Over the past year, investors have been receiving notifications about the U.S. Department of Labor’s fiduciary rule that would have impacted financial advisors and their clients. Simply stated, the DOL’s new “fiduciary duty” standard would have required financial professionals who receive compensation for transactions to act in their client’s “best interest.”
There are many opportunities to support disaster-recovery efforts and help people whose lives have been upended by Hurricane Florence, but you should be careful. It's also prime time for scam artists to take advantage of your generosity and steal your money or even your identity. Take these steps to help you choose a charity:
Many retirees today are redefining the “golden years.” Forget about endless days of leisure. Retirees seek adventure, travel, and new business pursuits. While these changes may redefine retirement, will retirees be able to finance their plans? Today, many people age 50 and older have not begun to save for retirement or have yet to accumulate sufficient funds.
Charitable Remainder Trust (CRT)
A charitable remainder trust (CRT) can be a highly effective financial and estate planning tool. The CRT can allow you to: avoid capital gains taxes on highly appreciated assets, however when income is distributed to the income beneficiaries it is taxable; receive an income stream based on the full, fair market value (FMV) of those assets; receive an immediate charitable deduction; and ultimately benefit the charity(ies) of your choice.
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 created substantial new tax breaks for companies of all sizes, but owners of smaller businesses in particular may still be reviewing how much their tax burden could change under the new legislation. The deductions individual business owners can take advantage of and the value of these tax breaks will vary considerably depending on the nature of their business activities, their income levels, and other factors that they may be able to adjust to maximize their tax benefits.
People are just becoming acquainted with the idea of digital money in the form of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, where transactions are recorded on a secure distributed database called a blockchain. And now along comes a new concept: the blockchain-based token, which I’ve been following as a blockchain researcher and teacher of courses about cryptocurrency and blockchain tokens.
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On December 7, 2001, a Gallup Poll ran the following headline:
“Americans Say Sept. 11 Will Be More Historically Significant Than Pearl Harbor.”
That December 7th day when Gallop ran that headline marked the 60th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. But it was also just a few months after the September 11th attacks in New York and Washington – when many Americans were comparing the events in 1941 to those that had just occurred.
On Friday, September 7th, the United States Department of Labor released the “Employment Situation” report and there were some fascinating and quirky data points. Let’s examine a few:
