Granted, the Fed’s monetary policy doesn’t directly determine economic growth. It operates by influencing broader financial conditions, which have eased a lot in the past year. Stock prices have risen, bond yields have declined and the dollar has weakened.

Alphabet Inc.’s Google ran an algorithm on its “Willow” quantum-computing chip that can be repeated on similar platforms and outperform classical supercomputers, a breakthrough it said clears a path for useful applications of quantum technology within five years.

David Arana always had a thing for numbers. That passion took him to MIT to study mathematics and later to New York, where he traded credit derivatives for Deutsche Bank AG.

Your annual strategy is the big-picture framework. Your quarterly plan is how you bring that framework to life. This is where you take the broad channels, content, and relationships you identified in your strategy and break them down into a focused plan with specific actions, deadlines, and responsibilities.

Advisory firms are people-driven businesses. Unlike asset managers or product manufacturers, their value is derived from human capital — specifically, the ability of teams to serve clients effectively, deepen relationships, and manage workflows.

Today's marketplace demands a new understanding of what it means to stand out — not through revolutionary uniqueness, but through extraordinary execution of fundamental principles that most advisors neglect or execute poorly.

Business Process Management is a systematic approach to making an organization's workflows more effective, efficient, and adaptable. The firms that survive and thrive will be those that recognize the concepts of BPM and BPMN as strategic infrastructure, not optional enhancements.

If you’re preparing to sell your business, the M&A process might seem daunting and mysterious. As a financial advisor, you’re an expert at connecting with clients and providing sound financial guidance.

At times like this, our Internal Financial System™ comes alive. Inside us, different parts react to the same market in opposite ways. A risk-taking part may feel emboldened by the gains and want to buy more.

A new generation of ETFs is giving the crypto rich a novel way to fold their digital fortunes into the regulated financial system — without selling, and through funds run by big asset managers like BlackRock Inc.

Vanguard Group is expanding its proxy voting program — designed to give shareholders a greater say on corporate resolutions at portfolio companies — to add the investment giant’s oldest index fund.

The artificial intelligence trade that has driven the S&P 500 Index to one record after another over the past few years is transforming traditionally sleepy utilities stocks into booming growth plays. Since the end of 2023, the utilities sector is up 44%, making it the third best-performing group in the S&P 500.

Investors looking to profit from a “Goldilocks” environment where US stocks rally but Treasury market losses are contained should short the dollar, according to a new study published by Morgan Stanley.

A relentless surge in the price of gold is delivering windfalls across emerging markets, boosting investor confidence in countries that mine and buy the metal.

Buybacks raise important questions. Foremost amongst them are whether, and how much, buybacks push up stock prices, and whether they create other distortions relevant to investors and public finances. This article explores these questions by drawing on economic theory and broadly held views of real-world investor behavior.

Seldom has the middling been the cause of so much relief. Six months after the White House unveiled steep tariffs, the global economy has held up well — mainly by outperforming some doleful projections. There's been no recession. Forecasts have even been revised up a touch.

Apple Inc. shares hit their first record of 2025 on Monday after Loop Capital upgraded the stock to buy from hold, becoming the latest firm to cite positive iPhone demand trends.

All it took was a classic bout of haven buying to wake up a slumbering Treasuries market and drive benchmark yields to the lowest in months.

Emerging markets rose, with the stock benchmark advancing to the highest level in more than four years, as signals of easing US-China trade tensions supported appetite for riskier assets.

Prior to his most recent role, Marsh held several leadership positions including as head of the EMEA financing group, global co-head of credit finance and global co-head of the alternative capital solutions unit. He became a partner at Goldman in 2014 after joining the bank in 2006.

I’m a big believer in simplicity for most things, and that includes investing. When constructing a portfolio, simplicity is what I aim for. In this piece, I offer a brief summary of how I analyze the holdings and make recommendations on what to keep and what to get out of when a client asks me to review and improve their investments.

Connecting the dots, we found that a nation's court system and level of justice have the most significant impact on its Freedom Index, and therefore, by extension, on the wealth and happiness of its citizens. Aristotle connected these ideas over 2000 years ago when he opined, “A just life is inherently a happy one.”

Wall Street has finally capitulated to gold’s record-breaking run.

Americans place a premium on elite and exclusive institutions. Many of us want to get into top-tier universities, pledge storied fraternities and, upon graduation, attain membership at Soho House.

The world’s metal traders are enjoying their most profitable ever year, after a series of supply upheavals propelled prices toward record highs and drove huge shifts in metal moving across the globe.

Being a millionaire isn’t what it used to be. This isn’t a lament, it’s a fact: As Bloomberg News reported last week, almost one-fifth of US households have a net worth of more than $1 million. Fully one-third of them have gained that status since 2017.

After a week-long rout that erased hundreds of billions in digital-asset value, Bitcoin has again failed to live up to its billing as a safe harbor asset.

Man Group Plc, the world’s largest publicly traded hedge fund, saw its assets soar to a record in the three months through September, as clients poured more money into long-only products and performance improved.

In 1967, a helicopter from United States Steel Corp. carrying a team of geologists made an accidental discovery after landing in a remote corner of the Amazon rainforest: a giant iron-ore deposit that would become Carajás, one of the world’s richest mineral regions.

To start from the top, the dollar’s doing fine. Having appreciated 3% in the past month, it remains above its 40-year average. It still commands the lion’s share of currency trading and global central bank reserves, even if international investors are hedging more exposure.

Bank of America Corp. and Morgan Stanley exposed a stock market puzzle on Wednesday. Both reported record third-quarter earnings following roaring results from rivals the day before.

Issuing new shares is usually considered a recipe for souring sentiment as stockholders get diluted. But in this go-go artificial intelligence-crazed market, that logic has been turned upside down.

Charles Schwab Corp. reported third-quarter earnings that beat estimates as the firm benefited from a surge in retail investing activity.

In just two years, India has gone from being the best-loved emerging market to the most sold, and now investors are bracing themselves for yet another quarter of disappointing corporate earnings.

Big banks are flying. Traders and dealmakers at Citigroup Inc., Goldman Sachs Group Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co. enjoyed a roaring third quarter while lending grew, too.

As the world faces a future of lower growth, there is a temptation among policymakers to have the government take a more active role in the economy. Policy certainly has a role to play. But all governments should realize that abundance doesn’t come from better planning.

In the current economic climate, many high earners are living paycheck to paycheck and generally wrestling with anxieties about their financial security. However, there are ways financial planners can help calm clients’ fears and create a “cushion” in times of uncertainty.

If you want to move ahead in your career, remember that, while you need to be authentic and your best “you,” someone is always watching and making decisions on what they see!

Every market jolt this year — from April’s tariff scare to September’s tech pullback — has met the same reflex on Wall Street: more ETF buying. That collective impulse has now pushed US exchange-traded fund inflows past $1 trillion, the fastest asset haul the industry has ever seen.

Sometimes there are economic narratives that don’t quite deserve a debunking — they have more than a kernel of truth to them — but rather demand an appropriate level of skepticism. Three such stories are widespread today.

Asset managers are looking to raise new private credit funds aimed at emerging markets to capitalize on an explosion of financing deals in the sector this year.

Finance ministers and central bankers, gathering in Washington for the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund, face a global trading system in disarray, uncertainty over the dollar’s standing and the likely course of interest rates, and financial markets that are (for now) unnervingly complacent.

US manufacturing may now be at its most vulnerable after decades of ceding crucial mining and production activities to China in the pursuit of low costs and higher company profits, and robust government support will be needed to narrow the time for securing the manufacturing supply chain.

The Fed may be chasing economic balance with its tiny nudges. Our wisest course is to find our own personal financial balance within the context of the larger economy. We can build it one grounded financial decision at a time.

A lot of people are watching this meteoric US stock market with amazement as it shakes off one worry after another – slowing labor market, sagging consumer sentiment, continuing trade uncertainty, geopolitical tensions and now a US government shutdown – on its way to new record highs.

Independent advisors have the ability to put their clients’ needs first, which is known as the independent advantage. Understanding the difference between captive financial advisors and independent financial advisors is also key to helping you pick the best advisor for you.

China’s sweeping new restrictions on rare earth exports mark its first major effort to police the global flow of critical minerals it dominates, using the same playbook that allows the US to wield power far beyond its shores.

The fastest way to embed yourself locally is a series of small, consistent actions that compound over time. Here are seven micro-moves we’ve used to position ourselves as the go-to financial planner.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. vowed to funnel $1.5 trillion into industries that bolster US economic security and resiliency over the next 10 years — an initiative that will invest billions of dollars in companies and hire bankers and other professionals

If you do not communicate with your prospect in their unique thinking mode, they will not become your client. If you can keep rapport high by matching their buying mode, you will double your business.