Will they, or won’t they? June unemployment numbers looked better and fears of an imminent economic downturn are easing, seeming to dampen expectations that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates at the next meeting, which will be on July 30 and 31. The Fed leadership says a healthy economy does not need the stimulus Read more
Tariffs: Who Really Pays?
When the Trump administration claims that the tariffs they have imposed on China have brought money into federal treasury coffers, they are correct. However, they are incorrect when they say that money is coming from China. Because tariffs operate as a tax on imports, when the United States levies a tariff, it is the U.S. Read more
Time for Budgeting 101
Managing your money is always important. For new graduates making the move from classroom to workplace it’s an essential skill. The three main priorities of financial adulthood are paying down debt, building up emergency savings, and saving for retirement. (For more on this, see the Bowen Report “Personal Finance Tips for College Graduates”: https://bowenasset.com/personal-finance-tips-for-college-graduates/) An Read more
First-Quarter Economic Growth, But Devil is in the Details
Is the economy still growing? We believe that the answer is still “yes” — but that growth is slowing and the details in the first quarter and April of 2019 reveal warning signs. The GDP received a boost from inventories, exports Gross domestic product (GDP) grew at an annualized rate of 3.2% in the first Read more
How ETFs Work: Issues and Advantages
Second of a two-part series In our first piece on exchange-traded funds (“What’s an ETF? And Why Isn’t It a Mutual Fund?”) — based on Bowen Asset Management’s visit to the “Inside ETFs” conference in Hollywood, Fla., in February — we looked at basic definitions of ETFs and contrasted them with the more widely understood Read more
What’s an ETF? And Why Isn’t It a Mutual Fund?
In February, Bowen Asset Management attended the annual “Inside ETFs” conference in Hollywood, Fla. The four-day gathering, which Bloomberg called “the marquee event for exchange-traded funds,” featured appearances by 200 speakers — including Nobel laureate economist Robert Shiller, former NFL quarterback Joe Montana, political strategists and news analysts Michael Steele and Donna Brazile, and author Read more