Hello, and welcome to our Market Alert video for today, which is Friday, February 9 2024. And forgive the virtual background with the blurring and all that it’s because I’m actually in Colorado, just finishing up a week of skiing. And so I don’t want you to see all the ugly background that is behind me. It’s interesting, you know, over the years, I’ve skied, I’ve been skiing now since I was eight years old. And so I’ve skied for a long time. And throughout the years, I’ve always been like a speed demon. So I was like, as fast as I could ski, the better. And so I skied on what are called groomers, which are the groom slopes are nice and smooth. And you can go really fast if you want to. Over the years, that was the thing I wanted to do. But now I’ve kind of gotten bored with groove with those kinds of slopes. And so I’ve decided I want to get good at skiing over the bumps, they’re called moguls. And it’s a completely different way of skiing. It’s very, very complicated. And as good as I thought I was, I discovered that I am a complete beginner when it comes to skiing on the bumps. And so two seasons ago, this is the third now, I decided that I wanted to get good at skiing moguls. And so the first season I really discovered how really terrible I was. In the second season, last year, I got a little better. So my goal this year is to be proficient, I can get down the hills now without falling, which is a big deal. That was a big improvement. But I don’t look pretty. And it’s all about looking pretty, you got to look pretty, you know, as Fernando Lamas once said, You look marvelous. Anyway, thanks for watching this video, an update, we got some data with regard to the economy and with regard to inflation. And with regard to jobs, they updated all the numbers from last month, nothing there to be overly worried about, in fact, they reconfirmed that we seem to be on a good trajectory when it comes to inflation, and therefore interest rates. The big big number is going to be next Tuesday when they come out with the inflation numbers. And we think that number will come in, pardon me at 2.8 the inflation rate which will be lower than it was last month, and that will be very well received in our view. And the trend over the next five months, we think will be that inflation will trend downward during that time, and that’ll bode well for our bond portfolio and for our stock portfolio. And so we think the Fed is actually going to succeed in getting inflation down without causing a major massive recession. So that’s good, because recessions come with bear markets, and we don’t like that. So right now, the bond side has been up and down, as the bond market kind of absorbs the fact that the Fed said no, we’re not raising or lowering interest rates until we’re sure. And the bond market was expecting that interest rates would go down in March, very unlikely event at this point, probably June or July, in our view, and so that recalibration is happening, but nothing to be overly worried about, we believe that by the end of this year, bonds should have had a very, very good year. So we’re very excited about the opportunity there. And of course, if inflation comes down and interest rates are lower, consumers have more purchasing power, they buy more stuff, companies have higher profits and profits drive stock prices, so that should also be good. So right now there’s nothing new on the horizon to tell us that our Fearless Forecast for this year is going to change. And so we keep on keepin on as they used to say, for those of you in SCWPer Nation, we hope that you are enjoying your second childhood without parental supervision. We hope you’re SCWPering your little tails off. I hope you’re having a fantastic time enjoying what you so richly deserved and worked hard for and for those of you who are not members of SCWPer Nation yet, our job is to get you there. I was talking to a client. She’s 94 just had her 94th birthday. She’s a SCWPer ’02, okay. That means that she retired in 2002. And so I was talking to her, and I said, you know, her name is Pat. Wonderful. I love her love her love her. She’s a wonderful person. And I said, you know, Pat, what is the key to 94? Because now she’s talking about, you know, I’m gonna make it to 100 who ever knew? And I said, Well, what’s the key to it? What do you attribute it? She said, Ken, you have to be brave. I said, Really? What do you mean by that? She says, Well, just getting out of bed requires bravery. And getting your daily exercise in requires bravery. Everything you do when you get to my age requires you to be brave because your body doesn’t want to do any of that stuff. So you got to have mind over matter and make it happen. So you know, many of you have told us that we project your retirement cash flow plan all the way out to age 100. And many, many times I’ve heard well, I’m not going to make it to 100. You know, that’s ridiculous. Don’t count on it, you the technology is changing, you might live to be 100. So all the stuff that we talk about your money lasting as long as you do, protection of principle, having a strategy, not only to invest, but to protect all of that, if your money’s gonna let if you’re gonna last to age 100, we want your money to last as long as you do. And that’s a long time. So that’s what we’re all about. And we hope that you have that peace of mind that we, we want you to have. So for now, things are looking good. We’re having a good month so far, both on the stock and the bond side. Obviously, nothing goes up in a straight line, especially not the stock market. But we anticipate that by the end of this year, we should be higher than where we are today on both sides of the equation. I want to also remind you guys that if you have money that is in a savings account at the bank, and you’re not happy with the interest rate you’re getting there, we’ve come out with a cash alternative. It’s called Basic Conservative. And it’s designed to help to get to a hopefully a higher interest rate with a cash equivalent type of portfolio. So if you’re in that boat, talk to your Retirement Planner, and maybe we can help you to get a higher return than than what you’re getting now. So take advantage of that. I hope you’re well share this video with as many people as you possibly can. We want as many SCWPerS out there SCWPering as we possibly can get. So thanks for watching and we will 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