Let's Talk Money

It's beginning to look a lot. Live Christmas everywhere you go. Oh so true, trueach Oh, keep it going. Zack is one of my favorite songs. Sack, Good morning everybody, and welcome. It's eight am, you sleepy heads. I can't thank you enough for tuning in taking part of your day. It's a good weekend for me, folks. I and not only because I'm here with you and I am sitting here live in the studio. I'm Stephen Bouchet. I'll be your host this morning. And if you

have any questions, any questions whatsoever, give us a call. One eight hundred Talk WGY one eight hundred eight two five, five, nine, four nine, Any questions whatsoever, give me a call. Because talk about being sleepy heads. I got in kind of late last night, or I should say early this morning. So one of my favorite weekends, and I'll tell

you why. Every year I try to do something special for all my colleagues, my team, and I think this is our fifth year in a row where I rent out the Hotel of Delphi and put them up in all the rooms. I take just about all of the rooms in the hotel, although now I can't say that because They've doubled the size of rooms. It's one of the Upstate New York's most spectacular hotels. I think that the best Western end in downtown Troy, believe it or not, maybe two of the best

places that you can grab a room anywhere in upstate New York. So the Hotel of Delphi, we kind of treat our colleagues. They come in and they spend the weekend and we take over the old blue hen dining room, and it is just it's so nice to spend the night. But what I have to remember is is my wife says, I'm no spring chicken. And you know, she was smart, she kind of she said, I'll go

home, you can walk, and I stayed. And it's like Captain Sulley in that US air plane that landed on the Hudson River, the last man off. He's the captain of the plane, right. Well, I'm the

captain of Bouchet Financier Group. And what I forget is I got a lot of really not only smart, intelligent, bright colleagues that I work with, but they're younger than I am. So I tried to hang in there, and I had I had it pegged harmony came and Harmony just had her third daughter just last month, and she came with the baby and I got to hold the baby a lot during the during the dinner. What a cutie. And she hung in there with that baby, and that baby was as good

as good can be. I said, well, when Harmony and Brandon go home, that's when I'm going home. God, she just stayed and stayed and stayed. So anyway, folks, long winded conversation, But give me a call. You got to keep me awake this morning. One eight hundred eight two five five nine four nine. One eight hundred eighty two five fifty nine forty nine. Today, so Ryan comes in with the kids. So today I get my Christmas with my grandchildren who are just just precious and George,

Harry and Josephine. So I look forward to that right after the radio. That to be my my my Christmas. One eight hundred eighty two, five fifty nine forty nine. Give me a call. Let's talk. Yesterday we had some good questions, great questions. And you know, listen, folks, we're having a great year in the markets. I don't know if you know that or not, Although if you tune in, if you're a loyal listener, you do know that, because I've been telling you all year

long, the worst is behind us, the stock market. Really, I think the the the we've seen the worst of it. I think the Fed will have to admit that they need to kind of, you know, up their game and stop talking that school yard bully talking. And and this week they did, and they had good reason to. You know, it's you know, we got some some some good reports. So on Tuesday, we had the latest CPI report consumer Price Index, and you know, it shows

that inflation has has kind of stabilized. It's well below last year. Remember a year ago June, when when this mess was really in the thick of it, inflation was registering nine point one percent. That was June. That was the June reading, which we get in July October last year the market bottom. So, folks, when you get all that bad news all of a sudden, you know, sometimes and the market's always looking ahead. It learns from the past, but it's always looking ahead. It's looking three,

six, nine months out. That's what the market looks at. Focus is on. It's focused on the fundamentals of the economy, jobs, inflation, you know, growth, everything, everything, that's what the market is is focused on. And you know, even though inflation registered nine point one percent

last June, the market bottom in October. And boy, folks, we're having I mean, I don't know if you realize it or not, but you know, over the last year, you know, the S and P we're we're we're we're up, you know, almost twenty three percent, with dividends twenty four percent. You know, Nasdaq is up fifty percent. Holy moly, one eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine. Let's kick off the morning with Rick in half Boon. Hello, Rick, I see

you, Good morning, Good morning to you man. I heard you talking about Schwab. I know you used a Charles Schwab platform. We do, and I was looking at it. I was looking at the direct direct self directing Investing m H. And it's wonder how Charles Schwab is relating to Vanguard. Do they know they both offer those type of services. Yeah, you know, all the platforms do. And you're right, Rick, we managed about one point two billion dollars and it's all at Charles Schwab thirty years ago.

Over thirty years ago, when I became a tiduciary. I had my choice. It could have been Fidelity, TD, Ameritrae, Vanguard, all of those platforms. I chose Swab because I trusted them back then as being the biggest and the best, and they still are. We don't get anything in return. I disclose that because we does not pay us. We get absolutely nothing. We could have our clients accounts anywhere, and we do use

Charles Schwab, So thank you for bringing that up. And in light of full disclosure, I actually have a few dollars in what we call the Intelligent Investor platform at Charles Schwab, which is automated. You pick your tolerance for risk, you put the money in, they manage it, and it's pretty good. I like the Schwab platform. The only downside to a lot of these platforms and the lifestyle funds is they use a lot of international investments.

And I gave the stats yesterday. Over the last fifteen years, your average return year in year out for the SMP was fourteen percent. Your average return for international investments was like six percent. So that's the only thing I don't like, because I'm not a fan of international investments. With the one point two billion dollars. We don't have one dollar invested overseas, not one and our clients have really profited in a very good way because of that. So

that's the only thing I don't like about these. But Schwab is as good as any of them. And look at them. Look at make sure you're comparing apples to apples. So if you're a growth oriented investor, Rick, make sure you're looking at the Vanguard version, the Fidelity version. You get the picture. Make sure you're comparing apples to apples. So look at two. One the intelligent investor. The other one is what we call life style funds, not target date. I'm not a fan of target date lifestyle funds.

This way, if you choose growth, you're in growth till the day you sell it. With the target date is you get closer to that target date, they automatically get you more conservative, and I'm just not a fan of that. I always feel that, you know, people say, oh, I'm going to retire in a couple of years, Yeah, that's great. You're going to retire at sixty five. You still have thirty years you're

going to live. You don't plan on dying, So that's long term and The problem with those target date funds, says, all of a sudden, you're sixty five. You know you still got some wife. Then you you're getting ready to enjoy your retirement and your portfolios sucking win because they got you mostly in cash and bonds. But take a look at them. Don't be afraid of Charles Schwab. I actually have it and the returns have been pretty decent. Yeah, I want to look at their platform. Do they have

good a political tools in Charles Swab? Oh? Yeah, especially now we got the TD remember that think or swim. That's all part of Charles Schwab. Now, Charles Schwab bought TD mayor Trade, So you got more tools now than you've ever had. You'll like it, Rick, I can vouch for it. One percent of my money and my my family's money's invested, just like my clients. And we're at Charles Schwab, and I love it. Rick, enjoy the Sunday Sunday Funday one eight hundred eighty two five five

nine four nine eighty two five fifty nine forty nine. Let's go back to the pull mines. We have Paul on hold. Good morning, Paul, Good morning, Chris. You Merry Christmas to you and for all of our listeners that celebrated Hanukah over the last week or so. Happy Hanukkah. We got the new year coming up. Before we know, it'll be twenty twenty four. Baby, I tell you it's very nice. I was just driving through Broadway Saratoga, past the Adelphi and hold on, I'm in the window.

I'm waving, I'm waving. Where are you? Oh? I saw the vehicle with the King with the Keen license plate. Yes so, and here I am trying to keep a low profile, Paul. I mean, I got my car right out front. I'm I'm I'm on. I take the entire third floor of that building above Eddie Bauer Piper Boutique, and I had the whole third floor and I'm standing here now. I don't see you, Paul, but I believe you because my car is out front and it does say Keen Ice. Fine, all right, what can I help you

with? Well, I just wanted to I'm looking at all the different financial advisors out there, and I'm chatting with a few different people, and there's a plethora of different financial ratings on people, and there's all kinds of financial accreditations, CFP, c FA, up on and on, and one thing I'm surprised by is when it comes to fiduciary I've talked to three different people locally. They're all acting as fiduciary, but they're all giving me different advice.

One is pressing for insurance, another one is pressing for annuities, and another is pressing for straight stock investments. If they're all fiduciary, how can they be so far off on what is right for me? I guess that's that's kind of an open ended question. But you know, what is the fiduciary rating? How can you be acting as a fiduciary or be a fiduciary all these different financial titles. It's very confusing for somebody entering into in the

market area. It sure is, and there's going because I know I have a lot of people in the industry that listen to my show because I take pride in my show, whether I'm doing my show or one of my esteemed colleagues is filling in for me because I have a conflict. I take pride in the show. Where we've been doing this show twenty nine years. I've been a fiduciary now for over thirty one years, and I'm very, very, very proud of being a fiduciary. Now. You have to remember back

then, nobody knew what a fiduciary was. I used to sell a nudies and make a six percent commission. Mutual funds make five point seventy five percent commission. I could sell insurance policies and make believe it or not, up to fifty percent commission of the first year premiums. Yeah, and you have the right when you're interviewing these people everybody listening, take if I give you

any advice today that is worth remembering, it's this. When you're sitting if you have a relationship now with an advisor, or you're interviewing an advisor like you are Paul, ask them, point flank and do it face to face, look at them, eye to eye, man to man or man to woman. Look at them and make sure you see the reaction. And ask them one question, how do you get paid? And if they say, oh no, they you know you don't pay us. These people get paid,

folks, and they're getting paid somehow someway. And when you buy, for instance, an annuity, you got to ask yourself why is there a sixty five page contract that they give me and buried probably on page thirty nine or forty three. Is you know we're making all this money, and not only are we making money, your fees are so much higher. So let me let me just give you a quick quick summary. The average internal management fees of an annuity is somewhere around three percent. Some are different, Some

will be lower, some will be higher. According to the morning Star, the average internal fee of a mutual fund is somewhere around one percent. Our core holdings is point zero three percent. Our total portfolio that we manage for our clients is point two oho percent point two zero percent. So as a fiduciary, I have a legal duty to act in clients' best interests. I have to. You know, transparency and full disclosure is right on on top

of our the tip of our tongues. We avoid all conflicts of interest because we don't sell an investment. We don't have that conflict of interest. Do we try to make you believe that an annuity is the best thing for when we know we're getting a six percent kickback or and I hate to use the word kickback, it's a commission. So we're always putting our clients' interests first.

Now I'm not saying that these other advisors aren't, But what I'm saying is if they're selling investments, in my mind, hands down, they cannot call themselves a fiduciary. Why because for eight years. The Department of Justice came out with the ruling a few years ago and it said, if you're selling any product for a commission that you're earning, you cannot call yourself a fiduciary. Well, you can only imagine the uproar on whether it be you

know, marily Inch or Wells Fargo or you know these insurance companies. They fought it tooth and nail, and guess what thej after eight years to come out with such a simple definition, they change their tune. So now technically these people can call themselves a fiduciary because they think they're putting their best interest to the clients first. But they have to or they should be disclosing off fees, how they get paid, where their money is invested. Those are

the questions, Paul, that you want to ask. So I have a hard time with a lot of advisors calling themselves a fiduciary. So we are truly a fiduciary, and I'm proud to say that my firm, you know, our clients know, and we put everything right out there. We are so we're so transparent that when a new client comes in to kick the tires and look under the hood, every one of my colleagues know to put my

investments right up there on the screen for them to see. I want them to see because I'm proud to say I'm invested just like my clients are. Not many people can say that I want. I want these people that are interviewing us to know that, and I put it right out there for them. So I'm I'm as transparent and I fully disclose everything that I can possibly

do. That's the definition of a fiduciary. I could have people I've heard so far well, I could have people listening that maybe calling, and maybe they'll call me offline because I got friends in the business that earned commissions and we debate it often. And I said, you're not a fiduciary. Oh yes, I am. I managed you know a lot of money. I said, you don't manage a lot of money. You're selling anudy, you sell a mutual fund, you forget about those clients. You have it in

your calendar. That's seven years after you sell somebody an annuity, all of a sudden you call them up. Why because that deferred sales charge runs out, and now you sell them another annuity. You tell them it's it's the latest, greatest, you know, most improved annuity. Come on, you're not a fiduciary. There you have it, Paul Lae, all it like I see it. That's how I see it. Well, I can. I can hear the passion in your voice, and I can hear that you're

trying to do what's right for the people. And I appreciate that very much. So I do listen the choices. You're at the top of the heap right now, so well listen. If I knew you were driving by, I would have had you stop at uncommon grounds and grabbed me a coffee. I did not have time. I started to show out by saying I was

out late last night. My these young people that work with me, you know, I can't keep up with them, and I think, you know, my wife asked me this morning, she said, what time did you get home? I said, well, I know the Adelphi closed down at eleven and we were still hanging around talking. So you know, I was really looking forward to a coffee and I just couldn't get there in time.

I would have had you stop and get me a coffee, Paul, darn it, listen, stay healthy, Thanks for thanks for for calling in. And man, I thought I was keeping a low profile. Now that I know you know where my car is, I'm gonna have to rethink where I park. Hey, Paul, be good in all seriousness, that's what a fiduciari is. That's what you want to look for. Give us a call and let them know. You and I chatted this morning, and I think you'll like what you hear from us when you compare it to the others.

Thanks Paul. What eight hundred eight two five five nine four nine. Let's go to Dave in the car. Good morning, Dave, Good morning Steve. Thanks for your service as usual. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas to you. You know I I love doing this show, Dave. You do know that it energizes me to come in and do the show because I love help like Paul that I just got off the phone with. I don't know Paul, but he must know. Keen Ice was one of my horses, and

I have it on my license plate. As a friend of mine said, you know, I say, I used to have my last name. He says, do you think it's any better that you got keen Ice on your license plate now instead of your last name? But Paul might have confirmed maybe I should, maybe I should get something else. But no, I Hey, Dave, I love doing this show. I love helping the listening audience, and you know it energizes me. What can I help you with today? Awesome? For my son, he's twenty three, you know, he

has an IRA from an old account. He's asking me he wants to invest in a market, but he wants to be able to take it when he wants to buy a house. What is the best avenue as far as mutual funds or what would you recommend? Yeah, so you know, I'm an ETF kind of a guy. You heard me kind of say that. There's annuities and mutual funds and exchange trade of funds we we have, you know, so we're managing one point two billion. That's a lot of money.

We only have two stocks in our portfolio, and we don't even buy it from clients because they're up so much in price. But Apple and Amazon are the only two individual stocks we have, and thank god, it's helped us. You know, Amazon's up seventy six percent year to date, Apple's up over fifty three, fifty four percent, So it's helped our portfolios. But we use exchange traded funds. We love exchange traded funds ETFs. They're pulled

investments, they're transparent in a lot of ways. There, tax efficient. If I heard you right, your your son has an IRA. So what he wants to do if he takes that money out, he's going to have to pay income tax on it and a ten percent IRS penalty because he's under fifty nine and a half. So what I did with my two children, as soon as they graduated from college, I had my office open them up

a raw IRA before they got used to spending that money. Because listen, when you're in school and you know you're you basically don't have any income, and all of a sudden, you get a job. I don't care if you're making fifty thousand, seventy five, one hundred thousand, whatever your job's paying you. You've never had a job before. So I told my children before you get used to spending all that money. You know, let's fund the iras. Back then it was like five thousand dollars. Now it's up

to seven thousand dollars for next year. And I had my son I'll use as an example, Ryan, Ryan funded a wroth Ira and there's different rules in place if it's there for more than five years. Long story short, when he relocated from Boston to Saratoga, you know, we talked it over and we had him take money out of that wroth Ira minimal tax consequences to put as a down payment on a homebies he was able to leverage obviously a

three four hundred thousand dollars home and it was win Winby's. He was still young enough to keep funding his retirement plans. So give give that some thought. Hey Dave, thanks for calling in, and tell your son to be invested Growth oriented SMP or the Nastak folks you're listening to. Let's talk money brought to you by Bouchet Financial Group, where we help our clients prioritize their health while we manage their wealth for life. One eight eight, two,

five, five, nine four nine. I'll see you on the other side of the news break a behold for Christmas, you can plan on me. Please have snow on, Missile Toe and Weapon Jack so you can play these old time songs all day long for me and the listening audience. Good morning, folks, it is Stephen Bouchet Live with you today. I took a couple of weeks off. I apologize, and you heard the lineup of my team talk about being proud of these these these colleagues that I work alongside.

They kept me out late last night, so I'm I'm, I'm. You know, I'd love to have you call me to keep me awake so I don't fall asleep here with the microphone. You know I could, I could, I could bruise my head. You know how it goes. But in all seriousness, I can't thank you enough for tuning in as you do every Saturday at ten, every Sunday morning at eight. I just can't thank you enough. You really, you really get get the blood flown for me.

I love coming in and doing the show. I've been doing it twenty nine years and it does not get tiring at all. I try to give you a good show. I try to give you good information. I try to give you stuff to go back and talk over with your advice, or if you're like Paul, who was one of our earlier callers interviewing advisors. I'll give it to you straight, my honest opinion. I promise I'll give it

to you if you have any questions, any questions whatsoever. One eight hundred talk WGY one eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine one eight hundred eighty two, five fifty nine forty nine. Yeah, you know, if you didn't tune in. At the beginning of the show, I took over the Hotel of Delphi. We had our farm holiday party. Everybody showed up bells and whistles and dressed to the nines. And as I said, they kept me out late. I was trying to be, you know, as

the leader. I wanted to be the last man standing. Finally had I had a call it a day. I said, man, oh man, I can't hang out with you people past midnight. You know, I'm in bed by eight o'clock. But they kept me out. They are a great group of people. I tell you. I look out at as I was greeting them, and looked at each and every one of them, and I'm so proud the expertise that we have eighty two five five nine four nine.

So we you know, on Tuesday, we we we we had. The consumer price index came out three point one percent from the month of November year over year. Uh, you know, a little lower than than October. The low point was this June at three percent compared to a year ago June at nine point one percent. So, as you can see, inflation has been on quite the roller coaster ride, and it's good that it's coming down. You know, the FED has a target of two percent and we're getting

closer. And the you know, the FED, with their power to raise or lower interest rates, they can help fuel or put the brakes on a stock market rally or a bond market rally. Believe it or not, folks, we talked yesterday about the asset classes. Stocks is an asset class. Bonds is an asset class. Commodities is an asset class. When you think of gold or silver or other commodities, that's an asset class. Real estate

is an asset class. Cash is an asset class. Now crypto is an asset class, and boy, what a ride crypto has had from a low of sixteen thousand and today as we sit here, it's the only action you can get unless you're gonna bet the NFL football games. Crypto was up to forty four thousand a couple of days ago. It's down just under forty two

thousand. But crypto has really really made a comeback. You know, not many people are talking about crypto because when it was sixty five thousand, they thought it was going to one hundred thousand, and before they knew it, it came all the way down to sixteen thousand. But here we are at, you know, forty two thousand right now, forty four thousand over the

last week. So cryptos really really made a comeback. And that's the only action if you want to trade, other than betting with your favorite sports consultant on your favorite NFL football game or maybe a horse race. But if you want legit action, the crypto markets about it. But anyway, in all seriousness, CPI three point one percent. That was good news for US housing costs. You know, a big component is shelter housing, and right now

housing continues to provide you know, upward price pressure. The shelter index rows point four percent in November and six point five percent over the last year. So if housing comes into line with the other components of inflation, you could see that three point one percent. You know, I'm hoping the next next report will be in the two percent range, the high two percent range. Before we know it, we'll be in with the Fed at the two percent

range. And speaking of the Fed, guess what they met on Tuesday and Wednesday? Yes, they did, and guess what, no surprise, they left interest rates alone. One eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine. If you have any questions, give me a call. One eight hundred eighty two five fifty nine forty nine. So the Fed, you know, they're starting to pivot toward lowering rates. And this is why I said, this is why the Fed did not scare me with their tough talk over the

last you know, really couple of years. You know, they got it wrong two and a half three years ago when when they didn't see inflation, and then last year they said, oh we had we you know, you know, we won't be doing anything with interest rates. Well, listen, they are so dependent on data, and they're looking at data every day, and depending on the data, depends on what mood they're in. Will they

raise rates, Will they hold rates, will they lower rates? Well, right now they're pivoting because they had eleven rate hikes and for the last three meetings they kept them on hold. And before we know, the folks they're going to lower interest rates. But it's all good news for the for the market. You know, Fed Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is pivoting away from raising interest rates. I think the I don't think we're going to see any more hikes. I can't sit here and say I can guarantee that, but I

really don't think you're going to see any more hikes the Fed. You know, they listen, we're still at a twenty two year high. And they held study with their with their interest rate forecasts, and at the press conference, which is what really everybody is focused on, what will the Fed Reserve chair say or not says. It's all on the message that comes that comes across. And basically Powell focused instead on the risk of you know, causing

unnecessary harm to the economy by leaving rates too high as inflation falls. Because remember, folks, the Fed, when when they need to stimulate the economy and get the economy going, it's like you and I having a cup of coffee this morning. Some people just need that cup of coffee to get going. Well. Sometimes the Fed will lower rates to get the economy going. That's why they lower rates to stimulate the economy. So you go out and you don't think twice about buying a house, a car, a boat,

a second home. Interest rates are low, you can afford it. Maybe you're putting things on your credit card. Whatever you're you're out there spending money and the economy is benefiting from it. And remember, the consumer makes up two thirds of the economy. Two thirds, almost seventy percent of the economy is made up by the consumer. So they lower interest rates to stimulate the economy, and they hike interest rates to slow down in the economy that's grown

too fast, better known as inflation rearing its ugly head. And a year ago June when inflation popped up to nine point one percent, and you know, you pull into the Stewards and whether you're you're pumping gas or going in for milk and bread, you're paying more for it. You're paying more for services, you're paying more for rent, you're paying more for everything. That's

inflation. So if inflation is is rearing its ugly head. The Fed will kind of tap the break on the economy, slow it down by hiking rates, and we just lived through eleven hikes where the Fed needed to, you know, they were determined to fight inflation, and they did a good job. They brought inflation down from nine point one to three percent. They did the job, and now they have interest rates on hold because steadiety. It's you know, we may not have to go into a recession. I've been

saying that all year. Why do we have to go into a recession? And the Fed at one point was saying, absolutely, we have to go into a recession, and we have to push the unemployment rate from three point seven up to five six percent range, and millions of people have to lose their job. And I said, weekend week out on this show, why does that have to happen? The economy is resilient. People have jobs, they're not only working, but they're being paid better than they've ever been paid

before. Why is that because companies? You know, remember before COVID, we were sitting here talking about you know, Will Washington raised minimum wage that you know, whether it was seven eight nine dollars, you know, we were worried Washington was going to raise minimum wage at ten dollars an hour, and how it will hurt small businesses. Forget about it. The market forced companies. If companies wanted to hire people, they weren't hiring people at seven,

eight, nine dollars an hour. You know, the average starting range, whether you're working at Costco, Walmart, Amazon, target is fourteen to twenty dollars. If you're looking to get a job at the local pizza shop, they're going to be paying you more than they've ever paid you before. And sure, some businesses might have gone on out of business, but listen,

I've said it before. If a business owner makes less profit and their employees are making more money and they're able to take care and provide for their family, I don't have a problem with that. So the marketplace actually took care of that chatter that that was, you know, the rampant at one point, will the Fed raise minimum wage? Well, guess what, I don't know. I don't even know what the minimum wage is. What is minimum wage? I'm gonna put it into my chat gp GPT. What is

the federal minimum wage? Let's see what it comes up with. I love this chat. GPT is of my last update in April twenty twenty three, the federal minimum wage in the United States was seven dollars and twenty five cents an hour. This rate has been in effect since gin since two thousand and nine. Well, folks, I can assure you there's not a company out there paying their employees seven dollars and twenty five cents an hour. They won't

get anybody to work for them. One eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine one eight hundred eighty two five fifty nine forty nine. Give me a call, let me talk with you. I'm gonna take a quick fifteen second break. Don't go anywhere. Oh that's some music to get you going this morning, on this Sunday morning, July or I'm sorry, July December seventeenth. You know, Christmas is, you know, just over a week away. New Year's twenty twenty four is just over two weeks away. Holy

cow, where did the year go? But I love this year. Love this year. The SMP up twenty three percent, twenty four almost twenty five percent when you add in the dividends, NASTAC up forty two percent, QQQ up fifty two percent. Year today folks, you're making some money if you stayed in the market, if he didn't get scared out, if you didn't listen to your brother in law Sunday dinner, tell you that you got to buy, you know, gold and sock your money away. Listen gold,

Listen, it looks nice. I had. I had forty of my colleagues and their spouses and loved ones and partners at my Christmas dinner last night, and a lot of them wore gold that looked nice on them. But as nice as gold looks on you. As an investment, it's not my thing. No intrinsic value. It doesn't pay a dividend. It's up eleven percent year to date. Give me the s and P being up to almost twenty four to twenty five percent year to date all day long. Gold. People

buy out of fear and greed. They buy and sell out of fear and greed. I always say, listen. I love Gary dak and a day family who runs Stuarts. I bet if I go into any Stewarts and believe me, his partners and I call them partners because they all have a piece of Stewarts, he really runs a great company. If I go into any stewarts with the gold bar. I'm not going to be able to shave off a few shavings to buy some milk and bread. It's just not going to

happen. So when you own gold, you have to have somebody on the other side of that trade. If you're buying or selling, there has to be a buyer and seller on the other side of that trade. And gold, you know, I gave this stat out was thirty five dollars an ounce for like thirty five years and the gold, you know, everything was held

to the gold standard in the early seventies. That went away. Gold crept up to like eight hundred dollars an ounce in the early eighties, and you know, twenty eleven it was almost two thousand dollars an ounce, and then gold came down and you know, over the last years, over the last twelve years, came down to about eleven one hundred dollars an ounce, and then crept back up to two thousand dollars an ounce. As we sit here, gold was at twenty twenty one dollars an ounce, to be exact.

But and somebody asked for me adding it to the portfolio, I said, no, why, why why why should I? If I look over the last fifteen years and the headlines were as grueling as any headline can be over the last fifteen years, give me the S and P with an average return year in year out of fourteen percent compared to bonds at two point six percent

or gold. You know, So for all those gold bugs out there, you know, if you look over the last fifteen years, so here you could have bonds at two point six stocks at fourteen percent, or gold at five point six percent. Give me stocks all day long. I'm one hundred percent investment in the stock market, folks, I really am. I show my clients that, you know, anytime they want to see my portfolio, I pull it up, they can see it. I'm I'm proud. Listen.

I know everything there is to know, or at least I should know everything there is to know about my clients, because that's how we're able to help advise them better by knowing everything about themselves financially speaking, and in return, I show I show my clients my portfolio, and they're they're you know, sometimes they don't believe that I'm one hundred percent investment in the stock market.

And then when they see how much money I've made because I've been in the stock market, even with all the bad news and all the emotional headlines. Over time, folks, stocks as an asset class is your best performing asset class comes with volatility, But investors over the last couple of years also

realize that fixed income bonds come with volatility as well. One eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine one eight hundred eighty two five nine Give me a call, keep me up. I had a late night last night. I told you that my colleagues kept me out late. So the Fed, you know, they ended their two day their their two day meeting and basically

drone pile. The Fed Reserve chair indicated that officials were turning their attention to rate cuts because inflation has declined much faster than they expected, and in their latest projections they expected core prices, which excludes volatile food and energy items. I don't know why we we we exclude them because we all need that violatile food and energy, right How how how can we live through a day without

food and energy? And you know that was three point two percent, you know, down from from where it was, so all good news on the inflation front. Folks. You know the the jobs report. You know, we had one hundred and thirty thousand jobs on average over the last six months, which is down from two hundred and twenty eight thousand jobs on average for the six months before that. So if you look a year ago, the first six months, your average increase of jobs was two hundred and twenty eight

thousand. That slowed two one hundred and thirty thousand. But we're still putting people to work. It's not going backwards, it's not going negative. So that was all good news. The stock market loved that, which is why you know, listen, we had a good you know, the S and P up two and a half percent, NAS, that composite up two point eighty five percent, QQQ up three point three five percent this week, just this week. And the big winner, Russell two thousand, up five point

five five percent. I had a dear friend that we lost too soon. His favorite numbers were five to five to five better every day in the numbers, five to five five. That Russell two thousand was up five to five to five. Tommy Pirella would be very happy about that, five five five, And that's good news. That shows that the broader market is starting to rally and come back. And you know, as good as the S and

P being up twenty four percent with dividends. The one holding that I look at is the equal weight index, and that equal weight index is up about eleven percent. It was sucking win for a long time. It was like two or three percent, and all of a sudden it started to take off over the last you know, month or two. And that's good news. That's a positive sign. This is why I'm optimistic on the market. I'm optimistic on the stock market because I just and I've been saying this all year

long. And I'm not sitting here trying to pat myself on the back. But if you've been listening to the show and you hung in there with your investments, you made some money. And I'm happy for you. Our clients they put their full faith in us. We have full discretion to manage their portfolio. My son Ryan heads up our investment committee now, and our our portfolios are out performing their benchmarks by two three hundred percent, and our clients

are making money. I'm I'm tickled pink about this, folks. We're all making money and that's really, uh, just great news. So you know, don't be afraid of stocks over time bonds. Finally, I sat here, so I've been off for the last two weeks, so it had to be three weeks ago, right, I think I sat here and bond's were actually negative, and I said, bonds could actually have another year where they

lose money. Listen, you know, if you just look at the bond index, and that's a a good, you know, way for people to track fixed income. You know, twenty twenty one down one point seven percent, almost one point eight percent. Last year, bonds ended the year down thirteen percent. They were down almost eighteen percent at one point, down almost the stocks as much as stocks. The long bond was actually down more than stocks. The long bond last year in twenty twenty two was down about thirty

percent. And this year, three weeks ago, I told you bonds were down. As I sit here, they really rallied over the last few weeks. They're actually up. Now. That bond index AGG is up five percent year to date. So it looks like and why is that Because when you look at the yields of bonds, there's an inverse relationship. When you see

yields go up, the value of the bonds go down. So if you go back to US ten year treasury note in nineteen eighty one September to be exact, was yielding sixteen percent three years ago, went down to point five to two percent. So during that forty plus year rally, bonds were on a rip roaring tear for forty years. So when that yield came down from sixteen percent for the ten year treasury down the point five percent, the price of the bonds went up, and you made some money in the bond market.

And that's all good, Jim and Dandy. I mean, that's really good. But now bond yields went from point five a couple three years ago to as much as five percent just a month or so ago. And as we sit here, that ten year treasury is now down to, you know, under four percent, So bonds had rallied. Folks were coming up to the end of the show. I can't believe that you're listening to Let's Talk Money, brought to you by Bouchet and and where we help our clients prioritize

their health while we manage their wealth for life. I can't thank you enough for tune. Go to our website for more information. Bouche dot com, that's b A Z and boy O U C h e y dot com. In the meantime, stay healthy. It's all about your health. Stay healthy, and let's hope we have another profitable week in the markets. I'll see you next weekend. Thanks for listening.