Global stocks easily fit the bill, returning 21.8% including reinvested dividends. If you are keeping score, that is three times the inflation rate, suggesting real (inflation-adjusted) returns were fine. Gold? Well, gold fell -4.3%. Yes, as the inflation rate hit a 40-year high, gold lost value in absolute terms. Exhibit 1: Gold and Global Stocks in 2021 Source: FactSet, as of 1/14/2022. MSCI World Index return with net dividends and gold price (dollars per troy ounce), 12/31/2020 – 12/31/2021. Indexed to 100 at 12/31/2020. Now, we aren’t arguing this is destined to repeat in 2022. We also happen to think inflation is likely to moderate later this year. That isn’t a political or ideological statement, just an opinion based on our analysis of inflation’s causes and how the calculation works. But let us be clear: Anyone selling you gold as an inflation hedge is selling you snake oil.[iii] A reliable inflation hedge should be able to prove its power on a repeatable basis, especially at times when everyone fears inflation—as they did last year. If you can’t count on gold in that environment, when can you?" MY COMMENT I like to own a little gold and sliver.......but.....just for fun. I dont consider it an investment or a hedge against inflation. It just sits and does........yes....nothing.
I remember when Hedge Funds first came out. they were the investment vehicle of the RICH and regular people envied them being able to invest in those funds. NOW......who cares......they are often simply a vehicle to achieve lagging returns with extremely high fees. Top hedge funds earn record $65.4B for clients in 2021 - LCH data As a group, the most successful managers earned more than one third of the $176 billion that all hedge funds made last year, LCH Investments reported https://www.foxbusiness.com/financi...-record-65-4-bln-for-clients-in-2021-lch-data (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "BOSTON - The world's 20 best-performing hedge funds earned $65.4 billion for clients in 2021, setting a new record as stock markets marched higher despite rising prices and coronavirus cases, LCH Investments data show. As a group, the most successful managers earned more than one third of the $176 billion that all hedge funds made last year, LCH Investments, a fund of funds firm that tracks returns and is part of Edmond de Rothschild group, reported. The top 20, including brand-name investment firms TCI Fund Management and Citadel, returned an average 10.5% and jointly managed nearly one fifth of the industry's $3.6 trillion in assets, the data show. Their returns, however, lagged broader stock market gains. The best performers in 2021 topped the $63.5 billion they made in 2020 and 2019's $59.3 billion, despite the Delta and Omicron coronavirus variants and fears the U.S. Federal Reserve will soon have to raise interest rates to tackle spiking prices. "The net gains generated by the top 20 managers for their investors ... were the highest ever," topping 2020's gains which also set a record, Rick Sopher, LCH's chairman said. There was a shake-up among the very best performers in 2021 as Chris Hohn's TCI Fund Management earned $9.5 billion and Ken Griffin's Citadel made $8.2 billion for investors to rank as the top two. 2020's breakout winner, Chase Coleman's Tiger Global, which earned $10.4 billion in 2020, posted losses of $1.5 billion in 2021, the data show. Israel Englander's Millennium, which also ranked at the top of the list in 2020 with a $10.2 billion gain, posted a $6.4 billion gain in 2021. Ray Dalio's Bridgewater, the world's biggest hedge fund, snapped back after a disappointing year of losses in 2020 with a$5.7 billion gain in 2021, the data show. Daniel Loeb's Third Point, which pursues a range of strategies including activist investing, broke into the top twenty in 2021 with a gain of $3.3 billion. Representatives for the hedge funds declined to comment. Even though many firms earned billions, stock oriented hedge funds largely lagged the broader stock market S&P 500 index' 27% gain in 2021. They "generally did not fully capture the spectacular returns available in equity markets," Sopher said, adding "their low net exposure and a difficult environment for short selling limited their returns."" MY COMMENT TYPICAL........I would simply invest in the SP500 before I would EVER put money into a Hedge fund. Few if any of them can beat the SP500. The fees they take are OUTRAGEOUS for their performance record. Most of us on here.......simple long term investors.....probably beat the returns of the Hedge Fund GENIUSES most years. I know most of us did last year.
It's on days like these that I remember singing songs and drinking wine while your eyes played games with mine. So, yeah. Doing pretty well today.
So many of them are. People from my generation, also lazy. I believe the ratio of lazy People was a bit lower but still far from great.
Baby Boomers....born from 1946 to 1964. The early Boomers are far from lazy......those from 1946 to about 1956. The later ones are very different. The EARLY Baby Boomers lived their formative younger years to about age 10 or 12....during the 1950's. The later Baby Boomers lived their formative early years to about age 10 or 12....mostly during the 1960's, Things were much more permissive during that time span compared to the 1950's.
Agreed. I conflated boomers with millenials. I'm a GenX'er. Barely. Consider me a Boomer light. Perhaps the point I was trying to make is there aren't a ton of good workers my age, or any age. The ratios are going from low to extreme low and that causes viability issues for corporations.
Yeah....the deeper you get into the generations that were raised TOTALLY with computers and the internet.........the more different......workers get. Add in those raised with lifelong cell phones, social media, and the internet.....and you have a whole bunch of very different people.....at least until they have kids. I notice that once younger people have kids their ideas and thinking seems to change......some.....not a lot....but some. The younger generations are also being changed by working at tech and other companies that are very short on older people. In my generation once you got into a job....you were surrounded by older people and you did not see differences based on age.....everyone over about age 26 to 28 was about the same on the job. You leaned a lot from the older, more experienced, workers around you. Now in many businesses.......there are very few older workers. So.....there is a big lack of institutional knowledge and work culture. I am glad that I am no longer a business owner. Although....I did not hire a lot of people because my workers stayed around for a long time. I was way ahead of my time with things like job sharing and other policies that I learned in my business classes. All workers got a one month pay bonus at Christmas. I also set up my pension plan to make all current workers fully vested immediately and new workers fully vested after only one year....something very few employers did. When I did need to hire.....I had my current workers find people for me. So.......many of my workers were acquainted with each other through family, church, or friendship. I believe that sort of hiring got me better workers in general because of the social pressure and peer pressure of them being interconnected off the job. In fact.......when I think back.....every person I ever hired was referred to me by an existing worker. They took care of me and I took care of them. When I closed my business I gave every person working there one year salary and through my connections found a job for everyone that wanted one. I take pride in the fact that every person went right into another equal or better job and did not have to use that one year BONUS severance pay. Of course.....that was the OLD DAYS. (I closed down in 1999...I started as a business owner in 1978)
For tomorrow: Earnings season in full swing, Fed blackout period: What to know this week https://finance.yahoo.com/news/earn...-period-what-to-know-this-week-163248002.html (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "Earnings season is heating up this week. Even with one fewer trading day as markets are closed in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day Monday, investors will come back from the holiday weekend to a prolific lineup of fourth quarter reports from market heavyweights such as Goldman Sachs (GS), Proctor & Gamble (PG), Netflix (NFLX) and United Airlines (UAL). The period kicked off in earnest last week with lackluster results from major U.S. banks. JPMorgan (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC), and Citigroup (C) were among the financial forms posting less-than-impressive results that dragged on Wall Street and tempered expectations for a strong start to the earnings season. As fourth quarter earnings reports pick up speed, investors will shift their focus from monetary policy to look for signs of relief in company profits and other corporate metrics after economic uncertainty and worries around the Federal Reserve’s pace of interest rate hikes have weighed heavily on markets to start the new year. The S&P 500 is down 2.79% in 2022 so far, while the Dow has lost 1.84%. The Nasdaq has shed a whopping -5.93% year-to-date, with more than one third of companies in the index at least 50% from their 52-week highs, according to Bloomberg data. “We’ll have to see if earnings season comes to the rescue once again,” Ed Clissold, chief U.S. strategist at Ned Davis, told Bloomberg earlier this week. “Still, earnings revisions over the past several weeks weren’t as strong as other pre-announcement periods last year, which leads us to believe that we may not get those fantastic beat rates.” In the energy and industrials sector, which typically serves as a key driver in fourth quarter results, underlying fundamentals may lack the strength to power markets this earnings season, PNC chief investment officer Amanda Agati told Yahoo Finance Live. “Investors need to be starting to set their expectations a bit lower,” she said. “Not necessarily bearish, but we do think the moderation in terms of growth not only for earnings season going forward, but also for economic growth is really going to be a dominant theme." S&P 500 earnings in aggregate were expected to grow 21.7% for the fourth-quarter of 2021, according to recent data from FactSet Research vice president and senior earnings analyst John Butters. That figure would mark a fourth consecutive quarter that earnings growth tops 20%. Industry experts have previously predicted companies in the S&P 500 will report record-high earnings per share in 2022. Butters has pointed out that the bottom-up EPS estimate for the S&P 500 was $222.32 as of last month. If the forecast meets expectations, this would be the highest annual EPS number for the index since FactSet began tracking this metric in 1996. FactSet reported that, on average, analysts have overestimated the final EPS number by 7.2%. Even taking the overestimation into account, the final EPS value of $206.32 for 2022 would still beat previous records. The bottom-up EPS estimate for the S&P 500 is $222.32, a figure that would mark the highest on record, according to FactSet data. Continued signs of Omicron’s economic impact and increasing indication by the Federal Reserve that it will intervene more aggressively to curb rising inflation, however, continue to dampen the outlook for 2022. “Our expectation is that we're going to have a very solid and robust earnings season,” Schwab Asset Management CEO and CIO Omar Aguilar, though adding that the coming quarters may reflect the toll of Omicron more heavily than fourth quarter numbers. “That being said, we expect the earnings to continue to decelerate — still very robust and in a good place as companies continue to drive to generate free cash flow and generate business,” but we will hear a lot about supply chain disruptions and the potential higher costs in these sectors that may have been transitioned to consumers. "I think what investors are really focused on is what are these CEOs going to say about two primary things, number one being inflation," TD Ameritrade Chief Market Strategist JJ Kinahan told Yahoo Finance Live. "For the financials, it'll probably be more wage inflation and their ability to retain workers and pay up... and then on the other end of that, for the non-financials, perhaps it's more of whether they can go through supply chain issues, because of COVID or because of the cost of inflation, to deliver goods to their end customers." Meanwhile in Washington, Fed policymakers will enter a blackout period this week ahead of the Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) next meeting on Jan. 26. The central bank has been top of mind for investors bracing for interest rate increases and tighter financial conditions that could come as soon as March. In confirmation hearings last week, Fed officials have doubled down on earlier assertions that the central bank is prepared to mitigate inflation through higher interest rates. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell told Congress Tuesday that if the pace of price increases does not settle, policymakers will get more aggressive with raising short-term borrowing costs. In a separate hearing on Thursday, Fed governor and vice chair nominee Lael Brainard pledged to use that "powerful tool" — the central bank's benchmark for short-term interest rates called the federal funds rate — to bring inflation down over time. Economic calendar Monday: Markets closed in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day; No economic reports scheduled for release Tuesday: Empire Manufacturing, January (25 expected, 31.9 prior); NAHB Housing Market Index, January (84 expected, 84 prior); Net Long-Term TIC Flows, November ($7,100,000,000 prior); Total Net TIC Flows, November ($143,000,000,000 prior) Wednesday: MBA Mortgage Applications, week ended January 14 (1.4% during prior week); Building Permits, December (1,700,000 expected, 1,712,000 during prior month, upwardly revised to 1,717,000); Building Permits, month-over-month, December (-1.0% expected, 3.6% during prior month, upwardly revised to 3.9%); Housing Starts, December (1,650,000 expected, 1,679,000 during prior month); Housing Starts, month over month, December (-1.7% expected, 11.8% during prior month) Thursday: Initial Jobless Claims, week ended January 15 (220,000 expected, 230,000 during prior week) Continuing Claims, week ended January 15 (1,521,000 expected, 1,559,000 prior week); Philadelphia Fed Business Outlook, January (19.8 expected, 15.4 prior); Existing Home Sales, December (6,410,000 expected, 6,460,000 during prior month); Existing Home Sales, month over month, December (-0.8% expected, 1.9% during prior month); Friday: Leading Index, December (0.8% expected, 1.1% prior) Earnings: Monday: Markets closed in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day; No reports scheduled for release Tuesday: Goldman Sachs (GS) before market open, PNC Bank (PNC) before market open, Bank of New York Mellon (BK) and Truist Financial (TFC) before market open; Interactive Brokers (IBKR), Hunt Transport (JBHT) after market close Wednesday: Bank of America (BAC) before market open, Charles Schwab (SCHW), Procter & Gamble (PG) before market open, United Health (UNH) before market open, Morgan Stanley (MS) before market open, United Airlines (UAL) after market close, Discover Financial (DFS) after market close, State Street (STT) before market open, Comerica (CMA) before market open, Citrix Systems (CTXS) Thursday: Travelers (TRV) and American Airlines (AAL) and Northern Trust (NTRS) before market open; Netflix (NFLX) at market close Friday: Schlumberger (SLB), Ally Financial (ALLY)" MY COMMENT The BIG factor for gains will.....as usual....be the forward looking statements in the earnings reports. Plus the markets will continue the multi-year trend of discounting good or even great earnings by focusing on some esoteric little bit of data or comment in a report. In the end....contrary to expectations....I do expect a GREAT earnings season on whole.
OBVIOUSLY I am not a fan of the IRS and the...way beyond normal.....INCOMPETENCE they have shown over the past couple of years. Massive IRS backlog triggers premature collection notices IRS sent tens of millions of notices to taxpayers in 2021 https://www.foxbusiness.com/money/irs-backlog-premature-collection (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "The Internal Revenue Service is prematurely sending some Americans collection notices even though they filed their returns, as the agency works to wade through a deluge of unprocessed returns from years past. That's according to a report from National Taxpayer Advocate Erin Collins, who warned that the IRS took too long to process taxpayer responses to its notices, further delaying refunds and in some instances, leading to premature collection notices – an occurrence that prematurely hurts low-income Americans. The IRS sent tens of millions of notices to taxpayers in 2021, including 14 million math error notices, automated underreported notices (where an amount reported on a tax return did not match the corresponding amount reported to the IRS on Form 1099), notices requesting a taxpayer to authenticate his or her identity and collection notices. In many cases, taxpayer responses were required; if individuals failed to respond – or they did and the IRS failed to process it due to the severe backlog – it could "take adverse action or not release the refund claimed on the tax return," Collins wrote. The problem is that many taxpayers did respond to the notices from the IRS, but the agency was so overwhelmed by the millions of unprocessed returns that it was still working through, that it did not process those responses. While the "normal" processing time for the agency is typically 45 days, Collins estimated that it's actually running close to six months or longer. To prevent enforcement actions before the IRS had adequate time to process taxpayer responses, the agency reprogrammed its computer systems. But there are gaps, Collins said. The IRS has a backlog of nearly 5 million pieces of taxpayer correspondence, some of which are from April. If the IRS is mistaken, taxpayers will not owe any additional dues, penalties or interest. But it can still create a complicated resolution process. "Like return processing delays, correspondence processing delays can harm taxpayers," the report said. "In cases where the IRS is holding a refund until it receives a taxpayer response, correspondence processing delays mean refund delays." The difficulty this season – which officially begins Jan. 24 – stems from a massive pileup of unprocessed returns accrued during the pandemic: Collins estimated the IRS had a backlog of more than 8.6 million unprocessed individual income tax returns and 2.8 million business returns as of mid-December due to the pandemic and other related disruptions. It also had close to 5 million pieces of unanswered mail. By comparison, the IRS usually enters the tax-filing season with fewer than 1 million remaining items to address. There are several reasons for the delays. The IRS was grappling with office closures as well as the Herculean task of delivering millions of stimulus checks in 2020 and 2021, all while trying to adapt to major changes to the tax code in the middle of the filing season. The agency is also grossly understaffed; it has 20,000 fewer staff than it did in 2010, and its budget is roughly $11.4 billion – 20% less than it was in 2010, when adjusted for inflation, according to the Congressional Budget Office. On top of that, more than 20% of the IRS customer service workforce has been unable to work for pandemic-related health reasons over the last two years. "The IRS is in crisis and needs to apply resources to its core mission – processing returns and paying the corresponding refunds," the report said." MY COMMENT As I have mentioned a few times....my 2020 return is caught up in their backlog of INCOMPETENCE. Their official position is that there is no record of me having ever filed a return. Luckily I have my canceled check for what I owed them......and from talking to a lady at the IRS.....that "no record of return being filed"......means that I am in the massive backlog. I have very strong feelings that the IRS will NEVER get caught back up and the backlog will continue to grow every year. Between incompetence and their employee attitudes as government workers in a totally dysfunctional agency dealing with an ANGRY public.....it is HOPELESS that they will catch up.
LOL......perhaps I was psychic in posting the above post about government incompetence. NO.....my tax return is still caught up in the backlog. BUT....I MAY have won my appeal that I filed with Social Security over them using my 2019....rather than my unprocessed 2020 return....to figure my "extra" medicare and drug coverage premiums. Starting at age 59.5 and on into my retirement I very carefully executed a plan to use up ALL my retirement accounts that would be taxed as regular income....by age 70. I carefully set up my retirement spending and income so that when my income annuities kicked in at age 70..... I would.....for tax purposes....show a much lower income. As a result......in 2020 I cut my income tax obligation by 80-90%. That meant that Social Security starting in year 2022 would be taking ZERO "extra" premiums for medicare or drug coverage. The IRS backlog screwed me on this plan.....since my 2020 return was not processed yet and not reported to Social Security. So.....they calculated my Medicare and Drug premiums for 2022 using my old 2019 return, with much higher income levels. After I put up the above post on the IRS.....I looked at our bank account. There I saw a deposit from Social Security in my wife's name for an additional $51.20. That is the exact amount of the extra drug premium. SO....I am thinking that I WON my Social Security Appeal and they have now refunded the extra drug premium that was taken out of my wife's benefit.......and........I will see them refund the extra Medicare Premium some time over the next couple of days. Between the two of us......if my thinking is correct......this will mean an additional $7773.60....that we will get from Social Security this year. I will HOPEFULLY get something in the mail from Social Security some time over the next week or two VERIFYING that I did WIN my appeal.
I hope I am not celebrating prematurely. HELL YEAH......free government money. Although in reality it is......IN FACT......my own money being refunded. BUT....it STILL feels like FREE MONEY. Since that is about as close as it gets for me to receive free government money.....I will take it.
I just found out, one of my companies cut the dividend by 75% in December and I didn't notice. This month they bumped it a bit but still less than half the November distribution. Next month will be the same as this month. No idea, after that. All part of an acquisition, apparently. I spent the day on the beach in Mexico. Have been here a while and won't be returning home, any time soon. If one of my companies wants to stump up some cash and buy another company, I'm smooth with that. My whole portfolio is pretty hands off, by now. I wouldn't own them if I didn't trust management.
