Here are six money moves that can help you find your bearings, clear the clutter and finally feel in control of your finances going into the new year.
If the U.S. stock market were to fall 30% from current levels, it would take us back to where it was in January of 2024. I'll bet you would like to go back and buy more stocks then, knowing what we know now. If you kept dollar cost averaging into stocks during a crash it would be painful in the short-term but likely make you very happy in the long-term.
Bitcoin has underperformed stock benchmarks this year, but its performance vs. gold and silver is even more striking. In hindsight, those two will likely be remembered as the standout assets of 2025, a surprising outcome if you'd predicted it at the start of the year.
Gold is having its best year since 1979, up around 72% year to date and recently breaking out to new all-time highs above $4,500 an ounce. Silver has done even better, rallying nearly 160% year to date and about 45% in the past month alone, reaching a record ~$75 an ounce yesterday.
If the AI trade were to have already peaked, we'd probably retroactively refer to this stretch as a mix of an earnings bubble (like the period of over-earning based on some unsustainable credit trends that preceded the financial crisis) and a valuation bubble (like the dot-com boom, where rapidly expanding price-to-earnings ratios were the key driver of explosive gains).
But if we're doing anything close to running back the late '90s, well, this bubble is going to get some more air to inflate it. What do you think?
In Q3, personal spending rose 1.6%, or 6.4% annualized, while personal incomes only rose 0.8%, or 3.3% annualized. Personal spending rose 0.75% more than personal income. Just how much more did spending rise than the income to fuel it compared on a historical basis?
The very same people who argue endlessly about the “right” safe withdrawal rate also brag about their backup systems—their yield shield, their “living off dividends,” their three years of cash “just in case,” their guardrails, their bucketing strategy, and so on.
When was the last time you weren't moving from one thing to another? From work to a happy hour? From the gym back to your desk all while checking emails on the walk back? We don't particularly like giving ourselves the space to answer the question, “What do I want to do next?”
Will we have enough? When can we leave? How much do we need in our accounts before we can finally click our ruby slippers three times and escape this road? $3 million? $4 million? $5 million? When will it be enough to leave this road behind?
Everyone wants to own a business. It really doesn't matter who you talk to. People want to be their own boss. But looking back, there was no widespread desire to be self employed until about ten years ago. Now, people hate jobs. Why is that?
We can't plan for everything. Nevertheless, planning for unknown risks is an exercise we should do periodically. Here's the risk you aren't thinking about.
In the quest for life's meaning, some people might be looking to their career for answers, while others don't feel their job has a significant impact on the world.
While most Americans debate whether to spend 10% more or less on gifts this year, many physicians faced a more fundamental question: will they see their families at all?
According to an NBC News poll, 55% of adults reported they would spend less on gifts this year compared to last. Consumer sentiment fell to its lowest level in over three years in early November.
