How to Grow Money Without Always Thinking About It

grow moneyA common question among many people is how to get more money in their savings account or grow their wealth without necessarily having to work all of the time or think about money every day. What a lot of wealthy people will not tell you is that you do not have to be incredibly wealthy already or know everything there is to know about an ex dividend date and investing.

There are some really easy, practical things that anyone can do that will allow you to grow your money without having to spend all of your time at work or thinking about it. Following the tips below will help get you on the path to wealth and financial freedom.

Track how much you are spending and stick to a budget

This is one of the most basic rules when it comes to growing your money and it sounds like something that is so fundamental that everyone should know about it already. However, the real problem is that it may be so basic that people often forget to do it. Continue reading

Risk Management: When It Gets Personal

risk When we think about risk management, we tend to consider business risks – the risk of a catastrophic failure with technology causing the business to fail to provide critical services, or the risk of a competitor encroaching on our best-selling product line with a copycat version.

What we don’t often consider is risk management from the perspective of the individual. How can individuals be better protected or catered for within a business realm? In this article, we explore this less discussed topic in enough detail to bring it into the light.

Risk Management: Illness or Urgent Care Treatment

When an employee suddenly falls ill, going to the emergency ward of a nearby hospital and waiting for many hours to be seen is a poor option. For important members of staff, this doesn’t demonstrate a level of care that they would expect. Continue reading

Bitcoin, Sour Grapes and the Institutional Herd

Charles hughbitcoin Smith – If I had a bitcoin for every time some pundit declared bitcoin is a bubble, I’d be a billionaire. There are three problems with opining that bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are bubblicious:

1. Everything is in a bubble now: stocks, bonds, housing, heck, even bat guano is bubblicious. Exactly what insight is being added by yet another guru repeating the BTC is a bubble meme?

2. What’s the value proposition in declaring BTC is in a bubble? Spotting bubbles is like shooting fish in a barrel; the value proposition is in identifying the price/time tipping point at which bubbles pop. Continue reading

Silver, Silliness, Gold, and Risk

riskGary Christenson – The movie “The Big Short” features Michael Burry. His statement from Zerohedge:

“It seems the world is headed toward negative real interest rates on a global scale. This is toxic. Interest rates are used to price risk, and so in the current environment, the risk pricing mechanism is broken.”

Repeat: The Risk Pricing Mechanism Is Broken.”

What risks could be mispriced? A few come to mind.

  • The world is saturated in debt – over $200 Trillion. Does anyone expect that debt to be repaid? What are the risks when over $200 Trillion in debt can be counted as an asset only if that massive and increasing debt can be rolled over and replaced with say $300 Trillion in debt? What are the risks this exponentially increasing debt nonsense will be acknowledged for what it is – a train wreck in progress?
  • The US stock market looks like it is rolling over, just as it did 7+ years ago in 2008, and 15 years ago in 2000, and 1994, and 1987. What are the risks that the S&P 500 is overvalued, that the P/E and a dozen other measures are overvalued, and the stock market will correct/crash? Think back to 2008, 2000, 1994, and 1987. Read: Tread Lightly – 2016 Technical Outlook.
  • People and countries in the Middle East are not playing nice with each other. Regardless of whether the problems are religious, a 2,000 year feud, outside interference, control over gas and oil pipelines, or foreign policy stupidity, the region appears ripe for turmoil and more violence. Have risks been properly assessed? What happens if WWIII is born out of the fires of Middle East hatred, energy markets, and political posturing? Has that risk been properly priced into bond markets with negative yields, or stock markets with historically high P/E ratios, or crude oil prices at multi-year lows? Continue reading

Negative interest rates to hit the US

riskSimon Black – It started in 1921.

World War I was over. The Treaty of Versailles had been signed two years before.

And Germany, the biggest loser from the war, had been stuck with both the blame and the bill.

Germany’s war debt– which it owed not only for its own war-related expenses, but also for reparations to the victors– was devastating.

They didn’t have the money, so they started printing it.

Not surprisingly, the German mark began to sink. It started slowly at first, but by 1921 hyperinflation had taken hold until prices soared by thousands of percent.

One of my favorite stories from this period, was of the elderly man who went to the police to report a robbery. Thieves had stolen a wheelbarrow of money.

It was common at the time to use wheelbarrows to transport the huge sums of cash that were required to buy even the most simple things like bread and milk.

When the police asked him how much was in the wheelbarrow, the man corrected them saying that the thieves had only stolen the wheelbarrow, and had left the cash behind.

Undoubtedly the entire society was upturned by this hyperinflation. But as history shows, in any situation, there are always winners and losers.

Pensioners and people who responsibly saved their money were wiped out; whereas people who had borrowed to invest in real assets did extremely well.

Owners of residential real estate suffered under government imposed rent controls, whereas owners of farmland thrived. Continue reading