Shadow banking is back. A constellation of less-regulated intermediaries — from insurers to private investment funds — is increasingly taking on the traditional business of banks, making trillions of dollars in risky loans and occupying a central role in the economy.
The consumer price data last week showed a gradual deceleration in housing inflation. Economists expect this will persist for a while as official statistics slowly catch up to moderating market rents.
Losing a sale comes not from failing to educate your prospect on the complexities of their situation. It comes from failing to simplify their problem.
In this article, I summarize some of the most common mistakes I come across when reviewing client agreements and how such mistakes can cost an advisor.
In many ways, the journey involved with reaching the summit of Mount Everest parallels the journey to a secure retirement.
Relative to 18 developed economies since 1870, U.S. leverage is high though not unprecedented. However, unless the recent rise in interest rates reverses, the U.S. will need to cut its debt load.
A global bond rally ignited by signs that inflation in the world’s largest economy is finally slowing once again faces a reality check this week.
When US markets reopen next Tuesday after the long weekend, everything will likely seem normal. It’s only after the close and in the following days that any cracks are expected to appear.
When Thomas Edison wired his own house in Menlo Park, then a tiny village in New Jersey, he fabricated a primitive cable. As insulation he chose a mix of asphalt, linseed oil and beeswax; for the core, copper wire.
Retirement is expensive. If you’re lucky, yours will last a few decades, and you’ll be earning no or very little income. So if you want to have enough money when you retire, you basically have three options: Save more, take more risk with your investments, or work longer.
Geography, it’s often said, is destiny. The paths nations follow though history are written like a script on the patterns of their rocks, rivers, plains and coasts, in ways that often confound the views of the people who inhabit them. It’s rare for a country to escape that geological fate.
One of Wall Street’s most prominent bears has just turned positive on the outlook for US stocks.
Like clockwork, the commodities market worries in May about the strength of oil demand heading into the northern hemisphere summer holiday. Nervousness about the seasonal pickup in oil consumption abounds.
High fees are the main reason the Bridgewater fund and the other hedge funds using a risk-parity strategy performed so badly. Their underperformance relative to the 60/40 index portfolio amounted to about three percent annually. Of that three percent about two percent went to fees and other compensation.
JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s asset management arm has created a new European money market fund focused on public debt, a kind of investment that largely disappeared when interest rates were negative.
Hopes for regime change in Venezuela have surged in recent weeks, the result of a coalescing political opposition and apparent divisions within President Nicolás Maduro’s ruling socialist party ahead of July 28 elections.
The fortunes of Silicon Valley startups rose and fell together like never before in recent years. Partly that was due to the indiscriminate tidal wave of money that washed through venture capital, but it’s also because many business-to-business software startups are closely connected as each other’s customers.
When it comes to Bitcoin ETFs, it’s not just the retail trading crowd that’s taking the plunge. It’s now clear that hedge funds, pension funds and banks have also sprinkled capital into the exchange-traded funds after their blockbuster debut that was more than a decade in the making.
Billionaire investor David Tepper loaded up on beaten-down Chinese stocks last quarter while reducing stakes in high-flying US tech firms, leading hedge fund managers who are slowly warming up to China amid a record gap in valuations between the two markets.
Bitcoin was lumped in with other speculative investments during the run-up of the Federal Reserve’s last tightening cycle, slumping on expectations higher interest rates would damp the appetite for risk.
It’s been close to two years since the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau indicated it was looking to tighten regulations on popular “buy now, pay later” services. Since then, the sector has grown to $300 billion.
Most people have seen robots in human form. The Hollywood version has starred in movies for decades. Now there are videos on the internet of real bipedal robots, whether it’s Elon Musk’s Optimus or the incredibly flexible two-legged robot from Boston Dynamics. Agility Robotics has one with legs that bend back at the knees like a flamingo.
For more than two decades, a simple handshake has shaped how people find information online. It works like this: Websites allow Google’s web crawler to index their content so it can appear in search results.
Everyone is worried about the excessively high level of US government debt. Everyone, that is, except America’s creditors.
The rise of electronic trading and growing popularity of portfolio trading has had an unintended consequence for the US corporate bond market: making private credit even more attractive.
BlackRock Inc.’s Rick Rieder has some advice that bucks conventional wisdom: The best way for the Federal Reserve to temper inflation will be to lower rates, not hold them higher.
This week’s meme-stock pop is a sign that US equity markets are frothy and potentially peaking, according to the latest Bloomberg Markets Live Pulse survey.
Gold’s record-setting rally may have captured the headlines this year, but it’s silver that’s running harder and faster as the less glamorous metal benefits from robust financial and industrial demand.
Huge news from the markets today: The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit 40,000 points for the first time. The number is splashed across financial news sources the world over (including Bloomberg), even though the index closed back below the threshold by the end of trading.
The JPMorgan Chase & Co. chief executive officer said significant price pressures are still influencing the US economy and may mean interest rates will be higher for longer than many investors are expecting. Dimon cited costs linked to the green economy, re-militarization, infrastructure spending, trade disputes and large fiscal deficits.
New US home construction rose by less than forecast in April and permits for new activity dropped, suggesting the recent rise in mortgage rates is giving builders pause.
There was white smoke over the Bureau of Labor Statistics, sort of, on Wednesday morning. The key measures of consumer price inflation for April confirmed expectations for a slight decline, and alleviated growing anxiety over a possible reacceleration. Risk assets across the world spent the rest of the day exhaling deeply.
Active exchange-traded funds have seen record inflows in recent years, taking assets under management to $630 billion.
Aside from the big box bloodbath of 2022, when an abrupt halt in buying left Walmart Inc. sitting on too many sweatpants and patio sets, the world’s biggest retailer has been one of the beneficiaries from inflation.
The most important thing when it comes to managing your time, priorities and life is to get your priorities straight in the first place. It can be helpful to think in categories: work, family, spiritual, health, charitable inclinations and so on.
Despite the availability of advance directives, many patients still receive aggressive, life-sustaining interventions that may not align with their preferences or improve their quality of life.
As artificial intelligence rolls out around the globe, will it drive inflation or deflation? The answer is both — one and then the other, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s new global co-heads of sales and research.
Time and again, Jerome Powell has made it clear. Financial conditions, the Federal Reserve’s key lever for cooling the US economy, are tight.
A measure of underlying US inflation cooled in April for the first time in six months, a small step in the right direction for Federal Reserve officials looking to start cutting interest rates this year.
Here are the key takeaways from the US CPI report for April released Wednesday.
An unfortunate byproduct of the dollar’s unexpected surge has been the revival of a bogey that just won’t die: currency wars. The phrase gets thrown about during periods of dislocation in the foreign-exchange market and has the beauty of meaning whatever the person who utters it desires.
Our holiday from history has come to an end. I am referring not to world peace but to the zero-interest-rate environment so many people expected would last forever.
Wealthier is the ultimate investing playbook, revealing the not-so-secret “secrets” of the financial advisory community and equipping investors with all the tools they need to effectively invest on their own.
Can artificial intelligence help you have stronger, more authentic relationships with human clients?
The generational wealth transfer is the mountain range on our horizon, likely dominating the landscape for much of our careers. Yet many firms struggle to move from acknowledgement to action.
With such colossal wealth in play, the demand for financial advisors equipped with the expertise to navigate the complex terrain of tax planning and wealth management optimization strategies has never been more vital.
How much do you pay every month for invisible stuff you don’t use? I’m referring to subscriptions or memberships for things like music streaming, movies, software, magazines, gyms, shopping clubs, and other services or online resources you may have forgotten about.
In this article, I highlight five important steps firms looking to purchase an RIA can take to achieve their goals. For a step-by-step guide to buying an RIA.
Alphabet Inc.’s recent results raised hopes that the Google parent can still be a big player in artificial intelligence. Now it has a chance to prove it.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the US central bank needs to be patient as it awaits more evidence that high interest rates are curbing inflation, doubling-down on the need to keep borrowing costs elevated.
