Investment Planning

This year felt like a decade. We are twenty days from the start of a new year, and it can't get here fast enough. I'm expecting next year to be much better because it can't get much worse – right? It's been a wild ride for investors this year, but if you stayed the course, you probably made money. The NASDAQ, S&P 500, and Dow Jones are solidly in the green, despite falling more than 30% in March and April.

The Hare and the Tortoise is a classic Aesop fable. A story we know well.  The hare mockingly asking the tortoise, "Do you ever get anywhere?" Of course, we know how the story ends. The tortoise "kept going slowly but steadily, and, after a time, passed the place where the Hare was sleeping." Practicing a life of slow and steady is harder than it looks. We are an impatient nation addicted to getting our way as quickly as possible.

Should you buy Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies? Maybe. Bitcoin has performed well this year, up 107%. Though it has done well, it still hasn't eclipsed its all-time high set in 2017. If you want to buy Bitcoin, I would consider it an alternative investment, not as a substitute for cash or a money market fund.  

Election day has come and gone, and pollsters once again missed their mark. In 2016, they forecasted a Clinton landslide, and she lost. This year, Biden was projected to win by double digits, and a blue-wave would overtake the House and Senate. The election is not officially over, but it won't be a double-digit victory, and we did not experience a blue-wave. Same as it ever was.

I love the great outdoors. Hiking, fishing, camping are the hobbies I enjoy most. My wife and I spent a few days hiking in the Rocky Mountain National Park this summer, and it was beautiful. Our best vacations tend to be outside enjoying nature. We have visited several national parks over the years, including Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Grand Teton.

It's a bit awkward to arrive late for a party, especially if it's very late. Walking into a room full of strangers once a party has started can be intimidating or embarrassing because it forces you to interrupt conversations or eat food picked over by the punctual guests.

The presidential election is less than forty days away, and investors are getting nervous.

Dave Johnson is known for this call, "And down the stretch they come!" Mr. Johnson has been calling horse races since the early 1970s, including the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Belmont Stakes. There are few things more exciting in sports than watching horses make the final turn towards the finish line – the stretch run.

Exxon Mobil is leaving the Dow Jones Industrial Average after 92 years. They joined the Dow in 1928, and it's considered one of the bluest of blue chips – a stock to own forever. Salesforce will take its spot. It's not the first perennial holding to be substituted by a newer, swankier company. Walgreen's replaced General Electric in 2018 after a 112-year run and Apple supplanted AT&T in 2015 after 99 years.