Are you spending like other consumers? Retail sales in the month of October showed an impressive gain of 2.8% compared to last year. With lower gasoline prices, gas stations were a major negative as they declined 7.1% compared to last year. If this group was excluded from the headline number, retail sales would have been up an even more impressive 3.7%. There were several areas of strength as gains were quite broad across various industries, but nonstore retailers, which was up 7.0% and food services and drinking places, which was up 4.3% continued to lead the charge. Interestingly, both furniture and home furnishing stores, which was up 1.5% and building material and garden equipment and supplies dealers, which was up 2.8% showed annual gains for the first time in many months. I wouldn’t necessarily say these categories are particularly strong, but it appears they may have finally bottomed. With that said, I do believe they could be areas of strength in 2025 considering they have both been depressed areas for a couple of years now and I believe people will look towards home improvement next year. Overall, this is further evidence that the consumer remains healthy and willing to spend in this economy.    How the tariffs with China could play out over the next few months I’m beginning to get questions from people who have concerns about the tariffs on China products such as when will they start? How much will they be and should I buy products such as appliances now before the tariffs on China begin? These are all great questions. It's important to understand the tariffs cannot be placed until after the inauguration of the Mr. Trump. It is possible on is his first day that could be one of the many things he will do when he is the official president. It is, however, possible that he may hold off on the tariffs because the purpose of tariffs is to force equal trade or free trade with China, and Mr. Trump may want to use tariffs as a negotiation tool. In 2023 the trade deficit with China was $279 billion. Mr. Trump wants China to import more goods from our economy, which was only $148 billion in 2023. This could come from such things as agricultural products and based on the amount of oil we could be pumping in 2025, we may have more oil than we can use here and maybe China will purchase some. There are also other products as well that will be on the table. It should also be noted last time Mr. Trump was in office, China’s economy was very strong, and they were not as willing to negotiate. Fast forward to today and the Chinese economy has weakened. This could mean they would be more open to talk on trade to help their economy. No one knows exactly what the new president will do or how much the tariffs will be, but if you need to buy goods that are made in China, your window of opportunity may be running out!   Is inflation continuing to cool? The October Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed price gains came in line with expectations. Headline CPI increased 2.6% compared to last year and core CPI, which excludes food and energy climbed 3.3%. The headline CPI was above September’s reading of 2.4% and core CPI matched September’s reading of 3.3%. According to economists, the monthly inflation rate in October 2023 was unusually low, which made the October 2024 reading look relatively high. Hopefully, this means we will see further progress in the months ahead as core CPI has not shown much progress as of last as it has been stuck at 3.2% or 3.3% since May’s 3.4% reading. While much of this sounds problematic, there are not many areas of concern when looking at the inflation report. The major issue continues to be shelter which rose 4.9% compared to last year and accounted for over 65% of the annual increase in core CPI. I continue to believe shelter inflation will eventually resolve itself, which would then bring the major inflation measures more in line with the Fed’s desired level. Powell even said during a press conference, “Market rents, newly signed leases, are experiencing very low inflation." He also mentioned the current shelter inflation readings are due to a catch-up problem and "It's not really reflecting current inflationary pressures." I do believe with this report a December cut looks more likely, but that would not leave room for as many cuts in 2025. Based on the current data, I believe a Fed Funds Rate around 3.5% would be a fair level and that compares to a current Fed Funds Rate of 4.5-4.75%. That means if there is a cut in December, we could be looking at maybe just 3 or 4 rate cuts next year.    Work Income vs Retirement Income When planning for retirement, it’s important to understand the difference between your work income and your retirement income. If you get paid $200k/year, close to $17k/month, after taxes and savings, your net paycheck might be closer to $120k/year or $10k/month. If you go into retirement with the idea that you need to replace that entire $200k of income to continue your lifestyle, that’s just not true. In retirement you are not paying payroll taxes, which in California is a flat rate of 8.75%, you’re typically not saving much anymore, and if planned properly, you’re paying less federal and state taxes as well. In this scenario, Social Security alone might be between $5,000 and $6,000 per month for a married couple which means any retirement savings just need to cover the remaining living expense need which a nest egg of about $1 million should be able to do if invested appropriately, even after taxes are considered. We see retirees all the time where their income potential, or the maximum amount they can spend without running out of money, is much larger than they are currently living on, and they have no idea. If you’re planning for retirement, know how much you actually need so you can either retire earlier or at least have the peace of mind that you are financial independent if you’d rather keep working.     Companies Discussed: Honeywell International Inc. (HON), Dominos Pizza, Inc. (DPZ) & Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (BMY)

Major changes to the Dow Jones you should know about! The Dow Jones has changed again as Nvidia (NVDA) replaced Intel (INTC) and Sherwin-Williams (SHW) replaced Dow Inc. (DOW). The most recent change in the Dow Jones came on February 26th when Amazon (AMZN) replaced Walgreens (WBA). With the addition of Nvidia, much of the Mag Seven will now be present in the Dow Jones. As I mentioned Amazon was recently added, but Apple and Microsoft have been components for many years. It seems the Dow has really lost relevance as it has trailed the S&P 500 and Nasdaq in popularity and performance. I worry adding NVDA at this point in time could be buying high and at times the committee has had poorly timed decisions. Back in August 2020 the committee ended up doing a three-company swap as they eliminated Exxon, Pfizer, and Raytheon and added Amgen, Honeywell, and Salesforce. The interesting swap was Exxon (XOM) for Salesforce (CRM) considering XOM is up close to 200% not including dividends during that time period while CRM is up just around 10% during the same timeframe. Another poor decision came back in June 2018 when the committee swapped General Electric (GE) for Walgreens (WBA). Since the switch GE is up over 180% and I don’t believe that return even includes the benefit of the spinoffs GE Vernova and GE Healthcare, which would make the return even more attractive. During the same timeframe, Walgreens has had a rough time and the stock has actually fallen over 80%. While some maybe excited about the move, I wouldn’t be surprised if Intel actually outperformed Nvidia over the next 5 years.    The election is over, what investors should do now! My belief is that your plan should not have a drastic change after the Trump win, but there may be small changes to keep an eye on. The first thing I would tell people is to be careful chasing proposed winners or selling potential losers this early in the game. Ultimately, we don’t know exactly what policy changes he will be able to implement and we don’t even know at this point who will fill his cabinet. I was bullish on financials before the Trump win, but now that he will be entering office the group will likely benefit from a more relaxed regulatory environment compared to the current administration. Regional banks in particular look like they could be big beneficiaries, but be careful as many already had a big first day move after the election results. I was somewhat surprised to see big tech as a big winner as well, but it seems in today’s world everything is good for big tech. If you have been following us, you know we are skeptical of many of these big tech companies due to excessive valuations and frankly I just don’t see how a Trump presidency would be overly positive for the group. Especially considering both Trump and VP elect JD Vance have been critical of the group in the past. I would not be surprised to see continued regulatory pressure for some of these companies even after the change in the White House. Health care is also an interesting sector with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. being a large part of the Trump campaign considering his criticisms of vaccines and the food system. While this is something to keep your eye on, I don’t believe the group is completely doomed and in fact you could find some opportunities if stock prices continue to be pressured. Green energy is also in the cross hairs and many of these companies saw large declines after the results. While this may be an area of concern if the Inflation Reduction Act is repealed, I believe investors may be able to find some good opportunities if these businesses can maintain profits especially considering our need for more energy. At this point in time, I would wait for more clarity on that space as changes to tax credits could totally disrupt the current earnings picture for many of these businesses. Overall, you may be excited or disappointed with the results, but ultimately the strategy of investing in good quality companies at fair prices over the long term should not change!   Do you think you will be able to retire when the time comes? At Wilsey Asset Management we continue to work very hard to encourage people to invest for retirement and also to invest wisely so they can retire at a reasonable age. What is a reasonable age? Most would say 65 but in recent surveys the average age is 62, that's a surprise to me. What is also a surprise is that in 2002 the average age of retirement was 59, and in 1991 it was 57. Could it be because people are living longer and are getting bored in retirement for 20 years or longer? I’m not sure of the reason why but it seems like we have to work a little bit harder based on a survey from New York Life that says 22% of retirees think they may never be able to retire. I have often said getting old is not that great but getting old and not having a good investment portfolio, well that can be devastating. Be sure you are taking advantage of workplace retirement plans, IRAs, or even investing in a tax advantaged brokerage account.   Is Your Social Security Taxable? Social Security benefits are taxable, but they are not treated like any other source of income. Currently there are only 9 states that tax Social Security: Colorado, Connecticut, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Utah, Vermont, and West Virginia. The remaining states do not tax it so the majority of Americans do not need to report it on their state returns. Since this income does not take up any room in state tax brackets, it is much easier to keep taxable income lower in retirement at the state level. On the federal level, between 0% and 85% of Social Security benefits is reportable as income, so at least 15% is tax free. The lower someone’s income is in retirement, the greater chance that a larger portion of their Social Security will be tax free. The ratio of taxable to non-taxable benefits is based on “combined” income which is a Social Security Administration term that includes ½ of Social Security benefits plus all remaining income sources. If a married couple’s combined income is less than $32,000, none of their benefits are taxable. If combined income is between $32,000 and $44,000, up to 50% of benefits are taxable, and if combined income is greater than $44,000 then up to 85% of benefits are taxable. If these parameters seem low, that is because they were created in 1983 and have not been indexed for inflation. In the 80’s, $32,000 and $44,000 was a relatively high level of retirement income so most people did not have to pay taxes on it. Over the last 4 decades as income levels have naturally risen due to inflation, more and more recipients are forced to pay taxes on their benefits. It is unfortunate that Social Security is taxable at all because it used to be tax free prior to 1983. Now we are taxed in retirement when we receive it, and we are taxed on the income we earn that is used to pay into Social Security while we are working resulting in double taxation. It is possible to structure retirement income in a way that reduces the taxation on Social Security, but it is getting increasingly harder to do so.   Companies Discussed: First Solar, Inc. (FSLR), Five Below, Inc. (FIVE) & Sherwin-Williams Company (SHW)

Don’t let the presidential election be your investment indicator Presidential elections, especially this one, make people become very emotional, but don’t let that sway you away from investing. Looking back to 1950, the S&P 500 index gained 12.1% per year under Democrats and 7.1% under Republicans. So based on that tad bit of information, you would think that Democrats are better for the stock market than Republicans. If we dig deeper, we will see that Nixon had a major negative impact as he left office in August 1974. This was at the end of the 73-74 market crash when the S&P 500 was down 48%. The other Republican who had bad timing was George W. Bush, who was in office from 2001 to 2009. The S&P 500 dropped 38% in 2008 during the Great Recession and wiped out all the previous gains in the stock market while George W. Bush was in office. Looking more recently, there were investors who hated Trump as President and when he got into office, they sold their stocks missing an average annual return of 13.8% per year while he was President. The same thing happened in 2020 when Joe Biden became president, many Republicans thought the world was coming to an end and sold their stocks. The gain in the stock market under Joe Biden so far has been an 11.9% average annual return. The best advice I can give you is do not look at the President for any type of analysis on stocks, there are so many other factors at play rather than just who is in the White House. Instead, I recommend you look at the equities you are investing in and ask yourself how will they do going forward. Ultimately, businesses will find ways to succeed regardless who the President of the United States is.   Job openings continue to decline, is that a problem? In the September Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs), job openings declined to 7.44 million. This was below both the expectation of 8.0 million and the prior month’s reading of 7.9 million, which was revised lower by 179,000. This also marked the lowest level of job openings since January 2021. While this all sounds negative, there are still around 1.1 job openings per available worker. Also, this should be positive for inflationary concerns as the labor market is now more balanced when looking at the relationship between employers and employees. When employees have way more power like we saw over the last few years, it can have a big impact on wage inflation, which generally feeds through to overall inflation. While this isn’t an overly exciting report, I believe it still shows the labor market is in a good place. I think we could see job openings even fall a little further before it would become a concern.   Based on Friday’s job report, it looks like the economy is in trouble, but it’s not! We have not seen numbers like these in the jobs report since 2020 with nonfarm payrolls only increasing by 12,000 for the month. The expectation was job creation of 100,000 jobs. Why the big miss? Right off the bat the strike of Boeing was a loss of an estimated 44,000 jobs and who can forget the two hurricanes we had in the south. It’s currently unclear how many jobs were lost during that timeframe due to those natural disasters. On the positive side, average hourly earnings did increase 0.4% for the month, which was above the estimate and the 12 month gain of 4% held steady. Revisions to August and September took out 112,000 jobs bringing the August number to only 78,000 and September’s gain declined down to 223,000 jobs. Temporary jobs are sometimes seen as underlying strength of a job market, but they have declined by 577,000 jobs since March 2022. We don’t feel this is the indicator that it used to be and we expect to see some reversal of temporary jobs for the holiday hiring season. This should start being reflected in the next month or two. The hurricanes in the south were a hit to leisure and hospitality as I’m sure many bars and restaurants were closed and the category saw drop of 4000 jobs in the month. Only two sectors in the job market saw increases which was healthcare as it added 52,000 jobs and government experienced an increase of 40,000 jobs. On the surface, the job report looks frightening, but we are out of hurricane season and heading into the holiday season. I think you’ll see a reversal in the job market in the next 2 to 3 jobs reports, which should be rather positive. Not as positive as it was during the expansion when we were recovering from Covid, but definitely better than a 12,000 job increase! There are two meetings left for the Federal Reserve and I think this job’s report would allow them to cut rates by a quarter point at the next meeting. For the last meeting of the year, we will wait for more economic data before predicting another rate.   Is the US economy still growing? The GDP shows it is. While Q3 GDP, which stands for Gross Domestic Product, growth of 2.8% came in below the expectation of 3.1% and Q2’s reading of 3.0%, it is nowhere near signs of a recession. It also points to a US economy that remains in a good spot, even though it may be slowing. Remember slowing and declining are very different! The consumer continued to remain a bright spot in the economy as personal consumption expenditures added 2.46% to the headline number. This was thanks to growth of 3.7% as service spending growth was 2.6% and goods spending growth was 6.0%. Durable goods in particular were quite strong as they grew 8.1% in the quarter. Gross private investment had little impact on the headline number as it added just 0.07% to the headline number. The change in private inventories subtracted 0.17% and residential investment continued to be a problem as it fell 5.1% and subtracted 0.21% from the headline number. This was largely offset by growth in equipment spending of 11.1%. Government spending also was a large factor in the quarter as it added 0.85% to the headline number in large part due to growth of 14.9% for national defense spending. The only major category that subtracted from the headline number was trade as it had a negative impact of 0.56%. While exports were up 8.9% in the quarter, imports were up even more at 11.2%. Overall, I’d say this was a good report. I would warn people that I would not be surprised to see growth slow in the quarters ahead, but I’m still not looking for a recession in the near term.   Retirement Plan Allocations The majority of working people have some type of retirement plan through their employer like a 401(k) or 403(b), but many of those people don’t pay enough attention to how those funds are invested.  Employer retirement plans are great because they automate your savings so every paycheck you have a portion that gets invested.  Over time this can build to a lot of money.  There are also no income limits you have to worry about like with IRA accounts and you get the tax benefit from making tax-deferred or Roth contributions.  However, in order to get the most out of the plan, you need to make sure you’re choosing the best investment options within that plan.  Every plan has a list of options called a fund lineup.  These may include stock funds, bonds funds, balanced funds, asset allocation funds, real estate funds, and cash funds, all of which will have different expected growth rates.  In many cases we see people choosing a random fund that they don’t understand or the default option which is usually a target date fund or stable value fund.  Target date funds generally have higher fees and an overconcentration of bonds which results in lower performance over time and a stable value fund is essentially cash which doesn’t grow.  It only takes a few minutes to update the investment options but taking the time to do it can result in thousands of extra dollars per month in retirement without actually contributing any more.  Once you choose your investments, you typically don’t need to adjust them too often, and in many cases, you can set up automatic rebalancing if you would like.  Making sure your retirement plan is set up correctly is a simple thing everyone can do which will have a huge impact on your financial future.    Companies Discussed: Chewy, Inc. (CHWY), Genuine Parts Company (CPG) & ASML Holding (ASML)

T-bills could be your worst investment Right off the bat you’re thinking what how could they say such a thing? Warren Buffett has hundreds of billions of dollars in T-bills! Why do we think it’s the worst investment? First off, Warren Buffett spends all day long reading, researching, analyzing and when he sees a good value investment, he will likely sell what he needs from T-bills to buy those good long-term investments. If you are someone that needs the money in 2 to 3 years, then this belief does not apply to you as T-bills are a great place to have your short-term money. But if you’re a longer-term investor, and you want your money to grow for you, I worry that T-bills are not a great place for you. What will likely happen is that you will feel safe for a while, especially when the correction comes. You’ll be glad you have money in T-bills, but you probably won’t pull the trigger when lower equity prices arrive because you will feel comfortable with the safety and no volatility of your T-bills. Unfortunately, what will then happen down the road is you will eventually get tired of getting a lower return as interest rates drop and your T-bill is only earning you 2 to 3%. You will then likely want to move to something else and maybe do something silly like look at the past performance of equities and buy after stocks go back up after the correction. When it comes to investing, be sure to use the right tool for the right job. A T-bill is not the right tool for long term investors unless you really are a skilled investor and know how to navigate the volatility in equities.   One forgotten component of Tesla’s business has a huge impact on profits! Tesla reported numbers that were ahead of analyst expectations, but I wouldn’t say I was overly impressed. Sales increased 8% compared to last year and earnings per share of 72 cents did top expectations of 58 cents. This was a growth of 9.1% for EPS when compared to Q3 2023 EPS of 66 cents. The interesting component that people forget about is revenue from automotive regulatory tax credits. To comply with emissions regulations that are set by authorities including the United States and European Union, other automakers purchase credits from Tesla. In the most recent quarter, this added $739 million worth of revenue. While this is just under 3% of total revenue, this is essentially pure profit for the company, which means it likely accounted for close to 34% of the company’s $2.17 B worth of net income. As other companies continue to ramp up their own EV and hybrid plans, a big question I would have is will they need as many credits from Tesla? Also, if there is a change in leadership after this election, will there be a reduction in regulatory requirements that could decrease the need for other automakers to purchase these credits? This could cause problems for Tesla as it would lose a very high margin component of its business. It is hard to bet against Elon considering his successes, but I have a hard time recommending this stock since it still trades at around 70x 2025 expected earnings. With that type of multiple we need to see much higher growth for sales and earnings than what we saw this quarter. Elon did mention his “best guess” for vehicle growth next year is 20% to 30%, which is one reason the stock shot higher. This seems quite ambitious and I’d be curious where that growth is expected to come from. I would say Tesla bulls continue to point towards autonomy as a potential reason to buy the stock, but at this point I would say that is a huge gamble given the elevated level of uncertainty in that space. Elon did say on the earnings call that Tesla has developed a ride-hailing app that some employees in California have been able to use this year and he expects the service to roll out for public use next year in California and Texas. The company intends to use it for a robotaxi network in the future. With that said, according to a list of permits issued on the California Public Utilities Commission’s website, Tesla isn’t currently licensed to operate a commercial, transportation network company or ride-hailing service in California. From a regulatory standpoint, I would say Tesla is behind both Waymo and Cruise.    Luxury brands lose excitement as thriftiness takes over in this slowing economy Luxury brands like Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Chanel have seen a big decline in their sales growth. These luxury brands have increased their prices so much to try and keep their products exclusive. The push back towards exclusivity came after the Covid giveaway years where many consumers became short term purchasers. Unfortunately, this has turned off their normal elite customers who saw how ridiculous it was to see prices climb from 2019 to 2024 by 50 to 100 percent. They may be rich, but they are not stupid. As things have slowed, on social media and YouTube frugality has become cool once again. This includes talking about the deals you got or even buying knockoffs, which have a new name called dupes. On many of the posts on social media and other places it is now cool to show off your dupe that you purchased and how much you saved. I remember a couple years ago I talked about how the hype for expensive purses and brand names would not continue to rise. I think we have now hit the turning point where many people who pay those higher prices for purses or shoes will not be able to sell them for anything close to what they paid for them. The reason for that is you’re no longer competing on price with the brand names but now many consumers buying secondhand will compare that price to the dupe and want to get a discount compared to the dupe price. I would not recommend investing any money into these ultra-luxury stocks, even though some are down between 40 and 50%. Many of them still trade at lofty valuations and sales growth has been cut from 20 to 30% down to 2%.   Inheritance Issues with Annuities Annuities can be purchased with qualified (tax-deferred) funds or non-qualified (after-tax) funds. Because qualified money is tax-deferred all withdrawals or income taken is taxable at ordinary income rates to the owner or the beneficiaries. With non-qualified annuities, any gain in addition to the purchase amount will be taxable at ordinary income rates to the owner or beneficiaries.  There is no step-up in basis at death and they do not receive the preferential lower tax rate treatment that capital gains and dividends do. The growth is tax-deferred, but it is deferred to a higher tax rate than other investment income.  When a spouse inherits either a qualified or a non-qualified annuity, they may treat it as their own and retain all the options that their deceased spouse had.  When someone other than a spouse inherits a qualified annuity, they have the ability to rollover those funds into an inherited IRA and will be subject to the 10-year rule like any other IRA.  The most complicated situation is when you leave a non-qualified annuity to a non-spouse beneficiary.  In this case the beneficiary is typically children of the owner and they have 2 options. They can either stretch the withdrawals from the annuity over their life expectancy, which is typically better for their tax situation as they can spread out the income over many years, or they can deplete the annuity in any way they want within 5 years.  With the stretch option, they must take their first distribution within 12 months of the date of death of the owner or they will default to the 5-year option.  This requirement often causes a problem for beneficiaries because if they forget to take that first withdrawal, they are forced to realize a potentially large amount of ordinary income in a short period of time.  Owners of annuities need to understand their options so they can not only plan their own retirement income, but also have a plan for their estate.   Companies Discussed: Capri Holdings Limited (CPRI), Expedia Group, Inc. (EXPE) & Highwood Properties, Inc. (HIW)

Where does private equity invest the money, you give them? Private equity invests money in many different areas, but the problem that they are having is that both them and venture-capital are sitting on $2.6 trillion, which is a record high. Ultimately, they are having a hard time finding where to invest. A private equity firm generally has to earn between 12 and 14% on their investments to cover their management fee and pay investors a worthwhile return. One area they have been attracted to is HVAC, also known as heating, ventilation, and air conditioning. Other areas of interest have included plumbing and electrical companies. Over the last two years, private equity has purchased nearly 800 big HVAC, plumbing and electrical companies. It is also estimated there are plenty of smaller deals that just don’t show on the radar. I do believe somewhere down the road someone whether it’s the consumer, the employee, the business owner or the investors is going to lose. Basically, private equity is trying to streamline these smaller businesses into bigger businesses to cut costs. Many times, this changes the way they do business and it could place a larger emphasis on making more new sales rather than doing repairs, which leads to bigger profits. I do worry about the business owners who are told they can still run their business the way they want and keep a 20 to 25% stake. If things get difficult, the private equity firm with a 75% ownership will override the small business owners’ decisions.   Are gas prices going up or down in the future? A big factor in the price of gas is the price of oil. If you live in a state like California, then you can add other factors like taxes and regulations. Oil has remained somewhat reasonable falling under $70 a barrel in the last few weeks, it then recently crossed $80 a barrel on concerns in the Middle East. We know there is potential for a major disruption with tensions between Israel and Iran showing signs of escalation. The war in Ukraine continues to linger on, but so far it has not deterred Russia from selling their oil to countries like China and India. We also have a change in our president quickly approaching and everyone has to ask themselves, who would be more likely to tame the violence in the Middle East? If the next president cannot reduce or stop the fighting, we could see Israel start sending missiles towards Iran’s energy infrastructure. This could then lead Iran to try and restrict or block oil tankers flowing through the Strait of Hormuz. These actions would likely cause oil to skyrocket to over $100 per barrel, which could mean a 20 to 25% increase in the price of gas at the pump. What has kept oil and gasoline prices low so far has been slowing demand from a weak economy in China and talks of OPEC exporting more oil come December. It’s also important to know that there is less oil in storage than the historical average, which could mean there is pent up demand to refill that storage. If you’re an investor, I think it makes sense to have at least 5% of your portfolio in oil and natural gas companies because I believe the upside in the price of oil unfortunately is much greater than the downside.   Are you still spending money in this economy? Retail sales have continued to prove resilient as in the month of September we saw growth of 1.7% when compared to last year. With the decline in the price of gasoline, gas stations saw a decline of 10.7% compared to last year and if this component was excluded from the headline number, retail sales would have grown at a stronger rate of 2.8% in the month. Areas of weakness included furniture and home furnishing stores (-2.3%) and electronics and appliance stores (-4.6%). One area that showed positive growth for the first time in a while was building material & garden equipment & supplies dealers. It was a very small annual gain of 0.5%, but could this finally be the turning point for a group that has struggled tremendously over the last couple years? Areas of strength in the report included nonstore retailers (+7.1%), health and personal care stores (+4.6%), and food services and drinking places (+3.7%). While the growth in retail sales isn’t setting the world on fire, I believe this report provides further evidence that this economy is in alright shape.     Income Tax vs Property Tax on Inherited Property There are many factors to consider when inheriting real estate, especially in California, and the tax impact is one of the largest.  When receiving an inheritance of property there is an income tax consideration and a property tax consideration.  When capital assets, such as real estate, are sold for more than they were purchased for, the increase in value is considered a capital gain which is a type of income.  When property is inherited, it generally receives a step-up in basis which means the original purchase price is no longer relevant and the new income tax basis is the value of the property as of the date of death of the owner.  This means a parent who purchased a property for $200k and passes away when it is worth $1 million can leave it to their children who will not be responsible for the tax on the $800k gain. If they do sell, they will only need to report income on the appreciation after the date of death, or the amount over $1 million.  This is obviously a benefit and applies to other assets as well such as stocks and bonds.  However due to Prop 19, there may be a counteracting property tax implication when inheriting real estate.  In California the property tax assessed value can only increase by a maximum of 2% per year, even if the fair market value of the property increases much more than that.  Because of this people who have owned properties for many years are paying relatively little in property taxes compared to the actual value of their real estate.  However, when the property is inherited, the property tax assessed value increases to match its fair market value, resulting in a much higher property tax bill every year going forward.  As a result, vacation homes and rental properties that were great investments become unaffordable when the heirs receive them.  This often causes the sale of the property, which fortunately can be done income tax free due to the step-up received at death. There is an exception to this property tax increase where if children inherit the primary residence of their parents and begin treating that property as their own primary residence, they may add up to $1 million to the property tax assessed value before being required to pay additional property taxes.  Understanding these tax issues can help you determine when property should be held or sold before or after an inheritance.    Companies Discussed: Sirius XM Holdings, Inc. (SIRI), Vistra Corp. (VST) & Etsy, Inc. (ETSY)

Inflation comes in hotter than expected, is that a problem? The Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed September headline inflation was up 2.4% compared to last year, which was a little higher than the estimate of 2.3%. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy was up 3.3% compared to last year and it also came in a little higher than the expectation of 3.2%. While the numbers were a little hotter than expected, headline CPI was down from last month’s reading of 2.5% and it registered the smallest increase since February 2021. It’s come a long way from the high that was reached in June 2022 when headline inflation grew 9%. The major discrepancy between the headline and core number was energy. The energy index was down 6.8% compared to last year and gasoline prices had a major impact as they were down 15.3% over the same time frame. Shelter costs continued to have an outsized impact on the report as the index was up 4.9% over last year and accounted for over 65% of the 12-month increase in core CPI. The decline in inflation has continued to moderate, but overall, it has continued to trend in the right direction. While this report was somewhat disappointing, I don’t think there is anything of major concern in this report. With the Fed’s next meeting coming in November, it will be interesting to see how they interpret all the data as there are several factors that will have hopefully just a short-term impact on inflation and the labor market. These factors include both Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton as well as a Boeing strike that has had roughly 33,000 union workers on strike since September 13th. Given all this my estimate at this point in time would be that the Fed will do a quarter point cut at that November meeting.   What is PPI and how it can affect you as a consumer PPI stands for Producer price index. It’s important to understand these monthly numbers because it will eventually have an effect on consumers. If the cost of producing something increases, that cost will generally be passed to the retail level where consumers purchase. While September headline PPI of 1.8% was higher than the expectation of a 1.6% increase, it is still a low level that shows no major concern on the inflation front. When excluding food and energy, PPI increased 2.8%. This was higher than the estimate of 2.7% and last month’s reading of 2.6%. It was somewhat disappointing to see a small increase over last month’s reading, but overall, it has continued to head in the right direction and at 2.8% I believe inflation at that rate is still manageable. It is worth keeping an eye on this data as the months progress, but it seems to have less impact on the markets now that inflation has become more manageable.   Gold is up about 28% year to date, here are a few important points to help you decide to buy, sell, or hold. I hear the thoughts out there that as interest rates decline, gold should rise and so far, that has held true. But if you go back in history, in the early 80s as interest rates fell so did gold. Let’s say that correlation does hold true though, I’m not overly optimistic that we will see a large decline in the 10-year treasury as historically it yields about one and a half percent more than inflation. I believe inflation should be around 2-3% going forward. My other major concern for why I don’t see long term rates falling much further is the United States continues to struggle with a huge debt load. Looking at gold purchasing, central banks from around the world including countries like China, India, and Poland bought more than 1,000 metric tons of gold in both 2022 and 2023, but in 2024 we have seen those purchases slow down. The countries have become a little bit more concerned given the large gain this year. Some of these countries could even consider locking in some profits and sell some of the gold they own. If you still insist on buying gold, you can buy the gold bars at Costco, which has been a huge hit for them, but if you notice they don’t have a program to buy back gold. So when you want to sell those one ounce bars from Costco, you will have to go to a dealer who will charge a markup somewhere between five and 10%, which can eat into your gain more than you think. If you paid $2000 for gold and sold at $2700 you have a paper profit of 35%, but if you pay a 10% commission on that $2700, your gain drops to $430 which gives you an after commission gain of only 21.5%. Another option if you are looking to benefit from the price of gold is mutual funds and gold mining stocks, but because of the trading the returns don’t track the performance of gold very well. If you really insist on adding gold to your portfolio, then I would suggest the best way to do it is an ETF like GLD, which has low fees and tracks closely the price of gold. Full disclosure, we do not hold any gold in our portfolio now nor do we plan on buying it in the near future!   US consumers love their chicken! In 2023 the average American consumed more than 100 pounds of chicken wings, legs, breasts and thighs, which was an all-time high. American farmers are cranking out about 10 million chickens per year. This includes various forms from organic, free range, antibiotic free, and the list goes on. Compared to beef and pork, chicken is a better value. Unfortunately, the price of chicken has increased dramatically over the last five years. Back in 2019, the average chicken was going for $3.11 per pound and today that average cost comes in at $4.08 per pound, which is $.97 more or a 31.1% increase. I personally consume a fair amount of chicken as I think it tastes good and it’s also easy on your digestive system. I know the cost of chicken is up, but are you consuming the same amount of chicken you were five years ago?   Prioritize the Right Retirement Goals The most common goal when planning for retirement is to not run out of money. This is obviously important, but it should not be the only goal and in many cases, it should not even be the priority.  If you get to the point where your assets and income greatly exceed what is needed for your lifestyle, the chances of outliving your money decline and the priority should shift to income tax minimization.   For example, if you have a $2 million portfolio but only need $3,000 per month to supplement your social security or pension income, you probably won’t ever run out of money.  However, if you don’t implement the right tax strategies, you will end up paying way more than you need to and the longer you wait the worse it gets.  If your portfolio is $5 million to $10 million or more, you likely aren’t too concerned with running out of money and you hopefully are implementing income tax reduction strategies.  However, at this point you should also be thinking about estate taxes.  This has been largely disregarded because the currently exemption amount for a married couple is so large at about $27 million.  In 2026 though this number is expected to be cut in half to around $14 million, and the tax rate on estates that exceed that will potentially increase from 40% to 45%. An estate worth $14 million is still quite large, but compounding interest is a powerful thing.  A portfolio of $5 million can easily exceed $20 million after 20 years of growth, and waiting to address this until your estate reaches the exemption limit makes tax planning more difficult and more expensive because the value of assets will only grow faster over time.  It is too common for people to fixate on not running out of money and end up neglecting their income and estate tax planning which ultimately just results in more taxes.   Companies Discussed: Roblox Corporation (RBLX), Tesla Inc. (TSLA) & Pinterest, Inc. (PINS)

More jobs data points to a healthy economy The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) showed a surprise increase in the month of August. Openings totaled 8.04 million, which topped the estimate of 7.64 million and July’s reading of 7.71 million. While this is still well off the highs from just a couple of years ago, there are still 1.1 available jobs for every person looking for one. On the inflation front, I believe it was positive to see the quits rate decline to 1.9%, its lowest level since June 2020. This indicates that the labor market has softened as employees are seeing less opportunity to quit their job in favor of another one. This should help put less pressure on wage inflation. The Fed will have to continue to walk the fine line of keeping the economy moving in a positive direction without stoking a rise in inflation. It’s a tough task, but the labor market has continued to hold up much stronger than many believed was possible.    Employment report surprises to the upside      I was surprised to see the continued strength in the labor market as the growth of headline nonfarm payrolls of 254k in the month of September easily topped the estimate of 150k. Strength came from leisure and hospitality, which saw payrolls grow 78k thanks to a nice spike of 69k jobs from food services and drinking places. Other positive sectors included health care and social assistance (+71.7k), government (+31k), and construction (+25k). Only two sectors saw declines in the month with manufacturing losing 7k jobs and transportation and warehousing down 8.6k jobs. Both July and August saw upward revisions to their reports for a combined total increase of 72k. Wage inflation was also stronger in the month as average hourly earnings grew 4% compared to last year. This is up from last month’s reading of 3.8%, but still remains substantially below last year’s high of 5.92%. Precovid, wage growth was in the low to mid 3% range. Overall, this report didn’t have many problems. The only concern is, did the Fed move to soon and could inflation still be the larger concern rather than a weakening labor market? This report did increase expectations for a November rate cut to be 0.25% rather than 0.5%. I would have been shocked if the Fed would have opted for another 0.5% cut even if the jobs report wasn’t this strong.    ILA Dockworkers strike Good news for those that were concerned about the International Longshoremen’s Association’s (ILA) strike as the union and the United States Maritime Alliance reached a tentative agreement on wages and agreed to extend the Master Contract until January 15th, 2025. Wages will increase 61.5% over six years under the tentative deal, but the major point of conflict that still needs to be negotiated is port automation. With the increase in wages, it will be interesting to see how much the Maritime Alliance is willing to budge on automation as they will likely need to look for ways to improve efficiency to offset the higher wages. Efficiency is already a concern for US ports as a study from just a couple of years ago ranked the LA and Long Beach ports as the least efficient trade hubs for handling containers in the world. Other US ports including Savannah, Georgia, New York, and New Jersey also ranked in the bottom half of the list. Of the 370-member Container Port Performance Index, we did not have a single port in the top 10. While this resolution is positive, the problems could be delayed until early next year if the two sides still cannot come to an agreement. During my research on this strike, I learned some surprising things about the union leader, Harold Daggett. You may be shocked to learn that his combined income as president of two unions is around $900,000 per year with $728,000 coming from the ILA. He currently drives a Bentley, which is a high-end luxury vehicle with a price of $210,000 for a new one. He also recently sold his 76-foot yacht and based on the US boat group market index, the average price of a yacht in that range is $1.5 million and costs around 10 to 15% of the value to operate yearly. I was also surprised to see this is a “family business” as his son is employed by the same two unions as his dad and was paid a total of more than $700,000 last year. As for the workers, on the East Coast the union workers have an average pay around $81,000 per year. However, the waterfront commission of New York estimates 1/3 of the longshoreman made $200,000 or more last year with overtime.    Investors are still adding money to money market funds Even with the recent rate cut by the Federal Reserve, investors still put nearly $130 billion into money market funds. This brought total assets in money markets to $6.8 trillion. I don’t believe this money will stay there very long as probably within 3 to 6 months investors will start seeing the interest rates decline and once, they fall below 4%, we could see a large drop in the assets held in money market funds. The big question for investors is where to go. If you need liquidity, you’re probably best off staying in the money market funds, but if you won’t need the money for the next 3 to 5 years, you should be looking at building a strong investment portfolio using patience and a lot of research to make sure you have the right investments.    A Lesser-Known Spousal Social Security Strategy After 2015 many of the spousal strategies such as the file and suspend or restricted application options are no longer possible. This is because a “deemed filing” rule applies which means when someone files for Social Security benefits, they are deemed to be filing for all benefits they are eligible for such as spousal and their own benefits.  When they apply, they will receive whichever benefit is larger, but not both.  However, there is still a way to switch between benefits. In order to receive a spousal benefit, the spouse you are collecting from must also be collecting. If they are not, you would only be eligible for your own benefit until they begin collecting.  Consider a wife who is no longer working and whose full retirement age 67 amount is $1,000 and who has a working husband with a full retirement age amount of $3,500.  Because of the husband’s larger benefit, the wife is also eligible for a spousal benefit of half that amount, $1,750, if she collects it at her full retirement age.  In this situation the wife may collect from her own record as early as age 62.  Since she would be collecting 5 years early, her own benefit would be reduced from $1,000 to $700.  Later on though, when her husband retires and starts his own social security, she could begin her spousal benefit at age 67 and boost her benefit by $750 up from $700 to $1,450. This $750 boost is because her spousal benefit of $1,750 is $750 larger than her own full retirement age amount of $1,000, even though she began collecting at 62.  If she had waited to apply for anything until age 67, she would receive the full spousal benefit of $1,750, but she would have waited 5 years of collecting nothing just for an extra $300.  From a Net Present Value perspective, it is better for the wife to collect her own benefit at 62 and later receive the spousal boost rather than wait completely until 67.  Also, there are many spouses who collect early without knowing they are also eligible for a larger spousal benefit when their spouse retires.  If they do not alert the Social Security Administration, they may not ever receive their increased benefit.   Companies Discussed: Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST), Humana Inc. (HUM) & LyondellBasell Industries (LYB)

We do have a housing problem in this country, but it may not be the one you’re thinking. The price of homes has continued to rise and it has left some people out of the housing market, but that may not be a bad thing. I say that because people are doing anything they can to buy a home at these high prices. This includes risky endeavors like cashing in their retirement savings or borrowing from friends and family. The Atlanta Fed’s affordability index was recently at 68.5, which would mark its lowest levels since 2006. I worry people are getting in over their heads as ownership costs, which include mortgage, taxes, and insurance are now occupying nearly 44% of median household income. Generally the 30% level is considered a threshold for affordability and that was last seen in 2021. I worry when the economy slows down, you could see people selling their houses because they can’t afford them. I think it’s rather silly that some campaign promises have talked about giving $25,000 for down payments or expanded tax credits for developers to build affordable rental housing. These sound good as soundbites, but I think they’re terrible ideas because all they will do is pushup demand and that will continue to put more pressure on prices. People don’t realize that builders say roughly 25% of the cost of new homes is from regulatory costs like building codes and zoning issues. If we could get the local government to back off, you could see a nice reduction in prices. The problem is we have the federal government trying to give you money to buy a higher priced home and local governments are raking in the dough collecting fees on those higher priced homes. Throughout history, it has never been great to invest or buy into any type of asset when there is a buying frenzy going on. Look at the history books if you don’t believe me and then think ahead what will happen in the next 5 to 10 years. I know my opinion goes against many experts, but in our over 40 years in asset management, we have seen how things can change unexpectedly.   Is the new iPhone 16 going to move the stock price up? Last weekend an article in Barron’s written by Alex Eule tried to convince people that Apple stock will increase based on looking back to the original iPhone and every iPhone release after that. Based on the research, Apple stock has returned an average of 11.7% six months after iPhone releases. But before you run out and buy the stock, one thing I noticed was there was no discussion around price/earnings ratios during those launces. I believe it is very important to not over pay for any company and I am curious what the PE ratios were during those last 24 iPhone launches. Holding Apple several years ago I know the multiple was not where it is now in many of those cases. Don’t get me wrong, I think Apple is a great company and has great products, but I worry with the stock trading at 31 times next year ‘s earnings it is more than fully valued. I also believe some of that data was skewed considering the first iPhone launch led to 63.7% return six months after the release and there are several instances where the stock did nothing or actually fell like the iPhone 12 (-3.4%), the iPhone 13 (-1.3%), or the iPhone 15 (-1.0%). I was surprised to see that analysts are more negative than I expected on the stock as currently nearly 1/3 of them have either a hold or a sell rating. Mr. Eule does correctly point out that if Apple beats expectations, the price earnings ratio will come down. However, that assumption would also mean that the stock price did not climb to offset the earnings beat. We have avoided investing in Apple for quite some time now, but I will still not break my discipline and I will not overpay for any company because history has proven eventually everything comes back to the norm.    ETFs have proven not to be as effective as mutual funds When Jack Bogle, the founder of Vanguard, was CEO back in the 90s, he refused to add indexed ETFs (exchange traded funds) to their lineup. His concern was it was too easy for people to jump in out of the products and not be long-term investors. There are now long-term studies proving that he was right. A report from Morningstar shows there is a 0.9% per year gap over the study’s 10-year period favoring investors who used indexed mutual funds over investors who used indexed ETFs. While it might not sound like a lot, the compounding takes hold in the long-term and I believe it further illustrates why people should not trade. Unfortunately, even financial advisors who control about 2/3 of the ETF assets appear to be just as jumpy and emotional as their clients. Maybe they’re just trying to prove their worth due to the management fees that they charge on top of the ETF fees.   Is our tax code too complicated? I know many people hate paying taxes, but have you ever thought about how much time you spend compiling all those documents? According to the Tax Foundation, it is estimated that the time and money individuals and businesses are spending on complying with the federal tax code this year could reach 7.9 billion hours and $133 billion in out-of-pocket expenses—or $546 billion when also accounting for lost productivity. I believe a major problem is that we keep adding more and more complications to the tax code and between 1994 and 2021 it grew in length by 40% to about four million words and has expanded steadily since. Regulations keep climbing and according to the National Taxpayers Union Foundation, from 2000 to 2022 the Department of Treasury’s annual volume of regulations grew 35% to 17,631 pages from 13,070. With all the complications, it’s no wonder most people don’t understand how taxes work and what they actually pay in taxes!   The Third Type of Retirement Account When it comes to retirement accounts, most people are familiar with 401(k)s, Rollover IRAs, and Roth IRAs.  These accounts have tax benefits when contributing and withdrawing money and allow either tax-deferred or tax-free growth.  However, there are also restrictions such as annual contribution limits and age requirements to make qualified withdrawals.  In addition to these pre-tax or Roth accounts, it can also be helpful to supplement retirement income with a third type of retirement account, which isn’t a retirement account at all – the taxable brokerage account. There are no limits when making contributions or withdrawals and technically withdrawals from this account are not taxable.  This account produces income in the form of capital gains, dividends, and interest which must be reported every year whether withdrawals are taken or not, which is why the withdrawals are not a taxable event.  However capital gains and dividends are taxed at a lower rate than other types of income and in retirement it is more common to be in lower tax brackets which means the tax rate on those gains and dividends can be as low as 0%.   Retirees may have gross income of $125k or higher in some cases while still falling in that 0% tax rate.  It is great and typically preferred to fund retirement accounts but if those are being maxed out, it can make sense to put addition savings into a taxable account.  These types of accounts aren’t utilized as often as they should and they are more commonly used when receiving a large sum of money such as an inheritance or proceeds from selling a property; but combining them with other “retirement” accounts adds flexibility and tax diversification when structuring withdrawals in retirement.   Companies Discussed: Uber Technologies (UBER), Lennar Corporation (LEN) & Alibaba Group Holding Limited (BABA)

Retail sales shows the consumer is still spending August retail sales were expected to decline 0.2% in the month, but the consumer was more resilient than anticipated as they actually grew 0.1% compared to the month of July. Compared to last August, retail sales were up 2.1%. Gas stations were the biggest negative in the report as lower prices for oil and gasoline lead to a 6.8% decline compared to the prior year. If this volatile category was excluded from the headline number, retail sales would have climbed by a more impressive 2.9%. Areas of strength included nonstore retailers (+7.8%), healthcare & personal care stores (+3.5%), food services & drinking places (+2.7%), and electronics & appliance stores (+1.9%). Two areas that continued to bring down retail sales were furniture & home furnishing stores (-0.7%) and building material & garden equipment & supplies dealers (-0.1%). While this report doesn’t point to a booming consumer, it definitely doesn’t show an economy that is in recession.    What should investors do after the Fed’s rate cut? What should investors expect going forward when interest rates decline? Going back 50 years, when the Fed begins its interest rate cuts, 16 out of 23 times 6 months after the first cut the stock market was higher. Could this be like one of those seven times it is not higher six months from now? Investors have to realize that valuations for the market are very high and this could lead investors holding those high valuation equities to sell the news. I do believe if you were a strong investor and have watched what you have paid for the earnings and cash flow of what you have invested in, you should be OK. But if you do hold in your portfolio equities trading at 25 to 35 times forward earnings, this could be a buy the rumor, sell the news situation. At our firm, Wilsey Asset Management, I know our portfolio has an average forward P/E ratio of around 12. I believe this is a very comfortable place to be in this crazy time. I would advise you to analyze your portfolio to be sure it is not overvalued.   Why you should be careful investing in the S&P 500! People continue to shift towards index investing and have a desire to invest in the S&P 500 index fund because they believe it is a good diversified investment. I continue to worry that people do not realize how risky this index has become with the overconcentration in just a few expensive stocks. The S&P 500 currently has a forward P/E of around 22-23x, which is well above the historical average of around 16-17x. The reason for this elevated figure is the outsized weight of the expensive growth stocks. If you look at the 10 largest stocks, which are Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Amazon, Alphabet (Google), Meta (Facebook), Berkshire Hathaway, Eli Lilly, Broadcom, and Tesla they now occupy over 35% of the entire index and their average forward P/E is lofty at nearly 40x. People believe they are getting a diversified portfolio, but Apple (6.86%), Microsoft (6.72%), and Nvidia (6.24%) all have larger weights than the entire sectors of real estate (2%), materials (2%), utilities (2%), energy (4%), and consumer staples (6%). Communication services has a weighting of 9%, but Meta and Alphabet make up a combined 43% of the Communication Services SPDR ETF. Consumer discretionary has a weighting of 10%, but Amazon and Tesla make up over 38% of the Consumer Discretionary SPDR ETF. While the performance of the S&P 500 has been great over the last decade, if the performance of these mega cap stocks turn so will the index. With these expensive valuations, I just don’t see exciting returns over the next decade. I definitely don’t believe they will even be close to what we saw over the last 10 years. Just for reference, the remaining sectors of the S&P 500 are industrials (8%), healthcare (12%), financials (13%), and technology (31%).    How will dividends impact the stock market’s return? People may not realize that stock dividends historically have accounted for around 40% of the total return in the stock market. However, because of the unbalanced market over the last 10 years, dividends have accounted for just 16% of the total return. I believe over the next decade as markets adjust to more normalcy, dividends should once again play a larger role in the total return and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it return to a similar rate of around 40%. Places you can look for dividends would include real estate investment trusts, utilities, energy, along with financial stocks and healthcare. But as always, when investing, be sure to make sure the investment is not overpriced and is fundamentally strong based on the financial statements.    How Much of a Rate Reduction is Needed to Refinance? With interest rates coming down, more people are starting to wonder if refinancing makes sense, but how much of an interest rate reduction do you need to be worth it? Half a percent, one percent, more? A lot of people get hung up on the interest rate alone, but you must also factor in the costs associated with getting the loan. When you get a new mortgage there are three types of costs- fees paid to originate the loan like points and underwriting fees, prepaid expenses like interest and homeowner’s insurance, and other 3rd party fees like title and recording fees. When deciding on a refinance, the prepaid fees are irrelevant because they will still be paid whether you refinance or not. That leaves the origination and 3rd party fees as the actual cost it takes to get a new loan. It is important to differentiate the two because mortgage companies often advertise no point or no cost refinances, but they are generally referring to the origination fees. As the borrower you still have to pay the other miscellaneous fees, you just aren’t paying them to the lender. Most people are familiar with points which are upfront fees in exchange for a lower interest rate. Over time the interest savings makes up for the points but only if you keep the same loan. You would not want to pay points if you expect to refinance again or sell in the foreseeable future. Since most people agree that interest rates are at least slightly coming down, most borrowers should not be paying points as there will likely be an opportunity to refinance at a lower rate. Instead of paying points, you can do the opposite and accept a higher interest rate in exchange for “lender credits”. These credits can then be used to pay the fees which results in a true “no-cost” refinance. Consider a situation where you have a mortgage at 7% and the ability to refinance into a 6% loan but at a cost of $15,000 in fees. Instead, it would likely make sense to refinance into a higher 6.5% loan using credits to cover the cost and then refinance again in 6 months assuming rates will be lower. In other words, you wouldn’t want to spend an extra $15,000 to save $1,500 in interest over the next 6 months. With this logic, even the smallest rate reduction at no cost would still make sense.   Companies Discussed:  Nike Inc. (NKE), Snap Inc. (SNAP) & Lululemon Athletica Inc (LULU)

Another lesson on why investors should stay away from derivatives  The well-known mutual fund company, Franklin Templeton, has a division known as Western Asset Management, WAM. Please do not confuse that with our investment firm, Wilsey Asset Management, also referred to as WAM. Western Asset Management received a Wells Notice from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which informed them that the agency was planning on enforcing some action against them. From the spring of 2021 through the autumn of 2022, the manager Ken Leech, who by the way has now taken a leave of absence, did 17,000 treasury derivative trades. The fund performance was horrendous and the three funds he managed lost as much as half of their assets as investors sold their shares. There is nothing proven yet, but if you hold these funds or other Franklin funds, I would definitely be selling my shares and looking elsewhere. I have known the Franklin funds for nearly 30 years and it is disappointing to see this type of news for that company. Full disclosure, we stopped using their funds well over 20 years ago and have zero dollars invested with them at this time    Boring inflation report likely secures a 0.25% interest rate cut next week August headline CPI rose 2.5% compared to last year, which was below the estimate of 2.6% and marked the lowest reading since February 2021. The headline number benefitted from energy prices that were 4.0% lower than last year, largely thanks to a 10.3% decline in gasoline prices. The other normally volatile category, food, was also quite subdued as it showed an increase of just 2.1% compared to last August. Food at home showed a small increase of just 0.9%, while food away from home was up 4.0%. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy was up 3.2% compared to last year, which matched the reading in July. The lack of progress on core CPI is the main reason I believe a 0.25% cut will be preferred over a 0.50% cut at next week’s Federal Reserve meeting. Shelter really remains the key hurdle for core CPI as it increased 5.2% compared to last year and accounted for about 70% of the increase in core CPI. The shelter number is still puzzling to me considering the BLS New Tenant Rent Index actually fell 1% in the second quarter. At some point these shelter costs in the CPI will come down, I’m just shocked at how long that process is taking. Auto insurance continues to steal the show in terms of large gains as the category was up 16.5% compared to last year. A positive for the category as we move forward is both used cars & trucks (-10.4%) and new vehicles (-1.2%) saw declines compared to last year. While high, motor vehicle and maintenance (+5.1%) has cooled from earlier levels. This should all lead to more subdued auto insurance inflation next year.    Diet drugs could cause health insurance premiums to skyrocket Weight loss drugs have become very popular as an easy way to lose weight, but who is going to pay for this more expensive option? Some of the drugs cost about $13,000 a year and there are now some discount versions that were recently announced that will still be around $6,000 to $7,000 a year if you’re willing to get a separate needle and vile to inject yourself, rather than using the autoinjector version. It is estimated that in 2024, Zepbound and Mounjaro combined sales will reach $18.3 billion. In 2025, it is estimated that the sales for these two drugs will hit $28.7 billion. What people do not realize is the strain this is beginning to put on the US healthcare system. Insurance companies make money by collecting insurance premiums from many people and calculating out what they will likely have to pay out in claims. It is obvious that if claims will be rising because of the high cost of these diet drugs paired with many people using them, the only solution is to increase insurance premiums. Some insurance plans and even Medicare won’t pay for the weight loss drugs to help with weight loss but ways around it include saying they reduce the risk of heart failure, sleep apnea, and stroke. I believe to help correct the situation, these drugs need more competition to bring more supply to the market and reduce prices. I know of a couple of other companies like Pfizer and Viking Therapeutics that are very close to releasing their own weight loss drugs. Hopefully these additions will dramatically reduce the cost of these drugs so that people can pay for them out of pocket and leave the insurance companies to cover the big expenses our healthcare system incurs.    Tax benefit of owning a house Everyone likes to talk about the tax benefits of owning a home, but it’s important to understand what the true benefit is before deciding to purchase. When buying a home, the property taxes and mortgage interest are itemized deductions that can reduce taxable income for federal and state taxes. However, you need enough itemized deductions to exceed the standard deduction in order to receive any tax benefit. For married couples, the federal standard deduction is $29,200 and the California standard deduction is about $11,000. If you own a home but your total federal itemized deductions after paying your mortgage and property taxes are only $25,000, you won’t receive any federal tax benefit even though those expenses are technically deductible because you will still end up claiming the higher standard deduction. This situation is more common for people who have owned their home for a while because their property taxes are generally lower due to Prop 13 and they likely would have refinanced their mortgage when rates were lower which reduces the amount of interest they can claim. For people buying new homes, there are typically more expenses which can result in tax savings. On the federal side, the most common itemized deductions are mortgage interest on loans up to $750,000, state income and property taxes capped at $10,000, and charitable giving. In California mortgage interest is deductible on loans up to $1,000,000, property taxes but not state income taxes are deductible, and charitable gifts are deductible. If you are buying a $500k home, your tax savings will likely be between $4,000 and $6,000 per year; with a $1 million home, it’s likely between $10,000 and $12,000 per year; and with a $2 million home, it’s likely between $15,000 and $20,000 per year. The actual tax savings will vary based on the value of the home, the loan balance, the interest rate, and your tax bracket. It’s always great to reduce taxes, but this means you are paying anywhere from $40,000 to upwards of $100,000 in interest and taxes to get those levels of tax savings. Also keep in mind that taxes are likely to change in 2026 which will largely increase the tax benefit of owning a home. As with any financial decision, it is important to understand the whole picture when buying a home, not just the potential tax benefits.   Companies Discussed:  Topgolf Callaway Brands (MODG), United States Steel(X), McDonald's (MCD)

The labor market continues to soften The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) showed job openings continued to fall across the country in the month of July. It was reported that available positions fell to 7.67 million in the month, which 237,000 lower than June’s downwardly revised number and well below the estimate of 8.1 million. While this marked the lowest level since January 2021, there were still close to 1.1 job openings per available worker. I do believe we still have some room left for normalization before these declines in job openings becomes problematic. This news also caused the relationship between the 10- and 2-year Treasury yield to uninvert for the first time since June 2022. Generally long-term rates are higher than short term rates and I believe we will see the yield curve continue to steepen as the Fed cuts rates. While the curve usually reverts before a recession hits, I still believe we aren’t heading towards a problematic recession in the coming months. The labor market is definitely slowing Nonfarm payrolls increased by 142,000 in the month of August, which was up from 89,000 in July, but below the estimate of 161,000. Both June and July also saw downward revisions, which totaled a substantial 86,000. Leisure and hospitality (+46K), healthcare and social assistance (+44.1K), construction (+34K), and government (+24K) led the way for job gains in the month. Manufacturing (-24K), retail trade (-11.1K), information (-7K), and utilities (-200) all subtracted jobs from the headline number. I was also surprised to see professional and business services only create 8K jobs in the month and I believe that is a good indicator that the economy is definitely in a slowdown. While the numbers don’t look great, I still believe there is no cause for major concern at this point. With an unemployment rate of 4.2% and the major gains we saw coming out of Covid, it was unlikely we’d see that type of labor market continue. I still believe it’s possible we see a soft landing, but in that scenario, you wouldn’t see major payroll gains every month and the prints would likely be more muted and even softer than the readings we have seen the last few months. My expectation is for the Fed to cut rates by 0.25% at the September meeting followed by cuts of 0.25% at both the November and December meetings. The economy is getting back to normal It may feel like the economy is weak, but I believe that is because we are comparing it to an excessive economy that had too much money floating around and people spending it pretty much on anything they wanted while not caring about how much they paid. Now that extra cash is gone and we’re back to normal. That might feel uncomfortable for some people as they now can’t spend so easily on things like luxury items. Proof of this can be seen in the used luxury watch market which was very hot, but has now seen prices fall over the last 9 quarters because the demand is gone. I don’t care if you’re buying stocks, homes, or luxury items, if you overpay during the hype, you’ll probably end up losing money down the road. I believe it’s always best to buy things on sale, even if that means being patient for a few years. There’s a lot of talk about company’s price gouging, but the numbers tell a different story! There is no doubt that with inflation, prices for many items have increased over the last five years. But are businesses taking advantage of these higher prices to increase their profit margins? Looking at just the companies in the S&P 500, the average price markup between the selling price and the cost is 54%. That compares to 51% five years ago. According to research from financial company Bloomberg, they say the grocery business markup is actually down from five years ago and when looking at the average profit margins for grocery stores, it is now 0.3% lower than five years ago. You may not like the information because we want to blame somebody for paying higher prices, but based on these numbers companies are not price gouging. We do believe every business has a right to make a decent profit for being in business, but the free market and competition should eliminate price gauging and keep the market balanced. How the Time Value of Money Impacts Roth Conversions When you do a Roth conversion, the amount you convert into a Roth account is taxable when you do it. First, this means you are paying taxes now that you didn’t need to.  Second, the question people have is, “If I don’t pay that tax now and instead got to keep those dollars invested, what would that grow to and does that offset the benefit of doing the conversion?”  In other words, is having extra tax-free money in the future worth paying taxes now when considering the time value of money? Time value of money is the concept that dollars today are more valuable than dollars in the future because dollars today may be invested and grow over time while dollars in the future are worth less due to inflation.  This is an extremely important concept and needs to be considered when making almost all financial decisions from Social Security to paying debt to investing in general. However, when it comes to Roth conversions this should not be considered.  For example, let’s consider someone making a $50,000 Roth conversion who is in the 20% bracket and will be for the rest of their life.  On that conversion they will owe $10,000 in taxes (20%) meaning the remaining $40,000 makes it into the Roth account.  Money in a pre-tax account and a Roth may be invested exactly the same so we’ll assume an 8% compounded return.  After 10 years, the $40,000 in the Roth grows to $86,357, which is all tax free.  The question though is what would that $10,000 have grown to if it didn’t have to be paid 10 years prior?  Well, if no conversion was done, all $50,000 would have remained in a pre-tax account growing at the same 8%, so after 10 years it would be worth $107,946.25, obviously more than the $86,357 in a Roth.  However, that $107k has not yet been taxed so if accessing it still costs the same 20% tax that would be $21,589.25, meaning the after-tax amount is… $86,357 or the exact same as we would have in the Roth.  What this means from a time value of money perspective is, since pre-tax and Roth accounts may have identical investments and returns, the present value of the tax on the conversion is the same as the future value of the tax if there is no conversion, assuming the tax rate is the same. In our example the future value of $10,000 is $21,589.25 assuming an 8% return over 10 years, which is true. Therefore, when considering a Roth conversion, it is not the time value of money that is relevant, but the tax rate during the conversion compared to the tax rate in the future.  In our example we assumed a consistent 20% tax rate which is not realistic.  Over time income levels and sources change as well as the tax rates themselves.  If Roth conversions are performed when the individual tax rate is lower than it will be when pre-tax retirement withdrawals are being taken, the conversion is helpful. For instance, if we think our retirement tax rate will be more than 20%, a conversion should be done now if it is 20%.   Companies Discussed: DraftKings Inc. (DKNG), Dollar General Corporation (DG) & Dell Technologies (DELL)

Inflation report pretty much solidifies a rate cut in September Personal consumption expenditures prices (PCE) were right in line with expectations as they increased just 2.5% in the month of July. Core PCE, which is the Fed’s preferred measure came in at 2.6% and was slightly below the estimate of 2.7%. While both readings matched the June inflation report, I would say inflation at around 2.6% is still extremely manageable and I believe we will continue to see it trend towards the 2% target as we exit the year. With these numbers I believe we will see the Fed cut rates by 0.25% at the September meeting and then we could see one or two more cuts before the end of 2024.    Will oil and natural gas disappear over the next few years? You may think that in a few years oil and natural gas will be a thing of the past, but Exxon believes the consumption of oil will be the same in 2050 as it is today and they don’t see carbon emissions dropping until the year 2030. In the report they do see the world demand for natural gas increasing by 21% by the year 2050 while they expect the demand for oil to increase by just 2%. They do point out most of the growth for these energy sources will come from the industrial sectors to fuel manufacturing and also from chemical feed stock. Exxon does believe consumption of biofuels, solar, and wind will continue to rise, but clearly, they believe natural gas and oil are still needed to help fuel our world’s energy needs. The big loser they believe is coal as they see that energy source dropping off 39% by 2050. To help with emissions, Exxon is largely turning towards carbon capture and hydrogen-based fuels.    Rent concessions are climbing at apartment complexes! We are now well into the second half of 2024 and as we have been saying for the past couple years we believe the overbuilding of apartment buildings will eventually put downward pressure on rents. According to Moody’s, rents are up 22% since 2019 across the country and the average rent is $1750, but due to the overbuilding of apartment buildings, landlords are having a hard time maintaining the higher rents and are now starting to offer concessions such as a month or two of free rent or a discount on utilities. Some of the more creative apartment companies have come up with cash rewards or gift cards to Amazon, CVS, Target or Walmart if you pay your rent on time. Don’t get too excited about the concessions. They may sound good, but be sure you do the math to find out how much you’re really saving. One large rental company says by offering a rewards program, about 97% of the renters renewed their lease in 2024. That is well above the national average renewal rate of 65%. I do believe over the next couple of years we should see rents decline somewhat as vacancies climb and these big rental companies have to pay the loans on all the construction costs, they incurred to build these apartments. Simply put, they will need the cash flow to make their debt payments.   Business failures have climbed this year! Over the past year, starting a business has not been that easy. The number of failed new businesses increased by 60% as the new business owners ran out of money. Could this be because of a slowing economy? Bad business management? Or not having enough cash to start a business? Or perhaps it could be all three?   Growth vs Income Investing The fundamental goal of investing is to make money, but for most people this is broken into two phases, growth and income. During working years everyone is saving and investing money, building their nest egg so during retirement, they can stop working and begin relying on income from their assets to support them. However, it is one thing to add money every paycheck to a 401(k) for 30 years, it’s another thing entirely to withdraw money from an investment portfolio every month for 30 years without running out. During the growth phase, the swings in the market aren’t as emotionally tolling because there’s a paycheck coming in every few weeks. When that paycheck stops and you’re selling positions to withdrawing money from an account during a market decline, things can go bad quickly. Not to mention nest eggs are largest in retirement, so a small percentage change is still a large dollar swing. The average retirement lasts over 20 years, but bear markets occur about every 4 years so retirees have to endure these periods multiple times. During a bear market if positions are sold at the wrong time, if the bear market lasts too long, if too much is withdrawn, or if the investments aren’t sound, the portfolio will not have enough remaining funds to recover. Again this is not a risk during the growth phase when funds are begin added, not withdraw. To prevent against volatility risk in retirement, a lot of people shift their investments to something overly conservative, which short term feels safe, but long term will not produce the growth necessary to keep up with inflation and prevent outliving money. Before actually retiring, it is necessary to get comfortable with an investment philosophy that will continue to provide growth but will also allow sustainable withdrawals through the ups and downs of the market. Mistakes made early in retirement can result in the need to return to work or heavily reduce your lifestyle which no one wants to do after spending decades looking forward to retirement.   Companies Discussed: Super Micro Computer, Inc.(SMCI), Sprouts Farmers Market (SFM), Advance Auto Parts(AAP) 

History shows robo-advisors failed to live up to the hype! When robo-advisors first came out years ago, people asked if I was worried about my career. I said no because I do believe that investing can be very complicated and a good advisor is worth it. I’m happy to report that has been the case. Robo advisors have only accumulated one trillion dollars in assets, that is only 2% of the entire $50 trillion advisory market. JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs both dropped their robo-advisor programs because their clients didn’t feel the low cost provided what they needed. Low costs were the initial selling point for robo-advisors but today most have added some human interaction. With that costs have increased and these hybrid services can now cost around 0.65%. In my opinion, that is still not a great option because you won’t get a personal advisor and instead you will be left with a team of people who really don’t know your situation. The biggest problem I have seen with the robo-advisors has been when things get difficult, investors have no one to talk to and they end up selling at the wrong time. When it comes to performance, I think most investors have found that the lower fees did not produce the results they had hoped for. Over the last five years, the best performing robo-advisor based on a 60/40 portfolio was Sofi Automated Investing with a 7.8% annualized return. Schwab pulled up the rear with their Schwab Intelligent Portfolios showing a five-year annualized return of only 5.8%. It’s important to point out these numbers are only if the investor stayed in the program for five years straight. Sometimes automation can be great, but there are just certain areas of life such as your health and financial well-being that you need a good professional on your side to talk to when you need.    A look into the history of inflation data  Whether we’re talking about the CPI or the PCE, it seems no one is happy with how inflation is reported. I tell people your personal inflation is the most important inflation to understand as it is based on what you’re spending habits are rather than looking at someone else’s. A good example is a college student has far different expenditures than a retired senior. The Bureau of Labor Statistics released its first CPI number in February 1921 and that report included data going back to 1913. Time has changed consumer inflation as spending and prices have changed overtime. From 1935 through 1939, food represented 33.9% of a household’s expenses, today it is only 13%. During the depression, apparel was hard to come by and it was 11% of a paycheck. Today it only represents 2.6%. Many items are not comparable as time and style has changed. For example, cars and radios weren’t common enough to be included in the earliest years and now radios have become a dying product. There are some items though that we can look back over history and come. In 1913 round steak was 22.3 cents a pound which is equal to about $7 today. This would be below the price of $8.25 in the month of May. Butter was hard to come by and cost 38.3 cents a pound. That would be around $12 a pound in today’s dollars versus the May average of around $4.60. I will agree the CPI and even the PCE are not the best or should I say an exact measurement that people may want, but keep in mind the Bureau of Labor Statistics surveys metro area businesses and households collecting 94,000 prices and 8,000 rental housing unit quotes per month. So while it is a difficult task to take on, it is not just one person throwing out numbers but an accumulation of a lot of data that has been compiled for over 100 years. There will never be a perfect system for measuring inflation, but as of now they have not been able to find a better way to calculate it.   The Strategic Petroleum Reserve has remained at low levels Oil currently trades around $75-$78 a barrel but the uneasiness in the Middle East should cause concern about the level of our Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). The government used part of that reserve back when oil was $100 a barrel to try and keep the price of oil low, but they have never tried to replace it. We are currently sitting at a 41 year low on the SPR and I have to ask excuse the language, What the hell are we doing? Yes, the United States is currently pumping a lot of oil, but if there were a worldwide supply disruption that would then increase the price of oil around the world. The current administration should’ve been taken advantage of the low prices. We have had oil low for quite a while now and should have been buying a little bit at a time. For some reason the administration has chosen not to do that. I think this is a mistake and I do believe that if we don’t do something soon, we have the potential for some major problems with our energy security here in the US.    The US government is issuing too much short term debt over long-term debt We have said many times that we’re not that concerned with the overall debt of the US government because a true balance sheet shows we will be OK. However, that doesn’t mean that the current way we are financing that debt is correct. What concerns me is we are issuing too much short term debt versus long-term debt and that in the future the country will be at the mercy of short term interest rates to finance our large debt of $36 trillion. What should be happening is the government should be issuing more longer-term debt to lock in lower rates, just like you would on a mortgage. The concern is if they were to do that, it could cause long-term rates for consumers to increase. What appears to be happening is that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates and short term rates will fall, but there should be a spread of around 2% from a short term rate to a 10 year treasury. If short term rates fell to a reasonable 3% that would put the 10 year treasury around 5%. It could cause some short term pain, but that’s far better than having a big portion of our $36 trillion debt in short term maturities. If short term rates were to skyrocket so would the interest cost and that would create more problems.     Why is gold hitting new highs? Last week gold surpassed $2500 per ounce, which is an all-time high for the precious metal. Many people thought with high inflation in 2021, 2022, and 2023 gold would have appreciated then, but it actually did very little as the ETF GLD was up just around 10% from the beginning of 2021 through the end of 2023. Something else that moves gold is the strength of the US dollar, which is starting to decline. The reason for the decline in the US dollar is because it does appear that interest rates are coming down. This generally leads the world to buy more gold. 2024 has been a great year for gold as it is up over 20% and while it may have some more appreciation going forward, you will still not find it in our portfolio. I still think there are some good value companies out there that are paying good dividends and that will outperform gold.   Can Starbucks (SBUX) hold on to the recent 25% jump in their stock price? After the news that Starbucks hired Brian Niccol, the CEO from Chipotle, was released, the stock climbed 25%. The question is… can that higher stock price last? Under Brian‘s management at Chipotle, the stock climbed over 700%. Prior to being the CEO of Chipotle, he was the CEO for Taco Bell. They say being at the right place at the right time can help. When he first took over Chipotle, the company was having reputation problems, customer traffic issues, and their stock was struggling from the E. coli and norovirus outbreaks. He came in when the stock was trading at extreme lows and while I believe he did a great job, there was a lot of negativity priced into Chipotle’s stock. It’s important to understand how much larger Starbucks is and what a different business than Chipotle it is. It operates with 10 times as many stores, a large international business, and it has a packaged food business. I do believe that Brian Niccol has taken on a large order with his new role at Starbucks!   Tesla may be further ahead in self driving then I was aware of On October 10th of this year, Tesla will be holding a robotaxi event for investors. I have said before that the Cruise division from General Motors and the Waymo division from Alphabet are far ahead on public testing for their driverless cars compared to Tesla. I recently saw an article in Barron’s that showed data from Tesla that their software has accumulated over 1,500,000,000 miles. The question is will the government accept this software data or not. The government has come down very hard on both General Motors and Alphabet, let’s see how they handle Tesla.    The million-dollar home is just not as special as it used to be  Living in San Diego many “normal homes” have surpassed the $1 million mark, but nationwide that trend has also been increasing. In 2023, 7.6% of US homes had a value of $1 million or more. In 2024, that number has now climbed to 8.5% of US homes. That is nearly a 12% increase for $1 million or higher homes. I just don’t see how the price of homes can keep increasing at such a pace when incomes are not keeping up and affordability continues to remain a major problem.     Could a potential overbuild of apartments help with housing prices? We have talked many times about the potential overbuild of apartment complexes and now as more projects are finishing, it appears we are finally seeing an impact on pricing. In the month of June, more multifamily units were completed than in any month in nearly 50 years. This is leading to more recent concessions as 33.2% of U.S. landlords offered at least one rent concession. This was up from 25.4% last year. The increased supply also led to a decline in the median asking price for apartments in one- to three- bedroom units in the month of July. This marked the first decline since 2020. According to Redfin data, the median asking rent price for a studio or one-bedroom apartment fell 0.1% to $1,498 a month; two-bedroom apartments decreased 0.3% to $1,730; and units with three bedrooms or more, were down 2.4% to $2,010. I believe this is a major positive as it could help control home prices if renting is a more cost competitive option. It should also be a huge benefit to inflation as CPI has continued to see a major negative impact from high shelter costs.   Can Annuities Lose Money? Annuities are often associated with high fees and limited growth, but in exchange they come with guarantees like lifetime income and downside protection. This begs the question “can they lose money?”, and the answer is “absolutely”! There any many types of annuities and depending on how they are structured and the underlying investments, they can and do lose money despite being conservative. We met with someone this week who purchased an annuity three years ago for about $580,000. Now, even though the market has gone up during that time period, the annuity is worth less than $560,000, not including any surrender charges. How could this product lose $20,000 when most of the market overall is positive? Well, this was a variable annuity which means the account value is invested in a variety of mutual funds. When the annuity was purchased, the agent selected some funds that didn’t do too well. On top of that this annuity came with an income rider that includes an additional fee that is deducted from the account balance, further hurting performance. This rider comes with a separate income base that grows at a non-compounded 5% per year, and at annuitization will pay out 3.5% of the income base for life. Basically, this means even if the account balance itself doesn’t grow, guaranteed income can still be available from this income base. However, when you look at what this translates too, it does not seem attractive at all. This guy purchased the annuity when he was 58. If he starts collecting lifetime income at 65, he will be over 86 years old before he gets back the money he put in when he was 58. Technically this income is guaranteed for life, but with the fact that a low-interest checking account would have better performance over 30 years, the “guaranteed” benefit loses most of its appeal.   Companies Discussed: Brinker International (EAT), Intuitive Surgical (ISRG), Cisco Systems (CSCO)

Declining CPI opens door to lower interest rates Inflation concerns are falling as the July Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed an increase of 2.9% compared to last year, this would mark the lowest reading since March 2021. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy was also positive as it came in at 3.2% which would mark the lowest reading since April 2021. Areas that continued to put upward pressure on inflation included food away from home (+4.1%), electricity (+4.9%), and motor vehicle insurance (+18.6%). Other areas that used to be problematic have now reversed course and are benefitting the inflation report. This includes used cars and trucks (-10.9%) and new vehicles (-1.0%). Shelter continues to be the heavyweight in the report as the category increased 5.1% compared to last year and accounted for over 70% of the increase in core CPI. If shelter was stripped out, CPI would have increased just 1.7% compared to last year. I believe we’ll continue to see further progress on inflation as we end the year.   Retail sales data shows people are still spending money Data points continued to come in favorably for the Fed this week as retail sales increased 1.0% compared to last month. This easily topped the estimate of 0.3%. Looking compared to last year, retail sales were up a healthy 2.7%. Nonstore retailers continued to see strong growth with a 6.7% gain compared to last year and while growth has slowed, food services and drinking places still showed good growth of 3.4%. It appears both electronics and appliance stores and building material & garden equipment & supplies dealers have bottomed with gains of 5.2% and 0.4% respectively. This is the first time I remember seeing a positive gain in building material & garden equipment & supplies dealers in a long time. Furniture & home furnishing stores did remain a drag on the report as sales declined 2.4% compared to last year. Overall, I believe this was a great report considering we are seeing inflation slow and the consumer is still willing to spend. The soft landing many have wondered about is looking more and more possible with reports like this.   Are separately managed funds best for you? At Wilsey Asset Management, we manage all our accounts separately and have done that now for over 30 years. What that means is our clients actually hold the securities in their portfolio versus buying shares in a mutual fund or ETF. This trend seems to be taking hold with other brokers as asset growth for separately managed accounts (SMAs) has been 30% over the past two years. SMA’s are now at $2.4 trillion in assets in professionally managed accounts. This compares to $4.3 trillion in mutual funds and $1.9 trillion in ETF’s. These managed accounts will generally use an outside money manager and it will not be quite as individualized as people would prefer. One thing to understand is the fees considering you are likely paying you’re an advisor/broker a fee and then an additional fee to the SMA manager. Often times this strategy can cause confusion for the investor as well, sometimes we have seen this strategy produce 50 to 100 positions which can also be a nightmare to get out of. Lastly if you have questions on why certain positions are in the portfolio you will not be able to call and talk to the person making those investment decisions and you’ll be stuck with a pre-scripted response from the broker. Be sure to ask your broker/advisor many questions if they are advising SMAs as it may sound better than it really is.   Financial Planning: When to get Umbrella Insurance Both home and auto policies contain liability coverage, which pays in case you are sued for damaging property or if you are responsible for hurting someone.  An example could be someone slipping on your driveway, but more commonly it is due to a bad car accident.  An umbrella policy adds extra liability coverage that kicks in after the home and auto liability is exhausted.  In recent years, litigation across the board has been rising, but also inflation has increased the cost of medical bills and auto repairs.  This in turn has resulted in more umbrella claims as costs are more likely to exceed the coverage on home and auto polices alone.  As a result, insurance carriers have increased premiums on umbrella policies (as well as home and auto policies) and have been more likely to deny umbrella coverage increases or coverage all together.  Even with these cost increases, it is still relatively affordable at a few hundred dollars per year, so if you are underinsured you should consider purchasing a policy.  Umbrella coverage comes in increments of $1 million, and the rule of thumb is to carry insurance equal to your net worth.  However, this can be excessive in some circumstances as assets like qualified retirement accounts and home equity have some protection against lawsuits. Generally speaking, if your net worth is over a million, you should have an umbrella policy, and depending on your net worth, the types of assets you own, and your exposure to liability, you may need to carry higher amounts of coverage.  The last thing you need after building a nest egg is for an unexpected lawsuit to take all your assets and put you back to square one.   Companies Discussed: JB Hunt Transport Services (JBHT), Mobileye (MBLY), Ulta Beauty (ULTA)

“Friendly fraud” is costing businesses $100 billion a year I was surprised to learn of a new term called friendly fraud. This is when a customer disputes a legitimate charge they made on their credit card, debit card, or another payment method. According to a recent survey,35% of Americans admit to committing this kind of fraud, and 40% know someone who has. This has come at a huge cost to merchants as it is estimated to cost them $100 billion per year. Some of the fraud is accidental as it can come about when a consumer doesn’t recognize the merchant’s name used to identify a purchase on their bill. Sometimes a merchant will have a name that differs from their commonly known name. If you are a merchant, you may want to look into this as it could help save you some of these potential costs. Of those that committed this type of fraud, 29% said it was accidental. Other reasons for committing this type of fraud included economic hardship (34%) and respondents knew someone else who had gotten away with it and then gave it a try (19%). I have to say, if you have intentionally done this, it is just wrong. It is really no different than walking into the store and stealing. Ultimately, this costs other people as merchants will need to charge more for their goods to offset these costs.   Google’s monopoly ruling could be a huge loss for Apple This might sound crazy, but I believe the ruling by a federal U.S. judge that Google has illegally held a monopoly in search and text advertising might have a bigger impact on Apple’s stock than Alphabet’s. This case was filed in 2020 by the Department of Justice and a bipartisan group of attorneys general from 38 states and territories. It alleged that Google has kept its share of the general search market by creating strong barriers to entry and a feedback loop that sustained its dominance. The court found that Google violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act, which outlaws monopolies. In the ruling, the court focused on Google’s exclusive search arrangements on Android and Apple’s iPhone and iPad devices, saying that they helped to cement Google’s anticompetitive behavior and dominance over the search markets. This should be a major concern for Apple considering Google paid them $20 B in 2022 and if we annualize the recent service revenue in Q3 of $24.2 B the Google payment would account for about 25% of service revenue. I can’t imagine there are many costs associated with this for Apple, so the loss of this payment would essentially subtract $20 B from total profit. For Google the risk is that users might have other options for search engines, but with their strong reputation and well-run platform I don’t think they would lose a lot of users.    The US debt continues to climb, should you be concerned? If you haven’t heard the news already, you probably will hear it as time goes on, the US treasury estimates America’s gross national debt at $35 trillion which was hit last week. No doubt about it, $35 trillion by itself is a scary number. But this number is only half the story. In accounting, a balance sheet has assets and liabilities. To know the total equation, one needs to know what the assets are for the United States government. It is estimated the government has assets of $178 trillion which is made up of real estate, oil and natural gas rights and other assets. It is also important to know that much of the real estate was bought many many years ago and is carried at book value, not the current value or market value. Taking it one step further and looking at the debt-to-equity ratio, the government would have a debt/equity of 24.5%. This is not a bad ratio at all and I’m sure many people across the country would love to have a personal debt ratio that low. So when you hear people complain about the debt, ask them what are the assets and their value? Most people don’t have a clue! Thank you to most of the mainstream media that only wants to scare you, rather than educate you by giving you the whole story!   Financial Planning: Tax Changes in 2026 The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 contained quite a few changes for federal taxation, but some of the more impactful differences were the tax rates themselves, the ranges of income that is subject to the tax rates, and the adjustment to deductions and exemptions. These went into effect in 2018 and are expected to sunset back to their original rules in 2026. We are now in 2024, so we only have 2 tax years left. There are 7 federal tax brackets which currently are 10%, 12%, 22%, 24%, 32%, 35%, and 37% and these are expected to increase back to 10%, 15%, 25%, 28%, 33%, 35%, and 39.6%. This is one of the more well-known adjustments, but one of the lesser-known features is that the amount of income subject to each of those tax rates will be adjusting as well. Essentially this means the same level of taxable income will climb into the higher tax brackets more quickly beginning in 2026. In other words, you may fall into the 3rd tax bracket right now, but after the sunset, you would fall into the 4th tax bracket with no other changes to income. These tax rate and income range changes are both bad for your tax bill as they will increase tax lability in 2026. Alternatively, there is also the change to the standard deduction, itemized deduction, and exemptions which may be helpful for your tax bill in 2026 and beyond. Between 2017 and 2025, the standard deduction was increased, limits were placed on itemized deductions, and exemptions were eliminated. Based on your situation, the net impact of this is either a larger or smaller level of taxable income, which is what is subject to the tax brackets. Many people currently claim the standard deduction, but itemizing will again become more common in 2026 which results in lower levels of taxable income. What’s funny is most people aren’t familiar with how taxes work or how much they actually pay, they just know they pay “a lot” or “too much”. Consequently, people seem to let their opinion of former president Trump dictate whether they are in favor or not of these tax changes as he was largely responsible for them. We’ve seen people who love Trump and thought they got a tax cut, when their tax bill really didn’t change much, and we’ve seen people who hate Trump thinking their taxes increased when really, they didn’t. Every situation is different but generally people with lower levels of income will see a tax increase in 2026. This is because most low-level income earners do not itemize which means they will have a higher taxable income that is taxed at a higher rate. People with higher levels of income will either see relatively no change, or a tax increase in 2026 as they will likely itemize resulting in lower levels of taxable income but will be subject to higher tax rates. People who claim the standard deduction and who are in the middle tax brackets will likely see an increase in taxes in 2026 as their taxable income will be higher and will be taxed at higher rates. People who will itemize and who are in the middle tax brackets will either see not much of a tax change in 2026 or will see a tax decrease. People who are more likely to see a tax decrease are those in the third or fourth tax bracket living in a high-income tax state and who have a house with a mortgage with higher property taxes. This is because they will have a higher level of itemized deductions from the extra state income and property taxes, but their income is low enough so they aren’t pushed too far into the upper brackets. Overall, the majority of people, even in California, will either see relatively no change or a tax increase in 2026, but there are a few who will see a tax decrease.   Companies Discussed: Intel (INTC), Merck (MRK), Charles Schwab (SCHW) 

Did the markets overreact to employment numbers? Markets headed largely lower Friday morning after nonfarm payrolls grew by just 114,000 in the month of July. This was well below the estimate of 185,000 and the downwardly revised June number of 179,000. Total revisions for the previous two months led to numbers that were 29,000 lower than previously reported. The major concerns here are that job creation is well below the average monthly gain of 215,000 over the previous 12 months and the unemployment rate has now ticked up to 4.3%, its highest since October 2021. This triggered fears over the Sahm Rule, which states the economy is in recession when the three-month average of the jobless level is half a percentage point higher than the 12-month low. The three-month unemployment rate average has now moved up to 4.13%, which is above the 3.5% level in July 2023. Frankly, with unemployment as low as it’s been, I don’t believe this rule provides a strong signal here. As for the lower payroll numbers, it should be expected after years of expansion that job growth would slow. I don’t believe that means we are heading into a recession considering it is just one month of data and it still showed positive gains in the month. On the positive side, inflation concerns should be helped here considering wage inflation grew 3.6% from over a year ago, which was below the estimate of 3.7% and last month’s reading of 3.9%. While this wasn’t a great report, I don’t believe there is much to panic about here.    The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) showed job openings totaled 8.18 million in the month of June. This was a bit higher than the estimate of 8.1 million, but lower than May’s upwardly revised reading of 8.23 million. The ratio of openings to unemployed workers still stood at very good rate around 1.2 to 1. I don’t think this report will move the Fed’s thinking for rate cuts one way or another as it shows a softening labor market that remains near a healthy level.   I’m not that impressed by the new sports streaming service Venu Sports. Venu Sports is the joint venture between Disney’s ESPN, Warner Bros. Discovery and Fox. It will feature all three companies’ portfolio of live sports. This includes the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, and college football. The service will cost $42.99 a month. The joint venture is aiming to launch before the start of the NFL season on September 5th, but it is still pending regulatory approval. It is also expected for further details to be released when it launches. My problem here is there are still so many sports games you are not receiving and $42.99 a month is quite expensive. Consider the fact that now Amazon, Apple, Alphabet and Paramount also own large sports rights. One thing I’ll be interested in is how expansive the service will be. For example, with the NFL on Fox you are only able to view the local Fox game that is being broadcasted. With this new service would I be able to watch any NFL game that is being broadcasted on Fox that day? If not, I really don’t believe this is worth the money. As for the business structure it will be interesting to see how it plays out. Each company will own a 1/3 stake, have equal board representation, and will continue to bid independently for sports rights. I find it interesting they have an equal share since they all bring different rights to the table. As it stands right now, I’m not a fan of this deal as a consumer nor would I be as an investor in one of these companies.   Are Microsoft and OpenAI going from partners to competitors? In Microsoft’s recent annual report, it added OpenAI to its list of competitors. This list has included companies like Amazon, Apple, Google, and Meta, but OpenAI was a new major addition. The competitive landscape in AI continues to evolve and with the launch of OpenAI’s search engine known as SearchGPT last week, the two companies are now competing directly in the search space. Remember when OpenAI was supposed to revitalize Microsoft’s Bing search engine? It doesn’t look like that will pan out. Microsoft said they are also competing with OpenAI in AI offerings and news advertising. After investing a reported $13 B in OpenAI, Microsoft is the biggest investor. The company also serves as the exclusive cloud provider for OpenAI and uses its AI models in its products. I would say this relationship is definitely looking more and more confusing, especially when you consider OpenAI’s business model. According to their website, OpenAI operates as a partnership between the original Nonprofit and a new capped profit arm. I would say this definitely complicates how Microsoft will be able to monetize its investment. As for AI, while I still believe it will have an impact on our society, it’s just too early to try and pick winners and losers in this complicated space.   Planning for the Expected and Unexpected A lot of people associate financing planning with “goal planning” such as preparing for retirement, a home purchase, or education costs, but life has a way of going in unexpected directions. It is equally important to take the steps necessary to prepare yourself in case the unexpected happens, because it inevitably will. This could be an illness, disability, job loss, death, divorce, income reduction, or anything else that negatively impacts your financial situation. Just because you don’t know what’s going to happen, doesn’t mean you can’t plan for it, and you want to have contingency plans in place so a bad situation doesn’t become catastrophic. Some examples would be making sure you have an established emergency fund, also having additional liquid assets or access to credit, making sure you have the right types of insurance and the appropriate levels of coverage, spending that is under control, and not being over-leveraged at any given time. These aren’t necessarily moving you in the direction of your goals, but they do keep you from going backward. I spoke to someone recently who’s in their early 30’s, has four kids and a wife that stays home with them, so he’s the bread winner. It looks like the company he works for might be going bankrupt and he could be losing his job. So far he thought he has been doing to right thing by buying a home and saving toward retirement, but all their money is tied up in retirement accounts and their house, which doesn’t have a lot of equity, so there’s not a lot of funds to access if he suddenly loses his income. They may need to withdraw from their retirement accounts in which case the tax and penalty consequences will greatly outweigh the benefits they got by funding them. Hindsight is 20/20, but this is an example of what can happen and why you want to be prepared. Financial planning is about making the right decisions on a consistent basis to accomplish your goals, but it is also important to make sure you are in a position to handle whatever comes at you, good or bad. When opportunities come along, you want to be able to take advantage of them. When something bad happens, you want to be able to take care of it without it derailing your financial situation or lifestyle.   Companies Discussed: SoFi Technologies (SOFI), UPS (UPS) & DexCom (DXCM)

Q2 GDP not as strong as the headline numbers show While Real Q2 GDP increased at a 2.8% annualized pace and easily topped the estimate of 2.1%, there were some likely one time impacts that lifted the numbers. The major outlier was the change in private inventories as it added 0.82% to the headline GDP number. As we discussed after Q1 GDP, private inventories negatively weighed on GDP during that quarter as it subtracted 0.42% from the headline number and led to a disappointing growth for Real GDP of 1.4%. Government also saw a nice boost as it grew 3.1% in Q2 and added 0.53% to the headline number. Even though the report may not be as strong as the headline shows, I still believe it was a good report. Personal consumption expenditures grew 2.3% in the quarter as spending on goods was up 2.5% and spending on services was up 2.2%. Spending was different when compared to Q1 considering in that report goods spending fell 2.3% and services spending rose 3.3%. Private investment was also strong in Q2 as it rose 8.4%. Although residential was down 1.4%, nonresidential investment was up 5.2%. Equipment was the strongest subcategory as it was up 11.6% and intellectual property products also saw good growth of 4.5%. Trade was the only component that subtracted from the headline number. The increase in imports of 6.9% more than offset the increase in exports of 2.0% and led to a subtraction of 0.72% from the headline number. I believe this GDP report is exactly what we needed to see for a potential soft landing. We are still seeing growth of around 2%, but it is slowing which should help reduce inflation in the coming months.    June PCE Inflation continues to normalize as the June personal consumption expenditures index (PCE) increased 2.5% from a year ago. Core PCE, which is the Fed’s preferred measure showed an increase of 2.6%. Both numbers were in line with expectations and they provide more evidence that an interest rate cut should be heading our way as we exit the year. This report does put more pressure on the Fed to provide a signal for fed policy direction at next week’s meeting. I don’t think there will be a cut at that meeting, but the market appears to be hoping that they at least hint towards a cut in September.    Legal battle between Warner Bros. Discovery and NBA is set to begin The NBA announced deals with Disney, Comcast and Amazon for rights to games for 11 years starting in the fall of 2025. The deals totaled around $77 B with Disney paying around $2.6 B per year, Comcast paying around $2.5 B per year, and Amazon paying around $1.9 B per year. These deals also include the rights for WNBA games. The current rights that will expire next season were for 9 years and nearly $24 B. Disney will air more than 20 games per season on ABC and up to 60 games on ESPN. NBC will air 100 NBA games each season, including about 50 that will be exclusive to Peacock. NBC is returning as a partner with the NBA after losing rights in 2002. Amazon will offer 66 regular season games. This was a major disappointment for Warner Bros. considering Turner Sports has carried live NBA games for nearly 40 years. This spells more trouble for TNT and TBS as this was a major asset for these stations. The popular “Inside the NBA” show on TNT is also in question if Warner Bros. is unable to win back the rights. Warner Bros did acquire matching rights as part of the current deal, but the NBA rebuffed the bid and said, “Warner Bros. Discovery’s most recent proposal did not match the terms of Amazon Prime Video’s offer and, therefore, we have entered into a long-term arrangement with Amazon.” It will be interesting to see how this shakes out. The NBA doesn’t believe Warner Bros. rights extend to an all-streaming package, which was carved out for Amazon. The last time these deals were made I can’t see how streaming would have been addressed. For that reason, my early inclination would be that it would be hard for the NBA to deny Warner Bros. their matching rights.    The IRS and Inherited IRAs After 5 years, the IRS has finally come to a decision with inherited IRA withdrawals. The Secure Act in 2019 removed the ability for most retirement account beneficiaries to stretch distributions over their life expectancy and now requires them to fully deplete the account after 10 years. With tax-deferred accounts, this severely limits compounding growth and increases the income tax burden on these beneficiaries. The component that has been up for debate is whether those beneficiaries also have to take required distributions during each of those 10 years. So far, no distributions have been required and a few days ago the IRS confirmed that a distribution will not be required in 2024. However, beginning in 2025, beneficiaries who inherited a tax-deferred retirement account in 2020 or later from someone who was subject to RMDs (which will be most cases) must begin taking small required distributions of their own each year as well. This does not apply to beneficiaries who are spouses, minors, or disabled, and while inherited Roth IRAs are subject to the 10-year rule, they will not have annual required distributions. Keep in mind, if you inherited an IRA in 2020 and wait until 2025 to start distributions, you now only have 6 years left to deplete it because you are still bound by the 10-year rule. This means larger annual distributions and maybe higher tax brackets. So even though you don’t have to start, that doesn’t mean you should continue to wait or that you should only take the minimum amount required. Every beneficiary should have their own plan on how best to distribute the funds at the lowest tax rate which will be dependent on their own income level, retirement date, level of their own retirement assets, and the fact that tax rates could increase in 2026. This could mean accelerating or deferring inherited withdrawals so they occur when your own income is lower.   Companies Discussed: Bank of America (BAC), Dominos (DPZ) and UnitedHealth Group (UNH)

Retail sales beats expectations but shows consumer is still softening. June retail sales came in flat compared to the previous month, this topped the expectation for a 0.4% decline. Compared to last June, retail sales were up 2.3%. Areas of strength included non-store retailers (+8.9%), food services and drinking places (+4.4%), clothing and clothing accessories stores (+4.3%), and electronics and appliance stores (+2.7%). Both furniture and home furnishing stores (-4.0%) and building material and garden equipment and supplies dealers (0.9%) were done when looking year over year, but they have perhaps started to turn the corner as they both showed month over month gains. Gasoline stations were also a negative weight as it was down 3.0% compared to last month and 0.4% compared to last year. Overall, I believe this is a strong report that shows an economy that is slowing but remains in a healthy place. With this news and other comments from Fed chair Powell markets have now priced in a 100% chance of at least one rate cut by the September meeting.    Will oil demand increase or decrease in years to come? I have been concerned about oil consumption and investing in oil related companies based on the increase in electric and hybrid vehicles. Unfortunately, there’s not much help in predicting oil demand from the experts. British petroleum, also known as BP, expects oil demand will plateau by 2025. They believe the subsequent decline will depend on how aggressive countries get with carbon omissions. BP believes by 2050 oil demand could drop down to 25 million to 30 million barrels a day if countries get serious about a “net zero” goal. This would be a major decline from today’s level of about 102 million barrels a day. But there’s others who disagree such as OPEC which sees demand growing by 4.1 million barrels a day from 2023 to 2025 and continuing to rise at least through 2045. The Paris-based International Energy Agency forecasts a peak in 2029 and the US Energy Information Administration is looking for peak between 2030 and 2040. It also looks like Warren Buffett does not believe a peak is coming soon as he has been investing heavily into Occidental Petroleum and has a sizeable stake in Chevron. With all the uncertainty, I believe if an investor is going to invest in an energy company, it should be a well-diversified.    Japan’s $1.5 trillion pension fund could be a black Swan for our stock market. Japan has grown their pension fund to $1.5 trillion over the years and has continued to increase the amount of money they invest in the US. As of March 31st, about 50% of the fund was held in foreign stocks and bonds, most of which was in the United States. The problem they have is their currency, the yen vs the dollar has fallen to levels not seen since President Reagan was in office. The investments in foreign countries have led to some criticism as some say it amounts to a vote of no confidence by the Japanese government in its own currency. It is unknown what US equities they hold, but the fund was up 23% in its most recent fiscal year. My concerns are what if they want to reduce their exposure to US equities and bonds to 30%? That would be a reduction of around $300 billion. What if they hold in their pension the high-flying technology companies? How would those stocks perform if the fund sold $100 to maybe $200 billion worth of stock? No one knows for sure, but with that 23% gain there is a high likelihood that they had a portion perhaps a good portion of the investments in the US technology companies.    A Major Mistake with Spousal Social Security When collecting Social Security on your own work history, you may collect between the ages of 62 and 70. Every month you wait, your benefit amount increases. In cases where one spouse did not work, or had a very limited earnings history, that spouse may qualify for a larger spousal benefit from Social Security. The maximum spousal benefit is one half of the higher earning spouse’s full retirement age benefit amount, and the lower earning spouse would need to collect at their own full retirement age to receive it. If this half is more than what they would receive from their own earnings history, they will receive the larger spousal benefit, not both. If they collect before their full retirement age, they will receive a reduced amount. Also, the higher earning spouse must be collecting for the lower earning spouse to be able to collect a spousal benefit. Many people have the idea of deferring their Social Security until age 70 so they receive the highest possible monthly amount. This strategy may not be the best decision normally, and it can be even more problematic when a spousal benefit applies. I met with some people this week who had this idea. One spouse worked and the other did not, so a spousal benefit was definitely going to be applicable. The problem is, a spousal benefit does not get any larger beyond full retirement age, which in this case was age 66 and 10 months for both of them. They were both the same age, so if they had waited to collect until 70, the lower earning spouse would be deferring 38 months (from 66 and 10 months until 70) for no additional benefit. In this case the spousal benefit was about $1,900 per month so whether she collects at 66 and 10 months or waits until 70, she would still receive only $1,900. This mistake would have cost them over $70,000 in missed Social Security benefits. Fortunately, they had not reached their full retirement age yet and the working spouse had not retired, so they had not lost anything yet. If you will be receiving a spousal benefit from Social Security it is almost never helpful to defer beyond your full retirement age, which is usually around age 67.    Companies Discussed: CrowdStrike (CRWD), Amazon (AMZN) and PepsiCo (PEP)

Inflation continues to cool, creating more hope for rate cuts. The June Consumer Price index (CPI) rose 3.0% compared to last year, which was below last month’s reading of 3.3% and the expectation of 3.1%. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy rose 3.3% from a year ago. This was below last month’s reading and the expectation which were both 3.4%. This also marked the smallest annual increase in core CPI since April 2021. Food was up 2.2% over the last 12 months with food at home up 1.1% and food away from home up 4.1%. Energy was up 1.0% as gasoline was down 2.5% and electricity was up 4.4%. Motor vehicle insurance continued to be an outlier as it was up 19.5%. The shelter index also continues to be a problem for inflation as it was up 5.2% and accounted for nearly 70% of the 12 month increase in core CPI. While this is off the peak of around 8%, the shelter index continues to lag real time data considering the annual inflation rate for new rental contracts fell 0.4% in the first quarter this year. This was down from the record highs around 12% just two years earlier. Part of the reason for the lag in the shelter index is the government constructs it by sampling a “staggered panel” of renters and homeowners. It splits the sample into six groups, and surveys each on a staggered basis every six months. I do believe this means we will continue to see shelter fall, which should be a major positive for the inflation rate. With this report I believe the chance for two rate cuts before the end of the year is now more likely.    Producer Price Index disappoints against expectations The Producer Price Index (PPI) rose 2.6% in the month of June, which was above the expectation of 2.3%. Core PPI rose 3.0% in the month, which was above the expectation of 2.5%. Although this looks troubling, I still believe these rates are manageable, especially considering the several months of positive data when compared to the CPI. I don’t think this report should be cause for concern, but it should definitely be monitored in the months ahead. I’m still looking for both core CPI and PPI to head closer towards the 2% target as we exit 2024.   The Labor Market Can be Confusing, Which Survey Should You Trust?  We received the job numbers last Friday and lately there have been big differences between the establishment survey and the household survey. Because of these major differences, some people say these numbers are not worth relying on. But if one understands why the two are different, it justifies that the establishment survey is the one to follow. The establishment survey/nonfarm payroll number comes from employers who detail how many employees are working at their company. The household survey is completed by asking households who is currently working in their household. We have seen an increase in undocumented workers and when these people receive a call from any US government surveyor, they do not want to answer any questions for obvious reasons. This has likely led to part of the discrepancy between the two surveys. I believe businesses will provide a more accurate picture of labor market over a simple household survey. I especially think this is true when you consider the household numbers are based on surveys of approximately 60,000 households. These household responses are then used to calculate the numbers for the entire US population.    Investors beware, what goes up must come down!  I remember since I was a little kid there was a saying: the higher you climb, the further the fall. I believe this applies to almost everything, including the Magnificent Seven stocks. The S&P 500 this year has increased in value by $6.2 trillion, the Magnificent Seven having contributed $4.2 trillion. Throughout history, we have seen similar periods with stocks that have dominated the market going all the way back to the 1920s when it was the railroads. Then about 20 years later, it was chemical companies and automobiles. If you lookback 40 years, who could forget the AT&T monopoly and their break up in 1984. Over history, markets have gotten it right when it comes to the benefit of technology, but the highflyers in the beginning generally do not do as well as time progresses. I believe many investors could lose buying the high flyers at these prices. Don’t forget about the Tortoise and the Hare.   Financial Planning: What is the Goal of a Roth Conversion? A Roth Conversion is the process of transferring funds from a tax-deferred retirement account to a Roth account. When the funds are transferred, the amount is reportable as income and taxed during the year it occurs. However, once the funds are in the Roth, they can continue to be invested and grow tax-free without any required distributions in retirement. Unlike contributions, there is no limit on the amount you may convert. The transaction itself is relatively simple, you’re just moving money from one account to another. The difficult part is determining when, how much, and how often you perform these conversions. Many people and advisors mistakenly think the goal of Roth Conversions is to reduce your lifetime tax bill, which is not the case. The goal, along with most retirement planning strategies, should be to increase your after-tax retirement income; reducing taxes is simply a byproduct of that. Reducing taxes and increasing after-tax income may seem like the same thing, but they are not. What matters when performing a Roth Conversion is the marginal tax rate at the time of the conversion and the tax rate in retirement if that conversion is not performed. This marginal tax rate includes all taxes such as federal, state, net investment income, capital gain, and IMRAA. If you can convert funds at a lower tax rate than they would otherwise be subject to if not converted, you will increase your level of after-tax income in retirement, which accomplishes the primary goal. If your goal was simply to reduce lifetime taxes, that may cause you to convert too aggressively by converting too much and pushing yourself into a higher tax bracket. If you live long enough this may reduce your total taxes, but if you paid too much tax upfront on the conversion, you may not have enough after-tax Roth funds to create the level of income you need. In many cases it is more appropriate to perform several smaller, more calculated conversions. You probably won’t convert 100% of your pre-tax funds, you may still have some extra Medicare premiums to pay, you may eventually get pushed into a higher tax bracket, but that may be necessary if the net result gives you the highest level of income after paying those.   Companies Discussed: Carnival Corporation (CCL), Levi Strauss (LEVI) and International Paper (IP)

Largest US Banks  I continue to remain optimistic about investing in the large financials, specifically the money center banks. For the most part they trade at good valuations and the recent stress test shows they remain healthy. All 31 of the largest US banks passed the Federal Reserve’s annual stress test, which provided a hypothetical scenario where unemployment levels rose to 10%, commercial real estate values decreased by 40% and housing prices fell by 36%. Following the results, the banks released plans to buyback stock and increase dividends. JPMorgan increased its dividend 8.7% and authorized a new $30 B share repurchase program. Jamie Dimon noted the dividend increase marked the second this year for JPM. Citigroup raised its dividend 5.7% and said it would continue to assess share repurchases. Bank of America increased its dividend 8%, but made no mention of share repurchases. Wells Fargo increased its dividend 14% and said it has the capacity to buy back common stock over the four-quarter period starting Q3 2024 through Q2 2025. You likely won’t see these stocks double over the next 12 months, but I believe many of them over the next few years could produce sound returns of around 10% when including dividends.   Jobs Report The labor market continues to soften, which should be a positive for Fed rate cuts. Nonfarm payrolls increased by 206,000 in the month of June, which was better than the 200,000 estimate but less than the downwardly revised gain of 218,000 in the month of May. Combined, nonfarm payrolls in April and May were reduced by 111,000. Looking under the hood, the report was even weaker than the headline number indicated considering government was the second largest contributor adding 70K jobs in the month. Health care and social assistance continued to lead the way as the sectors added 82.4K jobs and construction was strong as well as it added 27K jobs. Areas of weakness included manufacturing (-8K), retail trade (-8.5k), and professional and business services (-17K). Wage gains also continued to soften as average hourly earnings were up 3.9% year over year. This was below last month’s reading of 4.1% and is well below the high in 2022 of 5.9%. The unemployment rate climbed to 4.1%, which tied the highest level since October 2021. Part of the increase in the unemployment rate came from a 0.1 percentage point increase in the labor force participation rate to 62.6%. The so-called prime age rate, which focuses on those between ages 25 and 54, rose to 83.7%, its highest in more than 22 years. While a lot of this report may sound negative, it is important to remember that the labor market is softening from a very strong level. We also need to see the labor market soften to give the Fed more confidence in their ability to cut interest rates. I would say this report was very positive considering it achieved the goal of softening without being damaging. We should keep an eye on the reports moving forward to make sure the labor market doesn’t fall off a cliff, but as of right now I don’t see that happening.    Labor Market In the recent JOLTs report, job openings showed the labor market continues to soften but to a healthy level. Openings stood at 8.1 million in the month of May, which was an increase from 7.9 million in April. While openings have fallen from a record of around 12 million in 2022, they are still above prepandemic levels when they were tracking at just under 7 million. The report showed the number of job openings for each employed worker remained at 1.2. This is below the peak of 2.0 in 2022, but it is right around prepandemic levels. I would not be surprised if we continue to see the labor market soften even a little further. I believe this would be healthy for the economy as it would create a more balanced labor market between employers and employees.   Risky Investing I’m very concerned that the bar on risk taking in investing continues to rise. We are already dealing with craziness like GameStop, Roaring Kitty, cryptocurrencies with no real value, and technology companies that have expectations that the earnings will continue to go to the moon. Now add to that list what is known as “zero days to expiration” better known as 0DTE options. These options currently account for nearly half of the daily volume of the S&P 500 index options, more than double the 17% in 2020. These are simply one day options on the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ 100. It is estimated by early 2025 these 0DTE’s will be available for individual equities as well. That’s unbelievable! There will be sometime in the future that an event will cause wide volatility and many of these gamblers will lose large amounts of money. I’m disappointed that this is being allowed and the SEC and other regulators are letting this happen. I can’t believe I’m going to put this in print, but maybe I should send this to Elizabeth Warren. I’m afraid unsuspecting people with money will see on social media some people shouting how they made tens of thousands of dollars one day with small investments. What you won’t see is the larger majority of investors losing large sums through this gambling tool. In fact, retail investors lost more than $350,000 on 0DTE options on an average trading day between May 2022 and September 2023. You also won’t see the fact that institutional traders with their algorithmic trading and market makers are able to pounce on split second moves, leaving retail investors with the losing crumbs. I’m in hopes sometime down the road we will see these smaller brokerage firms that are pushing the 0DTE’s hit with large fines and hopefully forced into bankruptcy. However, in the meantime, these brokerage firms will be bringing in millions and maybe billions of dollars in fees and commissions. There are more portions of the market now that is no longer investing, but more like playing the lottery or gambling and betting on short term movements. In my opinion 0DTE’s should be illegal and people gambling like this should lose their money as it is high risk gambling. What concerns me is they will relate it to the stock market and when they lose money they will say the stock market is risky. If you invest in good quality equities and have a time horizon of 3 to 5 years and they have strong fundamentals, stocks are not risky. Unfortunately, many people right now are caught up in the hype and are more into gambling rather than investing.   Financial Planning: Reviewing Mid-Year Income Now that we are half way through the year, it can be helpful to review your income to estimate how you will end up by the end of the year and make some adjustments. Maybe you had some unexpected income like extra capital gains or a bonus or perhaps your business had more sales than you were expecting. These increases in income may push you into a higher tax bracket or trigger income-related surcharges like the net investment income tax or IRMAA. More income is better than less, but if this is the case, now is the time to mitigate the tax hit. If you are still working, it may be helpful to increase retirement contributions or change which accounts you are contributing to. If you are retired, you might want to adjust how much you are withdrawing from accounts or adjust which accounts you are withdrawing from. It may also be necessary to adjust your withholdings or make an estimated tax payment if you have not withheld enough so far to prevent extra penalties and interest for underpayment of taxes. With rising rates, the interest for underpayment of taxes is much higher than in years past. Other tax strategies like Roth conversions are better implement at the end of the year, but making mid-year adjustments can help your annual income end up where it needs to be.   Stocks Discussed: Micron (MU), Whirlpool (WHR), Nike (NKE)

May Retail Sales May retail sales showed the economy is continuing to decelerate, which is exactly what I think we need to see. The release showed retail sales were up 0.1% compared to last month, which missed the estimate of 0.2%. When looking at May 2023, retail sales were up 2.3%. While this doesn’t show a booming economy, I still believe it is a healthy level. Nonstore retailers continued see strong growth as sales were up 6.8%. It appears as the comparisons have gotten more challenging sales growth at food services and drinking places is slowing as sales were up 3.8%. It appears we have seen a turn in electronics and appliance stores as sales were up 1.8%, but furniture and home furnishing stores (-6.8%) and building material and garden equipment and supplies dealers (-4.3%) remained the two weakest groups in the report. Overall, I think this report should provide further evidence that a rate cut by the Fed should be warranted as we exit the year.  Annuities I have always cautioned people when it comes to annuities. Over my 40 years of financial experience, I have seen annuities sold to people by companies that later went through bankruptcy and insolvency. Two companies come to mind, Baldwin United and Executive Life Insurance Company. After these bankruptcies some policy holders only received 2/3 or so of their investment and no interest at all. I was curious how some annuities were paying high yields over the last few years with interest rates so low. Thanks to an investigative team from Barron’s, they discovered a report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago dated June 3rd that life insurers are relying more heavily on private placements and generally higher yielding securities that are exempt from federal reporting requirements and are lacking an active secondary market. According to the report, private placements now are about 20% of all life insurance bond holdings, which is up from 15% just five years ago. I believe holders of these annuities have no idea that their annuity is backed by private loans from soccer teams, film financing, and even sports broadcast rights. They are definitely far riskier than the old insurance companies that would invest in good quality equities along with highly rated bonds. Consumers need to be aware because in the brochures that are given by the sales people who have no idea what’s in the portfolio, they’re still saying these are as safe as CDs, savings bonds, money markets, and treasury bills. Unfortunately, that is not the case and I believe down the road we could be reading about seniors who were depending on these annuities for their retirement and they have stopped receiving income from the annuity and/or have lost some of their principal. My recommendation is to understand what you’re investing in and make sure the investment advisor you’re dealing with is knowledgeable about the investments and not just selling you a product for a big commission or a trip to Australia or Morocco as some annuity companies have given as an incentive to their brokers with the best sales. It’s always best to deal with an investment advisor who is 100% a fiduciary.  New Car Sales Maybe you’re driving around in a car that is six- or seven-years old thinking gosh my car is old, perhaps I should replace it with a new one. Well don’t be in too much of a hurry. The age of your car is well below the average vehicle on the road which is currently 12.6 years as reported by S&P Global Mobility. That Is up from the average age of 11.2 years just 10 years ago. This is caused by many factors, not just the average cost of a new vehicle which is around $47,000. You also have higher interest rates, your registration will be higher, and insurance premiums could increase by double digits with a new car. There are some people who just don’t want the hassle of going to buy a new car and having to deal with the car sales person that could put a lot of pressure on them. Some people flat out just don’t like the new cars and they miss the old buttons and easy access to turn things on and off as opposed to the new touchscreens and technology that can take hours and hours to learn. New car sales have done well over the last few years and probably will continue to stay strong for years to come, but there are a few people out there that are just resisting the technology and will stay with their current vehicle for many more years to come. Navigating the Social Security Earnings Limit Social Security can be collected between the ages of 62 and 70, but if you apply before your “full retirement age”, which is usually 67, you will be subject to an earnings limit. This rule states that for every $2 of earned income, such as wages, you have above the annual limit of $22,320, $1 of your Social Security will be withheld from you. This limit does not include retirement income like pensions, interest, capital gains, dividends, or IRA withdrawals. Also, once you reach your full retirement age, this rule no longer applies meaning you can continue to work without any benefit reduction. If you do have Social Security benefits reduced due to this earnings limit, once you reach age 67, you will receive a credit for the benefits you did not receive and your monthly payments will be permanently increased to compensate for it. In other words, the benefits are not totally lost, just deferred until your full retirement age. This might happen if you retire and return to work, or simply apply for Social Security before you retire. Most people retire partway through the year, so it is common for wages in the first half of the year to exceed the $22,320 limit. However, there is a second component to this earnings rule which states if you apply for Social Security in the same year you retire, as long as your monthly earnings are less than $1,860 once you begin Social Security, there will be no reduction. It is also important to note that this earnings rule is the main reason your “full retirement age” is significant. It is a misconception that it is better to wait until full retirement age to collect when in reality every month you wait beyond age 62 up until 70 your benefit amount increases. If you are retired, your full retirement age is irrelevant as the earnings limit will no longer apply.     Stocks Discussed: Dave and Busters (PLAY), Airbnb (ABNB) and Rivian (RIVN)

May CPI I would say I was very optimistic after the May Consumer Price Index (CPI) was released. Headline CPI increased 3.3% compared to last year, which was below the estimate and last month’s reading which both stood at 3.4%. Core CPI which excludes food and energy was up 3.4%, which was below the estimate of 3.5% and last month’s reading of 3.6%. This also marked the lowest reading since April 2021 when inflation concerns really began and the core CPI was at 3.0%. In March 2021 core CPI was at 1.6%. The shelter index continues to be the heavyweight moving core CPI as it was up 5.4% over last year and accounted for over two thirds of the annual increase. Many areas of the report have come back down to more normal inflation rates with areas like food at home increasing just 1% compared to last year. Food away from home was a little more challenged as that was up 4% compared to last year. I believe much of this can be attributed to the continued demand for bars and restaurants and the increased wage pressures. Although energy saw a 2% decline compared to the previous month, it was 3.7% higher than last year. This stems from the major fall in energy prices last year that I believe will make for difficult comparisons over the next few months. Two major areas that have remained problematic include admission to sporting events, which saw an increase of 21.7% compared to last year and motor vehicle insurance, which saw an increase of 20.3% compared to last year. It was positive to see a monthly decline in motor vehicle insurance of 0.1%. I believe this category will not be a problem in 2025 as much of the rate increases have now taken place. Overall, I believe this report should be supportive of a rate cut, but we will need to see more reports like this with further progress in the coming months for a cut to actually occur.  May PPI After a positive Consumer Price Index (CPI), the Producer Price Index (PPI) delivered more welcome news on the inflation front. May headline PPI rose 2.2% compared to last year and when comparing against the month of April there was a decline of 0.2%. Estimates were looking for a 2.5% increase in the annual number and a 0.1% increase in the monthly figure. When looking at core PPI, which excludes food and energy, the report showed and increase of just 2.3% on annual basis which was below the expectation for a 2.5% increase. These numbers are right around the Fed’s 2% target and should be a positive indicator for CPI and PCE as we continue to move forward.  Private Investment Deals Investors be aware that your local broker could start hitting you up for private investment deals to fund apartment complexes somewhere around the country. The problem is the banks are starting to clamp down on just loaning money for projects on apartments that may be losers. In 2023 almost 500,000 new apartments were opened which is the most since the 80s. That growth is expected to continue and it’s estimated to be around the same number in 2024. We have said before this will help bring down housing costs probably by 2025 as there are so many apartments on the market that the owners will give so many free incentives and reduce the rents just to get people in and provide the owners some cash flow. This will affect the housing market along with the CPI since shelter costs are a big part of that index and lower rents would help reduce the inflation numbers.  Apple Stock I was surprised to see Apple move more than 7% higher a day after the developer conference on Monday and close at a record high. There was a lot of hype leading up to the event as the company was anticipated to detail more about its AI strategy. I’m not sure if I saw the same conference, but I was not overly impressed by the details. Apple launched Apple Intelligence which can proofread your writing, or even rewrite it in a friendly or professional tone. It can create custom emojis called “genmoji,” search through your iPhone for specific messages from someone, summarize and transcribe phone calls or show you priority notifications. It can even tap into OpenAI’s ChatGPT to provide you more detailed answers from Siri. ChatGPT is also built into systemwide writing tools. So, for example, Apple said you can create a bedtime story for a child and add images created by ChatGPT. Since the updates will only take place on the iPhone 15 Pro, Pro Max, and newly built phones, the hope is there will be a major upgrade cycle. Personally, I just don’t see how these updates will get many people to move and buy a phone that will cost at least $1,000. I know new emojis is definitely not enough for me to upgrade. I also do worry about how this will impact the relationship with Google. Alphabet currently pays Apple around $20 B per year to be the default search engine on Apple devices. If more people begin to use the AI function and do less search, why would Alphabet continue to pay such a hefty fee? For a stock trading at close to 30x this year’s projected earnings, there is now a lot riding on this next iPhone cycle.  What should you do with your Annuity? It is very rare that I come across someone who fully understands their annuity. Annuities can be either qualified or non-qualified and their status will determine how they are taxed. A qualified annuity means it was purchased with retirement funds while a non-qualified annuity was purchased with non-retirement funds. Generally qualified annuities are more flexible because they can be surrendered and rolled into another IRA without tax. However, if non-qualified annuities are surrendered, the entire gain becomes taxable at ordinary income rates. Because of this sometimes (but not always) it can make more sense to annuitize non-qualified annuities which is the process of converting the funds into a pension-like stream of income. This is still taxable, but the gain is spread out over time rather than realized in one year. I recently spoke with someone who is close to 80 years old and owns a non-qualified annuity. It turns out their annuity has two annuitization options. They can either withdraw 5% of the account value for the rest of their life, or they can withdraw 7% of the account value until the account value has been reached, but would also stop upon death. The issue here is in both of these cases, there is a decent chance they will not live long enough to get all their money back, let alone any growth. Another option would be to surrender the annuity to guarantee they receive all their funds back, but then they would pay a decent chunk of it in taxes. This is one example of many that illustrate if you have an annuity, make sure you also know when and how to use it because waiting will limit your options.   Stocks Discussed: Docusign (DOCU), Ferrari (RACE) and Southwest (LUV)

Jobs Report  The Jobs Report showed the labor market continues to remain on good footing considering nonfarm payrolls rose by 272,000, which easily topped the estimate of 190,000. Strength occurred in health care and social assistance (+83.5K), leisure and hospitality (+42k), professional and business services (+33k), and construction (+21k). Government was also strong as it added 43k jobs in the month. I generally don’t like to see government adding this many jobs as it is essentially an expense to taxpayers and it can detract from showing an accurate picture of the private labor market, which should ultimately drive our economy. The strangest part of the report was the divergence between the establishment survey and the household survey. While the establishment survey showed strength, the household survey showed the unemployment rose to 4% for the first time since January 2022 as the level of people who reported holding jobs fell by 408,000. Wage inflation was also a slight concern as average hourly earnings rose 4.1% compared to last year. This was above the estimate of 3.9% and last month’s reading of 4.0%. Overall, I’d say this report was somewhat complicated with a mix of positives and negatives. I don’t think it provides any evidence for the fed to cut rates, but I also wouldn’t view it as problematic. JOLTs The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) showed there were 8.06 million job openings in the month of April. This missed the expectation of 8.4 million and was also below the prior month’s reading of 8.4 million. The number marked the lowest reading since February 2021 and it was well below the peak above 12 million in March 2022. While this all sounds like bad news, I believe this puts us back in line with a more normal labor market. Even with this decline, the labor market is still historically strong and I believe there is further room for it to soften without causing problems. There are still about 1.2 job openings for every available worker, which puts us back in line with where we were before Covid.  NVIDIA and the S&P 500 There is no doubt that AI has pushed Nvidia to records that are nothing short of astounding. It should be noted that when you include Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, Apple and Alphabet into the equation, these six companies now account for nearly 30% of the value of the S&P 500. Nvidia alone has accounted for close to 35% of the index’s gain this year. Even a powerful freight train eventually gets derailed when it gets going too fast. What could cause Nvidia to fall off the tracks? I see more articles about how the demand and future sales of AI could be overhyped. If that comes to be true, then the earnings estimate for Nvidia will fall, which would cause a deep decline in the stock price. It is currently the king of the mountain and no one can knock it from the top, for now. But no company stays on top forever and competition can come out of nowhere causing the price of chips to be cut dramatically, which also could cause a problem for earnings. Keep in mind Nvidia does not make the chips, they rely on Taiwan Semiconductor to manufacture the chips for them. The contracts that they have are rather secret, but what if Taiwan Semiconductor says they want a bigger piece of the pie? This could really hurt Nvidia’s profits and there’s no other company that can produce the chips at this time. I think it could be a very rocky summer for equities, especially stocks that are trading at valuations that are well above the norm.  Natural Gas Prices It was a hot May across the country, except for here in San Diego. We seemed to have some nice weather with temperatures still in the 70s. But with hot weather across the country, it increased electricity demand as people cranked up their air conditioners to stay cool. Before the increase in demand, there was a large inventory of natural gas that brought natural gas prices down to levels not seen in a long time. The reduction in natural gas inventories to more normal levels has allowed natural gas prices to rise and they now trade around $2.60 per million British thermal units which was about 65% higher than the low reached in late March. It is forecasted that this could be a hot summer, which means a higher use of natural gas for electricity to run those air conditioners. One area that is helping is solar, which is reducing some of the need for natural gas. Currently, estimates are that natural gas should not be too much higher as recent prices are perhaps just enough to bring back the drillers. This should make consumers happy with lower natural gas prices and the drillers happy since they can drill more and get a reasonable price for natural gas. It’s a nice situation, but keep in mind it will not last forever and something will cause the market to move one way or the other and spoil the party.  Game Stop Roaring Kitty is back and I must say I still don’t get why people follow this guy. He seems nice and all, but he has profited tremendously from this GameStop (GME) craziness. Keith Gill who goes by Roaring Kitty now holds 5,000,000 shares of GME and has 120,000 call options with a strike price of $20 that expire June 21st. It is unlikely he will be able to take full possession of that stock after the options expire as he would need $240 million to take custody of it after exercising the calls. Just looking at the value of his GME shares he has a net worth of at least $140,000,000. Considering he started this crusade sharing his positions with a $53,000 stake in September 2019 he must have sold during the craziness in 2021. I cannot think of any other way that he was able to amass such a fortune considering the major fall in GME’s stock price that occurred over the last few years. The initial premise for buying the stock in 2021 was to stick it to hedge fund managers who were shorting the stock. At that time short interest was over 100% and a short squeeze was rather easy to achieve. Recently the short interest was around just 20%. While the intention was to essentially take money from these big hedge funds, I believe there were many small investors that Gill profited off and this time around if he sells with a big gain, I believe it will come at the expense of even more small investors. The company has terrible fundamentals considering the business model is dying with sales that declined 29% compared to last year and a loss of $32.3 m in the recent quarter. GME also said it would sell an additional 75 million shares on top of the 45 million share sale it had announced in May that raised more than $900 million.   Stocks Discussed: Salesforce (CRM), Foot Locker (FL) and eBay (EBAY)

PCE The core personal consumption expenditures index (PCE), which is the Fed’s preferred measure for inflation did not show much progress in the month of April. Year over year core PCE was up 2.8% which matched the previous month’s reading. If you want to get really mathy with the numbers and move over one more decimal place there was actual a positive move in the number considering it came in at 2.75% vs slightly over 2.8% in the month of March. This would result in the smallest gain since March 2021. Headline PCE which includes food and energy was up 2.7% compared to last year, which also matched last month’s reading and the estimate. While I can’t say the numbers were overly impressive and point to enough evidence for a cut, I also don’t see any reason for the Federal Reserve to discuss rate hikes. My estimate at this point in time is for the Fed to cut once, maybe twice this year.  Quality Investments  At our firm, Wilsey Asset Management, we are currently getting out of our second largest holding, which we began investing in back around 2010. I want to explain the long-term history of this not to brag about how some of our clients got a very large return over that timeframe, but to help you understand, what happened over the years to get that type of return. The numbers I’m using while very close are not the real numbers and are for educational purposes only. In 2010 we began investing in this company at around $20 per share. Eight years later it traded as high as $120 per share, along with our clients we were very happy with the gains. Then in 2020 when Covid hit, we saw this equity drop more than 50% to around $50 per share. Fast forward to today and we are currently selling this position around $160 per share. The real lesson here is to explain why we continued to hold even when we were down over 50% in 2020. We always talk about the fundamentals and how in the short term they mean very little, but in the long term they can make a big difference. Each quarter we review the financials and listen to or read the conference calls to see what is going on with that company over the last quarter and find out what management sees going forward. Every Monday we go over all the ratios, growth rates, forward earnings and roughly a total of 25 other numbers to keep asking, is this a business we want to continue to hold? This discipline and strategy is what keeps us on course with good quality companies over the long term. I have said for many years we are not traders; we are long-term investors. I want to emphasize that does not mean we or you should ever hold any equity or any investment blindly long-term without following what that business is doing on a regular basis.  Short-Term Investing  If you’re like our firm, Wilsey Asset Management, you may be sitting on a lot of cash as we have made a couple sales this year and aren’t finding anything worthwhile to buy. The advantage this time is short term rates are high so we can invest that money in short-term instruments and receive a roughly 5% rate. Many other people are catching on. Back in 2022 retail investors only owned about $1 billion of treasury bills, at the last count that is now over $16 billion. Investors need to be cautious because there is what is known as reinvestment risk. Today you may be receiving 5%, but then 6 to 12 months from now that could be 3 to 4%. Keep in mind these should not be long-term investments, but rather a holding place until you can find a good long-term investment. Besides the short-term maturity of T-bills and their safety, they are also come with the benefit of being free from state income taxes. There are also short-term ETF’s and money markets that can invest in short term US government securities, but be aware they may not be investing 100% in tbills. Sometimes they invest in short term loans backed by US government securities or repurchase agreements, which are not free from state income taxes. So, enjoy the high yield on short investments, just realize we are currently dealing with an inverted yield curve and short-term rates should come down in the near future.  Reducing Auto Insurance Premiums It’s no secret that auto insurance rates have noticeably gone up the past few years. To counteract these rate hikes, here are a few tips that may help keep premiums low. It is common for auto insurance to include collision and comprehensive coverage. Collision coverage pays when there is damage to your vehicle due to a collision that you cause. Comprehensive coverage pays when there is damage to your vehicle caused by something other than an accident such as theft, vandalism, or acts of nature. Both collision and comprehensive coverage come with deductibles that must be paid before the coverage kicks in, and increasing these deductibles is one way to reduce the amount of premium you pay. In some cases, if you have a vehicle with a low market value and that you don’t drive often, it may not be necessary to carry these coverages at all which would further reduce premiums. Additionally, auto insurance premiums are based on your assumed annual miles driven, which in many cases is more than you actually drive. If you provide your insurance carrier with a more accurate lower number, they will reduce your premium. In many cases it is not necessary to change insurance carriers, but rather just adjust the coverage on your existing policy.   Stocks Discussed: Treehouse Foods (THS), Target (TGT) and Live Nation (LYV)

AI Boom You may have missed the AI boom in NVIDIA, but for patient longer-term investors there could be a good investment opportunity in energy going forward. As more companies begin to use AI, the demand for energy will increase. Keep in mind that this is on top of expected growth in the electric vehicle market and if it continues on in future years, cryptocurrency is also a drain on electricity to mine all those silly tokens. To give you an example on the power needed for AI, a ChatGPT request takes roughly 10 times as much power compared to if one did a Google search. Based on some research from Bank of America, they estimate that the current demand for electricity from datacenters is currently one to two percent, but in the next seven years that could increase to eight percent. There will be some great opportunities for the investor who is looking out 3 to 5 years, if they invest in good fundamentally strong companies. The nice thing about many energy companies is they also pay a decent dividend while you wait for the investment to grow.  Bond Allocation When we see potential clients come to our firm for a consultation and we see they have a 10% to maybe 30% allocation of bonds, I just scratch my head and wonder what the broker was thinking. Maybe they weren’t. Even the Bond King, Bill Gross, who managed the PIMCO Total Return Fund and who was largely responsible for bringing the investment firm PIMCO from assets under management of $12 million to around $2 trillion has said he now dislikes bonds and is investing money in other areas. He had some of the best returns of bond fund managers, but it came at time of declining interest rates from 1981 to 2020 that is now over. With long term interest rates at current levels, I believe the best return that investors could hope for is probably the coupon rate which on a 10-year treasury will be somewhere around 4.5%. This will not only hurt bonds; I believe it will also lead to disappointing returns in the old asset allocation model of 60% in equities and 40% in bonds over the next five to ten years. So, if your broker or advisor has part of your money in bonds, you may want to ask why. I would say be prepared for the weak answer of something to do with asset allocation or that it has worked in the past. In other words, they are taking the easy way out rather than doing some hard research for your portfolio going forward.  Tariffs on Chinese Goods I was happy to see the Biden administration boost tariffs on Chinese goods from electric vehicles to steel and aluminum. Unfortunately, I’m worried about Newton’s law that for every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction. The Chinese government will probably counteract against these measures by targeting the imports that they receive from us and US businesses. Two that come to mind are Apple’s iPhones and Tesla’s cars. That would hurt these companies and I believe that’s what the Chinese want to do in response. The Chinese economy is suffering and they are producing far more than they can absorb domestically. As an example, they are now producing seven times the number of electrical vehicles they did in 2019 and consumers don’t have the money to buy them. They have also been a big producer of solar cells and they too are up 500% between 2018 and 2023. China has seen their global exports increase by 14%, but exports to the G7 countries now only count for 29% of those exports. This is far below the 48% it was in the year 2000. My guess would be that they are selling more to other third world countries. This means the prices will not be as high as they could get selling to the G7 countries. One area of concern with these tariffs is higher prices in the US and as we are fighting inflation these tariffs will increase the price of products not just from China, but here in the US we may produce some of those products at a higher cost, which makes reducing inflation more difficult. 2 Monthly Mortgage Payments Making a payment every two weeks only makes a difference because at the end of the year you will have made 26 half payments (13 full payments) instead of the normal 12. This basically means you are paying extra toward the principal which will reduce the loan faster. If you were to actually pay twice a month for a total of 24 payments over the year, you will see no difference than if you had made 12 full payments. This is because with mortgage loans, the interest is based on the balance of the loan at the end of each month, so whether you pay 1 full payment or 2 half payments, the balance at the end of the month is still the same meaning the monthly interest is the same. This is different than other loans like credit cards or HELOCs where interest is calculated based on the average daily balance. With these loans making multiple smaller payments will reduce the amount of interest due and will pay it down faster. With a normal mortgage, the best way to make payments is once per month two weeks after the payment is due. For example, your May payment is due June 1st but you will not have any extra interest or penalties if you pay by June 15th. If you make your payment sooner, those funds are essentially set aside by the lender and not applied to your loan until June 15th, so there is no benefit by making your normal payment early. If you want to make extra principal payments in addition to your normal payment, it is best to make that extra payment at the end of the month. However, this should only be done if you have a high interest rate.   Stocks Discussed: Home Depot (HD), Zoetis (ZTS) and Altria (MO)

PPI Initially the Producer Price Index (PPI) looked problematic as it increased 0.5%, which easily topped the estimate of 0.3%. Looking further into the report though, the March reading was revised from an initially reported 0.2% gain to a decline of 0.1%, which more than accounted for this month’s beat. Looking on a year-over-year basis, PPI rose 2.2% and core PPI was 2.4%. While the core PPI increase was the biggest annual move since August 2023, I still don’t believe it’s at a problematic level considering the Fed’s 2% target.  CPI The Consumer Price Index (CPI) brought some positive news as the index grew 3.4% in April which was in line with expectations and better than the previous month’s reading of 3.5%. Core CPI which excludes food and energy was up 3.6% and was below last month’s reading of 3.8%. This was the lowest reading for core CPI since April 2021. Shelter continues to be the major weight keeping prices elevated as it was up 5.5% over last year and accounted for over two thirds of the growth in core CPI. Energy which was a major positive for the CPI numbers for much of last year has now brought some pressure to the headline CPI number as it was up 2.6% compared to last year. The easy comparisons from last year have disappeared and now I believe we will continue to see year over year gains in the energy component moving forward. Other areas that remained problematic included motor vehicle insurance (+22.6%), admission to sporting events (+15.4%), and motor vehicle repair (+9.8%). While there are some remaining negatives in the inflation fight, overall, I believe this report shows we are continuing to head in the right direction. Private Credit I have seen investors become more interested in the private credit space, but personally I have not invested any money in it, nor would I recommend my clients do so. Private credit is where nonbank financial institutions, like private-equity firms, make loans to businesses. It was essentially created to serve companies that were too big or risky for banks or too small for the bond market. The funds are generally illiquid, which means you could be stuck in an investment and if it goes south, you may have no other choice than to ride it out and hope it comes back. Also, since they rarely trade you don’t really know what the loans are worth and have to rely on pricing from quarterly accounting estimates. The fees are quite high as they are in the range of 1.25%, which I would consider high for essentially a fixed income alternative. Unknown risks could also be developing in the space due to less regulations and limited oversight. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) recently released a report that stated with the recent increase in yields, more than a third of borrowers have interest costs that exceed their earnings. Pull all the info together and I’m comfortable not being in this investment.  Meme Stocks Meme stocks are back in the news with companies like GameStop (GME) and AMC Entertainment (AMC) surging! AMC was actually quite smart and took advantage of the move to do a $250 million stock sale to raise capital. Like I said back in 2021, these moves are occurring for no fundamental reason. The fact that these are occurring because a guy that goes by the name “Roaring Kitty” posted an image of a man in chair leaning forward is just crazy. If you want to gamble on this stock just know that’s all it is, there is no fundamental reason for the company’s stock to be trading at these levels. It’s also important to remember that last time the hype occurred the stock reached an intra-day split adjusted high of $120.75 per share and has been in free fall before this recent move as it touched a three year low of $9.95 per share. I believe the story will end the same way for many of these traders and for those that think they are sticking it to Wall Street, unfortunately it will not have as big of an impact as they think.  Financial Planning: Best Withdrawal Rate for Retirement  The 4% rule has been around for decades and states if retirees withdraw 4% from their portfolio every year, and increase the annual withdrawals by the rate of inflation, they are very unlikely to run out of money. This rule of thumb has been widely used but it is important to understand it has some pitfalls. First off, a 4% withdrawal rate is overly conservative in almost all cases. To be able to withdraw 4% plus inflation over a retirement lasting 30 years, the asset return needs to outpace inflation by just 1%. A 1% real return is extremely low. This is partly caused by the misconception that retirees need to have an overly conservative portfolio. Regardless of age, retirees still should allocate their assets to grow and outpace inflation. That doesn’t mean they need to buy risky or trendy investments, but there should always be growth. Retirees are living longer and longer which means traditional “conservative” portfolios are actually riskier because they increase the chance of outliving money. Secondly, retirement spending typically doesn’t maintain pace with inflation. In the first few years of retirement, people are more active and spending more, but as they age, they tend to slow down which results in lower levels of spending. This means it can be appropriate to start with a larger withdrawal rate followed by smaller inflationary increases over time. Because of this, a 5% or even 6% withdrawal rate can be used in retirement when paired with wise investment management. A withdrawal rate of 6% may not seem like much more than 4%, but mathematically it is 50% more which means substantially more retirement income, or being able to retire several years sooner.     Stocks Discussed: Netflix (NFLX), Wayfair (W) and CVS Health (CVS)

Cash & Money Markets are not Long-Term Investments  With many companies in the stock market more expensive than we’d like to see, we have been sitting on more cash in a money market than we normally would. While the 5% or so in interest is nice for the time being, we are using this as a temporary parking place until we find a good long-term investment. It could take one week or it could be three months, but the important factor is we are not considering this as a long-term investment. I know many people right now are happy with their money market rates and would totally miss a great opportunity if it presents itself to continue investing in the money market. I believe this will be extremely damaging for their long-term returns, especially as short-term rates are likely to fall. Looking long term cash will likely not beat stocks and in a recent Vanguard paper, they showed global stocks earned about 6% more a year than cash from 1901 to 2022. Don’t become complacent with the short-term yields, as you could miss a great investment that could help you over the next three to five years.  AI and Jobs Some people are worried about artificial intelligence taking away many jobs. I remember hearing about the same concern when computers first came out, but in reality, they created new jobs. Investment firm Goldman Sachs projects that by the end of 2034, artificial intelligence could boost the GDP to 2.3%. According to the Census Bureau’s November 2023 Business Trends and Outlook Survey, only 3.9% of businesses nationwide have used artificial intelligence, which includes machine learning, natural language processing, virtual agents and voice recognition. Another survey by Deloitte discovered that 87% of private businesses who were surveyed, expect artificial intelligence to increase their labor productivity within the next three years. It is true that change is always scary and it is true that AI will replace some jobs, but it will also create jobs that haven’t even been thought of yet. It will also make our economy more productive, which then should increase the overall wealth of consumers.  Apple in China Relations between the US and China are rather strained currently and Apple could be paying the price for that. In the Wall Street Journal, they released information that the company has discounted phones in China by $70, which normally sell for around $600 on average. On a side note, wouldn’t be great to get an iPhone for $600? Consumers in China have been switching to Huawei phones as the government in China and consumers begin to feel more comfortable with the company’s technological progress. If you remember a while back, we did post that the Chinese government had banned the use of iPhones in government agencies. So, Apple is now fighting with the government of China, despite what Tim Cook says and they are also fighting with the Federal Trade Commission in United States as well. They are definitely in the middle of some major storms, which could go on for years hampering sales growth for their products. This could cost the company their premium valuation on earnings, which means no stock growth going forward at best. There could also be a pull back in the stock on the horizon if they are not able to return to sound growth.  Financial Planning: Tax Rate on Gold Investing in gold has been popular recently, but it is important for investors to understand how gold is taxed. Federally there are 7 tax brackets (10%, 12%, 22%, 24%, 32%, 35%, 37%) which ordinary income is subject to. Ordinary income includes most sources like wages, interest, and IRA distributions. There are also separate brackets for certain types of investment income like long-term capital gains and qualified dividends. Depending on the amount of taxable income, the tax rate is either 0%, 15%, or 20%, plus there can be an extra 3.8% tax if AGI is above $200k or $250k depending on filing status. Basically, this type of investment income will always be taxed at a lower rate than if it had been received as ordinary income. There is also a third set of brackets that is applied to income earned from collectibles, which includes gold. If gold is bought and sold more than a year later for more, it is considered a collectible long-term capital gain which is taxed at ordinary income rates for those in the 10%, 12%, 22%, or 24% brackets. For those in the 32%, 35%, or 37% brackets, gold is taxed at a maximum rate of 28%, but it can also be subject to the additional 3.8% net investment income tax for those with higher AGI levels. This tax rate includes investments backed by physical gold such as a gold ETF. If you are considering buying gold, be prepared to pay more taxes than you would on other types of investment income.   Stocks Discussed: Starbucks (SBUX), Chegg (CHGG) and Apple (AAPL)

Labor Market payrolls Nonfarm payrolls increased by 175,000 in the month of April. While this was well below the estimate of 240,000, this may actually be a big positive. Having that type of growth still shows the labor market is on good footing, but to combat the Fed’s inflation concerns it’s nice to see a labor market that is not too hot. Previous revisions also weren’t major considering March was revised up by 12,000 to a gain of 315,000 and February was revised lower by 34,000 to a gain of 236,000. Areas of strength included health care and social assistance (+87K), transportation and warehousing (+20.1K), and retail trade (+20.1K). Some areas actually saw minor losses including mining and logging (-3K), professional and business services (-4K), and information (-8K). With wage inflation being a major concern, I’d say the biggest data point was average hourly earnings growth of 3.9% missed the expectation of 4.0%. This was a decline from March’s reading of 4.1% and actually marked the lowest reading since the Fed starting hiking interest rates in 2022. Overall, I was quite pleased with the job numbers as I believe it shows a cooling labor market that remains healthy.   Job Openings At the end of March job openings totaled 8.5 million. This missed the estimate of 8.7 million and was lower compared to the previous month’s reading of 8.8 million. Compared to last year, job openings were down 1.1 million. While this all sounds like bad news, I believe this is a positive. To start, pre-covid we had never seen a reading of over 8 million job openings, which means there is still plenty of available work for those that are looking. Also, when there were too many available jobs it created more competition for workers, which many times leads to wage pressures and in theory puts pressure on inflation. The labor market has remained resilient, but I believe we need to continue to see some softening to assist with inflationary concerns. This report came after the employment cost index spooked markets as it rose 1.2% in the first three months of the year versus an expectation of 1%. Compared to last year’s first quarter, wages and benefits rose 4.2%, which matched Q4’s reading and is off the multidecade high of 5.1% in 2022. Wages make up about 70% of employment costs and they increased 4.3% compared to last year, while benefit costs increased 3.7%. One other note to consider is that union workers saw a larger increase than non-union employees in the quarter. As we lap the impact from the union negotiations that concluded late last year, we will likely see a smaller increase from union jobs in the report.   Microsoft and OpenAI I’m very curious to see how lawsuits against Microsoft and OpenAI over copyright infringement play out. Late last year the New York Times announced a lawsuit and now eight newspaper publishers in California, Colorado, Illinois, Florida, Minnesota, and New York have claimed Microsoft and OpenAI used millions of their articles without payment or permission. All eight publishers fall under the ownership of hedge fund Alden Global Capital and include names like the Denver Post, Chicago Tribune, and the New York Daily News. “The current GPT-4 LLM will output near-verbatim copies of significant portions of the publishers’ works when prompted to do so,” the complaint said. It also showed several examples of ChatGPT and the Copilot allegedly doing so. If these companies are able to win, I worry it could open the floodgates and other content providers could then claim the same infractions. ChatGPT also received more bad news with competitor Anthropic announcing its first enterprise offering and a free iPhone app. Anthropic was founded by ex-OpenAI research executives and has backers that include Amazon, Google, and Salesforce. Its Claude 3 model can reportedly summarize up to about 150,000 words and convert the large data sets into summaries in the form of a memo, letter or story. For comparison, ChatGPT can handle about 3,000 words. Overall, the AI space remains very early on to try and pick winners and I believe many investors will be disappointed a few years down the road as they unfortunately picked the wrong horse to bet on.   Starbucks Have you not been drinking as much Starbucks as you used to? The 52 week high for the stock is $109.72, but after reporting earnings the stock fell to $74.44. This was a 32.2% drop from the high. The company is struggling with their competitor in China, Luckin Coffee, and Starbucks saw a 11% decline in same store sales year over year. Starbucks has ambitious plans to roll out new beverages and increase their efficiency to bring back lost customers. Investors should note that there are union negotiations going on for 410 stores in the US, which could increase their labor cost and perhaps slow down their efficiency. In my opinion, even with this pull back it's still not a bargain as it still trades at almost 20 times earnings. We will do an analysis of Starbucks during our radio show and podcast on Saturday, May 11th after the numbers settle down and we can better view the company going forward.   Stocks Discussed: Tesla (TSLA), Albemarle (ALB), Manpower (MAN) and Ford (F)

GDP First quarter GDP was a large disappointment as it grew at an annualized pace of 1.6%, substantially below the estimate of 2.4%. I will say, considering there is a lot of data to collect the first reading can be subject to major revisions. As a recent example, in 2023 Q1 GDP had an initial reading which showed an increase of 1.1%, but it was later revised to 2.2%. It is possible we could see a similar situation with this report. Given the current numbers, there were still some positives. Although it was below the estimate of 3% and down from the Q4 reading of 3.3%, consumer spending in the quarter still grew nicely with a gain of 2.4%. There was quite a large discrepancy between goods and services spending as goods actually fell 0.4% and services climbed 4%, which marked the best quarter since Q3 2021. Goods spending was largely dragged down by a 1.2% decline in durable goods. Private investment was also very strong in the quarter as it grew 3.2%, residential investment was a large contributor to that number as it increased 13.9%. Government spending was also positive in the quarter with a gain of 1.2%. With all these positives, you might be wondering how GDP missed expectations. Areas that were negative weights on the report included the change in private inventories, which subtracted 0.35% from the headline number and net exports of goods and services, which subtracted 0.86% from the headline number. Private inventories can be a volatile metric that will depend on businesses restocking inventory. I would not be surprised to see this number turn positive in Q2 considering Q4 of 2023 was also negative and subtracted 0.47% from the headline number. This followed a nice benefit of 1.27% in Q3 of 2023. If consumer spending remains strong, businesses will likely need to restock inventory which should be a benefit moving forward. As for the trade imbalance, this came as exports grew 0.9% in the quarter, but imports rose 7.2%. Overall, I wouldn’t say this report was super strong, but I’m also not worried about the current standing of the economy as I am still anticipating a slowdown over a major recession.   Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) The release of the March core personal consumption expenditures price index (PCE) was I’d say lackluster. It wasn’t as positive as I was hoping for, but I still don’t think it was that bad. The core PCE of 2.8% came in slightly hotter than the estimate of 2.7%, but it matched February’s number. Including food and energy, PCE increased 2.7%, which was also slightly higher than the estimate of 2.6%. Services continues to elevate prices as they were up 4% on a 12-month basis versus goods which increased just 0.1%. Overall, it is somewhat disappointing to see the deceleration in inflation slow, but numbers don’t always follow a straight-line trajectory. It will be interesting to see this report over the next couple months, but as of now the estimate for three rate cuts is looking a little more questionable.   S&P 500 The S&P 500 remains expensive based on several valuation metrics, but that doesn't mean you can't find buys out there. Although the index trades around 20x forward earnings, about 20% of companies are bringing up that multiple as they trade at double the index's valuation. The positive is there is about 20% of the index that trades at half the index's multiple. Much of the dislocation comes from the excitement over growth stocks and the index now has more than two times the allocation towards growth (46%) over value (21%). Historically the allocation has been more balanced and on average over the last 30 years the split has been an allocation of about 31% for growth and 32% for value. I continue to believe that numbers like these will be a reason for value's outperformance going forward.   Technology & S&P 500  I have talked many times about my concern with the over-concentration of the S&P 500 index in technology. The sector controls about 30% of the entire index, but what is crazy is Amazon, Tesla, Meta, and Alphabet are actually classified as consumer and communication stocks which would then understate the tech weighting of the S&P 500 (If you count Tesla as a tech company). If these were included, the weighting would be over 40%. The last time the index was so concentrated in tech occurred before the dot-com bubble burst in 2000. If you’ve held the Magnificent Seven over the last couple years, congrats, but for those that enjoyed the movie, you may remember four of the seven end up dead. Could we see a similar fate with these stocks?   Nasdaq If you didn't do as well as the market in 2023, don't beat yourself up. The top 10 stocks greatly carried both the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq. In fact the average return for the top 10 stocks was 85.6% versus 16% for the other 490 companies. This meant that these top 10 stocks accounted for 63% of the index's return for the year. Over the past 30 years, the top 10 stocks have on average represented 24% of the index's growth. I do continue to worry many of these top 10 stocks could be a drag on the index and people's portfolios considering their lofty valuations.   Financial Planning: Do you Hold too Much Cash? Everyone needs some level of cash, and that number varies from person to person. For those with higher levels of assets, it can be possible to have too much cash which would be better off invested. We’ve seen people with $100k, $250k, $500k, or even over $1 million in cash which is likely way too much, even if it’s in a high-yield account or CD. Over time, cash will not perform as well as invested dollars. Right now, there are places where cash can earn over 5%, but this is still lower than market returns of 8% to 10% or more. Also, those 5% yields will be coming down as interest rates decline. We know there’s people out there who wait to time the market and invest their cash right at the bottom, but that generally doesn’t work out. From a tax perspective, cash produces interest which is taxed at a higher rate than investment income like dividends or capital gains. When interest is taxed at 10% or 12%, investment income would be taxed at 0%, and when interest is taxed at 22%, 24%, or 32%, investment income would be taxed at 15%. Not only is cash taxed at a higher rate, but its entire return is reportable as income every year, there’s no appreciation with cash. For example, if you have $500,000 of cash earning 5% for a total of $25,000, that entire $25,000 is reportable as interest income that year. If instead that $500,000 was invested in equities earning on average 8% made up of 2% dividends and 6% appreciation, you would only need to report the 2% dividend income of $10,000 as long as nothing is sold. This flexibility keeps your tax bill down but also reduces the chance of triggering AGI related issues like the net investment income tax or additional Medicare premiums. If you’re in the 4th tax bracket with an 8% investment return of $40,000, you’re only paying $1,500 in federal taxes from the dividends, plus $930 in state taxes if you’re in California. Comparing that with your 5% cash return of $25,000, you’d pay $6,000 in ordinary income taxes, $2,325 in state taxes, plus potentially an extra $570 net investment income tax, and/or another $3,000 in extra Medicare premiums. Now that 5% yield becomes 2.6% after tax while the invested dollars return 7.5% after tax. Investing can be volatile in the short-term, but over time it is a much better option than hoarding cash.   Stocks discussed: Nordstrom (JWN), Netflix (NFLX), Goldman Sachs (GS), and Palentir (PLTR)

Retail Sales People may be complaining about higher interest rates, but it does not appear to be slowing down the consumer. Retail sales climbed 0.7% in the month of March, which is easily topped the estimate of 0.3%. Compared to last year, sales were up an impressive 4.0%. Areas of strength continued to be nonstore retailers, which were up 11.3% compared to last year and food services and drinking places, which were up 6.5% over the same time period. Areas that continued to weigh on the report were furniture & home furnishing stores (-6.1%), electronics and appliance stores (-0.6%), and building material & garden equipment & supplies dealers (-0.6%). While energy prices have increased lately and gasoline stations saw an increase of 2.1% compared to February, compared to last year sales were actually down 0.7%. This makes the retail sales number even more impressive considering the fact that if gas stations were excluded from the headline number, it would have been up 4.4% compared to last year. Overall, this report provides further proof that the consumer remains resilient. This could bring into question the number of rates cuts this year. If the consumer remains strong, we may only see one or two cuts this year.  Value Companies With the market’s recent highs, we have had a few companies that reached their target sell price. We sold those companies and now we’re sitting on a large amount of cash. We were considering investing into an oil and/or natural gas company because based on the valuations they are still not that expensive. One thing that has concerned me is that we are probably near the peak for gasoline consumption, but oil is also used in chemicals with a big demand coming from plastics. Approximately 102 million barrels of oil are produced every day and roughly 60 million barrels go to diesel, gasoline and jet fuel. Only 12 million of that ends up in chemicals. What concerned me even more is how all the oil companies like Chevron, Shell and Saudi Aramco have a big push to produce more for chemicals. For instance, Shell opened a chemical complex with capacity to produce about 1.6 million tons of plastic pellets per year. Saudi Aramco is working on turning 4 million barrels of crude oil per day into chemicals by the year 2030, today just 1 million barrels go into chemicals. For many years China has been a major consumer of plastic and they accounted for 70% of plastic demand. Now they are producing their own plastic capacity, which is exceeding demand. On top of all this, you have the push for recycling plastics and statistics show that only 10% or less of plastic gets recycled. Even a doubling of that over the next few years would mean less oil needed for plastics. Recycled plastics are roughly 50% more expensive than virgin plastic, but I believe that will come down in future years. In summary, at this point it does not make any sense that I can see to invest in an oil company or the chemical companies. It may look like they could be on sale, but with the large supply going forward sales and earnings could decline, which would mean they are currently fully priced. The abundance of plastics is estimated to go on until the year 2030. So…. the search for that great value company to add our portfolio continues!  Home Owners Insurance You hear and read that insurance companies are dropping homeowners for no reason. Well, it turns out that insurance companies are becoming wiser on how to verify that policy owners are following the rules. To keep costs and risks down, insurance companies are now using drones, satellites, and airplanes to take aerial photos of your house. If you neglected to tell the insurance company that you have a pool, trampoline, a roof in bad shape or yard debris and hanging tree branches that are fire hazards, these will show up in the aerial views. You may think this is unfair, but when you sign your policy, you agree to home visits to verify that you’re telling the truth. Another question for consumers, is it fair for you to pay the same insurance premium with a brand-new roof then your next-door neighbor whose roof is 25 years old? At first thought it seems unfair that insurance companies can take pictures of your home from the sky, but if you neglected to tell them the truth about that pool or trampoline, maybe they have the right to drop you. In the long run, this could help insurance companies keep premiums lower for those who follow the rules and disclosed to the insurance company all the insurable risks that they have.  Avoiding Social Security Reductions Caused by Pensions If you receive a pension from work that was not covered by Social Security, you may see a reduction in any Social Security benefits you are entitled to which includes benefits from your own earnings or any spousal benefits you are claiming. This is caused by the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset. Keep in mind, if you earned a pension from a job where you also paid into Social Security, you will not see any reduction. One of the common pension systems we see in California is CalSTRS for teachers. Teachers do not pay into Social Security so their pension will reduce their Social Security amount. One way to get around this is by taking a “refund” from the pension. This allows you to withdraw all your contributions plus interest and roll them into your own retirement account so you can invest how you would like, and you will no longer have any reduction to your social security benefits, including any spousal benefits. The reason this works is because the refund only includes your own contributions, not the contributions made by the employer. This doesn’t work with all pensions as some lump sum options include employer contributions, so the same Social Security reduction would apply. Taking a refund from CalSTRS is not appropriate for everyone. If you are close to retirement or have been part of the CalSTRS system for many years, it likely makes sense to stay with it to receive your pension and any Social Security reduction that comes along with it. However, if you are younger, have a limited earnings history with CalSTRS, or are entitled to sizable Social Security Spousal or Survivor benefits, rolling over your CalSTRS pension to a retirement account may make sense so you get the benefit of both your pension dollars and Social Security.   Stocks Discussed: KBhomes (KBH), Northrop Grumman Corporation (NOC) and Boeing (BA)

March CPI The March Consumer Price Index (CPI) report spooked investors and sent the likelihood of a Fed rate cut in June to around 20%, which was a sharp drop from the greater than 50% chance that was priced in before the data was released. The concern came as headline CPI was 3.5% over the last 12 months, which topped the estimate of 3.4% and core CPI rose 3.8% from a year ago, compared with the estimate of 3.7%. Last month the annual rate for headline CPI was 3.2% and for core CPI it was 3.8%. Energy prices were a benefit to headline CPI over the last year or so, but with the recent increase in energy we are beginning to see them not benefit the headline number as much and I soon worry they will cause the headline number to top the core CPI reading. In the March report, energy was up 2.1%, but as we lap the easy comparisons from last year the annual increase could climb substantially which would cause the headline CPI to increase. Shelter continues to be a major weight on the numbers as the index climbed 5.7% compared to last year and accounted for over 60% of the climb in core CPI. Transportation services were also a major negative as they climbed 10.7% compared to last year. I believe this can largely be attributed to rising energy prices. Also, motor vehicle insurance continues to be a major negative as it saw an increase of 22.2% over the last year. While this report wasn’t overly positive, I would like to wait and see the PCE release on April 26th before abandoning the idea for a potential of three rate cuts this year.  March PPI The March Producer Price Index (PPI) report looked much more favorable than the CPI. Headline PPI rose 0.2% for the month, less than the 0.3% estimate and core PPI matched the estimate as it also rose 0.2% in the month. On a 12-month basis, PPI rose 2.1% which was the biggest gain since April 2023. While that may sound concerning, the inflation rate is near the Fed’s target so I would not say that is problematic. Core PPI rose 2.4% over the last year, which was the highest since September. Like the headline number, I don’t believe this is problematic considering the rate is still very reasonable in relation to the Fed’s 2% target.  Investing Highs and Lows I love to read information from smart people like Daniel Kahneman, who unfortunately passed away at age 90 on March 27. He was a pioneer in behavioral economics, although he felt he was really a psychologist. If investors would listen to his advice, their returns would probably be much higher and their psychological well-being would be far better when it came to investing. He mentions that people who lost on an investment feel at least twice as much pain as the gains feel pleasant. He also discusses how people do not incorporate all available information and people believe that short streaks in a random process enables them to predict what will come next. Interestingly, he also points out that based on research of asking people if they want to take a risk with an 80% chance of success, most people say yes. However, if you flip-flop that around and ask if they incurred the same risk with a 20% chance of failure, they say no. Obviously the risk is the same, but the psychology is different. I believe this is why many people get into bad investments. Sales people just focus on the positive side and leave the unsuspecting investor to do their own risk analysis.  Semiconductor Industry While the semiconductor industry is likely to continue growing, I do worry about China hurting the growth of US semiconductor companies. Shares of chip companies like Intel and Advanced Micro Devices fell after the Wall Street Journal reported that China is ordering the country’s largest telecommunications carriers to cease use of foreign chips. According to the Journal, Chinese officials issued the directive earlier this year for the telecom systems to replace non-Chinese core processors by 2027. China also recently set new guidelines to remove U.S. chips from government computers and servers. The problem here is China still remains a major market for US chip companies as the country accounted for 27% of Intel’s revenue in 2023 and AMD generated 15% of sales from China. Data from S&P Global showed that U.S. chip giants Intel, Broadcom, Qualcomm and Marvell Technology all generate more revenue from China compared with the U.S. The relationship with China is definitely worth keeping an eye on if you are investing in semiconductor companies, especially since most of them now trade at lofty valuations. To Reinvest or Not Reinvest Dividends From a retirement planning standpoint, it can be helpful to not reinvest dividends, especially in non-retirement accounts. In a non-retirement account, or a taxable account as they are called, dividends are taxed exactly the same way whether they are reinvested or not. In retirement, the focus shifts from accumulation to building tax-advantaged cashflow. When a dividend is automatically reinvested, it repurchases the same holding it came from. On the other hand if it is paid in cash, it will remain in the account where it can be invested or withdrawn. Therefore, when a dividend is paid in cash and incurs its normal tax, that cash can be accessed without any additional tax consequences. Alternatively, when dividends are automatically reinvested which is still taxable, if cashflow is needed, sells will also need to be made to generate that cash which can result in additional capital gain taxes. In a way, you’re getting taxed twice to create the same amount of cashflow. From a tax perspective, if a dividend is produced from a holding that is held for more than 60 days within the 121-day period surrounding the ex-dividend date, it will be considered a qualified dividend and taxed at the lower long-term capital gain rate. That criterion is a little technical but basically it means dividends from long-term holdings are taxed at the lower rate. It is popular to have dividends reinvested but this can force unnecessary taxation in retirement and can limit other planning opportunities like Roth Conversions. Stocks Discussed: BP (BP), Redfin (RDFN) and Highwood Properties (HIW)

March Jobs Report  I must say, I was very surprised by the strength in the March Jobs Report. Nonfarm payrolls increased 303,000 in the month, which easily topped the estimate of 200,000. Unlike prior reports, there wasn’t a major change to the previous months as February saw a negative revision of just 5,000 and January’s revision brought the total up by 27,000. There were many positives in the report considering the unemployment rate ticked lower to 3.8%, the labor force participation rate actually increased 0.2 percentage points to 62.7%, and average hourly earnings increased 4.1% which was lower than last month’s reading of 4.3%. Areas of strength in the economy included health care and social assistance (+81,300), government (+71,000), leisure and hospitality (+49,000), and construction (+39,000). According the BLS, the leisure and hospitality sector is finally now back to its pre-pandemic level. If the economy and labor market continue to remain resilient, I do worry we may not see those three interest rate cuts we have been expecting during the remainder of the year.   JOLTs In the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) it showed there were 8.8 million job openings in February, which pretty much matched expectations and last month’s reading. The job market has continued to remain resilient and I do believe that it will need to enter a Goldilocks period where it is not too hot or too cold. Too many job openings may deter the Fed from considering rate cuts and obviously we do not want a weak labor market as that would be bad for the economy.  Stock Market The stock market has gotten off to a strong start and in the first quarter the S&P 500 was up 10.2%, which marked the best first quarter performance since 2019. The Dow and Nasdaq also had good quarters as they were respectively up 5.6% and 9.1% in Q1. In a recent study, it was pointed that of the 16 times the S&P 500 rose 8% or more in the first quarter from 1950 through 2023, only once (1987) did the index lose ground the rest of the year. In the remaining years, the index gained an average of 9.7% over the next three quarters. In 10 of the 15 years the first quarter’s gains were higher than those seen over the remainder of the year. While this is bullish for the remainder of the year, I do worry about the concentration of the market. With Nvidia’s strong start and large market cap it accounted for close to half of the entire gain for the index. I don’t believe this will be able to continue, but I am optimistic that the rally could continue to broaden which would be beneficial to other stocks.  Office Rents Across the country office rents are holding firm and they are higher now than they were back in the fourth quarter of 2019. The average US office rent has an asking price of $35.24 per square foot. This is an increase from $34.92 per square foot in 2019. It is not a high increase, but compared to a lot of the negativity that the media is spreading, it shows office rents as a whole are still doing OK. I would recommend for investors looking into office real estate to really do their due diligence to make sure they are not buying or investing in a declining property. Stocks Discussed: Visa (V), Tesla (TSLA), Disney (DIS) and McCormack (MKC)

Electric Vehicle Sales Electric vehicle sales have really not kept up with expectations and I’m concerned for the smaller companies such as Lucid, Fisker and Rivian, which besides Tesla may be the only other exclusive electric vehicle company that may survive. Digging deeper into the numbers for Lucid, since 2021 they’ve only built 10,495 cars and the most recent quarterly loss per vehicle was $145,824. When the company first went public back in 2021, they had $4.8 billion in cash, but as of the end of 2023 the company is down to cash of $1.4 billion. In 2023 the company burned through $3.4 billion in cash. The only thing that could save this company would be another billion-dollar investment from the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund as they did back in 2018 when they invested $1 billion. I really like the look of the Lucid Air, but do not see how this company will survive. I would speculate that by 2025 this company will be in bankruptcy. The sad part is for people buying the cars today because of the great deals they may be receiving, think ahead a few years about who will be around to service these cars and they may be stuck in your garage with no way to get them serviced. I would encourage people if you’re going to buy an electric vehicle, buy it from a well-known brand like Ford or General Motors who will be around for years to come to service that vehicle. History of Hype Investing Are people so smart that they really don’t need to look at what happened in history? We have said many times we stay away from the hype investments like Nvidia and cryptocurrencies and back this up with reality. Let’s go back and learn from the late 90s about a company called CMGI, which helped fund internet startups. It was claimed to be one of the hottest investments in history and the CEO, David Wetherell, was deemed to be a hero and a genius. Keep in mind this was 24 years ago and when the company hit a $34 billion market cap, it was larger than Alcoa or Texaco. All the financial talk shows could not talk enough about CMGI and why the stock would continue to go up and what a great investment it was. Anyone on the other side who warned about this was considered a fool, or an idiot. They were told they didn’t understand enough about the company. In 1999, the stock rose 940% and everybody wanted a piece of it. Starting to sound familiar yet? However, the next year when the curtain came down, the stock fell 96%. That was the end of the story for many investors!   PCE No real exciting news from the personal consumption expenditures price index (PCE) as it was right in line with expectations. The headline number showed an annual increase of 2.5%, which matched the forecast. This was however above the January reading of 2.4%. This increase was likely a result of energy prices as they climbed 2.3% in the month. Core PCE, which excludes food and energy also matched expectations with a 2.8% rise compared to last year. This was slightly lower than last month’s reading of 2.9% and marked the smallest gain since March 2021.  Roth IRA 5-Year Rules There is often confusion around the nuances of the 5-year Roth IRA rules. There are two separate 5-year rules that apply depending on whether a contribution or a conversion is made. In a nutshell, the rule for contributions dictates how long you must wait to access the earnings without taxes or penalties, while the rule for conversions dictates how long you must wait to access the conversion principal. When making a contribution to a Roth IRA, you can always withdraw the contribution principal no matter your age. This is because contributions are made with after-tax funds. To access the earnings, the account must have been funded at least 5 tax years ago, and you must be at least age 59.5. Being age 59.5 alone is not enough to access those earnings. A contribution of any size will start this 5-year clock and after those 5 years it will no longer be relevant. After making a Roth Conversion, there is a separate 5-year rule which states that 5 tax years must pass for each individual conversion or the account holder must reach age 59.5 in order to access the conversion principal. Upon reaching age 59.5 this rule no longer applies. Therefore, if a conversion is made by someone who is 60, they can immediately access the conversion principal, or if someone who is 58 makes a conversion, they can access conversion principal upon reaching age 59.5 without waiting the 5 years. In these cases, the accounts must still be funded for at least 5 years to access any earnings. Since the conversion rule is triggered by the sooner of reaching age 59.5 or 5 years, a 30-year-old could make a conversion and withdraw that conversion principal after 5 years without tax or penalty even though they are not age 59.5. It is common for people to question making a contribution or conversion in fear that money will be locked up for 5 years, but if done correctly there can be ways to access funds without waiting.

Lawsuits Against Apple On Thursday, March 21st, the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed an anti-trust lawsuit along with 16 states against Apple. The DOJ claims Apple’s iPhone ecosystem is a monopoly that drove its “astronomical valuation” at the expense of consumers, developers and rival phone makers. The lawsuit claims that Apple’s anti-competitive practices extend beyond the iPhone and Apple Watch businesses, citing Apple’s advertising, browser, FaceTime and news offerings. The DOJ also said in a release that to keep consumers buying iPhones, Apple moved to block cross-platform messaging apps, limited third-party wallet and smartwatch compatibility and disrupted non-App Store programs and cloud-streaming services. With pressure also surrounding the App store in the EU, I worry the expected growth from the services business could be under pressure. We have often said Apple is a great company, but trading at such lofty levels has left many investors open to declines in the value of their investment. The stock trading around $170 per share is down from the high of over $200 per share, and while this lawsuit will take a couple years to go through the court system, it could have a major impact on the growth of Apple’s earnings. At Wilsey Asset Management, we do continue to believe that Apple is overpriced and has no potential for growth going forward. Looking out a couple years from now the stock could still be trading around these levels due to the high valuation and limited prospect for business growth. We do believe it’s very possible for the stock to drop at least another 10% to 20%.  Retirement Assets and Target Date Funds I was so disappointed to read recently that Vanguard has 63% of their US retirement assets allocated to Target Date Funds. I cannot stress what a poor investment these are. They make nice fees for Wall Street and people think it’s an easy way to retire but the allocation and numbers are just so wrong. A good example is as recent as 2022 when the bond index went down about 14% that year. Based on the theory of Target Date Funds and how they are invested, most of a 65-year-old retiree’s money would be invested in bonds. On a million dollar account a 14% decline would have led to an account value of $860,000 and now a couple years later, bonds are still lower. I do believe in buying and holding, but you must understand what you’re holding and why you’re holding it. It does make sense to just implement a blind strategy. If you have a target date fund, I would highly recommend that you sit down with a knowledgeable financial advisor that really understands and can explain how they work…. Yes, I’m available!  Mind Games of Investing I learned a new word this weekend, counterfactual. In my 40+ years of investing I believed what this word meant, but I just didn’t know there was a word that described what I knew. What I’m talking about as it stares in your face where you would have been if you would’ve bought Microsoft, Nvidia or Tesla a few years ago. The emotional psyche is great at tracking the big misses and convincing you why you should’ve invested, but it never seems to remember the investment losses that you missed because you didn’t take that risk. Over the years we’ve talked about these types of companies many times. Just to remind you, take a look at the cannabis companies or during the pandemic had you invested in Zoom or Peloton. More recently, we just discussed in our newsletter about had you invested in electric vehicle companies you would’ve lost about 90% of your investment had you purchased at the top. Investing is hard, throughout your lifetime there will always be some companies that you “knew” were going to go up after the fact. Comeback to reality and realize if you can average about 10% on your investments, in 21 years a $100,000 investment would be worth close to $800,000. But if you lost principal along the way by taking on risk, you may not even have your $100,000. And if one of your friends tells you they bought one of these high flyers and they brag about it, ask them percentage wise how much does it make up of their entire portfolio? More than likely it’ll be less than one percent, but even at one percent be sure to inform them that the investment, even if it doubles in price would only add a one percent increase to their entire portfolio. And if you would like to use the new word counterfactual, the definition is what might have been an imaginary alternative to the actual past.  Mortgage Points and Lender Credits When you apply for a mortgage, there’s a lot more to consider than just the interest rate. When you get a mortgage, there are closing costs that include things like title and escrow fees that are not part of the loan itself. Then there is prepaid interest which is the interest that accrues from the closing date through the remainder of the month. Since mortgage payments are paid in arrears, your first payment will be two months after the month you close. For example, if you close your mortgage in the beginning of April, you’ll have more prepaid interest at closing since you’ll have to pay interest for the bulk of April, but you won’t have to make the next payment until the middle of June. Also, at closing you might have points or credits. A mortgage point is an extra fee you pay in exchange for a lower interest rate. A lender credit is the opposite where you receive a higher interest rate, but the lender will provide you funds that can be applied to closing costs and prepaid interest. You can also choose to pay no points and receive no credits for an interest rate in the middle which is called the par rate. For example, if you were to get a mortgage right now your par rate might be 7%, or you could pay a few thousand dollars in points to receive a 6.75% rate, or you could receive a few thousand dollars in credits in exchange for a 7.25% rate. With where interest rates are at now, pretty much everyone agrees that mortgage rates will be coming down in the coming months and years. This means if you are considering buying or refinancing, even if you are using a 30-year mortgage, it is best to think of it as a 6, 7, or 8 month loan as there should be an opportunity to refinance in a few months at a lower rate. Therefore, if you are getting a loan now, you want to structure that loan so you have the lowest overall cost during the next 6 to 8 months. During a decreasing interest rate environment, this typically means accepting a higher interest rate and using the accompanying lender credits to cover as much closing costs and interest as possible. You might pay a few hundred dollars more in interest over the next several months, but that is worth it if you receive a few thousand dollars in credits upfront.

CPI The Consumer Price Index (CPI) came in a little bit hotter than expected as the headline number for February showed an annual increase of 3.2% versus on expectation of 3.1% and the core CPI showed an annual increase of 3.8% versus an expectation of 3.7%. While it was not much progress, there was still a decline from last month’s core CPI reading of 3.9%. This marked the lowest reading since May 2021 when core CPI was 3.8%. Food was a bright spot in the report as the annual increase was just 2.2%. Food at home came in at an annual increase of 1.0%, while food away from home increased 4.5%. With wage pressures continuing, I believe this discrepancy will continue. Energy was also an interesting sector as the annual reading showed a decline of 1.9%, but the monthly reading was up 2.3%. Energy has been a big positive for the headline number, but as we lap easier levels it will likely not be as big of a benefit. One of the areas that remains very hot is motor vehicle insurance as it was up 20.6% compared to last year. I believe this item will remain hot for the next several months, but as we lap higher prices it should subdue. Shelter also remained a large weight on the report as it increased 5.7% over the last year and accounted for about two-thirds of the annual increase in core CPI. I feel like I sound like a broken record, but I continue to believe that this is heavily distorting the numbers and is it declines over the remainder of the year it should be a benefit to both headline and core CPI. I don’t believe this report does anything to change the expectation for three cuts in the back half of the year. PPI I was somewhat surprised to see the negative reaction to the February Producer Price Index (PPI). It seems as if people were fixated on the monthly jump of 0.6%, which doubled both the estimate and January’s reading of 0.3%. Looking year-over-year though the numbers still look quite manageable. The headline number increased just 1.6% and core PPI, which excludes food and energy was up 2%. I don’t think this report should have a major impact on the Fed’s expected interest rate direction.   401k It's no secret that I'm a big advocate of saving in your 401k, but I was surprised to see that according to a recent survey 77% workers believe that the unavailability of pensions is making it harder to achieve the American dream and 83% say all workers should have a pension to be independent and self-reliant in retirement. I was also surprised to see some UAW members are still unsatisfied with the automaker’s retirement plans as some are continuing to push for pensions. A Ford spokesperson recently shared the current retirement structure at their company, "The company contributes 10% of employee base wages, plus $1 per hour worked (capped at 2,080 hours a year), with zero employee contribution required.” I would take that over a defined benefit plan any day. 401ks give participants the power to grow their wealth more effectively, they are much better estate planning tools, and they are much more portable if changing employers. The key is you have to take accountability and actually participate in your 401k to reap the benefits.  Bitcoin Peaking Point I admit it myself that I have no idea where bitcoin will peak. But the truth is, no one does. I do know that demand is high right now because Wall Street continues to build their ETF’s to collect their fees, which I have talked about before. But can we please get off some of the comparisons of Bitcoin to make one feel better, especially the one with gold and saying it is a digital gold. The value of all mined gold is around $15 trillion. A good portion of that is in gold jewelry. I know when I buy a gift for my wife like a gold bracelet or necklace, she’s going to be pretty happy, but I can’t even write the words how to compare if I gave her a gift somehow of a Bitcoin that she can open and do something with it. I think if I would try, I could be sleeping on the sofa that night. Also, let’s stop saying this will be the replacement currency if the dollar falls. Just think of the calamity the country would go through with a fall of the dollar in the United States. Do you think you will still be able to plug into the Internet and access your Bitcoin? You may not even have electricity to plug-in your electronic devices like phones, computers and laptops? Let’s really understand what Bitcoin is, it is a speculative game that is being played right now, and it really cannot be used for anything that is really of any value. There are smart economists like David Kelly from JPMorgan who have similar feelings. He recently told Barron’s, “I worry about the silly decisions investors make. People get misled by all sorts of fads and fantasies as to how they should invest. I worry about the money that’s been poured into things like Bitcoin, which is absolute nonsense. It is simply a focus of speculation. I worry that someday that’ll all go poof and people will lose money.” I’ve said it before, but congratulations if you have made money on Bitcoin, if you want to continue to hold it you should really think through what it is. If you don’t have a sound answer, you should sell it.  Tax Brackets vs Your Tax Rate Most people believe tax rates are going up, which may be true. With the level of government spending and debt, it is logical to conclude taxes will need to increase to keep up. Starting in 2026, the federal tax brackets are set to increase due to the sunset of the current tax rates implemented in 2018. We may also see further tax increases to address issues like the deficit or Social Security. However, there is a difference between the tax brackets and the tax rate you will experience as an individual. Just because tax rates increase, doesn’t necessarily mean the rate you will be subject to will be higher or that your tax bill will be higher. Currently the federal tax rates are 10%, 12%, 22%, 24%, 32%, 35%, 37%, and they are expected to change to 10%, 15%, 25%, 28%, 33%, 35%, 39.6%, which is technically an increase. These are brackets which means the more income you have, the higher you get pushed into the brackets. What most people don’t understand is that your individual level of income will also fluctuate up and down over time, not just the tax brackets. In retirement you have much more flexibility in choosing where your income comes from, so while you’re working you might find yourself in the 4th tax bracket which is 24%, but in retirement with the right planning you may get to the 2nd tax bracket which could be 15% at that time. Even though tax rates increased, your tax rate could go down because you will be in a lower bracket due to your income level. I’m not saying taxes aren’t a problem in retirement, because they absolutely can be, but the way to address them is to understand how your individual income will change over time so you can take advantage of the tax system all along the way.

Labor Market While the headline number of 275k jobs created easily topped the estimate of 198k and sparked concerns the labor market remained too hot, the details of the report showed a much softer labor market. To begin, the prior two months saw a downward revision of 167k jobs, which more than offsets the beat we saw in the month of February. Also, while I generally am a little more skeptical of the household survey, it did show a decline of 184k in those that were counted as employed, which led to an uptick in the unemployment rate to 3.9%. This was above the estimate of 3.7%. I was also disappointed to see that government remained a large contributor in the establishment survey as the sector added 52k jobs. Outside of government, other areas that were strong included health care & social assistance (+90.7k), leisure & hospitality (+58k), and construction (+23k). Wage gains were also a bright spot in the report as average hourly earnings increased 4.3% compared to last year. This was below the estimate of 4.4% and below last month’s reading of 4.5%. I believe this report continues to put us on track for 3-4 rate cuts in the back part of the year. JOLTs Report The January Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs) was right in line with expectations and the previous month as job openings totaled about 8.9 million. This remains well below the high of 12.2 million in March 2022, but is still well above historical norms as prepandemic we had not seen a reading above 8 million. I continue to believe job openings will continue to trend lower to come back in line with historic levels. This does not mean we believe we are seeing a weak labor market, but I would call it a normalizing labor market. We have also seen a normalization in quits which should be a positive for wage pressure. Quits in the month were 3.4 million. This compares to annual quits of 44.4 million or 3.7 million per month in 2023. Total quits in 2023 fell by 6.1 million when compared to 2022. Looking at prepandemic levels, quits totaled 42.1 million in 2019 which would have been an average of 3.5 million. Layoffs were also strong in the month as they totaled just 1.6 million. This is right in line with 2023 levels as for the full year they totaled 19.8 million and averaged 1.65 million per month. In 2019, layoffs totaled 21.7 million and averaged 1.8 million per month. I wanted to provide all this data to show the labor market may be softening from strong levels, but I believe there is still some room to have numbers normalize without tilting us into a weak labor market. China What happened to China? The country had such a robust economy just a few short years ago, but the writing was on the wall. Here are the problems that caused the economic downfall. A real estate boom which accounted for 25% of China’s annual economic output. The debt and inventory continued to rise in houses and condos but many remained empty with no one able to buy them. The government cutoff the debt to developers, which ended the real estate boom. Consumers who did buy into the expensive housing market in China leveraged beyond their means with the expectation that the growth would continue and they could sell out with a profit. Unfortunately, they are now sitting under water in much of their real estate, but still have to pay the debt and don’t have much discretionary income to spend in other parts of the economy. China is now experiencing deflation, which will give them negative growth in parts of their economy for perhaps years to come. China’s overall debts have now surpassed 300% of GDP with very little chance of the economy growing to pay down that debt. Many years ago, they put a cap on how many babies people could have and now that is hurting them with an aging workforce and a shrinking workforce. It will take years to reverse this. In the meantime, the economy remains underwater. Since 1998 foreign investment in China has always been on the upswing, but that run came to an end in the third quarter of 2023 as foreign companies sold out and left or just stopped investing in China. There is nothing left to build in China when looking at their infrastructure. They have built many roads, railroads and airports so there’ll be no future investment in infrastructure. China has always been a communist country and I don’t think they really understood capitalism very well. An economy will always go through the ups and downs, but the United States has been around for 200 years and we have learned some valuable lessons like 1929 and 2008. While we can’t avoid the down turns, we have learned how to minimize the depths of the down turns. Personal Consumption Expenditures The Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index, known as the PCE and is the main inflation gauge that the Federal Reserve looks at came in with a good inflation number. Excluding food and energy the change from one year ago for January was 2.8%, which shows a nice downward trend from December 2023 of 2.9%, November 2023 at 3.2%, and then October 2023 at 3.4%. The numbers are going in the right direction, but they are now falling a little more slowly than the big jumps we had. I still believe by the end of the year we should be at 2%, which is the Fed’s target and they should start reducing rates by midyear. Even though they won’t be at their target of 2% by June or July they need to start reducing rates a little bit to prevent a recession in 2025. At Wilsey Asset Management, we do believe the Federal Reserve came to the rescue to reduce inflation a little bit late but have now done a good job on managing the economy. We continue to believe that the Federal Reserve will do a good job in 2024, but stay tuned as we will be on top of it each month as the data is released. Social Security Changes Coming? The State of the Union was this week and one of President Biden’s talking points was Social Security. He stated, “Working people who built this country pay more into Social Security than millionaires and billionaires do” so he vowed to “make the wealthy pay their fair share”. It is true that millionaires and billionaires whose incomes do not come in the form of wages or self-employment do not pay into Social Security, but they are also not entitled to Social Security benefits in retirement. Working class people do in fact pay more into Social Security, but they are also the only ones who receive it. However, for people who do pay into Social Security, benefits are subsidized by high-wage earners and business owners for the benefit of low-income earners. As an employee, 6.2% of wages are withheld for Social Security up to a cap of $168,600. The Social Security benefit amount is based on 35 years of earnings which is used to determine the average monthly earnings. The full retirement amount will be the sum of 90% of the first $1,174 of average monthly earnings, 32% of the next $5,904, and 15% of any monthly earnings above that. For example someone who made $50,000 per year would receive $2,014 per month at their full retirement age which is 48% of their earnings. For someone who made $150,000 per year, their Social Security would be $3,759 per month which is 30% of their earnings. Even though both paid the same 6.2% of their income into Social Security, the lower-earner received a much larger percentage of their income in the form of benefits. In the case of business owners, they have to pay double the tax for a total of 12.4% because they are considered both an employee and employer, and they have to pay 6.2% for all their employees. So a business owner is really paying more into Social Security than all their employees combined. In regards to making the wealthy pay their fair share, there have been proposed bills that would tax earnings over $250,000, over $400,000, or possibly tax investment income. However, it is unclear if these additional taxes would change the potential benefit amount of those paying them, or if they would just benefit lower wage earners. There is no doubt that the Social Security system needs some adjustments, but we must understand the facts before implementing change.

401k Loans It was nice to see that retirement assets saw a nice increase in 2023. According to Fidelity, the average 401k was up 14% from a year earlier to $118,600 and the average IRA was up 12% to $116,600. While it is good to see this progress, balances are still short of the year end 2021 levels when the average 401k reached $136k and the average IRA stood at $131k. I was somewhat surprised but happy to see the average 401k contribution rate, including employer and employee now stands at 13.9%. With the decline in companies offering pensions, employees really need to make sure they are saving at least 10% of their pay to achieve an enjoyable retirement. On the other side of the equation, I was disappointed to see the percentage of workers who took a loan from their 401k, including for hardship reasons, increased to 8.9% from 7.8% at the end of 2022. Many times, people believe 401k loans are great option, but it costs you greatly when you consider the loss of compounding and the tax inefficiency. They are better than mounting high interest credit card debt, but they should only be used as a last resort rather than a tool to fund a vacation or buy a new toy. Hype Investing At Wilsey Asset Management we avoid hype investing. From time to time, we attempt to give evidence of how long-term, hype investing can destroy your portfolio. Here’s another example, in 2021, you may recall the hype around electric vehicles, people made it sound as if an internal combustion engine vehicles would never be sold again and we would all be driving electric vehicles. Well, the hype of the stock price matched that excitement, two examples are Lucid and Rivian automotive. The all-time high a couple years ago for Lucid was $35, recently it has fallen to under three dollars a share, a 91% decline. The other example is Rivian, in late 2021, it hit an all-time high of $146 per share and has recently fallen under $11 a share, a 92.5% decline. It is possible for these companies to turnaround and may do well in years to come, the massive decline in stock price is the reason we will not invest in a company which does not have earnings, and we will not pay more than 10 to maybe 12 times for those earnings going forward. We may miss out on some highfliers. but I’d rather take it slow and steady than try and hit the home run and lose 80 to 90% on an investment. For Lucid to get back to $35 a share that would be over a 1000% return. US Farmland Farmland in the United States has been on quite the ride for the past 26 years. Back in 1997, the average price per acre for farmland in the US was $1,270. It has now increased by over 430% to $5,500 per acre. Now before you people in San Diego think that is not that good because of the appreciation you’ve seen on your house, remember this is nationwide and a 400% plus return is very good on real estate. The question is, will it continue? Over the last 20 years, farm acreage has declined by about 50,000,000 acres to just under 900,000,000 acres nationwide. Development has been taking away some of the agricultural land which could drive prices higher. That could encourage farmers to take advantage of their high value real estate and retire. That would not be a good thing for our agricultural needs going forward. Is Long-Term Care Insurance Worth it? Most people know that elder care can be expensive later in life which begs the question, “Is long-term care insurance a viable solution?”. The long-term care insurance industry has evolved a lot over the last four decades. In the 80’s, 90’s and early 2000’s there were policies available that were affordable and provided more coverage, such as lifetime benefits. However, over time the insurance companies came to realize they weren’t making money because more people were filing claims than expected. As a result, most insurance companies have stopped selling this type of insurance all together, and the ones that remain have substantially reduced benefits and increased premiums on new and existing policyholders. Therefore, the cost/benefit ratio for long-term care insurance is not nearly as attractive as it once was and retirees are typically better off exploring other ways to pay for elder care.

Commercial Real Estate We hear that commercial real estate properties are having problems, but how bad are those problems? After the 2008/2009 financial crisis, by the second quarter of 2010 commercial property had a record $194.8 billion properties in distress. Compare that to the end of 2023, when commercial properties in distress totaled $86 billion. Also, think about how much commercial real estate has appreciated since 2010. Another point to consider, after the financial crisis there were not many funds on the sidelines and today real estate private equity firms are sitting on $544 billion in cash, which is a record level up from $457 billion in cash at the end of 2022. With that much cash, they will be interested in doing some deals and give a floor to many commercial properties across the country. Should You Buy Nvidia Now? We all know that Nvidia has done very well, and after the most recent report the stock is at a new high. I heard the dumbest thing from a money manager on CNBC, who didn’t own Nvidia and said you need to buy one percent of the stock in your portfolio. The reason I say it is dumb is because even if the stock doubles from here that would only increase your investment return by one percent. In other words, if your return was 10% over the next year, with the addition of Nvidia your return would be 11% if the stock doubles from here. This also assumes that had you invested one percent somewhere else it would’ve made no return at all. When it comes to investing, discipline is very important and yes, we all want to invest in investments that will increase in value, but an investor must understand their objective and their discipline, stay the course, and realize that one will not always own all the hot stocks and should not chase returns. Chinese Car Makers A Chinese electric auto maker, BYD, is sending chills across the auto makers in the US. Elon Musk said “If there are not trade barriers established, they will pretty much demolish most other car companies in the world. “In a memo from executives at Toyota, they stated Chinese companies have a 25 to 30% advantage over global competitors when manufacturing EVs. If not protected against, Chinese EV companies could storm the US market. In 2018, the Trump administration applied an additional 25% tariff on Chinese cars on top of the regular 2.5% tariff on all cars coming to the US. To get around this, BYD is looking at building a factory right across the border in Mexico. They have not purchased any land yet and this is a few years down the road, but it could be devastating to all car makers 3 to 5 years from now. I looked to see what the BYD cars look like and some of them are not that bad looking. Whoever becomes president in November 2024, I hope they look seriously at this situation to prevent BYD or any other Chinese carmaker from flooding our car market. Financial Planning: Investment Return of Annuities An annuity is exchanging your assets for income, you’re essentially buying a pension. It’s funny that pensions have such a positive connotation but annuities aren’t as popular, even though they’re pretty much the same thing. We don’t sell annuities and we don’t ever recommend annuities because when you look at the numbers, they aren’t that appealing for an investor. To illustrate this, I got a quote for a 65-year-old purchasing a $500k immediate annuity. In exchange for the $500k, they will receive monthly income of $3,000 for the rest of their life, which is a 7.2% yield. Keep in mind, the $500k is now gone, so they can’t decide down the road to do something else with their money. Statistically someone who is 65 has a life expectancy of about 83, or more 18 years. With this information we can calculate the expected return of the $500k investment and it comes out to 2.88% per year. In other words, if you were to invest $500k and then withdraw $3,000 per month for the next 18 years, you would need that $500k to return 2.88% per year to last the full 18 years. From an investment standpoint, most people wouldn’t be happy with an annualized return of less than 3% over almost 2 decades, but that’s what people agree to when they purchase an annuity. Don’t get confused by the 7.2% yield, which is misleading since those payments stop when you die. Instead, calculate the actual return to see if it still seems like a good idea. Keep in mind, the insurance company and the agent selling the annuity will not break down the actual return for you.

AI Outlook So Far Microsoft spent about $7 million per 30 second ad for the Super Bowl promoting their Copilot AI service. Some results are not coming in so good for Copilot with some testers after using the software for more than six months said it was useful but doesn’t live up to its price. Another survey adopter said the initial excitement wears off with a 20% drop in use after only a month. Executives at Microsoft expected billions of dollars in new revenue as their search engine Bing would take market share from Google. Unfortunately, nearly a year later Bing has only seen less than a one percent gain in market share. A survey from Boston consulting group said that roughly 90% of business executives said generative AI is a priority for the company this year; however, 66% said it would take a couple years for the technology to move beyond the hype. 70% of those executives said they were only going to do small investments with limited testing. I’ve been concerned about the over hype of the money going into AI and the return on investment taking years to payoff. This would not be the first time on Wall Street that the hype sent stocks into orbit, only to come back down to earth when reality set in. Investing in Technology More strange news with the markets. As of the week ending February 9th, the NASDAQ was up 6.5% this year and the S&P 500, which is also heavily weighted in tech companies had increased 5.4% in 2024. This compares to a return of just 0.84% for the broader Russell 2000 index. The S&P 500 has increased 14 of the last 15 weeks something we have not seen since the end of 1972. I’m not saying the market is going to crash tomorrow, but the 73/74 market period had a very long bear market. The difference here is that our market is so concentrated in technology that I think we could see a bear market, but many companies will still gain going forward because of the great value that has been ignored. Another example of exuberance in technology would be that fact that since the 2008 financial crisis, US companies with dividends above 5% gave investors a return of 450%. Over that same timeframe, companies that don’t pay a dividend have returned nearly 1200%. Going back to the 1870s, this flies in the face of normal behavior. The excitement in tech has led to some major gains for the big tech companies and Microsoft is now the most valuable company with a market cap around $3.1 trillion. It is almost twice the $1.6 trillion value of the entire S&P 500 energy sector, yet it’s annual free cash flow of around $67 billion is less than half the $135 billion from these energy companies. I do not know what will cause a drop or when it will happen, I just believe many investors do not realize the risk that they are taking by investing heavily into technology. Unfortunately, all parties do come to an end. CPI The Consumer Price Index (CPI) caused a lot of concern and sent stocks lower as the reading came in above expectations. Frankly, looking through the data I don’t think the numbers were that bad. CPI rose 3.1% compared to last year which was above expectations of 2.9%, but was lower than the reading of 3.4% in December. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy rose 3.9% and came in above the expectation of 3.7%. This reading matched December’s 3.9% rise which was the smallest increase since May 2021. It is important to remember that numbers don’t always go in a straight line and I believe this report should not have a major impact on the Fed’s rate decisions. Especially, when looking deeper at the numbers. The shelter index again continued to be a heavyweight on the report as it climbed 6% compared to last year. This increase accounted for over two thirds of the 12-month increase in core CPI. It was also interesting that there was a little bit of a divergence between the rent of a primary residence which was up 0.4% in the month compared to the owners’ equivalent rent of residences which was up 0.6% in the month. I believe this is a silly metric that distorts the CPI level. The Owners’ equivalent rent is obtained through surveys and asks members of a household: “If someone were to rent your home today, how much do you think it would rent for monthly, unfurnished, and without utilities?" I don’t believe this is a great way for tracking shelter inflation and that these numbers should be taken with a grain of salt. Other areas of the report continued to see positive deceleration or even deflation in some cases. The energy index was down 4.6% compared to last year with gasoline falling 6.4%. Food at home showed a gain of just 1.2%, which compares to a peak of 13.5% in August 2022. Food away from home did have a larger increase of 5.1%, which likely stems from higher wages and the elevated demand we are seeing at restaurants and bars. Overall, as I said I don’t think this was a bad report, but investors need to realize that the Fed will not be cutting rates 6 times this year. PPI I was somewhat disappointed by the Producer Price Index (PPI), as I thought we would see better numbers. In January, PPI rose 0.3% compared to the prior month, which was the biggest move since August and it was well above the expected increase of 0.1%. Core PPI was even more troubling considering it saw a 0.5% increase, which easily topped the expectation for an increase of just 0.1%. Looking at the year over year increase, the numbers are less concerning. Headline PPI increased just 0.9%, but core PPI did see an increase of 2.6%. I wouldn’t recommend panicking over one report, but I will definitely be keeping an eye on inflation over the next few months. I still believe the broader trend will show a decline towards the 2% target, but there will likely be bumps in the road. Financial Planning: Health Insurance Before Medicare Most become eligible for Medicare at age 65. With Medicare you will have a Part B premium, which is $174.70 per month in 2024, and potentially an additional premium of up to $200 per month depending if you select a Medicare Advantage Plan or a Medicare Supplement Plan. If you retire before age 65, health insurance can be much more expensive and range into the thousands of dollars per month. For many this is a major factor in why they delay retirement. However, with the correct planning ahead of time, it is possible to retire early without being subject to exorbitant insurance premiums. When purchasing health insurance through the Health Insurance Marketplace, the actual premium is based on your income. This means if you can keep your income lower, you will qualify for the same coverage, but at a lower monthly cost. Some ways to keep income low is to keep extra cash, taxable brokerage accounts, and Roth accounts available as withdrawals from these accounts are not considered income. Therefore, these types of assets can cover livings expenses until reaching Medicare at age 65 while also keeping health insurance premiums, federal taxes, and state taxes at a minimum. This also means it may be necessary to defer other types of income such as Social Security, pensions, capital gains, pre-tax retirement account withdrawals, and Roth conversions until reaching age 65. There are many insurance plans available all with their own premium based on income, so it is important to choose the right plan to cover your individual medical needs, but with the right planning, there are affordable options available for early retirement.

CPI One of the main reasons I continue to believe the Consumer Price Index (CPI) will continue to decelerate this year is I don’t believe there will be as much pressure from the shelter index. In December, the median U.S. asking rent price fell 0.8% from the prior year to $1,964. According to Redfin, this marked the third consecutive monthly decline as prices dropped 2.1% in November and 0.3% in October. The rent price reflects new leases which means I believe this will have a larger impact as we progress through 2024. I believe there will be even less concern over rent increases going forward considering the number of new buildings in the U.S. with five units or more. Looking at the chart below you can see that the amount of completed buildings is near the highest level in over 30 years and the number of new buildings under construction is at levels we have not seen before. China Owning U.S. Debt I have heard people worry about China owning U.S. treasury debt. Over the last decade or so, it truly has become a very small concern. China now holds just $782 billion of our debt which trails Japan at $1.1 trillion. China still tops the UK, but the gap has been narrowing over the years as the UK now holds $716 billion of US debt. The next largest foreign holders of our debt are Luxembourg at $371 billion and Canada at $321 billion. With our debt now over $34 trillion, China owns just over 2%. Compare this back to 2013 when Beijing’s holdings peaked at just over $1.3 trillion and our debt stood at close to $17 trillion and you will see the concerns over China controlling our debt are currently overblown. Back then they owned over 7% of our debt. The main benefit here is China no longer could threaten dumping our debt and causing a major spike in interest rates. The downside is our debt has continued to grow and with less demand for our debt from China, interest rates are likely higher than they would be if China was actively participating in buying more of our debt. Remember like everything else these markets are based on supply and demand. If there is more demand for our debt, prices would go higher and since there is an inverse correlation, interest rates would go lower. Growth Companies I don’t like to invest in the expensive growth companies because of the risk that comes with them. People often forget how much value they can lose and how long the recovery can be. One great example of this is Microsoft during the Tech Boom. In 1999, Microsoft could do no wrong and they were one of the most exciting companies in the world. The stock hit a peak of a split-adjusted value of $59.96 per share in December of 1999. The stock then fell dramatically during the tech bust and financial crisis and bottomed out in March 2009 at a price of $15.15 per share. This resulted in a decline of about 75% over essentially a 10-year period. The shares would not reach the 1999 peak until October 2016, essentially 17 years after it reached the tech boom peak. While the stock has done well as of late, how many people are patient enough to hold through a 17-year period with no growth? Not to mention if you need income from your portfolio, that would have been a complete disaster. While tech is hot again, I still recommend people be careful as they often forget the lessons from the past. Financial Planning: Understanding Your Tax Phases Sometimes it feels like taxes only go up, but it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, most people go through different tax phases during their lives. While you’re working, taxes seem high because you’re subject to 5 different taxes. You are taxed federally, on the state side, and you have Social Security, Medicare, and disability taxes withheld from payroll. Then when you retire, things change. You’re no longer subject payroll taxes, which in California is a flat tax of 8.75%, and some of your retirement income may be partially or fully tax-free. For many this is a period of low taxation which means you don’t need as much total income to produce your after-tax cash flow. Then in your 70’s, you may see your taxes increase again due to required distributions from retirement accounts and extra premiums for Medicare. By understanding these different tax phases over time, you can take advantage of your tax situation and create a plan to save taxes over your lifetime.

Employment Situation The numbers for nonfarm payrolls blew away expectations as they expanded by 353,000 in the month of January. This easily topped the estimate for 185,000. Job growth was widespread as it grew in every major category except for mining and logging which saw a decline of 6k in the month. Two areas that remained extremely strong were health care and social assistance (+100.4k) and professional and business services (+74k). Other areas of strength included retail trade (+45.2k), government (+36k), and manufacturing (+23k). The previous two months also saw upward revisions with an upward revision of 117k in December and 9k in November. There was some concern that maybe this report was too strong and that it could impact the Fed’s rate cut path. The major concern on the inflation front came from average hourly wages which jumped 4.5% and easily exceeded the forecast of 4.1%. While this could have an impact on inflation, it is important to remember that data doesn’t always move in a straight line. Also, the average hours worked fell to 34.1 which was 0.2 hours lower than the previous month and would have an impact on total labor cost. I was also happy to see in a separate report that the Employment Cost Index increase by just 0.9%, which was the smallest quarterly gain since the second quarter of 2021. Looking at year-on-year, labor costs increased 4.2% in Q4 which marked the smallest rise since Q4 of 2021. Overall, I think this report shouldn’t throw a wrench in the idea of the Fed cutting rates in the back half of the year. Job Openings It is looking like the economy could navigate a pretty remarkable feat with decelerating inflation rates, growth in the economy (albeit limited), and a resilient labor market. In the month of December, job openings rose to 9.0 million which easily topped the estimate of 8.7 million and marked a three-month high. This is well off the high of around 12 million that was achieved in 2022, but it still is a healthy level considering pre pandemic job openings were around 7 million.   Investment Grade Debt I was surprised to learn that the amount of investment grade debt was $168 billion so far in the month of January. One would think that these corporations would do everything they could to hold off until the second half of the year when rates should be lower. Investors would have to go back 34 years to find this much debt issued in January. It makes one wonder do they know something we don’t know and maybe rates won’t be falling? I still remain very confident we will see rates fall in the second half of the year. Liquid Cash As of the third quarter of 2023, cash in money markets and CDs has reached an all-time high of $8.8 trillion. The last peak for CDs and money markets was reached in 2008 when it climbed above $6 trillion. At US lenders, total deposits fell to $17.4 trillion from the peak of $18.2 trillion, but when you combine the two you have around $26 trillion of liquid money. The question is, as rates fall where will this money go and how much will be transferred to longer term investments like real estate and equities? I don’t believe we will see much action here until probably the last quarter of 2024 and even more likely happening in 2025. However, as an investor, I would rather be investing early than late because that will hurt your long-term returns. I think investing in the right equities on sale over the next six months will provide good returns when you look at December 31st, 2025. Financial Planning: Tax Filing Review With tax season coming up, it is helpful to review your tax return before filing to catch any mistakes. Some of the most common errors include misreporting 1099-Rs, missing rental expenses, incorrectly reporting capital gains, and missing IRA contributions. Any time money leaves a retirement account a 1099-R is generated, even with Roth accounts. However just because a 1099-R is generated, does not mean the distribution is taxable. Roth withdrawals and more commonly rollovers to other retirement accounts are not taxable. We have seen cases where a non-taxable distribution is reported as income due to the receipt of a 1099-R, so if you had retirement account distributions in 2023, make sure you’re only paying for taxable withdrawals. With rental properties it is common to have insurance, property taxes, interest, HOA or management fees, and depreciation all listed as expenses. If any of these are missing or seem low after reviewing the Schedule E, it may be necessary to go back and recount all your rental expenses to confirm you are receiving all possible deductions. When selling assets like a business or property there is no 1099 generated, so it is helpful to double check how a taxable sale is reported on the Schedule D. We’ve seen sales reported as a short-term gain instead of a long-term gain which can result in substantially more taxes. Lastly if you made any contributions to pre-tax retirement accounts like an IRA or SEP, be sure these contributions are reported and deductible. When making a contribution to an IRA, a Form 5498 is generated, but this form isn’t available until after taxes are due. This means you have to remember to report the contribution because there will be no tax form showing it. There’s many possible errors or omissions when filing a tax return, but these are some of the more common ones to keep an eye out for.

GDP Report I would say the GDP report was an extremely strong indicator that the economy is progressing in the right direction. While the growth number in Q4 of 3.3% was impressive compared to the estimate for a 2% gain, I believe the inflation numbers were even more important. The PCE price index increased just 1.7% in the fourth quarter and when looking at the “core” PCE, which excludes food and energy it increased just 2.0%. I believe this points to the possibility that barring any major shocks, inflation should continue to decline towards the Fed’s 2% target on an annual basis as we progress through this year. When looking at the growth in the GDP, it was interesting to see that all components produced positive benefits for the report. With growth of 3.8% in goods spending and 2.4% in services spending, overall consumer spending grew 2.8% and added 1.91% to the headline number. Private investment also grew 2.1% and added 0.38% to the headline number. Within private investment I was happy to see a mild impact from the change in private inventories as it added just 0.07% after a large impact in Q3 when it added 1.27% to GDP. Trade added 0.43% to the headline number as exports grew an impressive 6.3%. Lastly, government spending rose 3.3% which added 0.56% to the headline GDP number. Overall, I believe this report puts the economy in a great spot as we progress through 2024 as the potential for the soft landing is looking more and more realistic.   PCE More good news on the inflation front as the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index (PCE) showed an annual increase of just 2.6% in the month of December. More importantly, core PCE, which removes food and energy and is the Fed’s primary gauge, showed an annual increase of just 2.9%. This was a decline from 3.2% in the month of November and was the lowest 12-month rate since March 2021. This gives me even more confidence that we could come very close to the Fed’s 2% target by the end of the year and that my estimation for 3-4 rate hikes remains in likely. I believe as we exit the year the talk around inflation and the Fed will no longer be as newsworthy as investors move on from the inflation concerns.   Interest Rates At Wilsey Asset Management, we do expect to see the Federal Reserve to begin reducing interest rates with 3 to 4 cuts starting around the middle of the year. I have heard some estimates as high as six, but I think those are too aggressive. At our firm, we are value investors and we think this will be a positive as the cost of capital could decline for the equities that we hold in the portfolio, which would lead to a nice investment return. If you’re a growth investor, you may not experience the same type of return on your equities. I based this on when the Federal Reserve reduced interest rates in 2001 it did not help growth stocks go up in price and they actually underperformed. So as always be careful on the expensive growth stocks, they don’t always perform as you may hope.   Federal Reserve Balance Sheets The mainstream media loves to talk about all the negative news they can find, but never seem to want to talk about positive news. I remember the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet assets rising to nearly $9 trillion when they were at their high. They have been quietly reducing the assets on their balance sheet and as of early January they had fallen to $7.74 trillion. When compared to January 2023, that is a decline of nearly $850 billion. I do believe at the current pace and with the current economy by January 2025 perhaps we could see the assets on the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet under $7 trillion. The Fed is currently allowing $60bn of maturing Treasuries and $35bn of agency mortgage-backed securities to run off its balance sheet each month. For reference, before the pandemic the Fed’s balance sheet stood around $4 trillion.   Financial Planning: Rule Changes for Inherited IRAs The SECURE ACT passed in 2019 but one of the major provisions has not been enforced until now. Beginning in 2020, beneficiaries who inherit a retirement account can no longer stretch distributions out over their life expectancy and instead must deplete the account within 10 years. For accounts with pre-tax funds like traditional IRAs, this can result in a large amount of additional taxable income. This has been the case since 2020, but now in situations where the original account owner was old enough to be taking Required Minimum Distributions, meaning they were in their 70’s or older when they died which will be most people, the inheriting beneficiary now must also take a required distribution each year starting in 2024 in addition to depleting the account in 10 years. This beneficiary RMD has not been enforced in 2020-2023 due to the lack of clarity surrounding this rule, but the grace period is now over. There’s a bunch of people out there who have inherited retirement accounts in the last 4 years and haven’t done anything with them, however if they don’t take their distributions going forward, they will be subject to a 25% penalty. So, people with inherited IRAs need to make sure they take that distribution this year and be prepared for the tax impact of it. Keep in mind this applies to non-spouse beneficiaries who inherited accounts in 2020 or later. For accounts inherited before 2020, beneficiaries will see no change and may continue stretching distributions. Also, spousal beneficiaries may still treat retirement accounts as their own and are not subject to any special distribution rules.  

Banks and the Economy Each quarter we get very excited to see what the major banks have to say about the consumer and the economy. Last Friday, JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, Bank of America and Citigroup all reported earnings. The overall comments were the consumer is still strong. The CEO of Wells Fargo said average deposit balances per customer remain above 2019 levels and loans to businesses were up in the quarter. There were some write-offs on commercial office buildings with Bank of America charging off the most at $100 million. In total the four banks charged off $6.6 billion of all loans which was double what it was one year ago. Profits for the four banks in the fourth quarter were up 11% from one year ago coming in at $104 billion. JP Morgan Chase accounted for roughly half of that profit with $50 billion in the quarter. These profits are pretty amazing because in addition to the $6.6 billion charge off for loans, they also had to set aside $9 billion to pay a special Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) fee which was related to the failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank. So, I’m happy with the report and do continue to believe 2024 will be a good year for the economy and the consumer, but as always, we will receive our bumps and bruises as the year progresses. Office Space It was reported that 19.6% of office space in major US cities was sitting empty in the fourth quarter of 2023. That is the highest number on record which goes back to 1979. The problem is twofold. First, there are still some people working exclusively from home, which I still say as time passes more people will be coming into the office as businesses need to increase their profits and productivity. Second, overbuilding occurred for years with commercial buildings. It was noted that the bulk of the vacant space in buildings were built from the 1950s through the 1980s. If you’re going to get an employee to come back to the office, they don’t want to go back to some rundown building. They are asking for beautiful buildings with coffee bars, gyms, and Pickleball courts. There are some good opportunities for investments in class A commercial buildings that are in booming areas, but investors have to be wary that they are not investing in lower grade class B or C buildings in run down cities. Consumer Spending I think someone forgot to tell consumers to slow down on spending. Retail sales were strong in December as they grew 0.6% for the month, which topped the estimate of 0.4%. Looking compared to last year, December sales were up an impressive 5.6%. Areas of strength included food services and drinking places (+11.1%), non-store retailers (+9.7%), and electronics and appliance stores (+10.7%). Areas that weighed on the report included gas stations (-6.6%), furniture and home furnishing stores (-4.7%), and building material & garden equipment & supplies dealers (-2.3%). While this is good news and shows the consumer is still strong, it is leading to concern around the Fed’s rate cut path. I’m still optimistic the Fed can balance the economy and rate cuts to navigate a soft landing.   Financial Planning: Taxes When Selling a Home A house is considered a capital asset, and when a capital asset is sold for a profit, a capital gain is produced which can result in a tax bill. For homes that have been the primary residence of the seller for at least two years out of the last 5 years, a home sale exclusion applies which reduces the amount of capital gain by up to $500k for a married couple or $250k for a single person. For example, if a home was purchased for $250k then sold years later for $1,250,000, there would be a capital gain of $1,000,000. This gain may then be reduced by the $500k exclusion, resulting in a taxable capital gain on the remaining $500k. If the home was instead sold for $700k after purchasing for $250k, the gain would only be $450k, which the exclusion would completely cover resulting in no taxes on the sale. If there is a taxable capital gain after the exclusion, it will be taxable at the lower capital gain rate as opposed to ordinary income rates on the federal side. On the state side the gain will be taxed as ordinary income as most states don’t have separate capital gain tax brackets. For married couples with an adjusted gross income of about $125k or less, including any taxable gains from a home sale, the federal capital gain tax rate is 0%. So, if a residence is going to be sold, it would be best to sell during a year with low income such as the first year of retirement so that the 0% tax bracket would absorb some of the gain. Once income goes above $125k, the next capital gain bracket is 15% up to an income level of about $615k at which point the tax rate increases to 20%. It is also important to keep a record of any home improvements or selling costs as these can be deducted against the taxable gain. Due to appreciation in the housing market, it is getting more common for home sales to result in taxes, so be diligent about keeping records and be careful when you sell a home so you don’t pay more taxes than necessary.

Inflation Numbers While the headline inflation numbers were above estimates, I wouldn’t say there were really any surprises in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report. Headline CPI rose 3.4% vs the estimate of 3.2% and core CPI rose 3.9% vs the estimate of 3.8%. Although it was slightly higher than anticipated, progress is still being made on the inflation fight and core CPI registered its lowest reading since May 2021. As it has been the case for many months, the shelter index was the major contributor as the annual increase of 6.2% accounted for about two-thirds of the rise in inflation. Other areas that remained problematic included motor vehicle insurance (+20.3%), admission to sporting events (+14.9%), and motor vehicle repair (+10.3%). One area I found interesting was food, the entire index increased just 2.7% from last year but the divide between at home and away from home has widened substantially. The at home index showed an increase of just 1.3% compared to the away from home index which grew 5.2%. I believe this divide will remain due to the demand for dining out and the wage pressure restaurants and bars are facing. Overall, I don’t think this report moves the needle one way or another for the Fed and I believe rate cuts will start in the back half of the year. PPI More good news on the inflation front, as the Producer Price Index (PPI) showed an increase of just 1.0% compared to last year. Core PPI, which excludes food and energy, was up just 2.5% compared to last year. This points to more good news ahead on the inflation front as the PPI is normally a leading indicator. REITs With what I believe was the last rate hike of the cycle in the books, one area to evaluate is real estate. I’m not talking about single family homes or private investments, but rather looking at public Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs). These trade on the stock exchange, but instead of owning a business you will own the real estate that is bought within the trust. I believe there are many great values in the public real estate market at this time when analyzing the cash flows that an investor receives and historically REITs have outperformed the S&P 500 index by approximately 4.5 percentage points in the 12 months following the last interest-rate hike in a cycle. Looking at the last three hiking cycles, REITs have had an average total return of 19% in the 12 months following the last hike in a cycle. I believe the right real estate in the portfolio is a great area to look for value as we look down the road 2-3 years, not to mention many of these REITs have great dividend yields. Bitcoin ETF The hype for the bitcoin ETF is at all-time highs, as the SEC has now approved them for investments. We still don’t understand why people would want to buy an ETF that holds just one product like bitcoin. But for those who do, the fees are out and Fidelity has disclosed they will charge .39% annually for holding bitcoin. Their ETF competitors Invesco and crypto firm galaxy will charge 0.59% for holding bitcoin. I’m sure you’ve heard of the Grayscale bitcoin trust which charged an annual fee of 2% on the assets, they have now reduced that fee to 1.5% since it is now an ETF. I still believe this is hype, where the rumor will be far better than the news. I would not be surprised that for 2024 bitcoin is currently trading around its highs for the year.   Financial Planning: Social Security Spousal Benefits Social Security spousal benefits come into play when one spouse has little to no earnings history. In this case their own social security benefits would be low, so they can claim a spousal benefit from the spouse that did work. There’s a common misconception that it’s ½ of the higher earning spouse’s amount, but the actual calculation is ½ of the working spouse’s full retirement age amount and the non-working spouse would need to apply at their own full retirement age. The working spouse may apply at any point between age 62 and 70 and the spousal benefit is still ½ of their age 67 amount. The non-working spouse may collect as early as age 62, but they will receive a reduced benefit for every month they collect before age 67. Upon reaching age 67, they do not receive a larger benefit by waiting any longer. The only other caveat is the working spouse must be collecting social security for the non-working spouse to collect a spousal benefit. In situations where the higher earning spouse is not collecting social security because they are still working or they are waiting until age 70, this prevents the non-working spouse from collecting. If the non-working spouse has reached age 67, benefits are being permanently lost. This is compounded by the fact that the spousal benefits will only last until the death of either spouse because only the higher social security benefit is retained by a surviving spouse. This is one of several instances where it is better to collect Social Security sooner rather than later.  

Jobs Report There was initial concern that the jobs report was too strong and could point to inflationary concerns. After digging into the report, I believe it is still in line with our belief that the economy is in a good enough spot to have a soft landing and avoid further inflationary pressures. The initial concern stemmed from the fact that headline employment grew by 216,000 in the month of December, which easily topped the estimate of 170,000. While this may sound extremely strong, the previous two months were revised lower by a total of 71,000 jobs. Also, Government was a major contributor in the report as the sector added 52,000 jobs in the month of December. With such a large contribution from the public sector, this shows me the private sector is continuing to soften. Areas of the private sector that were strong included health care and social assistance (+58,900), leisure and hospitality (+40,000), and construction (+17,000). Even after many months of positive gains, the leisure and hospitality sector still remains 1% or 163,000 below pre-pandemic levels. Overall, the jobs market softened in 2023 as monthly gains averaged 225,000 for the year compared to 399,000 in 2022. I believe that those monthly gains will soften even further in 2024. The only concern I had about the report was wage inflation as average hourly earnings increased 4.1% compared to December 2022. This was above expectations for 3.9% and last month’s reading of 4%. Ideally, we would like to see this continue to soften as wage inflation generally pressures overall inflation, but data does always move in a straight line. It is something to keep an eye on, but I do believe wage inflation will also soften in 2024. JOLTs According to the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTs), the labor market is continuing to soften. The report showed that job openings fell to 8.79 million in November. This was right in line with the estimate of 8.8 million, but it was lower than October’s upwardly revised report by 62,000 openings. If it stands, the report produced the lowest level of openings since March 2021. While this continues to sound negative, there are still 1.4 openings for every available worker. While this is lower than the 2 to 1 ratio, we saw for much of 2022, it is still well above historical levels and shows we have a good labor market that is softening from historic levels. Dividends & Buybacks Dividends and buybacks for 2023 came in with dividends holding strong at $588 billion which was an increase of 4.2% compared to 2022. Buybacks were still higher than dividends at $780 billion, but company executives in 2023 cut back 15.4% on stock buybacks for the year. Don’t think dividends at 2% or 3% are not worth putting your investment dollars into, going back 100 years dividends as a percent of the total return still account for 38%. For the long-term, investors should have equities in their portfolio that not only grow the stock price but also pay a dividend that the company increases overtime. Federal Debt In the first part of January, it was announced that the federal debt for the first time surpassed $34 trillion. Yes, a very large number, but it is important to understand the debt to GDP. Debt to GDP is like looking at your own personal situation where your income is rising and you can take on more debt to either buy a home, a car, or some other asset that you want to finance because you can afford the payments. The debt to GDP peaked at the end of 2020 touching 126% and the most recent data shows debt to GDP has now fallen to under 120% of GDP. If the economy can continue to grow faster than the increase in the debt, the percent of debt versus GDP will go down and put the country in a better financial position. Financial Planning: Structuring Income for 2024 With the new year comes a fresh slate for your taxes, so now is the time to plan out your income for 2024. If you are withdrawing money from investment accounts, you’ll probably want to take another look at it as tax brackets and RMD’s have changed. Withdrawals from pre-tax accounts are considered ordinary income, Roth withdrawals are tax-free, and withdrawals from taxable accounts are tax-free. Taxable accounts contain capital gains and dividends which are taxable even if you don’t withdraw anything, but they are taxed at lower rates. Depending how you structure where your income comes from will determine how much you have to pay to the government. Ordinary income is taxed the highest, and it’s okay to have ordinary income as long as it only fills up the lower tax brackets. Tax-free income is obviously preferred, but you don’t need to only have tax-free income because then you’re missing out on the benefit of the lower tax brackets. Ideally you want to have the right amount coming from each source to satisfy your living expenses while keeping your income on paper at the most efficient thresholds. For those with lower expense needs, a threshold to plan around is an adjusted gross income of $30,000. At this level there would be no tax because the standard deduction would reduce taxable income down to nothing. $30,000 might seem low, but at that level social security is largely tax-free and if there is some Roth income, it is possible to have $5,000, $6,000, or even $7,000 of monthly cash flow while keeping that annual AGI at $30k. The next threshold is an income level of about $125,000. This is the point where ordinary income moves from the 12% tax bracket to the 22% tax bracket and where capital gain and dividend income moves from the 0% bracket to the 15% bracket. You really have to be careful here because a little extra ordinary income might fall in the 12% bracket but that can push some capital gain income up to 15% so your marginal rate temporarily is 27%. Next is an income level of about $210,000 for those 63 and older. This is when Medicare premiums start to increase based on higher income levels and since there is a 2-year gap between income and premiums, you need to be aware of this at 63 and not 65. Lastly for those with higher incomes, the threshold to watch out for is income of about $415,000 which is where the tax rate increases from 24% to 32%. No matter your income needs, it will help to plan it out because ultimately the goal is to be able to retire sooner with more income and pay less tax on that income.

Santa Claus Rally If you felt disappointed in your gifts from Santa this year, there is still hope he brings your investments some nice returns. We are currently in the middle of the Santa Claus rally which is the period of time that includes the last five trading days of the current year and the first two trading days of the new year. Historically these seven days have had higher stock prices 79.2% of the time and since 1950 the average gain was about 1.4 Cryptocurrencies Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies have been rising in 2023. We all know that criminals use cryptocurrencies for kidnapping, drugs and ransom. I was surprised to learn since 2017 hackers have used $2.7 billion for ransom payments. Over the last couple of years, it has approached a half billion dollars per year for crypto payments, perhaps helping push up the price of bitcoin. This has been a major problem considering the ease for the cyber gangs to transfer bitcoin and remain anonymous. Think about this, if you enjoy buying and trading bitcoin, you’re helping the gangs that do these ransom attacks make money off their illegal activities that are crushing companies such as Clorox, MGM Resorts, Caesars entertainment, and even the U.S. Marshals Service just to name a few. And guess who’s paying, yes you the consumer. I have hated cryptocurrencies since their invention because I said they have no real use. I guess unfortunately I was wrong, the criminals seem to love cryptocurrencies. Other than that, they really have no other use and I do believe one day they will be worthless. In the meantime, people continue to help out criminals by buying and holding cryptocurrencies. Banks We have had some good returns on our banks in our portfolio this year as some banks have returned over 20%. This is in-spite of the fact that a couple times this year we were in the negative column for returns on these big banks. We believed that since the fundamentals were very strong these banks were worth holding onto. Now with 2023 coming to a close, the big question is what to do in 2024 as interest rates decline as this could be a problem for the big banks. A mistake that small investors make is to not understand the full business of the bank. While loans produce big profits for banks there are other ways a bank can profit than just loans. If rates decline as we think they will, that could accelerate banks operations on the equity side, with more companies paying them to do initial public offerings. Another thing that people probably have no idea about is as rates become lower the banks unrealized paper loss on the bank security portfolio will boost the value of fixed rate securities that they bought when rates were much lower. If this paper loss drops back down, that can help a bank with capital levels and the banks could be open to bigger stock buybacks in 2024. So if you have the right banks in your portfolio at the end of 2023, it looks like next year could be another winner for the big banks. As always at Wilsey Asset Management, we will continue to do our Monday numbers on these companies, along with digging through the quarterly conference calls and financial statements. If things were to change, we could end up selling out of the big banks. Magnificent Seven I’m looking for a good return in the right stocks next year. I believe the market will broaden out considering much of the gain this year came from the Magnificent Seven (Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, Tesla, & Nvidia). One reason I am optimistic is there is still a lot of money held in money-market funds that I believe will be redeployed next year as the rates on cash become less attractive. Total assets held in money-market funds is near record levels at about $6.1 trillion. This is about 29% higher than just before Covid. The pros may even have excess cash to deploy next year. According to a Bank of America survey, the average portfolio manager holds about 4.5% in cash which is down from a multidecade peak of over 6% last year but still substantially higher than the lows of just over 3%. With interest rates likely to fall next year cash will be less attractive which should be a major benefit to stocks.

CPI The Consumer Price Index (CPI) did not show us much new news and I believe it will be enough for the Fed to keep rates steady and put an end to their hiking cycle. The headline number showed just a 3.1% increase compared to last year and the core CPI, which excludes food and energy showed an increase of 4%. The headline number saw a nice benefit from falling energy prices as the energy index declined 5.4% compared to last year and gasoline prices were down 8.9% compared to last year. Although the annual increases showed little to no change compared to last month, it’s important to understand the progress that has been made from the peak inflation levels. In June 2022, headline CPI hit a cycle high of 9% and in September 2022, core CPI hit it’s cycle high of 6.6%. Progress continues to be made in many areas including food at home which showed an increase of just 1.7% compared to last year, but remains stubbornly high in areas like motor vehicle insurance which was up 19.2% compared to last year and motor vehicle repair which was up 12.7% compared to last year. Shelter continues to be the big headwind in the report as the index was up 6.5% compared to last year and accounted for nearly 70% of the total annual increase in the core CPI. While this has taken longer than I anticipated, I still believe this shelter index will see subsiding price increases which should continue to bode well for the overall inflation report. Government Debt Many times I’m asked or hear concerns by people about the government debt and I tell them I don’t like where it is, but it’s not a major problem at this point. Currently the debt to GDP stands at 119.47%. Compare that to another developed nation like Japan, who has a debt to GDP of 263%. I do not wish to see the US get into that situation, but you have to notice that Japan has not fallen and it has continued to move forward. One problem with our government debt being so high is that there is only a certain number of buyers looking for debt and if the government is absorbing more debt to cover their bills, it takes money out of the private sector debt market, which can slow down our economy. In summary, we are not in danger territory, but to improve our growth going forward we need to get a handle on our debt and or grow our GDP much more. I still believe there is no need to panic for years to come. Apple In the future, the next iPhone you purchase may not come from China and instead it may come from India. Within two to three years, Apple is expecting to build over 50 million iPhones in India. If Apple reaches this goal, that would mean India would make up about 25% of global iPhone production. Currently global iPhone shipments are around 220 million per year, which means China will still continue to account for over 50% of the iPhone production. It does appear that relationships with Apple and the Chinese government are a little strained since the Chinese government banned some officials from using iPhones at work. Apple responded saying any iPhones sold in China will be produced in China. There are unions in India that do put up some barriers for Apple, but so far, they have been able to work with the unions to get things done like having the ability to do a 12-hour workday if production increases are needed. Even with Apple’s popularity here in the US, Samsung is still the global smartphone leader. Accident Repair People who own EV’s may be saving money on gas, but they lose that benefit when it comes to repairs if you get in an accident. This is because of such things as how the cars are built and special storage may be required because of lithium batteries to prevent fires. Last year the average cost for a crash of an electric vehicle was $6,587 which was 55% higher than on all vehicles which was $4,215. You may be thinking that’s ok, I don’t have to pay for accidents as my insurance will cover them. Unfortunately, the insurance companies know they pay more for electric vehicle repairs so you’ll pay 44% more for car insurance on an electric vehicle or about $357 per month compared to $248 per month for normal vehicles. You may still love your electric vehicle, but they’ve only really been around for a few years. As time passes, we are finding out more about some downsides that we did not know before. Financial Planning: The Season of Giving Whether it’s to charity, church, or family, people tend to be in a more giving spirit during the holidays. If you happen to be in the giving mood, there are a few stipulations to be aware of. When giving to family or friends, there is an annual gift limit that applies. In 2023 it is $17,000 per person and next year it increases to $18,000. This limit is stackable so a married couple may gift $34,000 to as many people as they want and may repeat this for as many years as they want. This gift is not deductible to the giver and does not count as income to the recipient. For extra generous givers, a 529 account may be used to gift 5 years’ worth of gifts at a single time, meaning a married couple could give $170,000 to as many beneficiaries as they want. This applies to beneficiaries of any age and they do not need to use the funds for education as long as they withdraw the entire gift from the 529 before it has a chance to accumulate earnings. Givers may also gift appreciated shares of stock to avoid paying taxes on the gains. In this case, the recipient inherits the gain and will realize income if the shares are sold, which may be at a lower tax rate than the giver. When making charitable gifts, it is important to verify if the donation will be deductible to you. In order to receive a tax benefit, you must itemize your deductions which means you need the total amount of your deductions to exceed the standard deduction. This applies to both federal and state taxes so even if you do not itemize federally, you may still itemize on the state side and receive a tax benefit. Givers may also donate appreciated shares of stock when donating to charity to receive the tax deduction and avoid the capital gains tax. If you liked the investment, you could repurchase the stock which essentially resets your cost basis while you receive the tax benefit from the donation. Keep in mind, when you give to charity, the dollar amount of the tax benefit does not outweigh the amount of the donation so it is still costing you money. In other words, you are still being charitable! Lastly, for people who are over the age of 70.5, have an IRA, and who would like to make a charitable donation, they should heavily consider using the IRA to make the donation directly to the charity. This is called a Qualified Charitable Distribution (QCD) and will offer the same tax benefit as an outright donation, but with a bunch of extra perks. With a QCD, the giver receives the full tax benefit whether they itemize or claim the standard deduction. Since the donation is coming from an IRA, this will reduce the amount of future required distributions and therefore reduces taxable income. Also, a QCD is not included in either the adjusted gross income or taxable income (regular donations only reduce taxable income) which means the donation may also reduce Medicare premiums in addition to taxes. If you plan to give this season, doing it in the most efficient way will give some tax savings or even allow you to give more.

Employment While the headline numbers for the jobs report showed results that beat expectations, when you look closely at the report it shows a softening labor market which is exactly what the Fed wants to see. Nonfarm payrolls in the month of November showed a gain of 199,000 which topped the estimate of 190,000 and the unemployment rate fell to 3.7% which was better than the forecast for 3.9%. The growth of 199,000 is below the average monthly gain of 240,000 and it is also important to point out that some of the gain in November was attributed to the end of the UAW and actors strikes. In fact, while employment in manufacturing increased 28,000 in November there was a 30,000 person increase in motor vehicles and parts as workers returned from strike. The employment in information also had a gain of 10,000 in the month, but motion picture and sound recording industries added 17,000 jobs as the resolution of labor disputes came to an end in the industry. The strikes have created volatility in the numbers over the last few months and that can also be seen in the revision to September where total nonfarm payroll employment was revised lower by 35,000. With these major strikes now behind us, we should be able to see a better reading in these job numbers moving forward. Another major area the Fed likely has their eye on is the change in average hourly earnings, which points to wage inflation. In the month of November average hourly earnings increased by 4.0%, which was the lowest reading since May 2021. Overall, this report points to the concept that a soft landing is still a real possibility. I believe the labor market will continue to soften, which should be good news for inflation and our economy.   JOLTs Report While it may not look like good news when reading the headline number, the JOLTs report showed exactly what the Fed is looking for. Job openings of 8.73 million in the month of October were below the estimate of 9.4 million and showed a decline of 617,000 or 6.6% compared to the previous month. This also marked the lowest number since March 2021. While this all sounds troubling, it shows the labor market is softening which is what the Fed has wanted to see. It also shows that the labor market is still doing alright considering there are still 1.3 job openings to every available worker. Pre-pandemic this ratio stood at 1.2.   Drug Companies The Biden administration has opened the door to seize the patents of certain costly medications from drugmakers. The administration has unveiled framework that outlines the factors federal agencies should consider in deciding whether to use march-in rights, which take patents for drugs and shares them with other pharmaceutical companies if the public cannot reasonably access the medications. Officials can now factor in the price of a medication in deciding to break a patent. While this may sound like a nice practice, I do worry about the long-term ramifications. While drug companies often do have nice margins on drugs that succeed, people generally do not discuss the billions of dollars that is spent on research and development for drugs that do not succeed. If drug companies cannot offset those costs with high margins on successful drugs, the industry could have major problems. Also, what would the incentive be to spend billions of dollars on research and development for a new drug, when you could just potentially wait for another company to come up with the solution and then use their patent that has been taken from them by the government? This could ultimately stifle innovation in the industry.   Magnificent Seven Remember a few years ago the FANG stocks? They have now been replaced by what is known as the Magnificent Seven which are Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia, Tesla, and Meta. People still believe index investing is a great way to invest and diversify your portfolio, but when you look at the S&P 500 you should realize that the Magnificent Seven have carried the index to a year-to-date return of around 20%. If you look at that equal weight index it is actually only up around 6% this year. Also, in the index 44% of stocks are showing negative results. You may think you had diversification with the S&P 500 but currently the seven stocks account for close to 30% of the index. These companies stock prices have continued to perform, but history has proven time and time again that any equity trading at such high valuations eventually comes back to reality. When that happens investors in these seven stocks, and also the index will have disappointing returns. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you when it will happen, only that history has proven itself to be right 100% of the time.   Financial Planning: Reviewing Income at the End of the Year As we get closer to the end of the year, it is getting more important to review income levels and make any necessary adjustments before December 31st. When analyzing income, it is helpful to identify the expected level of adjusted gross income (AGI), the number of itemized deductions (if any), the amount of total taxable income, and the amount of taxable income subject to ordinary income rates. Adjusted gross income is the sum of all reportable income which could be wages, capital gains, interest, IRA distributions, and Social Security to name a few. After tallying AGI, next is the itemized deductions which include mortgage interest, state income and property taxes, charitable donations, and medical expenses. Taxpayers can claim the larger of the itemized deductions or the standard deduction which is $27,700 for a married couple in 2023. These deductions act as an expense which reduces the adjusted gross income and results in taxable income (AGI – deduction = taxable income). From there the long-term capital gain and qualified dividend portion of income can be separated from the other ordinary taxable income as capital gains and dividends are taxed at a lower rate (taxable income = ordinary + capital gains and dividends). From this point a taxpayer can determine what tax bracket they will be in, the tax rate of their capital gains and dividends, and whether their income will trigger any additional net investment income tax or Medicare premiums. Finally, action can be taken such as Roth conversions, realizing gains or losses, charitable donations, or retirement contributions to push income in a more efficient direction.