• This is a follow up video from the last video that we put out a couple days ago.
• We had Jordan Roach, our Chief Investment Officer, on with Ken Moraif, and we would like to remind you to watch that one to get an idea of what we’re thinking is going to happen and what we are planning to do, should we get to our sell signal.
• We are not at our sell signal yet, and our view is we probably won’t get there.
• But three things could conspire together to get us there: tariffs, inflation, and the upcoming government shutdown over the debt ceiling.
• We are calling them the three horsemen of the apocalypse.
• If we hit our sell signal, we are going to sell. The question becomes, how much do we sell and what do we sell?
• We believe the three horsemen are not permanent conditions.
• We think inflation is going to start trending downward.
• We got jobs numbers this morning that looked okay, so the economy is still in good shape.
• The Fed may lower interest rates as we predicted in June.
• We’ve already seen most of the tariffs against Mexico being lifted, so we see the tariff threat as temporary and resolving itself.
• The debt ceiling seems to come around every time and the politicians argue and posture, but in the end they either pass a resolution to kick the can down the road or they raise the debt ceiling.
• It is too much of an existential threat to do anything else.
• If we default on the debt, the credibility of the United States will go to nothing, the dollar will crash, and we’ll have a worldwide depression of proportions we haven’t seen since the 30s.
• Because of all that, we think all three horsemen are temporary, but they could pile on top of the other and get us to our sell signal.
• An interesting component to all of this, is that the market seems to have an intuition where it smells something, even if there’s no actual data that you can specifically point to that tells you why the market is going down.
• Therefore, we don’t want to ignore when our signal tells us to sell, even though we think the issues that are causing the market to go down are temporary.
• If we hit our sell signal, we will evaluate what percentage of our stock position we want to sell, how we do it, and what we sell.
• We will, of course, tell you at that time, if it comes.

Hello and welcome to our Market Alert video for today, which is March 7, 2025 and this is a follow up video for you from the last video that we put out a few a couple of days ago, and the one we put out a couple of days ago was entitled mandatory. So I hope that you watched it, and if you didn’t, then I’m going to remind you in this video to watch that one, because we go into a lot of detail about what we think is going to happen. What are the drivers right now of the market? You know, it’s sold off quite a bit. And where do we go from here? I had Jordan Roach, our Chief Investment Officer, on with me, and I think it would be well worth your time to watch it, to kind of get an idea of what we’re thinking and what we’re going to do. So in this video. And by the way, I’m still in bed, yes, still recovering from my left knee. It’s now two weeks, and I’m progressing, well, actually better than I did on the right knee, which is good, or maybe I’m just used to what needs to happen, and so I’m dealing with a better I’m not sure. But be that as it may, I’m progressing well. Thank you for those of you who have asked. So in this video, what I want to do is I want to reiterate, just so that we’re all on the same page, what we’re going to do, should we get to our sell signal. Now we’re not there yet, and our view is we probably won’t get there, but there are three things that could conspire together to get us there. I call those the three horsemen of the apocalypse. One is tariffs, the other is inflation, and the third is the upcoming, you know, they’re going to shut down to government over the debt ceiling and whether we raise our debt ceiling or not. You know, the debt ceiling thing drives me crazy. So what we do is we borrow the money. Okay? So we go out, we borrow it, we issue government bonds, and we borrow the money, and then months later, we decide, okay, we’re gonna pay the loan that we took out months before. And then it becomes this big deal as to whether we’re gonna do it or not. It’s like it’s backward. We should approve whether we could do the loan in the first place, and then do the loan, not do the loan, and then argue about whether we’re going to pay it back or not. That’s anyway the government is is backward in many instances. But be that as it may so here’s here’s the thing. I wanted to be sure that we were clear. So if we hit our sell signal, for us, it’s the law, meaning that regardless of what the three horsemen of the apocalypse are telling us, we are going to sell. Okay, so the question is, how much do we sell, and what do we sell? So the three horsemen, as we described in the video, which I’m encouraging you to go watch, are not permanent conditions. Okay? So we think that inflation is going to start trending downward. The economy is in good shape. We got jobs numbers this morning. That looked okay, so the economy is still in good shape. Inflation should start to come down. The Fed may, in fact, lower interest rates, as we predicted in June. So those things bode well. The tariffs we’ve already seen. You know, President Trump announced that most of the tariffs against Mexico are going to be lifted, and so all of this tariff stuff, I shouldn’t say all, but most of it, there are some things that probably will stay in place, but for the most part, these 25% and these 15% tariffs are geared around fentanyl and illegal immigration and those things we view as resolving themselves. And then the debt ceiling, of course, you know it’s like this thing keeps coming around every time, and they argue and they fight and they posture, but in the end, what do they do? They either pass a resolution to kick the can down the road or they raise the debt ceiling. It’s they’re going to raise the debt ceiling. We can’t not do that. We can’t borrow money and then not pay it back. If we do that, the credibility of the United States will go to nothing, and the dollar will crash, and we’ll have a worldwide depression of proportions that we haven’t seen since the 30s. There’s no way that they wouldn’t do it. So it’s all you know, what can I get out of the other side before I finally agree. And so because of that, we think all three of them are temporary, and but they could, you know, one piled on top of the other, get us to our sell signal, because we’re about 5% away right now. So it’s possible that we could get there. And so what do we want to do? Should that happen? Now? There’s another component to all of this, which is kind of interesting to talk about, and that is that the market has an intuition, you know, sometimes the market smells something, feels something, and there’s no actual data, you know, specifically that you can point to that tells you, you know why the market’s going down. It could be the market right now is going down for reasons other than inflation, tariffs and the government shutdown. There could be some underlying fear or nervousness or something that the market is detecting, and therefore we don’t want to ignore when our signal says to sell, even though we think you know what, all three of those things are the cause of the market going down, and we think they’re temporary, so we don’t want to override the momentum and our strategy. So therefore, the question becomes, okay, we hit our signal, which we haven’t yet, and we may not, but if we did, then what do we do? Well, because the indicators that we look at are positive, mostly positive right now, and we think that what’s causing the market to go down is temporary. Our view, if it happened today, would be that we would not sell 100% of our stock position. We would sell half. Now, the details of that we’ll get to when the time comes right, because we don’t know where we will be at the time when we hit our sell signal. And so we’re going to evaluate what, what the best way to get us to the defensive posture that we want to be in. And we’ll, we’ll, of course, tell you at that time. But what I wanted to be very clear about is that, because we think that the majority of all of this is being caused by temporary issues, we don’t want to sell 100%. We probably will sell 50%. But how we do that? What we sell those details? Stay tuned. Okay, so that’s kind of where we are today again, please, please go watch the video we put out for you a couple of days ago. It’s there for you. We want you to know what’s going on. And I think you’ll you’ll benefit from from watching it or listening to it or reading it. We give you three ways to to get it. So that’s where we sit. I hope that all you SCWPerS out there are SCWPering your little tails off. I hope you’re enjoying your second childhood without parental supervision. That’s our job is to do everything for you when it comes to your finances, so that you don’t have to and you can go play. And for those of you who are clients, not yet SCWPerS. And by the way, just to remind you, SCWPerS is the acronym for second childhood without parental supervision. That’s why we use that. So for those of you who are not SCWPerS, who are clients on their way to becoming SCWPerS, we will do everything we can to get you there. Now we also want you to have peace of mind. And the reason why that’s so important is because you know, part of enjoying your retirement is also up here, right? If you’re stressed out all the time, it becomes hard. So we want you to have peace of mind. And so having our sell strategy, our Invest and Protect Strategy, gives me peace of mind. Why? Because I have every confidence that if the market tanks and goes into a big, bad bear that we have a strategy to help mitigate that downside and protect your retirement, so that you continue to be a SCWPer and not have to go back to work and become a client again. We love you both ways, but we prefer you when you’re a SCWPer. So we want to hopefully, hopefully our Invest and Protect Strategy does give you that peace of mind and please like and subscribe to this video. It’s important for us to spread the word, but also, if I could have you share it with your friends, your family, anybody that you think could benefit from, you know, knowing what’s going on and helping them with their retirement planning. So thanks for watching. I hope this video find found you healthy, wealthy and wise, and we’ll talk soon.

Please note: transcript has been modified after the time of recording. 

Economic indicators and stock market performance cannot be predicted. Opinions expressed regarding the economy and the stock market belong solely to Ken Moraif on behalf of Retirement Planners of America and may not accurately portray actual future performance of the economy or stock market outcomes. Opinions expressed in this video is intended to be for informational purposes only and is not intended to be used as investment advice for individuals who are not clients of Retirement Planners of America. All content provided is the opinion of Ken Moraif, CEO and Founder of RPOA Advisors, Inc. (d/b/a Retirement Planners of America ) (“Retirement Planners of America”, “RPOA”). ©Copyright 2023