December 4, 2025 • 39 mins
Chuck Zodda and Mike Armstrong explain why Friday is not a make or break day for the stock market. Ted Rossman (Bankrate) joins the show to share the results of a recent holiday tipping survey. Three year-end strategies that can cut your 2025 tax bill. Rising holiday scams to be aware of. Weight loss drugs for cats?
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
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(01:07):
Zada and Mike Armstraw.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Chuck Mike Zucker with the today and as we kick
things off, we got a little bit of right on
the board. But let's not all freak out about it.
The SMP's down thirteen points about a quarter percent. Dow
is off twelve points. It's not even a tenth of
a percent. The NASDAK composite is off sixty three points
(01:35):
about a quarter percent. Again, just not not anything of note.
I don't think there's anything huge moving in markets right now.
Tenure Treasury is up four point four basis points to
four point one pH two percent. Dollar Index down another
point oh four percent to ninety eight point seven to six.
We got gold up four to thirty and ounce to
forty two thirty six and eighty cents. Crude oil is
(01:59):
uh see, where's that puppy today? Fifty nine to fifty
a barrel, up fifty six cents a barrel. I will
point out, by the way, I don't know, Mike, have
you been paying attention to what's been going on on
the net gas front recently?
Speaker 1 (02:15):
No?
Speaker 2 (02:17):
So that gas yesterday clear the five dollars per million
BTUs for the first time since twenty twenty two. To
put this in perspective, at this time last year that
gas was trading at about three ten and so at
five it's up sixty six percent in the span of
(02:39):
a year, most of this in the last month or so.
Why this matters if it were to stay in this range, Mike,
what is the single heaviest input for power generation in
the United States?
Speaker 3 (02:51):
That gas?
Speaker 2 (02:53):
So those of you hoping for lower electricity prices next year,
if this price stays where it is could get a
little bit of a it might not be very good
for us on the electricity price side if net gas
prices stay in this five dollar range. I have no
idea if they will or won't. Ultimately, net gas prices
(03:13):
are a function of how much do you produce, largely
through fracking and things like that, which again, new wells
are declining right now because with oil prices so low,
you don't have an incentive to drill for oil, and
most net gas produced in the US is a byproduct
of fracking and things like that. The other piece is
(03:34):
the demand side, Mike. Do you know how cold it's
going to be this winter? Very well? Like relative to No,
I have no idea. No, no, I'm not a weatherman.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
You know it's it's not Even if you were, I
don't think you would know how cold the weather is
going to be this.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Listen, let's not disparage our weather friends.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
I'm not disparaging They don't know what the weather is
going to be three months from now.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
They do, They probably don't even they say they don't.
But again, what weather wethermenu an Economists share an awful
lot because we're trying to make forecast based on imperfect
data that's always changing. And so I always defend our
brethren in meteorology because they've got a tough job.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
It's not easy.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
So in any case, you got mat gas prices that
are moving up here, and that bear is watching just
in the event that they stay in this range. Okay, Barons,
I love the Tucker really puts this in. He just knows,
he just knows it's going to get a rise out
of me. Why Friday is make or break for the
(04:34):
stock market? Was this one of my festivest And in
the first two sentences, the stock market isn't really doing
much of anything. Now Friday will set its true direction. Uh,
why the heck does Friday matter for the stock market?
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Oh? Also expect big moves in all of these stocks
on Friday.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Ooh, I'm intrigued. Tell me more, Michael. Why why is Friday?
Which Friday's to it is?
Speaker 3 (05:01):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Why is December fifth the most important day of the
year for the stock market?
Speaker 3 (05:05):
First of all, it is not, oh, very clearly not
important to day for the stock market. You will have
an inflation reading. Oh, is probably going to surprise nobody.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Is it like new inflation data?
Speaker 3 (05:20):
No, it's old.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
When's it from Mike? Uh?
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Like September?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Oh, it's Is anyone going to make any investment decisions
based on September inflation data?
Speaker 3 (05:30):
No?
Speaker 2 (05:31):
No, no, So it's useless. Like I just I really
struggle with uh with pieces like this again, that just
I don't think even accurately capture you know, whether this
inflation reading is important or not, which the answer is,
it's not.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
Like I haven't read much worse clickbait this week. This
might be clickbait of the week.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
What inflation was three months ago is not relevant to
Fed policy today. It is not going to have an
impact on the FED meeting next week. And that's all
I have to.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Say about that. What has to happen in markets for
this story to be proven true tomorrow, I would say
to you that you need to have a greater than
one and a half percent swing in equity markets one
direction or another tomorrow for this story to be even
close to the truth.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
I mean, let's.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
With no other announcements, right.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I don't think it's going to be related to inflation. Yeah,
and here's why, Like you look at, here's the thing
about PCE inflation. All right, I'm gonna tell everyone the
truth about pc inflation.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
So huddle up, Okay.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Everyone knows what PCE inflation is going to be before
it's released. And it's not because anyone has any inside information.
It's because all of the big investment banks in their
inflation teams have gotten so good at extrapolating the inputs
from CPI and PPI that we know basically within like
(07:09):
a couple hundredths of a percentage point where the PCE
reading is going to come in. It doesn't surprise anyone
when it's released anymore because the banks have all gotten
really good at predicting it. And so even though PCE
is the Fed's preferred measure of inflation, all other inflation
(07:29):
measures are just sparkling inflation. They're not the Champagne of inflation.
Even though the PCE is the Fed's preferred inflation method,
it's not something that investors get surprised by at this
point because they've gotten so good at predicting it. It's
one of the least exciting reports released every month.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Yeah, this is going to surprise nobody, and if markets
move tomorrow won't be because of it.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
No. No, the only way that you could get, you know,
the market moving, is if there was a huge surprise,
but there just aren't. Like it's you're not gonna get
inflation printing like six percent for the month or negative
two percent for the month.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
So yeah, I I appreciate Tucker getting this in there
because it's, uh, it's it's nice to see him, you know,
doing what's important, just calling out clickbait. It is well
and it gets us excited too.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
It does chuck in the first time. We were talking
about the job market and I want to return there.
We got a weekly job as claims number that showed
at least last week, there weren't a whole lot of
new filings for unemployment, but we described the labor market
as generally weak and no matter which way you measure it.
The unemployment rate is up over the last three years,
the pace of hiring is down, the ratio of unemployed
(08:49):
job openings is not as strong as it was a
few years ago. So we concluded that's the case. We
also called some data from Challenger Gray and Christmas quote crap,
which I'm sure we'll take some crap. Can we explain
why we feel this way because Challenger, Gray and Christmas
is reporting that the layoff announcements in twenty twenty five
are the worst we've seen since twenty twenty and on
(09:10):
the surface, that would make me really scared about my job.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
So here's why I believe that the numbers from Challenger,
Gray and Christmas are crap. It's not because they actually
have bad data. They have good data. I'm sure they collect,
you know, really good data on layoff announcements. The piece
that was on CNBC this morning said it was something
along the lines of, hey, there have been you know,
(09:36):
one point one million announced layoffs this year. It's the
highest since year whatever. So like you get the headlines
that come out off of it, Mike, in a given month,
there are more than a million layoffs in the United States,
Like they're just there are, Like, if you look at it,
there's one hundred and sixty million people employed in the
United States right now, and when we look at the
(09:59):
level of labor turnover, okay, and specifically, I'm going to
pull the data right from the Job Openings and Labor
Turnover Survey Report, the JOLTS Report, which we get each
month from the federal government, and what the JOLTS rate says,
the JOLTS rate for layoffs, I'm looking at it right here.
It's not quits, it's not hires. It's specifically, is us
(10:20):
layoffs and discharges. It's one point one percent, which means
that in a population of one hundred and sixty million people,
you are having about one point seven million layoffs and
discharges on a monthly basis. The one point one million
in announced layoffs that are captured by Challenger, Gray and Christmas.
(10:42):
If we were to believe that this has some extrapolation value, okay,
then what you would see is, oh, because these you know,
announced layoffs have gone up, layoffs across the broader employment
market must have gone up as well. And in fact,
that's not what we're seeing because when we actually look
at the layoffs and discharges rate. It's been basically at
(11:04):
one point one percent for the last four and a
half years now, since March of twenty one. That's why
I call that data crap is because it's not predictive
in any way, shape or form to the actual larger,
broader data that is both measured on a regular basis
(11:26):
and then used to inform policy, Like the Federal Reserve
does not look at the Challenger, Gray and Christmas data
because it's useless.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
It's useful if your company happens to make a layoff
announcement and you missed it. Other than that, I don't
find it useful.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Which again, if you missed it, it means that you're
still employed, right because like you know, so, I just
I don't think there's a viable signal there. Historically it
does have a correlation with continuing unemployment claims, but even
(12:06):
there it's it's like tenuous and bestil like not every
cycle sees it through. It's it's not a one to
one thing. There's a divergence in a number of business cycles.
And so it's just not predictive of the actual economic
data that's used to make policy. And so that's why
I call it crap. It's not because, like Challenger Grand
Christmas is doing a bad job collecting or publishing it.
(12:29):
It's just that it's not useful in markets economic forecasting.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
All right, there's our rant of the day, quick break,
Ted Rossman from Bankreage joining us for holiday tipping. Next,
out of Financial Exchange.
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Speaker 2 (13:58):
Now joined by Ted Assman from bankut here to talk
about their twenty twenty five holiday tipping survey ted. How
are you today?
Speaker 6 (14:07):
Doing well?
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Good to be here, Ted, What kind of feelings do
Americans have about tipping this holiday season?
Speaker 6 (14:13):
In general, people are pretty fed up with tipping. We
see about six and ten Americans have a negative view
towards the practice. A lot of people are just annoyed
about those pre entered tip screens at coffee shops and elsewhere,
and just the constant invitations to tip. Now, specific to
the holidays, people actually feel a bit more generous and
(14:34):
they kind of separate some of that annoyance. The holiday
tip tends to be more of a once a year's
show of appreciation for service. Workers in our lives, like
housekeepers and babysitters and people like that. We found that
the frequency of tipping is down a little bit, but
the amounts that people are giving are holding steady or
even increasing a little bit. That feels like further evidence
(14:56):
of the K shaped economy. Basically, higher earners are propping
up the overall numbers.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
When you look at how things compare to you know,
kind of prior years. Are there any specific areas where
we might be seeing some differences compared to you know,
the last two or three years, or is it basically
you know the same in most key areas.
Speaker 6 (15:20):
There are some interesting and somewhat conflicting kind of trends
here because, on one hand, among the things we asked about,
which I should say, were housekeepers, childcare providers, landscapers, teachers,
mail carriers, and trash collectors. In those six categories, in
every single one, fewer people are tipping this year than
(15:41):
they did last year. So that's not a great thing.
But if we zoom out a little bit, in all
these categories, except for one which was flat, which was
male carriers, the other five more people are tipping now
than we're back in twenty twenty one, so it's like
the long term trend is better than the short term one.
The amount are interesting as well. The amounts have actually
(16:03):
been quite steady the past few years, and generally speaking,
we're talking somewhere between twenty and fifty dollars per service provider,
depending on the category. The median was highest for housekeepers
and landscapers, that was fifty dollars a person. Childcare provider
was closed, and then it was quite a bit lower
for mail carriers twenty bugs, teachers twenty five, trash reom
(16:26):
recycling collectors twenty five. Those actually really have not changed
that much year over year or even in the last
five years. A couple of the categories went up a
little bit over five years, that would be landscapers and
trashroom recycling collectors. But for the most part it's actually
been a little more stable than year round tipping. We've
(16:46):
actually seen a more steady decline in the year round tips,
Like people are tipping worse at restaurants, they're tipping worse
at hair salons. Holiday tipping is kind of holding its own.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
What about demographically, any demograph differences that you've seen.
Speaker 6 (17:02):
Generally speaking, older people are better tippers, higher income people
are definitely better tippers. That often goes hand in hand.
Men are interesting because men are kind of boom or
bus tippers, like they're more likely to give a good
tip and they're more likely to give nothing at all.
Women are more consistent, even if the amounts tend to
be a little bit lower. We're painting with a fairly
(17:24):
broad brush here, but sure, in general, a lot of
young people don't like the whole tip and culture. A
lot of gen Zers in particular kind of pushback on
some of it from a social justice standpoint, and it's like, well,
it's not fair, we shouldn't be doing this. If you
work in a restaurant and you get a table of
gen z s, statistically they're going to be the worst tippers.
(17:47):
I would say, though, that fighting the tipping culture is hard,
especially nowadays, because it's just everywhere. It's the coffee shop,
it's the shoe truck. And I was asked to tip
at a self checkout machine at Newark Airport, asked for
tips in more places, and a lot of people resent that.
But if you don't tip, I'm not saying you need
to tip in all those situations, but like, if you
(18:07):
don't tip at a restaurant, or you don't tip the
food delivery person, or you don't tip the rideshare driver
or your hairstylist, they're really missing out. I do think
around the holidays though, people are tipping more out of generosity,
and they're tipping more generously when they really know the person.
If it's a housekeeper in your home every week, or
a regular babysitter or nanny, they're gonna get a better
(18:30):
tip than the mail carrier or the trash collector that
you might just not see as much.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Very good, Ted, appreciate you joining us today. Thank you
for sharing the results of your tipping survey with us anytime.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
That is Ted Rossman from bank Rade talking about tipping.
Speaker 5 (18:49):
All right, we'll do trivia quick here on the Financial Exchange.
On this day in nineteen eighty eight, Roy Orbison performed
his final concert. Orbison sadly passed away two days after
a heart attack. At the time of his death, Orbison
was a member of a supergroup with George Harrison, Bob Dylan,
Tom Petty and Jeff Lynn. So trivia question today, what
was the name of the supergroup that featured Roy Orbison?
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Once again?
Speaker 5 (19:10):
What was the name of the supergroup that featured Roy Orbison.
Be the sixth person today to text us at six
one seven three six two thirteen eighty five with the
correct answer along with the keyword trivia and win a
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(19:33):
will win that T shirt. See complete contest rules at
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Speaker 2 (19:38):
Taking a look at markets as we head towards the
bottom of the hour. Basically all three major US indities
down about a tenth of a percent, not much movement
in either direction. A pretty boring day to this point
in equity markets, Bob markets getting a little bit more
exciting again, yields continuing to rise there, but uh again,
(19:58):
equities not really moving too much. Quick break here when
we return, we got the trivia answer at Wall Street.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Watch, bringing the latest financial news straight to your radio
every day. It's the Financial Exchange on the Financial Exchange
Radio Network. Time now for Wall Street Watch. A complete
(20:25):
look at what's moving market so far today right here
on the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
Speaker 5 (20:30):
Pretty quiet day on Wall Street to this point as
investors sift through weekly jobless claims data and ready for
the core PC index for the latest look in inflation,
due out tomorrow morning. Right now, the Dow is down
merely a tenth of a percent, or fifty points lower.
SMP five hundred is dipping five points. NASDAC also off
(20:50):
by only five points. Russ In two thousand is up
two thirds of a percent. Ten You're Treasure reeled up
four basis points at four point one zero four percent,
and crude oil up just over one percent higher, trading
a fifty nine dollars and sixty three cents a barrel.
Breaking news from Beta this morning, following reports that Mark
Zuckerberg is expected to meaningfully cut resources for building the Metaverse,
(21:16):
potentially with budget cuts as high as thirty percent next year.
MetaStock is climbing about four percent. Meanwhile, salesforce rising over
two percent higher after the software company hiked its full
year of guidance as its AI product agent force gained
some traction. As for its third quarter, the company beat
earnings forecast, but just missed expectations for its revenue. Elsewhere,
(21:39):
a cloud software company Snowflake posted at narrow a narrow
quarterly loss and reported growing demand for its AI agent. However,
its outlook for product revenue growth for the January quarter disappointed. Additionally,
Snowflake agreed to a two hundred million dollars deal with
AI startup in Thropic. Snowflake shares now down eleven percent
(22:01):
and Dollar General shares a jumping ten percent higher after
the discount retailer lifted its full year guidance after topping
third quarter expectations. I'm Tucker Silva and that is Wall
Street Watch. And last segment, we asked the trivia question
what was the name of the super group that featured
Roy Orbison. That would be the Traveling Willberry's Phil from Plastow,
(22:24):
New Hampshire is our winner today taking home a Financial
Exchange Show T shirt. And we played trivia every day
here in the Financial Exchange See complete contest rules at
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Speaker 2 (22:36):
Mike, we got a piece in the Wall Street Journal
three year end tax strategies that can cut your twenty
twenty five tax bill. That sounds fun.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
Yeah, you know these are not to be dismissed. You
know there is still time to max out your retirement
plan hypothetically. You know, I don't know how many pay
periods are left, but you can jack up that tech
no salary contracts, mission ray pretty much. Yeah, you got
to leave enough in there to pay for your benefits,
but you could bump that up as high as it
can go. Obviously, charitable giving just understand you know the
(23:06):
limitations on how much you can deduct and where that's
going to come from, and you know how it's actually
going to affect your taxes before you do it. Tax
losses good luck. I mean, unless you bought crypto like
a month and a half ago, I don't know where
you're going to find your tax losses in your portfolio,
but maybe a.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
Lot of the S and P five hundred if you're
a buyer of chargeable companies, yeah you can find some each.
S and P five hundred stock is not near its
all time high right now, despite the index being there.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
So the other side of this, though, that I like
to talk about, is people always focus on, hey, how
can I minimize this year's tax bill? And there's something
to be said for that, but far too often they
do so at the risk of paying a whole boatload
of taxes in the not so distant future. Right how
many people have you talked to who retire and they're like, oh,
(23:57):
it's been great, I've paid no taxes the last three years.
And then you just kind of you don't giggle because
that's mean, but you look at you like, that sounds great,
But you're going to pay like an average effective tax
rate of twenty seven percent now for the rest of
your life because you didn't do the planning that you
should have. And so when looking at minimizing taxes, it
(24:18):
is not a year to year plan that you should
be doing. It is not a hey, how do I
minimize my taxes this year? You need to be thinking
about how do you minimize your taxes over a lifetime.
Otherwise it's quite honestly, just a useless exercise. I can't
tell you the number of people that just fell into
that exact scenario I talked about. I remember meeting with
(24:39):
somebody that was turning seventy that year and you told
me I have paid zero dollars in taxes for the
last decade. And I had to walk through and them like, yeah,
at that point in time, you required minimums started at
seventy and a half and I had to break the
news like, yeah, that's great, but now you are going
to be paying right choose its plus federal taxes on
(25:02):
this massive required minimum distribution that you should have been
spreading out. Tax planning is a critical part of financial
planning at just about every stage of life. If you
have questions about how you can integrate that into your
overall plan, if you're not doing it today, learn more
by calling Armstrong Advisory at eight hundred three nine three
(25:24):
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chat with us at Armstrong Advisory dot com. But again,
nobody enjoys paying taxes, but believe it or not, there
can be good reasons to do so preemptively and prepay
what you might owe in the future. Call Armstrong Advisory
eight hundred three nine three for zero zero one.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
The proceeding was paid for by Armstrong Advisory Group, a
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Armstrong guide a specific financial, legal or tax advice. Consult
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advisory services.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Mike, I wanted to do little holiday scam warning. If
that's cool, sure and specifically ones here that are you
know more, you know, unique to this time of year.
Bunch them out there. In terms of text messages saying
that you have a package that's delayed, click this link
to reschedule your delivery.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Get those every day.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Never ever do that. Wherever you ordered from, pull up
the original order email that you received from the merchant,
whether it is Amazon, whether it is you know, Gym's
Taco Kit Construction, whatever, whoever it might be.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Yeah, Gim's Taco Construction is a major organization these days.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
It's a good one.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
In any case, go find the original email, find either
the customer service number on it or the customer service
email on it, and reach out through that method, not
the person who just texts you, because there's like a
ninety eight percent that it's a scam.
Speaker 3 (27:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
Occasionally those are real, which is confusing. And again I
always check these, and I occasionally find one that is
real and you're like, oh, that's weird. I wouldn't have
expected it. But in any case, most of the time
scam other ones. If you see an ad while you're
on the website that says like, hey, ninety percent off
(27:23):
sale going on, be very careful that you are actually
clicking on a legitimate ad and not one taking you
to a scam website. Even on legitimate sites, there are
illegitimate ads. Is that the right word?
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Yeah, So like you can be on Facebook and click
an ad and think you're going to see like Williams
Sonoma and you're actually going to like Williams No Money More,
and like that's the name of the website, but you're
not paying attention to the address and then it you know,
they basically take your credit card and stuff.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
Where I'm seeing AI get implemented in this, I know
we've you know, warned about what's coming, which I think
eventually is voice replication on phone calls and scary stuff
like that. I haven't seen a lot of that firsthand yet,
but where I am seeing a ton of it. AI
is clearly scraping business websites and putting together scam emails
based on what they find on your company's website. So, hey,
(28:15):
you've got these thirteen employees, Great, I'm going to spam
all of them, and AI is going to create an
email that looks and sounds like it's coming from your
CEO and is in fact nothing of the sort. Where
I think that goes next is probably AI sorting through
social media and trying to build good, successful scams based
on what's happening on your Facebook and Instagram profile. But
(28:39):
we're not, from what I can tell, quite there yet.
But yeah, if you are still working today and your
website or your email address is out there, yeah, be
prepared for those scamm emails to come in that way,
you know what?
Speaker 2 (28:54):
You know? What's one I actually got that recently was real.
So I woke up one morning and I have a
trip scheduled in like March of next year that I'm
staying in an Airbnb. I got a text message saying
your Airbnb's been canceled. Click here to reschedule. And immediately
I'm just like, no, not not real. I pull up
the airbnb website and it's like, oh, your trip's been canceled,
(29:16):
like click here to try to reschedule. Because A I
didn't know that a host could actually cancel your trip
right like they can just do that. I guess didn't know.
I figured like, once you booked, you were good. Turned
out that the host actually decided to sell their property
and so they canceled like everything. But I saw the
(29:37):
text message and it was just literally it didn't say
like from Airbnb or anything. It was just your trip's
been canceled. Click here. And then I saw like I
had an email. Also, I was like, okay, like something
might actually be up. Let's go check, and it was.
But it didn't come across in a particularly professional manner,
you know. So I found that kind of interesting. But
(29:58):
most of the time, my asumption as it's a scam.
Let's take a quick break when we come back. Stack Roulette.
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Speaker 2 (31:25):
Mike, what do you got for stack Roulette?
Speaker 3 (31:27):
Fat cats? Uh ah, That's what I'm That's what I'm
going with. I sent this story to my to my
wife about our own cat, who is not nearly as
cat fat as this picture of a cat on this
on this story. But the drug industry is testing out
(31:48):
GLP one implants for cats, which I'm just kind of
confused about how we test drugs these days. To start with, like,
isn't it usually you test it on animals first, see
how it goes, and then like, oh, yeah, it worked
fairly well in rodents, Let's try it on a cat.
Or a dog or a chimpanzee. Oh yeah, I worked
pretty well there, let's test it on humans. We seem
(32:08):
to have rolled it out to humans and now we're
going back to cats on this one. So little confusing. Also,
with my pets, at least I feed them, and so
if I'm worried about them gaining weight, Like I get
how this is different with a human being, with you
more control over their independence. But my animals, we determine
(32:32):
how much food they get, and so if they become
too fat, rather than putting them on one thousand dollars
a month GLP one drug, I'd probably just cut some
of their food. Am I missing something new?
Speaker 5 (32:46):
Uh?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
I know you can't make your dog or cat exercise necessarily,
but well, what are we trying to do here? Make
our cats sexier? Like?
Speaker 2 (33:00):
What are we trying to do here? This is a
solution in search of a problem. It's like, let's just
call it what it is. It's a solution in search
of a problem. Yeah, you do not need to o
zempic fi your cat? Okay, right, you do not need
cat zempic or what's the other one?
Speaker 6 (33:21):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (33:21):
Look at its cheekbones?
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Right?
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Like? What? Oh?
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Your dog's canines are really prominent now, like I mean, like, guys,
I'm sorry, we've gone too far. I mean, look, we
knew the pendulum had to swing back from a couple
of years ago when Bloomberg told us to let your
pets die. But now we've gone too far in that
you don't need to give glp ones to your pet.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
It's really expensive.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
There's a nice middle ground there where you take your
pet to the vet, you feed them, you play with them,
and you do all those nice things that you're supposed
to do. And that's where we need to get to.
Not hey, my my cat's one pound overweight. Should I
use ozembic?
Speaker 3 (34:06):
Can you imagine?
Speaker 2 (34:08):
I mean, like, who looks at I gotta be honest,
who looks at an animal? And it's just like no, no,
you need you need to lose weight. I'm gonna like, yeah,
I again. We all have like pets in our lives
that occasionally like look a little chunkier, look a little you.
Speaker 3 (34:27):
Know, dinner. I know that we all treat our pets
like as family members, and weight issues can cause earth
problems like early death, and pets like they can't use
their joints anymore, and they die early. But again, the
easy solution to that is forced your pet to lose
weight because it's not a human being. We don't most
(34:51):
of us. Most of us with pets are not to
McDonald's at midnight, right, We're.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
Not sending them out into the fields to like hunt
for their dinner. That's not how most of us work with.
Speaker 3 (35:01):
And if it were, it would be not overweight anymore
because it would be hunting its own dinner.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
So I gotta say, this is a real problem here,
that that this is even being talked about. I don't.
Speaker 3 (35:14):
I don't think it's a problem. I think it's very
funny text V. That's fantastic. I just uh, And.
Speaker 2 (35:27):
Don't get me wrong, Like we do use human medications
on pets on a regular basis.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
Sure, I have cat, cat has uh has diabetes. They
have to give it a shot of her day.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
I have a family member whose dog has seizures and
there's no dog specific seizure medications, so they the vet
prescribes human medication for that. You know, it's but like
that's a specific problem that you're trying to deal with,
not Hey, my my pets a little overweight. Do you
think we need to start giving it shots once a month.
Speaker 3 (35:57):
Oh man, I gotta drop my my animal health insurance
because if this stuff starts getting covered, it's gonna be
going through the roof.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Oh. I mean, it's just it's my my goodness, I
don't even know you know where to where to start
on this? Here? Another one here, This one from Bloomberg.
Tired Americans are spending more just to avoid chores. So
apparently ge has come out with what I do think
is kind of like the Holy Grail. It's kind of cool.
(36:24):
It's a washer dryer combo that you don't have to
like move things. Finally, the problem is that it costs
two thousand dollars to get it all into one unit
instead of you know, like twelve hundred dollars if you
just put them side by side. So the question is,
you know, over the eight to ten year lifespan of
(36:45):
a new washer dryer, is it worth it to you
to spend an extra one hundred dollars a year to
not have to move damp laundry from one side to
the other.
Speaker 5 (36:56):
Well, to play Devil's advocate, it could be a space
saving maneuver too.
Speaker 3 (37:00):
I like it, you know, this story like was trying
to mock people who are buying these expensive products that
make their lives easier. Some of them are silly, yes, absolutely,
like the closet that steams your clothes, Like, yeah, that
seems pretty silly, but have you ever.
Speaker 2 (37:17):
Steamed a single clothes, not let alone multiple clothes?
Speaker 3 (37:21):
Isn't this like the entire purpose of technology and innovation
is to make our lives easier. Now, some are gonna
be dumb, like a steaming clothes closet.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Do you remember the smart toilets from a couple of
years ago that would like read your bowel movements and
tell you what to eat?
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Yeah? So, uh not all of these are gonna be.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
If your cat's been eaten mice that have been you know,
in your laundry.
Speaker 3 (37:50):
Yeah, so some of these are dumb, But I don't
think we should just mock a you know, washer dryer
combo for two grand, Like that's not that ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
Some of them are okay. Some of them are you know,
a little you know, like do you need to buy
an oven with a specialized pizza setting in it? Or
can you just turn your regular oven up really high
with a twenty dollars pizza stone in it. What makes
it special?
Speaker 3 (38:18):
Well, I mean, a pizza oven is like a thousand degrees.
I don't think my oven gets that.
Speaker 5 (38:22):
Well, now you can cook a pizza, a good pizza.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Yeah, yeah, oh yeah, you can do a great or
just turn the broiler on, put it the top rack
and you're good.
Speaker 3 (38:30):
I don't make pizza. This is the easiest thing to
do take out.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
For And there you go, ladies and gentlemen, there you go.
I don't know what we're saying that about, but in
any case, let's take a quick break until tomorrow, so
you know, take the day for the most important day. Mark,
get yourself settled, do your laundry moved from the washer
to the dryer, and we'll see you tomorrow on the
financial exchange.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
Four
The Financial Exchange is produced by Money Matters Radio and
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(01:07):
Zada and Mike Armstraw.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Chuck Mike Zucker with the today and as we kick
things off, we got a little bit of right on
the board. But let's not all freak out about it.
The SMP's down thirteen points about a quarter percent. Dow
is off twelve points. It's not even a tenth of
a percent. The NASDAK composite is off sixty three points
(01:35):
about a quarter percent. Again, just not not anything of note.
I don't think there's anything huge moving in markets right now.
Tenure Treasury is up four point four basis points to
four point one pH two percent. Dollar Index down another
point oh four percent to ninety eight point seven to six.
We got gold up four to thirty and ounce to
forty two thirty six and eighty cents. Crude oil is
(01:59):
uh see, where's that puppy today? Fifty nine to fifty
a barrel, up fifty six cents a barrel. I will
point out, by the way, I don't know, Mike, have
you been paying attention to what's been going on on
the net gas front recently?
Speaker 1 (02:15):
No?
Speaker 2 (02:17):
So that gas yesterday clear the five dollars per million
BTUs for the first time since twenty twenty two. To
put this in perspective, at this time last year that
gas was trading at about three ten and so at
five it's up sixty six percent in the span of
(02:39):
a year, most of this in the last month or so.
Why this matters if it were to stay in this range, Mike,
what is the single heaviest input for power generation in
the United States?
Speaker 3 (02:51):
That gas?
Speaker 2 (02:53):
So those of you hoping for lower electricity prices next year,
if this price stays where it is could get a
little bit of a it might not be very good
for us on the electricity price side if net gas
prices stay in this five dollar range. I have no
idea if they will or won't. Ultimately, net gas prices
(03:13):
are a function of how much do you produce, largely
through fracking and things like that, which again, new wells
are declining right now because with oil prices so low,
you don't have an incentive to drill for oil, and
most net gas produced in the US is a byproduct
of fracking and things like that. The other piece is
(03:34):
the demand side, Mike. Do you know how cold it's
going to be this winter? Very well? Like relative to No,
I have no idea. No, no, I'm not a weatherman.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
You know it's it's not Even if you were, I
don't think you would know how cold the weather is
going to be this.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Listen, let's not disparage our weather friends.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
I'm not disparaging They don't know what the weather is
going to be three months from now.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
They do, They probably don't even they say they don't.
But again, what weather wethermenu an Economists share an awful
lot because we're trying to make forecast based on imperfect
data that's always changing. And so I always defend our
brethren in meteorology because they've got a tough job.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
It's not easy.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
So in any case, you got mat gas prices that
are moving up here, and that bear is watching just
in the event that they stay in this range. Okay, Barons,
I love the Tucker really puts this in. He just knows,
he just knows it's going to get a rise out
of me. Why Friday is make or break for the
(04:34):
stock market? Was this one of my festivest And in
the first two sentences, the stock market isn't really doing
much of anything. Now Friday will set its true direction. Uh,
why the heck does Friday matter for the stock market?
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Oh? Also expect big moves in all of these stocks
on Friday.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Ooh, I'm intrigued. Tell me more, Michael. Why why is Friday?
Which Friday's to it is?
Speaker 3 (05:01):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Why is December fifth the most important day of the
year for the stock market?
Speaker 3 (05:05):
First of all, it is not, oh, very clearly not
important to day for the stock market. You will have
an inflation reading. Oh, is probably going to surprise nobody.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Is it like new inflation data?
Speaker 3 (05:20):
No, it's old.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
When's it from Mike? Uh?
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Like September?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Oh, it's Is anyone going to make any investment decisions
based on September inflation data?
Speaker 3 (05:30):
No?
Speaker 2 (05:31):
No, no, So it's useless. Like I just I really
struggle with uh with pieces like this again, that just
I don't think even accurately capture you know, whether this
inflation reading is important or not, which the answer is,
it's not.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
Like I haven't read much worse clickbait this week. This
might be clickbait of the week.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
What inflation was three months ago is not relevant to
Fed policy today. It is not going to have an
impact on the FED meeting next week. And that's all
I have to.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Say about that. What has to happen in markets for
this story to be proven true tomorrow, I would say
to you that you need to have a greater than
one and a half percent swing in equity markets one
direction or another tomorrow for this story to be even
close to the truth.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
I mean, let's.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
With no other announcements, right.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I don't think it's going to be related to inflation. Yeah,
and here's why, Like you look at, here's the thing
about PCE inflation. All right, I'm gonna tell everyone the
truth about pc inflation.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
So huddle up, Okay.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Everyone knows what PCE inflation is going to be before
it's released. And it's not because anyone has any inside information.
It's because all of the big investment banks in their
inflation teams have gotten so good at extrapolating the inputs
from CPI and PPI that we know basically within like
(07:09):
a couple hundredths of a percentage point where the PCE
reading is going to come in. It doesn't surprise anyone
when it's released anymore because the banks have all gotten
really good at predicting it. And so even though PCE
is the Fed's preferred measure of inflation, all other inflation
(07:29):
measures are just sparkling inflation. They're not the Champagne of inflation.
Even though the PCE is the Fed's preferred inflation method,
it's not something that investors get surprised by at this
point because they've gotten so good at predicting it. It's
one of the least exciting reports released every month.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Yeah, this is going to surprise nobody, and if markets
move tomorrow won't be because of it.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
No. No, the only way that you could get, you know,
the market moving, is if there was a huge surprise,
but there just aren't. Like it's you're not gonna get
inflation printing like six percent for the month or negative
two percent for the month.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
So yeah, I I appreciate Tucker getting this in there
because it's, uh, it's it's nice to see him, you know,
doing what's important, just calling out clickbait. It is well
and it gets us excited too.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
It does chuck in the first time. We were talking
about the job market and I want to return there.
We got a weekly job as claims number that showed
at least last week, there weren't a whole lot of
new filings for unemployment, but we described the labor market
as generally weak and no matter which way you measure it.
The unemployment rate is up over the last three years,
the pace of hiring is down, the ratio of unemployed
(08:49):
job openings is not as strong as it was a
few years ago. So we concluded that's the case. We
also called some data from Challenger Gray and Christmas quote crap,
which I'm sure we'll take some crap. Can we explain
why we feel this way because Challenger, Gray and Christmas
is reporting that the layoff announcements in twenty twenty five
are the worst we've seen since twenty twenty and on
(09:10):
the surface, that would make me really scared about my job.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
So here's why I believe that the numbers from Challenger,
Gray and Christmas are crap. It's not because they actually
have bad data. They have good data. I'm sure they collect,
you know, really good data on layoff announcements. The piece
that was on CNBC this morning said it was something
along the lines of, hey, there have been you know,
(09:36):
one point one million announced layoffs this year. It's the
highest since year whatever. So like you get the headlines
that come out off of it, Mike, in a given month,
there are more than a million layoffs in the United States,
Like they're just there are, Like, if you look at it,
there's one hundred and sixty million people employed in the
United States right now, and when we look at the
(09:59):
level of labor turnover, okay, and specifically, I'm going to
pull the data right from the Job Openings and Labor
Turnover Survey Report, the JOLTS Report, which we get each
month from the federal government, and what the JOLTS rate says,
the JOLTS rate for layoffs, I'm looking at it right here.
It's not quits, it's not hires. It's specifically, is us
(10:20):
layoffs and discharges. It's one point one percent, which means
that in a population of one hundred and sixty million people,
you are having about one point seven million layoffs and
discharges on a monthly basis. The one point one million
in announced layoffs that are captured by Challenger, Gray and Christmas.
(10:42):
If we were to believe that this has some extrapolation value, okay,
then what you would see is, oh, because these you know,
announced layoffs have gone up, layoffs across the broader employment
market must have gone up as well. And in fact,
that's not what we're seeing because when we actually look
at the layoffs and discharges rate. It's been basically at
(11:04):
one point one percent for the last four and a
half years now, since March of twenty one. That's why
I call that data crap is because it's not predictive
in any way, shape or form to the actual larger,
broader data that is both measured on a regular basis
(11:26):
and then used to inform policy, Like the Federal Reserve
does not look at the Challenger, Gray and Christmas data
because it's useless.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
It's useful if your company happens to make a layoff
announcement and you missed it. Other than that, I don't
find it useful.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Which again, if you missed it, it means that you're
still employed, right because like you know, so, I just
I don't think there's a viable signal there. Historically it
does have a correlation with continuing unemployment claims, but even
(12:06):
there it's it's like tenuous and bestil like not every
cycle sees it through. It's it's not a one to
one thing. There's a divergence in a number of business cycles.
And so it's just not predictive of the actual economic
data that's used to make policy. And so that's why
I call it crap. It's not because, like Challenger Grand
Christmas is doing a bad job collecting or publishing it.
(12:29):
It's just that it's not useful in markets economic forecasting.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
All right, there's our rant of the day, quick break,
Ted Rossman from Bankreage joining us for holiday tipping. Next,
out of Financial Exchange.
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Speaker 2 (13:58):
Now joined by Ted Assman from bankut here to talk
about their twenty twenty five holiday tipping survey ted. How
are you today?
Speaker 6 (14:07):
Doing well?
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Good to be here, Ted, What kind of feelings do
Americans have about tipping this holiday season?
Speaker 6 (14:13):
In general, people are pretty fed up with tipping. We
see about six and ten Americans have a negative view
towards the practice. A lot of people are just annoyed
about those pre entered tip screens at coffee shops and elsewhere,
and just the constant invitations to tip. Now, specific to
the holidays, people actually feel a bit more generous and
(14:34):
they kind of separate some of that annoyance. The holiday
tip tends to be more of a once a year's
show of appreciation for service. Workers in our lives, like
housekeepers and babysitters and people like that. We found that
the frequency of tipping is down a little bit, but
the amounts that people are giving are holding steady or
even increasing a little bit. That feels like further evidence
(14:56):
of the K shaped economy. Basically, higher earners are propping
up the overall numbers.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
When you look at how things compare to you know,
kind of prior years. Are there any specific areas where
we might be seeing some differences compared to you know,
the last two or three years, or is it basically
you know the same in most key areas.
Speaker 6 (15:20):
There are some interesting and somewhat conflicting kind of trends
here because, on one hand, among the things we asked about,
which I should say, were housekeepers, childcare providers, landscapers, teachers,
mail carriers, and trash collectors. In those six categories, in
every single one, fewer people are tipping this year than
(15:41):
they did last year. So that's not a great thing.
But if we zoom out a little bit, in all
these categories, except for one which was flat, which was
male carriers, the other five more people are tipping now
than we're back in twenty twenty one, so it's like
the long term trend is better than the short term one.
The amount are interesting as well. The amounts have actually
(16:03):
been quite steady the past few years, and generally speaking,
we're talking somewhere between twenty and fifty dollars per service provider,
depending on the category. The median was highest for housekeepers
and landscapers, that was fifty dollars a person. Childcare provider
was closed, and then it was quite a bit lower
for mail carriers twenty bugs, teachers twenty five, trash reom
(16:26):
recycling collectors twenty five. Those actually really have not changed
that much year over year or even in the last
five years. A couple of the categories went up a
little bit over five years, that would be landscapers and
trashroom recycling collectors. But for the most part it's actually
been a little more stable than year round tipping. We've
(16:46):
actually seen a more steady decline in the year round tips,
Like people are tipping worse at restaurants, they're tipping worse
at hair salons. Holiday tipping is kind of holding its own.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
What about demographically, any demograph differences that you've seen.
Speaker 6 (17:02):
Generally speaking, older people are better tippers, higher income people
are definitely better tippers. That often goes hand in hand.
Men are interesting because men are kind of boom or
bus tippers, like they're more likely to give a good
tip and they're more likely to give nothing at all.
Women are more consistent, even if the amounts tend to
be a little bit lower. We're painting with a fairly
(17:24):
broad brush here, but sure, in general, a lot of
young people don't like the whole tip and culture. A
lot of gen Zers in particular kind of pushback on
some of it from a social justice standpoint, and it's like, well,
it's not fair, we shouldn't be doing this. If you
work in a restaurant and you get a table of
gen z s, statistically they're going to be the worst tippers.
(17:47):
I would say, though, that fighting the tipping culture is hard,
especially nowadays, because it's just everywhere. It's the coffee shop,
it's the shoe truck. And I was asked to tip
at a self checkout machine at Newark Airport, asked for
tips in more places, and a lot of people resent that.
But if you don't tip, I'm not saying you need
to tip in all those situations, but like, if you
(18:07):
don't tip at a restaurant, or you don't tip the
food delivery person, or you don't tip the rideshare driver
or your hairstylist, they're really missing out. I do think
around the holidays though, people are tipping more out of generosity,
and they're tipping more generously when they really know the person.
If it's a housekeeper in your home every week, or
a regular babysitter or nanny, they're gonna get a better
(18:30):
tip than the mail carrier or the trash collector that
you might just not see as much.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Very good, Ted, appreciate you joining us today. Thank you
for sharing the results of your tipping survey with us anytime.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
That is Ted Rossman from bank Rade talking about tipping.
Speaker 5 (18:49):
All right, we'll do trivia quick here on the Financial Exchange.
On this day in nineteen eighty eight, Roy Orbison performed
his final concert. Orbison sadly passed away two days after
a heart attack. At the time of his death, Orbison
was a member of a supergroup with George Harrison, Bob Dylan,
Tom Petty and Jeff Lynn. So trivia question today, what
was the name of the supergroup that featured Roy Orbison?
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Once again?
Speaker 5 (19:10):
What was the name of the supergroup that featured Roy Orbison.
Be the sixth person today to text us at six
one seven three six two thirteen eighty five with the
correct answer along with the keyword trivia and win a
Financial Exchange Show T shirt. Once again, the six correct
response to text us to the number six one seven
three six two thirteen eighty five along with the keyword trivia,
(19:33):
will win that T shirt. See complete contest rules at
Financial Exchange Show dot com.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Taking a look at markets as we head towards the
bottom of the hour. Basically all three major US indities
down about a tenth of a percent, not much movement
in either direction. A pretty boring day to this point
in equity markets, Bob markets getting a little bit more
exciting again, yields continuing to rise there, but uh again,
(19:58):
equities not really moving too much. Quick break here when
we return, we got the trivia answer at Wall Street.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Watch, bringing the latest financial news straight to your radio
every day. It's the Financial Exchange on the Financial Exchange
Radio Network. Time now for Wall Street Watch. A complete
(20:25):
look at what's moving market so far today right here
on the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
Speaker 5 (20:30):
Pretty quiet day on Wall Street to this point as
investors sift through weekly jobless claims data and ready for
the core PC index for the latest look in inflation,
due out tomorrow morning. Right now, the Dow is down
merely a tenth of a percent, or fifty points lower.
SMP five hundred is dipping five points. NASDAC also off
(20:50):
by only five points. Russ In two thousand is up
two thirds of a percent. Ten You're Treasure reeled up
four basis points at four point one zero four percent,
and crude oil up just over one percent higher, trading
a fifty nine dollars and sixty three cents a barrel.
Breaking news from Beta this morning, following reports that Mark
Zuckerberg is expected to meaningfully cut resources for building the Metaverse,
(21:16):
potentially with budget cuts as high as thirty percent next year.
MetaStock is climbing about four percent. Meanwhile, salesforce rising over
two percent higher after the software company hiked its full
year of guidance as its AI product agent force gained
some traction. As for its third quarter, the company beat
earnings forecast, but just missed expectations for its revenue. Elsewhere,
(21:39):
a cloud software company Snowflake posted at narrow a narrow
quarterly loss and reported growing demand for its AI agent. However,
its outlook for product revenue growth for the January quarter disappointed. Additionally,
Snowflake agreed to a two hundred million dollars deal with
AI startup in Thropic. Snowflake shares now down eleven percent
(22:01):
and Dollar General shares a jumping ten percent higher after
the discount retailer lifted its full year guidance after topping
third quarter expectations. I'm Tucker Silva and that is Wall
Street Watch. And last segment, we asked the trivia question
what was the name of the super group that featured
Roy Orbison. That would be the Traveling Willberry's Phil from Plastow,
(22:24):
New Hampshire is our winner today taking home a Financial
Exchange Show T shirt. And we played trivia every day
here in the Financial Exchange See complete contest rules at
Financial Exchange Show dot com.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Mike, we got a piece in the Wall Street Journal
three year end tax strategies that can cut your twenty
twenty five tax bill. That sounds fun.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
Yeah, you know these are not to be dismissed. You
know there is still time to max out your retirement
plan hypothetically. You know, I don't know how many pay
periods are left, but you can jack up that tech
no salary contracts, mission ray pretty much. Yeah, you got
to leave enough in there to pay for your benefits,
but you could bump that up as high as it
can go. Obviously, charitable giving just understand you know the
(23:06):
limitations on how much you can deduct and where that's
going to come from, and you know how it's actually
going to affect your taxes before you do it. Tax
losses good luck. I mean, unless you bought crypto like
a month and a half ago, I don't know where
you're going to find your tax losses in your portfolio,
but maybe a.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
Lot of the S and P five hundred if you're
a buyer of chargeable companies, yeah you can find some each.
S and P five hundred stock is not near its
all time high right now, despite the index being there.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
So the other side of this, though, that I like
to talk about, is people always focus on, hey, how
can I minimize this year's tax bill? And there's something
to be said for that, but far too often they
do so at the risk of paying a whole boatload
of taxes in the not so distant future. Right how
many people have you talked to who retire and they're like, oh,
(23:57):
it's been great, I've paid no taxes the last three years.
And then you just kind of you don't giggle because
that's mean, but you look at you like, that sounds great,
But you're going to pay like an average effective tax
rate of twenty seven percent now for the rest of
your life because you didn't do the planning that you
should have. And so when looking at minimizing taxes, it
(24:18):
is not a year to year plan that you should
be doing. It is not a hey, how do I
minimize my taxes this year? You need to be thinking
about how do you minimize your taxes over a lifetime.
Otherwise it's quite honestly, just a useless exercise. I can't
tell you the number of people that just fell into
that exact scenario I talked about. I remember meeting with
(24:39):
somebody that was turning seventy that year and you told
me I have paid zero dollars in taxes for the
last decade. And I had to walk through and them like, yeah,
at that point in time, you required minimums started at
seventy and a half and I had to break the
news like, yeah, that's great, but now you are going
to be paying right choose its plus federal taxes on
(25:02):
this massive required minimum distribution that you should have been
spreading out. Tax planning is a critical part of financial
planning at just about every stage of life. If you
have questions about how you can integrate that into your
overall plan, if you're not doing it today, learn more
by calling Armstrong Advisory at eight hundred three nine three
(25:24):
for zero zero one. You can also book time to
chat with us at Armstrong Advisory dot com. But again,
nobody enjoys paying taxes, but believe it or not, there
can be good reasons to do so preemptively and prepay
what you might owe in the future. Call Armstrong Advisory
eight hundred three nine three for zero zero one.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
The proceeding was paid for by Armstrong Advisory Group, a
registered investment advisor. Nothing in the ad or in any
Armstrong guide a specific financial, legal or tax advice. Consult
your own financial tax into state planning advisors before making
any investment decisions. Armstrong may contact you to offer investment
advisory services.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Mike, I wanted to do little holiday scam warning. If
that's cool, sure and specifically ones here that are you
know more, you know, unique to this time of year.
Bunch them out there. In terms of text messages saying
that you have a package that's delayed, click this link
to reschedule your delivery.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Get those every day.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
Never ever do that. Wherever you ordered from, pull up
the original order email that you received from the merchant,
whether it is Amazon, whether it is you know, Gym's
Taco Kit Construction, whatever, whoever it might be.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Yeah, Gim's Taco Construction is a major organization these days.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
It's a good one.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
In any case, go find the original email, find either
the customer service number on it or the customer service
email on it, and reach out through that method, not
the person who just texts you, because there's like a
ninety eight percent that it's a scam.
Speaker 3 (27:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
Occasionally those are real, which is confusing. And again I
always check these, and I occasionally find one that is
real and you're like, oh, that's weird. I wouldn't have
expected it. But in any case, most of the time
scam other ones. If you see an ad while you're
on the website that says like, hey, ninety percent off
(27:23):
sale going on, be very careful that you are actually
clicking on a legitimate ad and not one taking you
to a scam website. Even on legitimate sites, there are
illegitimate ads. Is that the right word?
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Yeah, So like you can be on Facebook and click
an ad and think you're going to see like Williams
Sonoma and you're actually going to like Williams No Money More,
and like that's the name of the website, but you're
not paying attention to the address and then it you know,
they basically take your credit card and stuff.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
Where I'm seeing AI get implemented in this, I know
we've you know, warned about what's coming, which I think
eventually is voice replication on phone calls and scary stuff
like that. I haven't seen a lot of that firsthand yet,
but where I am seeing a ton of it. AI
is clearly scraping business websites and putting together scam emails
based on what they find on your company's website. So, hey,
(28:15):
you've got these thirteen employees, Great, I'm going to spam
all of them, and AI is going to create an
email that looks and sounds like it's coming from your
CEO and is in fact nothing of the sort. Where
I think that goes next is probably AI sorting through
social media and trying to build good, successful scams based
on what's happening on your Facebook and Instagram profile. But
(28:39):
we're not, from what I can tell, quite there yet.
But yeah, if you are still working today and your
website or your email address is out there, yeah, be
prepared for those scamm emails to come in that way,
you know what?
Speaker 2 (28:54):
You know? What's one I actually got that recently was real.
So I woke up one morning and I have a
trip scheduled in like March of next year that I'm
staying in an Airbnb. I got a text message saying
your Airbnb's been canceled. Click here to reschedule. And immediately
I'm just like, no, not not real. I pull up
the airbnb website and it's like, oh, your trip's been canceled,
(29:16):
like click here to try to reschedule. Because A I
didn't know that a host could actually cancel your trip
right like they can just do that. I guess didn't know.
I figured like, once you booked, you were good. Turned
out that the host actually decided to sell their property
and so they canceled like everything. But I saw the
(29:37):
text message and it was just literally it didn't say
like from Airbnb or anything. It was just your trip's
been canceled. Click here. And then I saw like I
had an email. Also, I was like, okay, like something
might actually be up. Let's go check, and it was.
But it didn't come across in a particularly professional manner,
you know. So I found that kind of interesting. But
(29:58):
most of the time, my asumption as it's a scam.
Let's take a quick break when we come back. Stack Roulette.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Here The Financial Exchange every day from eleven to noon
Non Serious XM's Business Radio Channel one thirty two. Keep
it here for the latest business and financial news and
the trends on Wall Street. The Financial Exchange is now
life on Serious XM's Business Radio Channel one thirty two.
This He's the Financial Exchange Radio Network. Find daily interviews
(30:26):
and full shows of the Financial Exchange on how Are
YouTube page. Get caught up on anything and everything you
might have missed. This is the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
Speaker 5 (30:45):
This segment of The Financial Exchange is brought to you
by the US Virgin Islands Department Tourism. There's still time
to book your holiday vacation to Saint Croix Saints Homas
or Saint John. Enjoy one or all three, and if
you act fast, you could be on Saint Croix to
experience there Christmas Festival, taking place this December through early January.
Discover the magic of this long standing tradition with incredible food, music,
(31:08):
and entertainment. Or just go soak up the sun, stroll
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Playing your winter escape now at visit USBI dot com.
That's visit USVII dot com.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Mike, what do you got for stack Roulette?
Speaker 3 (31:27):
Fat cats? Uh ah, That's what I'm That's what I'm
going with. I sent this story to my to my
wife about our own cat, who is not nearly as
cat fat as this picture of a cat on this
on this story. But the drug industry is testing out
(31:48):
GLP one implants for cats, which I'm just kind of
confused about how we test drugs these days. To start with, like,
isn't it usually you test it on animals first, see
how it goes, and then like, oh, yeah, it worked
fairly well in rodents, Let's try it on a cat.
Or a dog or a chimpanzee. Oh yeah, I worked
pretty well there, let's test it on humans. We seem
(32:08):
to have rolled it out to humans and now we're
going back to cats on this one. So little confusing. Also,
with my pets, at least I feed them, and so
if I'm worried about them gaining weight, Like I get
how this is different with a human being, with you
more control over their independence. But my animals, we determine
(32:32):
how much food they get, and so if they become
too fat, rather than putting them on one thousand dollars
a month GLP one drug, I'd probably just cut some
of their food. Am I missing something new?
Speaker 5 (32:46):
Uh?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
I know you can't make your dog or cat exercise necessarily,
but well, what are we trying to do here? Make
our cats sexier? Like?
Speaker 2 (33:00):
What are we trying to do here? This is a
solution in search of a problem. It's like, let's just
call it what it is. It's a solution in search
of a problem. Yeah, you do not need to o
zempic fi your cat? Okay, right, you do not need
cat zempic or what's the other one?
Speaker 6 (33:21):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (33:21):
Look at its cheekbones?
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Right?
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Like? What? Oh?
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Your dog's canines are really prominent now, like I mean, like, guys,
I'm sorry, we've gone too far. I mean, look, we
knew the pendulum had to swing back from a couple
of years ago when Bloomberg told us to let your
pets die. But now we've gone too far in that
you don't need to give glp ones to your pet.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
It's really expensive.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
There's a nice middle ground there where you take your
pet to the vet, you feed them, you play with them,
and you do all those nice things that you're supposed
to do. And that's where we need to get to.
Not hey, my my cat's one pound overweight. Should I
use ozembic?
Speaker 3 (34:06):
Can you imagine?
Speaker 2 (34:08):
I mean, like, who looks at I gotta be honest,
who looks at an animal? And it's just like no, no,
you need you need to lose weight. I'm gonna like, yeah,
I again. We all have like pets in our lives
that occasionally like look a little chunkier, look a little you.
Speaker 3 (34:27):
Know, dinner. I know that we all treat our pets
like as family members, and weight issues can cause earth
problems like early death, and pets like they can't use
their joints anymore, and they die early. But again, the
easy solution to that is forced your pet to lose
weight because it's not a human being. We don't most
(34:51):
of us. Most of us with pets are not to
McDonald's at midnight, right, We're.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
Not sending them out into the fields to like hunt
for their dinner. That's not how most of us work with.
Speaker 3 (35:01):
And if it were, it would be not overweight anymore
because it would be hunting its own dinner.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
So I gotta say, this is a real problem here,
that that this is even being talked about. I don't.
Speaker 3 (35:14):
I don't think it's a problem. I think it's very
funny text V. That's fantastic. I just uh, And.
Speaker 2 (35:27):
Don't get me wrong, Like we do use human medications
on pets on a regular basis.
Speaker 3 (35:32):
Sure, I have cat, cat has uh has diabetes. They
have to give it a shot of her day.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
I have a family member whose dog has seizures and
there's no dog specific seizure medications, so they the vet
prescribes human medication for that. You know, it's but like
that's a specific problem that you're trying to deal with,
not Hey, my my pets a little overweight. Do you
think we need to start giving it shots once a month.
Speaker 3 (35:57):
Oh man, I gotta drop my my animal health insurance
because if this stuff starts getting covered, it's gonna be
going through the roof.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Oh. I mean, it's just it's my my goodness, I
don't even know you know where to where to start
on this? Here? Another one here, This one from Bloomberg.
Tired Americans are spending more just to avoid chores. So
apparently ge has come out with what I do think
is kind of like the Holy Grail. It's kind of cool.
(36:24):
It's a washer dryer combo that you don't have to
like move things. Finally, the problem is that it costs
two thousand dollars to get it all into one unit
instead of you know, like twelve hundred dollars if you
just put them side by side. So the question is,
you know, over the eight to ten year lifespan of
(36:45):
a new washer dryer, is it worth it to you
to spend an extra one hundred dollars a year to
not have to move damp laundry from one side to
the other.
Speaker 5 (36:56):
Well, to play Devil's advocate, it could be a space
saving maneuver too.
Speaker 3 (37:00):
I like it, you know, this story like was trying
to mock people who are buying these expensive products that
make their lives easier. Some of them are silly, yes, absolutely,
like the closet that steams your clothes, Like, yeah, that
seems pretty silly, but have you ever.
Speaker 2 (37:17):
Steamed a single clothes, not let alone multiple clothes?
Speaker 3 (37:21):
Isn't this like the entire purpose of technology and innovation
is to make our lives easier. Now, some are gonna
be dumb, like a steaming clothes closet.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Do you remember the smart toilets from a couple of
years ago that would like read your bowel movements and
tell you what to eat?
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Yeah? So, uh not all of these are gonna be.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
If your cat's been eaten mice that have been you know,
in your laundry.
Speaker 3 (37:50):
Yeah, so some of these are dumb, But I don't
think we should just mock a you know, washer dryer
combo for two grand, Like that's not that ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
Some of them are okay. Some of them are you know,
a little you know, like do you need to buy
an oven with a specialized pizza setting in it? Or
can you just turn your regular oven up really high
with a twenty dollars pizza stone in it. What makes
it special?
Speaker 3 (38:18):
Well, I mean, a pizza oven is like a thousand degrees.
I don't think my oven gets that.
Speaker 5 (38:22):
Well, now you can cook a pizza, a good pizza.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Yeah, yeah, oh yeah, you can do a great or
just turn the broiler on, put it the top rack
and you're good.
Speaker 3 (38:30):
I don't make pizza. This is the easiest thing to
do take out.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
For And there you go, ladies and gentlemen, there you go.
I don't know what we're saying that about, but in
any case, let's take a quick break until tomorrow, so
you know, take the day for the most important day. Mark,
get yourself settled, do your laundry moved from the washer
to the dryer, and we'll see you tomorrow on the
financial exchange.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
Four
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