While I am satisfied with my current investments and have not made any significant changes in several years I do occasionally evaluate alternatives.  I recently read a Morningstar article titled “Top-Performing Stock ETFs of the Quarter”.  Most had higher expenses than I would be comfortable with.  But several were low-cost, including Invesco S&P 500 Momentum ETF SPMO at 0.13% expense.  This ETF tracks the S&P 500 Momentum Index.  This got me looking into what “momentum” investing was all about. 

From the Wall Street Journal this morning: More than 1,000 families have lost a total of at least $190 million in 16 bankruptcies at continuing-care retirement communities since March 2020, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis. Chapter 11 filings rose during the pandemic period primarily because these facilities didn’t have enough new move-ins. And because of the way bankruptcy proceedings work, secured creditors get paid before residents.
I ended my online subscription to the WSJ a few months ago,

A recent Kiplinger article lists ten questions to ask your financial advisor. This one caught my eye.
“6. Check out what car the adviser drives.
Hope that Lamborghini in the parking lot belongs to the doctor next door, not your adviser. A car can indicate how the adviser deals with his or her own money, and that will influence how they will approach managing your investments. “Clients don’t want to see you driving sports cars,” says Richard Rosso,

With passage of the most recent Federal legislation the Congressional Budget Office projects another 3.5 trillion dollars added to the US debt over the next 10 years. The inevitable result of this will be the Federal Reserve having to increase interest rates.
In 2022 this scenario resulted in a bloodbath in my intermediate bond fund. I don’t remember in my copious reading any advanced warnings of prices dropping precipitously as interest rates increased (in fairness I had read about the inverse relationship between prices and yields,

Crab Fishing, cold beer and your portfolio 101
While I was enjoying the simple sight of kids crab fishing at Portballintrae harbour, pondering the wisdom of a cold beer at the boat club, a sailing boat came into the harbour entrance. And just like that, I thought to myself:
A sailing boat is a tiny bit like a financial portfolio. The boat itself acts as the wrapper – your 401(k) or IRA – providing a protective structure.

Perhaps what we should be debating is which is the most important line on the tax return. I can tell you that most would say line 34, “this is the amount you overpaid, or line 37, “this is the amount you owe. I contend line 24 matters most, “this is your total tax”. Rarely, and I mean well under 1% of the time, did a client ask me how much tax they paid. As a matter of fact,

Key Medicare benefits are being stripped away, and patient care is being handed over to profit-driven corporations.

On June 25, 2025, in an unprecedented move, Dr. Mehmet Oz and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), announced that Original Medicare will now require prior authorization for a list of 17 services.
This marks a major shift—and a serious rollback of a key protection retirees have relied on for decades.
What’s Changing?

There is something of a tradition when family is at our place on Cape Cod and it puzzles me. Actually it is picture puzzles. 
A card table is set up and the puzzle pieces laid out. The puzzle is assembled on the three foot square coffee table. The puzzles are 1,000 pieces or more and are photographs of houses, woods, streams with many of the pieces looking very much alike. I guess that why it’s a puzzle.

I belong to a club I never wanted to join: women who have outlived their husbands. Like me, millions of baby boomer women, and now Gen Xers too, will face life without their long-term partner.
Thankfully, today’s widows have more choices than our great-grandmothers did. Some of us embrace living solo. Others are surprised to find companionship again, sometimes even love. That next chapter can be sweet, but it’s also financially complex.
I know this firsthand.

A recent article by Michael Finke in Think Advisor discusses some anecdotal evidence he has been hearing about recent trends in SS claiming. Worry about a reduction in benefits apparently is leading some retirees to claim their benefits earlier than might be expected given their wealth.  I have to admit that this year’s discussions around SS funding and administration have given me pause.
Two things about the article. It was published in a professional journal targeting financial  advisors.

Sometimes, the big picture that frames your life can just happen without much thought, mostly by luck. I guess not everyone who has good fortune like this will admit anything other than hard work and true grit got them to where they are now. Take myself; I claim some credit for what I’ve achieved, but I had a lot of good tailwinds that certainly helped immensely.
I was part of the last UK generation eligible for free higher education.

The recent tax legislation triggered a thought. Do taxpayers understand the difference between their marginal tax rate and effective tax rate?
I see the focus on the tax on the next dollar earned – marginal tax rate as opposed to what I view as actually mattering – the effective tax rate. 
There is a big difference between their two. Are seniors overestimating the net impact on the new $6,000 deduction? 
My associate Gemini explains it like this:

Marginal rate is the speed limit on each segment of a road.

ON DEC. 31, 1759, Arthur Guinness signed a lease to take over a defunct brewery in Dublin. What was unusual was the lease’s term: 9,000 years.
It didn’t take long before Guinness and his landlord both realized they’d made a mistake and agreed to end the lease. Guinness needed more space, and the landlord realized he’d neglected to account for inflation. The rent was fixed at £45 annually for the entire 9,000 years.
The Guinness case is notable because it’s so extreme,

I have been following the passage of the new bill signed today. I thought the deduction was 6K for couples, but it is per person. Here is information on the specifics from an AI source:
The (bill) includes a significant tax break for older Americans, specifically a new $6,000 “bonus” deduction for those 65 and older. This deduction is targeted at those with modified adjusted gross incomes up to $75,000 for individual filers and $150,000 for joint filers.

So, we have signed the contracts. We have advised all our staff. We are talking to our customers every day about the sale, about the new owners and how it will be “business as usual”, how they can expect the same service that they have been used to.
We have already received lots of really positive and quite humbling feedback from our customers. Even those that could be challenging at times have been really generous in their praise and thanks.