Tag: Investing

Am I contagious?

 Gold? Or Fool’s Gold?

Posted on by Karac Avalron

Wednesday again so that means a blog post. Let’s talk about gold for this post. Now gold is a commodity that many financial experts will tell you is a great hedge against a potential downturn in the economy. Let me be upfront about something here first. I am a finance professional. I have been working in the finance industry for 30 years now. When I post about finance, investing, commodities, money etc. it is my opinion only. I am not giving you financial advice, what you take from this post is up to you.

So back to gold…. Is it a hedge? Well yes it can be. Like any other investment the key is the buy point and the sell point. Let’s do a little quick math. So based on this website https://goldprice.org/gold-price-history.html 10 years ago (Nov 2023) gold was trading at $1273.50 (U.S.) and ounce. 10 years later it is now trading for $1891.20, a 33% increase. That isn’t too bad, now keep in mind this is a straight net calculation. Meaning we are not accounting for inflation, fee’s nothing like that. Simply I bought at X I sell at Y I get Z.

33% isn’t a bad return but we have a few issues here that are not entirely represented in the % return. The main issue is we didn’t receive interest or dividends on the assets. This is one thing many finance professionals don’t tell you. When you buy a commodity or say a collectible (think famous painting) the only return you get is appreciation. Now there is a counter argument here and that is “yes but I have a tangible asset that I can use to obtain goods and services.”

You could always go into Bitcoin…..

Well, this might be true. For example, someone who puts in a driveway to your home you might be able to trade them a bar of gold for that service. In reality? This doesn’t happen often but that is the counter argument to not have dividends and interest you have a tangible item. Now, if the economy collapses etc. and you have a bunch of gold do you think you will be able to drive to Walmart and trade in your gold bars for food?

You’re better off investing in ammunition and firearms if that happens but the point here is Gold is just a place to hold cash that you want to protect from the volatility of equity markets. The only benefit here is a long-term play and the notion you have a tangible asset. I’ve moved all of the money I did have in gold and precious metals out and taken that money and bought tangible items I can enjoy that have value.

Antiques, collectibles, things of that nature are the same in principle as gold. Over time you hope the asset increases but you are not getting dividends or interest on the asset. However, you are getting something you can enjoy like a painting or an antique chair. Gold isn’t a horrible investment but it’s vastly overrated and often pushed as a “hedge” during hard economic times. I would encourage you to think critically about gold or any precious metals for that matter, the upside is extremely limited.

Thank you for coming by and supporting my blog I really appreciate it. Please remember to like the post, subscribe if you are not and leave a comment so I know you were here.

Karac  

The U.S. Government will never give Student Loan Relief – Here is why

Posted on by Karac Avalron

So Wednesday again and another blog post. This will not be a political post. When I say “U.S. Government” it doesn’t matter what party is in charge. Student loans are a huge issue in the U.S. Two generations have been saddled with this corrupt system of overcharging for a commodity (education) and those institutions (universities) having the debt secured by the government. The losers? Millennials and Gen Z. Government loans guaranteeing universities ridiculous tuition on the backs of the future earnings of teenagers is sinister IMHO.

So of course politicians will promise “Student Loan Relief” to get votes but they will never deliver it. That’s a bold claim and its one you will rarely see supported by finance professionals but there is a clear profound reason why, and I will explain it concisely in a minute. You see everyone in the finance world focuses on debt, in the context of student loans. You rarely if ever see a finance professional tell you the other side of that equation. AHHHHH now we get to it. Yes the other side of the equation is someone holds that debt as an asset.

Anytime you take a loan, you incur a debt the person giving you the loan secures an asset. This is why the government will never give Student Loan Relief. They hold the asset. Now I am going to give you some FY2022 numbers, don’t let your eyes gloss over it will be brief. For the math nerds/finance professionals I will provide a link to the data so you can go read it yourself.

In 2022 The U.S. Government had 5.0 trillion in net assets. AGAIN people always talk about the U.S. deficit but we do have assets too. Of the 5.0 trillion, 1.3 Trillion is student loans. That 27% of the total net assets of the federal government. This is the single largest asset class the U.S. government holds. Source https://www.fiscal.treasury.gov/reports-statements/financial-report/balance-sheets.html#table1  Let that sink in for a minute. Lets think about this logically. Even if you have only had a basic business class you know no entity in the world is going to “forgive” their biggest asset without replacing it with something else.

So let me do a quick summary here. The U.S. Government will never give student loan relief because student loans represent 27% of its total assets. This would be suicide financially without a huge increase in taxes. The simple reason being is liabilities (deficits) are 5 times the amount of the assets. If the U.S. had a smaller fiscal deficit student loan relief would be possible but that is not likely to happen anytime soon. Any politician telling you that they will give you student loan relief is full of shit.

Thank you for coming by and supporting my blog I really appreciate it. Please remember to like the post, subscribe if you are not and leave a comment so I know you were here.

Karac  

Anxiety Issues – 5 Easy tips for investing when you have anxiety

Posted on by Karac Avalron

Money can generate immense amounts of anxiety. We all depend on money to live. Food, shelter, electricity nothing is free. All of us, by whatever means generate income. Income is the basis by which you can obtain items you need to live and the luxuries that improve your quality of life. If you are like me, you are affected by moderate amounts of anxiety. You are functioning, likely have a full-time job and thus have to deal with all the regular poop that comes with life.

If you live in the states or in any other western culture, there is a large emphasis placed on retirement and saving. Putting your money in a bank account and collecting interest is no longer enough as bank interest is extremely low. If you are at a point in your life where you have enough income to invest, for whatever reason, it can be overwhelming and daunting.

Here are 5 easy tips that will help you.

  1. Have the money automatically drawn from your pay or your bank account: This eliminates the stress of you must transfer it yourself. Many employer plans will do this for you, and in many cases, it will be pre-tax money, lowering your tax burden.
  2. Determine what the money is for: Is this for income generation? Is this for retirement? For a new car? Decide what this money is going to be used for BEFORE you start investing.
  3. Where to invest, Large Cap Growth funds: I know your eyes are glazing over… These types of funds are normally comprised of strong companies that generate revenue and are considered very well capitalized. Companies like Apple, Boeing, Microsoft. These companies aren’t going to fold up over night if there are bumps in the economy.
  4. Time: Most investment vehicles have a return average over time. You can get this measure over 5years, 10 years etc. Look at mutual funds that have a 10-20-year track record. What was their rate of return? A 20-year avg return is a great measure because it accounts for ups and downs in the market.
  5. Trust yourself: There is no “trick” to investing. Consistent investment over years generates good returns. Don’t look for short cuts, you will regret it.

Money can equal stress, but it doesn’t have to. Remember the story of the tortoise and the hare? Slow and steady wins the race. If you stick with a long-term consistent plan you will be a successful investor. Once every 3-6 months check your investments make sure they make sense. If you have an employer with a retirement plan, sit down with HR and ask your questions. This will help with your anxiety, and that’s their job.

Remember you have anxiety, this won’t be simple, you will worry, you will react, you will make mistakes. However, you can do this, and someday with a lot of persistence and patience you will have accumulated a nice chunk of change!

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Finance Tip: How to pick great company stocks

Posted on by Karac Avalron

First and foremost, let me say that I am not a financial advisor, any finance posts you see on this blog are my own opinion based on decades of being in the finance industry and living my life. Now disclaimer out of the way, there is a method by which you can pick single company stocks that normally beat the indexes. It is another one of those dirty little secrets that a finance professional won’t tell you, but with a little common sense you could figure out on your own.

To be clear, I am talking about stock in one company like Apple, not mutual funds. These come with a much higher risk as your money is tied to the performance of one company exclusively. This method is one that I have employed in the past when helping to set up an investment portfolio for someone in my family circle. It is by no means full proof or for that matter scientific (from a math perspective) at all. It relies on a very subjective business measurement, done by multiple firms.

So what is this method? It is tracking annual lists of “the best places to work”

I know that sounds half assed, simplistic and an uncouth way to make a stock pick. Here’s the thing though, if companies are listed as “best places to work” isn’t the logical conclusion that they must have happy workers? Happy workers usually mean better services and products and that usually means higher sales which equals revenue.

How much is this going to cost me ?

Don’t dismiss this simplistic formula out of hand. Here is a few of the companies that made it on to multiple best places to work for 2021:

  1. Microsoft
  2. Nvidia
  3. In & out burger
  4. Google
  5. Delta Airlines

These aren’t small companies, as a matter of fact most of the are publically traded and provide great dividends. Now this method of stock picking isn’t absolute, companies can fall off the list at any time but the metrics used to evaluate “best places to work” are usually worker centric. That’s the secret sauce here because as I stated, happy workers = good products & services = profits = return on investment.

There is no one catch all best places to work list you should use, there are hundreds of them (if not thousands). What you want to do here is aggregate several (5-10) lists. So if Nvidia appears on 7 out of 10 chances are that’s a great place to work and this investment strat should be employed.

This ties in well to another piece I did about Aristocrat stocks here, combined if you employ both for a mid to long term investment cycle (5-25 years) you should do very well. Remember investments into the stock market are not guaranteed and should be done only after doing research and obtaining a good comfort level.

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Finance Tip: “The Cash Flow Buffer”

Posted on by Karac Avalron

This particular tip is used in business often. It is exactly as it sounds a buffer. Keep in mind that opinions I express in my blog may or may not be good advice for you personally. You should investigate all financial advice thoroughly before pursuing any course of action. So a cash flow buffer is a concept that many people might confuse with an emergency fund in the context of personal finance.

With the job market shifting to a more hustle economy, you might not be earning a steady paycheck any more. You might be doing contract or consulting work and who knows you might kill it for 8 months, then the next 2 months your down 60% on your earnings. This isn’t as farfetched as you might think. This happens a lot now. What I am seeing in the news articles I read are people busting their tails for 6 months, doing uber eats, working a full time gig, then maybe one more side hustle and banking a large chunk of change. Only to then slow WAY down to recover for 3-4 months, rinse and repeat.

The job market in the U.S. has changed a lot in the 35 years since I started at burger king in the mid 80’s. So one of the approaches I take with family members I advise financially is treat the working part of your life as a business. We set up a balance sheet, expenses etc. We build an emergency fund of 6 months of expenses (if there isn’t a whole lot of debt) and then work on the Cash Flow Buffer. There it is again, lets define it. A Cash Flow Buffer is the number of days you could continue to pay your bills out of your regular bill paying account if income were to stop.

Inflation is falling, but its still very high

Again this isn’t an emergency fund! So you have 5K in your checking account, you lose all your jobs you have no money coming in. You spend 3500 a month for expenses this would mean you have a cash flow buffer of 45 days. So many would assume you would then begin to tap your emergency fund, and that would be correct. AT THE END OF THE 45 DAYS. You see the buffer is meant to create space for you so you can replace income.

That 5K will keep you afloat for 45 days that’s your real window until you have a real emergency on your hands. The buffer assumes you are not replacing your income. Businesses use this tool a lot, particularly seasonal businesses who do a large % of their sales at a specific point of the year. For you in the new gig economy this might be useful for you to gauge as you navigate the new normal for working.

So how you do it is, look at your monthly spend. Take out all the non-essentials and come up with a number. (rent, electricity, food, water). If you lost all your income today how long could you pay for things without tapping your emergency fund? You see the concepts here are more for discipline purposes. The last thing we want to do is hit the emergency fund because if we tap into that, we know that things are really bad, it’s for emergencies.

Think about your personal cash flow buffer. I keep about an extra month of bills in my checking account so my buffer is 30 days which is light. I am confident that I would be able to replace my income (or a good chunk of it) before 30 days. Ideally you have a 30-60-day buffer here that you would use BEFORE the emergency fund.

I know it’s confusing, but if you start treating your financial situation as your own personal business and economy you might find that these things make sense.

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Yet Another finance secret finance professional won’t tell you (but I will)

Posted on by Karac Avalron

So another finance piece, as I write this the U.S. is in an official recession. This piece isn’t about recessions, inflation or politics so you can exhale. We are going to reveal another secret though that finance professionals don’t like to admit. So a quick disclaimer, I am a finance professional. I have been working in the finance and accounting field for over 30 years. This blog is not a finance advice blog; this is my own opinion based on my experiences. Any advice you receive regarding finance should be researched thoroughly by you as an investor and verified through multiple sources.

Now that out of the way here is the opening salvo “When things are good, everyone is a genius.” The last decade up until the pandemic really the stock market overall was pretty good. You had good annualized returns and many people made a lot of money. So being a finance professional and advising people to go into the market wasn’t a genius play. Of course if you aren’t fluent in finance you might have perceived it as such. Interest rates were low for a long time so there really wasn’t anywhere else to go with investing except real estate.

But the secret? Everyone is a genius when things are good, what about when things are bad? What about when you are in a bear market (when indices drop 20% in a calendar year)? The secret is, the real finance geniuses were diversified PRIOR to the bear market. Any finance professional could have told you to put your money in an index fund prior to covid and you would have made fantastic gains. The real economic geniuses advised you to diversify with money spread to commodities, bonds/treasuries, real-estate and precious metals (this is a commodity, but not a traditional commodity).

As an example, what if in 2016 your finance professional advised you to have 15% of your portfolio in “Gas & Oil”? That would look pretty good now wouldn’t it? Same with bonds, treasuries, wheat, gold… you get the picture. The secret here Is diversity of investment result in a wider spread of assets which can absorb declines in any particular sector.

Like it or not, the world still runs on Oil based products.

Now that does mean you would have had less in technologies for the same period and not enjoyed that growth. I concede that, but the savvy investor doesn’t play the short term they play the long term and sustained diversified portfolios over the long haul 10-30 years normally perform as well as a strict stock portfolio. Don’t get me wrong here, I personally believe the majority assets you are investing in should be either growth stock mutual funds or blue chip mutual funds.

100% of a portfolio though?  No, you diversify specifically for bear markets and sharp down turns because they always happen. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when and how long will it last. For calendar year 22 as of 6.30.22 the markets are down 20.3% now this has come up in July, there is no denying that but you’re still down overall. On top of that we have large inflation numbers devaluing the purchase power of your dollar. So what 1.00 would buy last year now buys .92 that’s an 8% decrease (rough estimate). That isn’t equated well in your portfolios return.

Meaning you made 10% on the stock sale but the money you received purchases 8% less than it did meaning the value of that 10% return to you in real time is a net positive of 2%. Again, the secret here is diversity. Always have part of your portfolio assigned to cash, bonds/treasuries, commodities and that will provide you a decent buffer for the next bear market because this will happen again.

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Historic Inflation – The most important # you need to know is 3.22%

Posted on by Karac Avalron

So another finance piece today. I am not going to go through my normal disclaimer hopefully by now you understand you should be diligent about your finances and obtain information from multiple sources. I’m thankful you consider me one, today we are going to talk about inflation. Yes, its real, and it isn’t exclusive to one region we have global inflation. The numbers I will use in this post will be U.S. numbers but in my research it tracks, mostly, globally.

You are probably wondering what the 3.22% is, that is the historic average inflation rate over the last 108 years. That’s ON AVERAGE, which is important. We have years in there where we have 13.5% inflation (1980) so it’s really important to have good perspective here. Historic inflation isn’t as important as “life time” inflation. That metric is the inflation rate in YOUR life time. For me? Its 3.95%. None of the numbers I am throwing at you include 2022 which right now is approx. 8.5% (give or take). As it isn’t a full year of data we can’t use it for these purposes.

Here is a link to the historic chart I am using. So a few important things to remember.

  1. The distinction between historic and life time inflation rates.
  2. The likelihood of sustained inflation.
  3. Globalization

I distinguished the 1st item already, but items 2-3 are intertwined. We had a sustained period of high inflation in the U.S. from 1973 – 1983 (roughly) that’s a long time. That was in my life time, it might be yours too. What normally happens, and is happening now is wages increase as inflation increases but rarely at the same rate. As an example, it’s likely that in 2022 we will come in between 6-10% inflation for the year, it’s unlikely that your income increased by that same amount. The thing that is a killer about sustained inflation is multiple years where your income doesn’t match or exceed inflation = less wealth overall.

Inflation decreases your purchasing power.

You may make more but it doesn’t buy as much, basically. Globalization is a fairly new phenomenon in the inflation equation. In the 70-80’s it was far less then it is now. So what happens in one major country affects the global consumption and production metrics. If China can’t produce as much of X as it normally does, the price of X goes up, or inflates. Add in a pandemic here and there and well you get the picture.

There is only one sure fire way to combat inflation for you personally and that is increase your income by more than the current inflation rate. The problem is most can’t do that. So the second best way to combat inflation is to ensure your income and investments are increasing more than the average inflation rate in your life time. So for me, that means I need to increase my income and investments every year by 3.95%. Now that is just to remain as is, if I want to improve my financial situation (my ability to consume more) I need to increase my return by MORE THAN 3.95%.

Take a look at the link above and see what your life time inflation rate is. This is the minimum target you should be striving for in all of your investments and your income. Trying to figure it out monthly or on an annual is probably not going to work, but hey if you can make 8.5% in these markets I tip my hat to you. For now, shoot for 4% minimum, 6-8% would be ideal and reasonably attainable if you have investments.

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3 compensations factors that make companies great.

Posted on by Karac Avalron

The great resignation marches on and in the U.S. unemployment is near record lows. Millions of people left the workforce due to the pandemic. Whether it was creating their own income streams or boomers retiring, there are a shortage of workers in the U.S. Now let’s be very clear here, the available jobs are not high end 6 figure salary roles. Sure there are some of those but nearly everyone has leveled up, so your traditional entry level positions are the ones that have the most openings presently.

Regardless of when you get a new job or if you are evaluating your current company there is one truism you always have to remember. Companies need you to perform tasks so they can make money. You wouldn’t be employed if you weren’t either generating income for the corporation, or supporting others who did. So in this sellers’ market (you the employee are the seller) we can now be even more selective of the places we want to work. There are 3 compensation factors that make companies great. This may not be in line with other lists you see out there but from an employee’s stand point, here they are.

Surviving 2020 & covid
Great, another list…..
  1. A robust retirement plan: This includes employer match, Roth and Traditional 401K/403B options. This should be managed through a large firm like a fidelity and the vesting time line is no longer than 3 years. Retirement planning is critical and most successful retirees in the modern era have created wealth through automatic withdrawals via their employer’s plan.
  • Comprehensive benefits: Health Insurance is obvious but you should have 3+ plans to choose from. Dental, LTD, STD, a 1-year life insurance of your salary. There should be A good PTO (Paid time off plan) that scales based on tenure. Every 5 years you should receive 1 additional week of PTO capping at 6 to 8. PTO should be one lump sum, vacation and sick and you get to manage it. Along with major federal holidays. This is where you really get value as this is part of your compensation package. It’s not just the annual salary, it’s the sum of the value of these “perks” as well.
  • Profit sharing: This is one of the rarest benefits you’re going to see out there. If you get into a company with this benefit you really lucked out. Most corporations keep their profits to make distributions to their shareholders. There is nothing wrong with that, they are paying you a salary and offering you benefits. It’s a fair exchange and one that has been the norm for decades. Profit sharing can come in all sorts of forms. Ideally what you get is if the company has a surplus to budget at the end of the year that amount is distributed to employees. Some managers are offered “profit sharing” of some form. I got quarterly performance bonuses based on budget performance in one role.

The 3 items listed above are in addition to your base salary. This is a sellers’ market and employees are now in a situation where they are empowered to create very good deals for themselves. THIS WILL NOT LAST FOREVER. Look, work isn’t meant to be easy. It’s likely you fall into one of two categories. You are either someone who truly loves what they do, or you work to obtain income so you can do the things you truly love.

Most of us fall into the latter category. Work is a means to get income to live life. The more perks you can get the better life becomes. Now is the time to look around, see what’s out there, measure your current work situation. Believe me if the situation was reversed and there was a surplus of workers your company would be looking to see if they could pay you less.

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A follow up to my post –  Commodities

Posted on by Karac Avalron

So this is a requested post I received via email. The original post is here where I talked about commodities etc. As with any finance advice I give on this blog these are my opinions, I am not a financial advisor. The person emailing me acknowledged this and the spirit of the email was more along the lines of “Well what are you doing then?” for a portfolio.

I told the person I would use my email reply and post it here as well so others can see. I am not going to list the specific funds I use, again this isn’t a financial advisors blog. I am a finance professional yes but I am not a certified financial planner so keep that in mind.

First, I am 52 years old. I have been investing since 1992. The majority of my assets reside in my 401K that I have rolled over from successive companies over the years. I am also debt free. Now this is important because while I invested for years, most of those years was at a lower than normal investment rate as I took that money and used it to pay off my mortgage. Approx. 35% of my net worth is the equity of my house. 50% is in retirement accounts, 10% is in a brokerage account that is designed to produce dividends the balance is cash.

So how does this break out exactly?

  1. I have 6 months of my current monthly expenses sitting in a money market account that gets .5% interest. This is an emergency fund.
  • 70% of my retirement accounts I use the “bogle” strat. I use index funds with low fee’s and loads. All of these are long term investments and have provided me with stellar returns. The fund names aren’t critical as long as they track correctly to the index:
    • 75% into an S&P Index fund
    • 20% International
    • 5% bonds

All of the funds in item 2 are investments I have held for several years in some mutual fund for or another.

  • 20% of my retirement is in 2 aggressive growth mutual funds. These focus on small cap funds and I monitor this grouping very closely. I “flip” this 20% often when I make good returns and then shop for new funds in this category.
  • 10% of my retirement is in a precious metals and commodities mutual fund. I have had the same one for years now it’s OK. This is a hedge really but I wanted to be in different parts of the market so I got one fund that invests in several commodities.
  • Brokerage account: this is all about passive income. I invest in singular stocks and mutual funds that have a long term track record of paying dividends. I keep reinvesting the dividends into more shares. The goal here is to build a big enough foot print to provide a good quarterly payout that I will use to supplement my income in retirement. I have many investments here which cumulatively add up to a good chunk of change. However singularly aren’t much.
  • Cash: I have another 3-6 months of expenses sitting in a debit/eft/checking account. This is what I call my “living” account. I want a coffee it comes out of here, gas, groceries. This is where my salary is deposited every month and I disperse from here to my other accounts.

So this isn’t very complex. Most of my wealth is tied into index funds and the equity of my house. The house equity of course isn’t liquid I am sitting on it but having bought the home decades ago the appreciation of the house has made it worth a nice chunk of change and paying it off early meant I saved on interest payments.

As I age this break out will change. When I am 62 I plan to collect Social Security and stop working for a salary. Ideally I will continue to work for health benefits, we’ll see. At that time, I will be shifting the break out and consolidating many of the asset classes into more capital preservation friendly vehicles that generate interest income. Ideally CD rates will be higher, and if they are I will look into them.

CD’s will never outperform the market but the extremely low risk is very attractive as I start to get into my 70’s and enact my legacy planning (for kids and grandkids). Keeping in mind the whole time I will still be living and spending and generating some income.

Anyway, as requested that’s where I am at on my investment portfolio. Thanks for coming by and supporting my blog I really appreciate it.

Commodities – Should you invest?

Posted on by Karac Avalron

For the first time in a long time we have inflation to the point where it is materially affecting multiple financial sectors. Bonus tip: Anytime oil prices rise, it affects pricing on nearly all consumer products. We also have the artificial inflation of the stock market due to interest rates being kept at historic low levels for over a decade. On top of that you had the pandemic that decreased production and you had governments stimulate with increase payments to individuals. These two factors alone cause inflation, less products and more money = product price increases.

Now before I get to far into this let me give you the normal disclaimer. I am a finance professional with 30 years of experience. These are my opinions based on years of observation, any decisions you make pertaining to your personal financial choices should be done so with a great deal of research beyond my blog posts.

Disclaimer out of the way, what does all of the reality of the first paragraph mean? It means commodities will increase. Oil, Precious metals, specific produce items wheat as an example. Does this mean they are a good investment? Yes, and no, first the no. Buying them now would break the basic principal of investing and wealth building (buy low sell high), you would be buying at a high, don’t do that.

Yes, because a diversified portfolio is a good thing. If you had gold in your portfolio at the start of the pandemic (3.1.20 roughly) it was trading at 1497.00 US per ounce. 2 years later? 1944.00 US per ounce that’s nearly a 30% return. Oil, wheat, Silver you can go figure it out, they are mostly up. The point here is you are seeing these items increase because the market is changing. The war in Ukraine effects commodities, specifically Wheat as Ukraine is a huge Wheat producer but what happens when markets change (with the many factors listed in this narrative) commodities tend to rise.

There is no sure thing in investing, its always a rollercoaster.

Ideally what you want to do is use the current financial climate as notice on how to diversify your portfolios going forward. Gold as an example, will come down. Should you go heavy into gold when it does? No, you should consider SOME gold though. 2-5% of your portfolio is what I recommend to family & friends buying at a low (I use 3-5 year price averages myself). Wheat will be another one that spikes soon, keep an eye on that.

Overall, commodities are a useful buttress for lower stock values. If you weren’t in commodities prior watch the prices in 2022 it’s going to be a good year to gauge your comfort level with commodities. Just like stocks it’s a gamble, but sometimes when you gamble you win and had you bought Gold (as an example) years ago and stayed with it, you would have a spectacular sell opportunity now to make some great gains.

Always be diligent when investing and don’t close your mind off to any specific sector of the markets. A diverse portfolio that takes a long term view on investments is prudent. Commodities are a big driver in markets (look at oil prices), ignoring them as investments isn’t the smart play. Nor is using a large % of your investing resources and putting that into commodities. It’s a sell position now. Take your gains if you have them and remember the simple phrase “buy low sell high” should always be paramount.

Source for Gold comparison:

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