Let's Talk Money

June 27th, 2026.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, in good morning everybody. I'm Stephen Bouchet. You have
me live today and tomorrow, and it brings me a
lot of joy to be here with you. I took
me la weekend off my daughter Lauren got married and
it was a beautiful day. I know that Sue was
looking down on her and giving her the absolute best,

(00:21):
most remarkable, amazing, beautiful day that she could have had.
So I thank you for you had some good hosts
last week. Marty did the show on Sunday, and I
think Polo and Ed maybe or pollow By himself on Saturday,
and they always do a great job. But today you're
stuck with me, and hopefully I can help you get

(00:45):
your pointed in the right direction. As I'd like to say,
you only get one opportunity to retire one, folks. You
don't get two or three or four. You get one.
Sometimes you get to I guess if you have to
go back to work because you're not prepared, and then
maybe you get another bite at the ample. But for
most people, you get one opportunity to retire and you

(01:05):
can't mess it up because you can't go back and
make up for all of those decades. Think about it,
you work for decades and you just have a short
period of time and retirement for the most part, and
you want to make sure you have enough money so
you can enjoy it. And if you have any questions,
any questions whatsoever about how to get you to that milestone,

(01:27):
give me a call one eight hundred talk why one
eight hundred eight two five five nine four nine, Any
questions whatsoever. So you know, NAS that got hit hard
this week, hit really hard. Bitcoin stumbled again, the Middle
East remains on edge. Investors are wondering if higher interest

(01:49):
rates are here to stay. Is this a buying opportunity
or the start of something bigger. If you have any questions, folks,
any questions at all. One eight hundred eight two five
fifty nine forty nine. I would love to help you,
love to help you. So you know, as I said,

(02:09):
you know, the big sell off in technology, it was
really a crazy week. Technology I'll perform the rest of
the market over the past year and for the last
several years. You hear me talk a lot about how
much NASDAC we own in our portfolios. And you know,

(02:30):
NASDAC is for the most part a growth oriented mostly
made up of technology stocks. So I call it, you know,
really it's it's our technology holding for the most part.
When you when you look at sixty percent of QQQ
and for our clients qqq M, it's same. ETF still

(02:54):
tracks the Nasdaq one hundred index, and sixty percent of
it is made up of of technology, and that's why
we like it. The rest of the portfolio, you know,
communication services thirteen percent, and you can kind of think
about communication services, what is that really? You know, I

(03:14):
think there's a lot of companies there. If you look
at the top ten holdings of QQQ, you got Navidia, Apple,
Micron Technology, Microsoft, Amazon, Advanced Microwth Devices, Alphabet which just
got added to the dial this week. We'll talk a
little bit about that, Tesla, Intel. Those are the top

(03:34):
ten holdings and they make up you know, they make
up a big part of the QQQ as a whole,
forty five percent of the QQQ ETF is made up
of those ten stocks. So in a way you're getting
a focused investment in mostly technology, and that's why we

(03:57):
like to call it our technology holding. We also have
obviously other technology holdings were very overweight technology. So a
week like this week doesn't help our clients our clients.
Really they a week like this, they'll lag more than
other weeks because the Nasdaq being down almost five percent

(04:19):
compared to the broad stock market the S and P
five hundred being down about two percent. But remember this
one statistic that I like to repeat, folks, Over the
last five years, your average return in QQQ was about
sixteen percent a year over the last ten years, about
twenty two percent over the last fifteen years, about twenty

(04:43):
percent year in year out. Those are your average returns.
And I know I repeat this often because I want
you to understand just how powerful QQQ is and it's
helped our clients over the last twenty plus years that
we've been overweight technology, mostly by using QQQ. Our clients

(05:03):
have had stellar returns because of it. And if you
look at the last fifteen years of the broad stock
market index, just about fourteen and a half percent compared
to just about twenty percent for QQQ. And that's why
I'm not afraid of technology. I'm not afraid of weeks
like this. And as I started out saying, you know,

(05:25):
is this a buying opportunity or the start of something bigger?
I think it's it could be a buying opportunity. In
my eyes, Listen, I'm either going to be right or
wrong on this. So there's a fifty to fifty chance
I'll get it right, fifty to fifty chance I'll get
it wrong. But I do believe and I said this
in the last couple of days the clients that came

(05:47):
into the office, when not if, when the war in
Iran gets resolved? And believe me, have we been waiting
a long time? We absolutely have? Is there an end game?
You know, it's there's a lot of emotion, say, and
every day it just keeps getting pushed off. We think
we're coming to some kind of an end with that war,

(06:11):
and there's an agreement, and then all of a sudden
there's another attack here or attack there. Will diplomacy hold,
Could the oil infrastructure become a target? Shipping lanes? Will
they remain open through the strait of horror moves? Does
higher oil mean higher inflation? Again? And usually the answer
to that is yes. You know, listen, we can't have

(06:36):
a prolonged conflict the markets, believe me, no side benefits
from a prolonged conflict. Iran needs economic stability, Western nations
need the oil, want the oil. Global markets dislike uncertainty.
You hear me say that for the thirty one years
I've been doing radio. What the market doesn't like is

(06:59):
un certainty. The market does not like to be surprised.
So the biggest wild card right now remains the straight
up foremost. Any disruption there could absolutely immediately push energy
prices higher and reignite inflation concerns because the price of
oil affects so much. And if you know, right now,

(07:23):
the price of oil is down to I think it's
sixty nine dollars a barrel, is where we ended up.
And you know, hey, the high for oil was almost
one hundred and thirteen dollars a barrel, so you know,
being down at sixty nine, were almost right where we
were before the start of this war. And that's that's
that's good news. You would have thought that with this,

(07:46):
this prolonged conflict, that the price of oil would be higher,
but it's been coming down no matter what you want
to say or believe, folks, When the price of oil
comes down, the price of gas comes down, and that
is a big part of inflation. So hopefully, hopefully, hopefully
we have you know, this war coming to an end

(08:08):
and sooner than then later, you know, there's nothing, nothing
else we can say. It's it's it's it's part of
the volatility that we're living with in the markets. Although
this past week we had a text sell off that
really had nothing to do with oil. It was more
chips and Apple raising prices. We had a lot of

(08:30):
news on the technology front this this past week. I'm
gonna take a quick fifteen second break. One eight hundred
eight two five five nine four nine. One eight hundred
eighty two five fifty nine forty nine. If you have
any questions, give me a qual I'll see on the
other side of this quick break, the fall lines are
open and I would love to talk to you. One

(08:52):
eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine. So
this past week, you know, listen, we had the war.
At the end of the week, it looked as though
there was some positive you know, vibes. Let's say, coming
out of the us I RNT situation. You have oil

(09:15):
prices that that right now. You know, basically the sixty
nine dollars a barrel is pretty good, folks. It's not
one hundred and thirteen dollars a barrel where it was
at it's high sixty nine dollars is pretty good. In
the UK, you had Prime Minister Kier Starmer who is resigning. Listen,

(09:38):
I don't want to get into politics, but there's a
lot of these these socialist, communist type politicians that should resign.
And in this country, I know, there's a lot of
talk about communism and socialism and folks, there's no room
for it. And unfortunately, we have a lot of uneducated
people that think that, you know, they believe everything that

(10:01):
these these communist socialist type politicians talk about. And then
you have a lot of young people that are being
fed so much let's say, garbage in colleges and universities
that they believe it as well. In these these are
are supposed to be our young assets that are that
are well educated. But you know, listen, there's no such

(10:23):
thing as a free launch, folks. You can't give everything away.
Somebody's got to pay for it. And you can't keep
taxing the rich. You can only tax the rich for
so long. The rich are gonna leave. They're already flocking
out of New York in California and other states. They're
going to more let's say, tax from these states or

(10:45):
where the environment is pretty good. Listen, New York we're
paying for New York City. I told my investment guys
get out of our New York City UNI bonds. That
city could go bankrupt. That's that's the direction that it's going.
It was bankrupt once before, and it could go back

(11:06):
in that direction. And I don't want to have any
part of it. I don't want to be any part
of it. I used to love visiting these big cities.
I used to love to go to New York, you know,
at least once a month, stay overnight, or Chicago or
Seattle or San Francisco. Folks, you can't get me to

(11:27):
visit those cities. You can give me a free trip,
I'm not going. I'm just not going to those cities.
I don't have any any desire to go and feel
unsafe and so forth. But listen, you know, so, I
know it's long winded, you know, this past week with

(11:51):
the UK Prime Minister resigning, but you know, when I
see what's going on in New York City, it just
my head spins. I just I can't believe that people
truly buy into this, this talk of nonsense. Folks. From

(12:11):
my heart, I think like a Democrat, I want, I
want everybody to have something. I want everybody to be
taken care of, and I do I give back a lot.
I want to help those in need. So for my heart,
I want to give it all. And then I think

(12:31):
logically with my head, we got to pay for it,
and there's got to be a balance somewhere between providing
and paying for it. But you can't just give it,
give it all the way. So the UK Prime Minister
resign on Monday. We had a big sell off. You
had SpaceX down sixteen percent. Right now it's below it's

(12:52):
opening price. You know it did below. It's settled at
about one hundred and fifty three dollars. I think long
term SpaceX can be a good, good, good holding. I
actually bought some of my sandbox account this past week
and I'm hoping that it'll be a good long term
holding and I'm hoping it takes off like a rocket,

(13:13):
no pun intended, but at this level. And listen ed Wilhelm,
my one of my investment guys, he nailed that. He said,
anybody who wants to buy SpaceX should wait, it'll come down.
It's going to take off immediately, which a lot of
IPOs do they immediately go up. It looks like you

(13:35):
missed out on an opportunity. And then after a couple
of days, all of a sudden, they come retreating back
and SpaceX is no different. SpaceX came back and you
can buy it at a pretty good price. If you
feel you missed getting in on the IPO like so
many people did, you can buy it now and it's

(13:56):
like getting in at the IPO price. You had Micron
Technology quadrupled the revenue, and you know Apple raising prices.
So it was a crazy week. The SMP as I said,
down about two percent. Nansdack dropped about four point six percent.

(14:17):
Y're to date, you're to date, you have nansdack. The
overall composite is up about nine percent. But QQQ, that's
the nanstack one hundred. There's a difference, folks. In the
Nasdaq composite there's about three thousand stocks in the Nasdaq
one hundred, there's obviously only one hundred stocks, and the

(14:38):
QQQ you're to date up fifteen percent. That's not bad,
twice the average of the S and P. The S
and P is up about seven and a half percent.
Russell two thousand and is up about twenty one percent.
So QQQ, you know, even though it had a tough
week year to date, you know, it's been responsible for
a lot of our great returns. So QQQ is doing

(15:04):
what it's supposed to be doing when you're in a
growth like investment. And we explain this to our clients
all the time. We will have more volatility because we
are overweight technology and some of our core holdings, like QQQ,
they'll go up and they'll also fall harder than the
broad market. When the broad market falls, QQQ usually falls

(15:28):
a little little harder. So we prepare our clients. Our
clients know that there's volatility to be had because of
our style of investments. But I think long term, our
portfolios have been doing pretty pretty darned good. We're outperforming
the market as a whole, our equity sleep. That's something

(15:50):
that is hard to do, and I'm proud to say
we are doing it, and we're doing it in a
major way. I had a client in the other day.
This client started out with us with two million dollars.
The client has taken out of the portfolio since he's
been with US two million dollars and as we sit
here today, the portfolio is up valued to just shy

(16:14):
of four million dollars. And this client is a client that,
as he said, he says, I only come in onces
a year. I said, no, we like to see you doctor,
come on in, and he does. He only comes in
months a year. We never hear from him, and he
just lets us do our job. As he says, every
time he does come in, I want to be invested,

(16:35):
just like Steve is invested. So he's in our growth strategy,
and he's done well. And year to date, why the
S and P is up seven and a half percent,
his portfolio is up almost four percent, greater almost twelve percent.
His portfolio is up year to date. So he was
really happy. And as they said, he's in our growth strategy,

(16:57):
which is an eighty twenty mix, So he was really
happy that we're doing the job that we're doing for him,
and he's done. He's done pretty pretty well by letting
us do the job that we're supposed to do. And
as I said, he started out with two million dollars,
just over two million, and he's taken out just about

(17:21):
two million. His net contribution right now is about thirty
nine hundred dollars and his value the portfolio is four
million dollars, so he's done. He's done well. But clients
like that that allow us to do our job. We
don't get a lot of clients that panic. We don't
get a lot of clients that really get scared and

(17:43):
want us to, you know, be very defensive take money
out of the markets. We've educated our clients along the way.
We're always communicating with them, always pointing out the good,
the bad, and the ugly. And our our clients know
because if they're taking money out of their portfolio, we

(18:06):
keep one to two years worth of what they need
to live on off to the side in the conservative holding,
so our clients know that when, not if, when that
next correction, when that next bear market, when that next
recession comes and happens, our clients know they don't need
the panic. We have two years to keep managing that

(18:29):
portfolio in the way that we do. And I say
one to two years because we start out with two
years work and then we let it drip down and
we look for opportunities to replenish it. And Casey just
told me that he replenished all of our cash this
past week when the markets were at all time highs,
he said, Steve, I'm going to take advantage of the

(18:50):
markets again being at all time highs. I went in
and we replenished the cash that our clients need to
live on, and that's beautiful news. Clients know we do this,
and we do it whenever we need to do it,
so we protect our clients. Our clients know that their
retirement will not be affected by the next correction, the

(19:12):
next Bayer market when they see volatility. I've done my
best to teach our clients that we get a little
giddy when we see volatility and we take advantage of
some opportunities. This past week, we made some trades in
the portfolio. We got into an investment that we've been
wanting to get into, got out of one of our

(19:34):
let's say, worse investments. Well not worse because it's up
eighteen percent year to date, believe it or not, but
over time we feel there is a better mouse trap
for that value play. So we got out of what
we were in and got into a new one, and
we think that's going to be a good change for

(19:56):
our clients and hopefully hopefully it continues to do well.
As I said, you know, being up eighteen percent in
our value holding here to date. Why the SMP is
up seven and a half. That's that's not bad, folks.
One eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine
one eight hundred eighty two, five fifty nine forty nine.

(20:18):
If you have any questions, any questions whatsoever, give me
a call. I would love to talk to you about
anything that you want to talk about. We had some
sad news this week. You had former Fed Reserve Chairman
Alan Greenspan, who I think did a great job, passed
away at the age of one hundred. He was a

(20:40):
good man, one of the good guys at the Federal Reserve.
So Alan Greenspan passed away at the age of one hundred. Folks,
you are listening to Let's Talk Money Brook to you
by Bouchet and Andrew, where we help our clients prioritize
their health while we manage their wealth for life. Give
me a call. If you have any question, any questions whatsoever.

(21:02):
I would love to talk to you. We got a
lot of things to talk about. On the other side
of the news break. You got the big Jobs report
coming out on Thursday. It's usually Friday, but because Friday
is fourth of July. It'll be coming out on Thursday.
Actually fourth of July is actually on Saturday, but it's
being celebrated on Friday, so the Stock and Bob markets

(21:25):
are closed on Friday. One eight hundred eight two five
five nine four nine. One eight hundred eighty two five
fifty nine forty nine. I will be here through the news.
Give me a call with any questions you have. I'll
see you in a quick couple of minutes. Good morning,
and thank you folks for hanging in through the news,

(21:46):
and thank you for tuning in today. I hope I'm
able to help you, give you some things to think
about if you have any questions, any questions whatsoever. One
eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine is
that's the phone number, and Katie, my producer, would love
to get you up on the board so I can

(22:08):
take the call and answer your questions, any questions whatsoever.
One eight eighty five fifty nine forty nine. So I'm
going to our website because you heard that we are
going to be the premier sponsor for really an Amazing
Women in Wealth, which I am one hundred and ten
percent behind. It's on August twenty fifth, and I got

(22:33):
Harmony and Sam who really head up our Women in
Wealth series. We do seminars for women in Wealth throughout
the year, and this is going to be an all day,
all day, full day, starting at nine o'clock. There's going
to be several several parts of the day and as

(22:53):
I said, being the presenting sponsor, I'm proud to say that.
So if you go to our website right right on top,
in the little yellow bar, you'll see where you can
register and reserve your seat. It's going to probably be
a sold out event. It's going to be at the
up h the United Preservation Hall in Saratoga, which is

(23:13):
a beautiful, like really a beautiful venue. If you've never
been there, you'll you'll like it. We've had many events there.
During COVID we actually did our State of the Economy
where we had a film a piece we couldn't get
near people remember those days, boy they were Oh man,
We we like to wipe those days right from our

(23:36):
memory bank, don't we. Five four nine. So we talked
a little bit about, you know, the war in the
Middle East and that creates a lot of a lot
of volatility, but you know, the big the big news
of the week was was the sellouf It's you know,

(23:57):
technology has done so well outperform the broad stock market,
but it gave some back and it's still twice the
year to date return of the broad stock market. You know,
QQQ is up almost fifteen sixteen percent, while the SMP
is up seven and a half percent. And when a
sector becomes expensive, even good news can trigger profit taking.

(24:22):
You had treasure yields that were you know, I tell you, folks,
if you need income and you want to buy some bonds,
I love where the bonds are right now. I've been
saying this for a long time. You got the ten
year US Treasury, which is state tax free yielding almost

(24:45):
four point four percent, and you got the one year
yielding almost four percent. That's not bad, folks. And you
can ladder a portfolio of where you you know, maybe
buy a one year or two year, or three year,
of five year, a seven year or ten year, and
every time that one year matures, you buy a new

(25:07):
seven or ten year. And what will happen is you
will have every year something come and do and you
don't have to guess where interest rates are going. It's
just like an autopilot that is the absolute best way
to ladder up bond portfolio. So you have the one year,
as I say, yielding almost four percent, the two year

(25:30):
over four percent, and that ten years yielding four point
four percent almost and if you really want to go
out on the limb you have you have the thirty
year yielding almost five percent. The twenty year is yielding
almost five percent. I wouldn't be buying a twenty or
thirty year, but those are pretty attractive rates. You know,

(25:53):
we lived since the financial collapse of two thousand and
seven through March ninth of when interest rates were near zero.
So the begetting four point four to almost five percent yields.
That's not bad, folks. So I like bonds. I like
treasuries better than CDs because with CDs you have taxation

(26:18):
on the federal level and the state level. With US treasuries,
New York State tax free, New York State. You pay
a lot of taxes in New York State, so you
have New York State tax free. The other big news
this week bitcoin fell again. There's a lot of listeners

(26:40):
that own crypto, I'm sure or wish they bought it
years ago. Listen. Bitcoin has struggled as investors basically moved
away from risk assets. Obviously, bitcoin is considered a risk asset.
We own a little bit non portfolio, a little bit
we we thought we wanted to get in and have

(27:02):
it be a long term holding. So we'll be patient.
We'll watch it come down and hopefully go back up.
You know, it's right now about oh sixty thousand bitcoin
is about sixty thousand, Yeah, just over sixty thousand. It was.
It was about fifty six fifty seven thousand over the

(27:25):
last few days, but right now it's about sixty thousand,
creeping up to sixty one thousand and bitcoin. You know,
once again, is it a buying opportunity? Folks, I don't
have a crystal ball, although I guess I do have
a crystal ball. He's a client of mine has heard
me say on radio for years I don't have a
crystal ball, and gifted me a crystal ball, a true

(27:48):
crystal ball that was in her family. She brought it
in and it sits on my conference room in our
Saratoga office. So I guess in a way I do
have a crystal ball. But seriousness, I don't know if
bitcoin eighty thousand or forty thousand but we do own
a little bit of it. I own it in my

(28:10):
sandbox account as well my trading account. So I'm going
to be patient. I'm going to hold on to it.
We'll see what happens. Bitcoin's going to be part of
four HUM one K plans, and when that happens, you're
gonna have a lot of a lot of people that
will probably add to it. Is it digital gold or

(28:31):
just another speculative asset. That's up to you to answer.
You know, the price of gold, no pun intendant. But
as long as we're talking about digital gold, let's talk
about the real gold. We're just shy of forty one
hundred dollars an ounce. It's down about six percent year
to day. Now, remember the fifty two week high was

(28:52):
over fifty three hundred dollars an ounce, over fifty three
hundred dollars an ounce, but here we are down to
under forty one dollars an ounce four thousand and seventy eight.
So gold has fallen. And with the bad news with
the war in Iran, you would think that gold would
be higher than where it is. But if anything, you know,

(29:13):
it's funny, it's it's actually come down through all of
this conflict and gold is we don't own it. And
I said, we missed it because it went from two
thousand to five thousand, and it was a nice ride
for people that bought it. I would not be buying

(29:34):
it here. I think it could fall some more, but
I could be wrong. We'll readdress whether I'm right or
wrong in a few months. We'll we'll come back and
look at the price of gold. Now remind y'all. Let
you know, I don't mind telling you when when I
get something wrong, but I'm not a buyer of gold. Actually,
when it was about five thousand dollars an ounce, you
heard me say on the show that you shouldn't be

(29:56):
buying gold at these at these levels, if anything, you
should be selling it. And I did believe that. When
gold was five fifty one fifty two hundred dollars in ounce,
I felt that that was a pretty good, you know,
a good point to sell and take some profits. Especially

(30:17):
there's a lot of people that get scared, nervous nellies,
and they buy gold because they think gold is going
to be a good investment long term. A lot of
people buy gold out of fear and greed, and unfortunately,
you can't take gold into stewarts and give them a
little shaving of gold to buy milk and bread or

(30:38):
fill up your car with gas. You just can't do it.
So gold, there's no real industrial use for gold. A
lot of people buy gold, but especially in the Pacific Rim,
in the Asian countries, a lot of people buy gold
and they give it as gifts. There's a lot of
people that buy gold, especially in India, as jewelry. But

(31:01):
there's really no industrial use for gold. So with gold,
there has to be a buyer and there has to
be a seller. And that's how you negotiate the price
of gold. Buy sell in demand, supplying demand. That's how
gold is priced. So we're just under forty one dollars ounce,

(31:22):
and the high was not too long ago, about fifty
three fifty four hundred. We'll see what happens interest rates.
You know, so a month ago we were talking about cuts. Right,
the Fed cuts interest rates when they feel they need
to stimulate the economy, get the economy going well. Now,

(31:43):
inflation seems to be Listen, it's stubborn. It's higher than
the Fed wants it to be. You have a labor
market that's really really healthy. You will get the the
may or the June jobs report this coming Thursday, so
at eight thirty, lives will be focused on what that
number is. The FED is becoming more concerned about inflation

(32:06):
than slow in growth, and markets are now pricing in
a greater possibility of a rate increase before any more cuts.
So we could have a rate increase by the end
of the year. Bank of America I think is calling
for three increases. I'm not so sure we'll have three increases.
We may have one, but if inflation comes back to

(32:31):
you know where the Fed can can live with it,
maybe we won't have any hikes. So the Fed, as
I said, they cut rates when they need to stimulate
the economy, and then when recession or I'm sorry, when
inflation rears its ugly head and you have the price
of goods and services going up. Basically, be paid a

(32:53):
dollar for a loaf of bread, and a year from
now you're paying a dollar three. That means inflation went up,
you know, three percent, And over time, believe it or not,
inflation has been between three and three and a half percent.
That's the long term average rate of inflation. So the
FED has a target of two percent. I keep asking myself,

(33:15):
how and why does the FED have a target of
two percent? Inflation was never that low except after the
financial collapse that I just mentioned in the first half
of the show, when the stock market lost fifty percent
between October two thousand and seven and March of two
thousand and nine, the SMP was down just about fifty percent.

(33:36):
Talk about the world coming to an end, talk about
people wondering why they own any stocks whatsoever. That was
a time when people question themselves. And the worst thing
that people could have done was sell out of those investments,
is they thought they couldn't risk losing any more. Remember, folks,

(33:56):
the average swing in stocks over the land forty seven
years fourteen percent on average high to low Pete Dee
trough on average fourteen percent. That's how much the stock
market swings. You're in year out fourteen percent urine year out,
So you have and with the war this year in Iran,

(34:23):
the market was down less than ten percent. It was
like nine point six percent. I think at the low point.
The broad stock market in Decks Russell two thousand and
QQQ were down over ten percent, But the broad stock market,
the S and P five hundred was down less than
ten percent, and you know that's that wasn't bad. I

(34:45):
remember saying when when when when we went to war,
I thought the market was going to drop and drop hard,
but it hung in there pretty good. The market's pretty resilient,
and you have you know that labor market is really,
really a strong labor market. So we'll see what the
Fed does. Maybe maybe we'll get a hike, maybe we won't.

(35:09):
Nobody knows. I would if I were a betting man,
I'm going to be optimistic and say no hikes, no
cuts for the rest of the year. But right now
it looks as though the Fed may and will hike
interest rates at least once. We'll see what happens. And
when that happens, folks, you're going to see the stock

(35:30):
market go down. And does a quarter point hike really
matter to your financial life? No, no, no it doesn't.
So if the Fed does hike interest rates, and if
the stock market becomes a little volatile, don't go selling.
Whatever you do, don't go selling. So here we are

(35:53):
is you know, is this a buying opportunity? Corrections are normal.
Every correction feels worse when you're living through it. Is
harmony in my office, said about four years ago, investors,
whenever there's a correction or worse a bear market, investors

(36:14):
feel the world's coming to an end. And guess what,
the world hasn't come to an end yet. And after
every correction, guess what, the market continues continues to go
on and make new all time highs. Isn't that funny?
So when you see a correction or worse a bear market, listen,

(36:36):
they could be buying opportunities. And you know, NAZAC being
down almost five percent this week, who knows, maybe this
coming we could be down another five percent. But I
do love technology. I'm behind those companies. I'm behind the
mag seven who have been really beaten up, companies like Microsoft.

(36:58):
You know, Apple took it on the gin this week
because they're raising prices because the price of chips are
up and they can't absorb those higher cost chips anymore,
so they're passing it on to the consumer and they're
basically they came out raising the price of their computers
and their iPads by one hundred and two hundred dollars

(37:21):
depending on which model. So you know, when we get
that quarter point hike, if we get that quarter point hike,
don't don't fret over and it may create more of
a buying opportunity. And historically, listen, investors who are disciplined

(37:42):
have been rewarded for staying invested rather than trying to
time the markets. It's impossible to time the markets. As
they said on the first half of the show, the
average return in the broad stock market index over the
last fifteen years is about fifteen percent a year, year in,

(38:04):
year out, no matter whether there's good news bad news,
it doesn't matter. The average return year in year out
is about fifteen percent QQQ almost twenty percent. And for
people that want to buy bonds, if you look at
the I Shares Core US Aggregate Bond ETF, that's really

(38:25):
I call it the benchmark for bonds. It's really the
bond index. It's like the S and P five hundred
index represents for the most part, the stock market. Your
average return over fifteen years two point two percent, and
it's you know, bonds over the last eleven years have
been down two years, and ironically, stocks over the last

(38:49):
eleven years have been down two years in that eleven
year time period. So there you have it. Bonds can
be bound, little stocks can be by a little. Real
estate can be bond everything can be volatile. The key is, folks,
if you're a long term investor in your discipline, stay
the course, use bouts of volatility to maybe re deploy

(39:14):
some assets. Maybe you're too conservative. When you see volatility,
that's a good time to take advantage of the growth
or like what we did this past week, if you
need to raise cash and markets are at or near
all time highs, that's a beautiful time to raise cash
and have it on the sidelines. Anybody who's living off

(39:36):
of their their portfolio should have one to two years
worth of cash so that you're not taking too much risk.
And if you have one to two years worth of
cash of what you need when that next out of
volatility comes, when that next correction, whether the markets are
down to five percent, ten fifteen, twenty percent, whatever they're down,

(40:01):
if you have one to two years worth of what
you need to live on on the sidelines, then you're
not going to you're not going to lose your mind.
You're not going to make irrational decisions because you're you're
thinking with your heart. You're going to be thinking logically
with your with with with your head. Thinking rationally and

(40:24):
doing what good longtime investors do. Stay the course, Do
not get crazy. You want to stay the course when
you see volatility, if anything, take advantage of that volatility reposition,
like we do some of our holdings. We look for

(40:45):
opportunities to get into holdings. That's what volatility is all about.
One eight hundred eighty two five five nine four nine.
One eight hundred eighty two five fifty nine forty nine.
Let me take a quick fifteen second break, folks, don't
go anywhere. Hello, folks, thank you for letting me take
that quick break. One eight eighty two five five nine

(41:08):
four nine. So a lot of you know, if you're
nearing retirement, folks, you're probably asking yourself, do you take
social Security at sixty four? Do you wait till age seventy?
It all depends. You could start taking at age sixty two.
If you're still working, you're going to be taxed on it.
It's not always. If you're still working, it's usually not

(41:32):
a good time to take social security because you're giving
back and the longer you wait, the more you'll get
with social security. So you don't want to take it
too soon, especially if you plan on living a long,
long life. If you're living past the mid to late seventies,
well you're better off the weight taking social Security because

(41:54):
you're going to get a bigger payout than taking it sooner.
And age seventy is the absolute last year. You want
to wait till because if you and we had a client,
We had a client who was a doctor, very very
very bright individual, and we kept telling him, doctor, you

(42:15):
got to take your Social Security and he was busy,
he was still working. He never got around the taking
and he was earning an income, and every year that
he didn't take it was a wasted year. Social Security
doesn't pay you like if you wait till age seventy two.
It doesn't give you those two years that you missed

(42:35):
lost money. Kiss it goodbye, see you later, alligator. It's
you know, so age seventies the last year and if
you know, if you really know, you're going to live
in qir eighties and nineties, waiting makes sense. Now. Some people, unfortunately,

(42:57):
don't have that long life expectancy, so it's a gamble.
It all depends what you need, how you want it.
I tell the story. You know, it's just over two
years that I lost my wife Sue, and I'm a
financial planner, so you know, she kept asking, hey, let
me take social Security, and I'd say, Sue, it makes

(43:19):
sense for us to wait before you take social Security. No,
I just want, you know, social Security. I want a
little paycheck. And you know, I thought logically with my
head as a certified financial planner, that it was better
to wait and not take it sooner. And basically, you know,

(43:41):
she passed away, and to this day I feel bad.
So I have a different different viewpoint now when social Security.
When people ask me when should I take Social Security?
I give them the good, the bad, and the ugly.
I give them. You know, professionally we lay it out
for our clients. We let them know just when when

(44:04):
they could take it, when they should take it. But
on a personal level, I tell the story about Sue.
And you know, if you want to, if you want
to have a little play money, that's what social security is.
It's okay to take it sooner because you never know.

(44:24):
You know, you really don't get rewarded bye bye by
not taking social Security. If you die prematurely, you know
it's it's done. Social Security is done. How much money
do you need to retire comfortably today? Well, you got

(44:49):
healthcare qualits, inflation, longevity, travel, grandchildren, taxes. You get the picture.
There's so much to think about. In the end of
the show. Coming up, you are listening to Let's Talk Money,
brought to you by Bouchet and the Introup, where we
help our clients prioritize their health while we manage their
wealth for life. Folks, go to our website Bouchet dot com,

(45:12):
Let's be as envoy O U. C H E Y
dot com. A lot of good information there, a lot
of good topics and white papers. In the meantime, enjoy today,
come back tomorrow. I'll see you tomorrow morning, eight am.
Bye bye.