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5 January 2025
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Weaker share prices may have already discounted some bad news, but cost inflation is creating wide divergences inside and across sectors. Early results show some companies are strong enough to resist sector falls.
Cash flow statements differ from income statements and balance sheets, and every company must balance payments to investors versus investing into the business. Cash flows drive the value of the business.
The long current positive run for the Australian stock market is unusual but not a warning of imminent demise. Previous long positive runs were not all followed by corrections but this one may end this month.
In reporting season, companies must deliver their results and many issue guidance for the next year. The response often send prices up or down and the market may make swift and not well-considered decisions.
While hot stocks generate media coverage and attention from investors, for the overall health of the market, they are irrelevant. A few big companies drive the Australian market.
Every day, an expert writes somewhere about the adverse impact of a reduction in franking credits due to a lower company tax rate. This tax rate has no impact on the after-tax returns received by Australian shareholders.
The major banks and other large companies attract a lot of attention when they report profits of billions of dollars, but other measures of profitability show the big headline figures can be misleading.
When you've been around long enough to have witnessed financial disasters, you wonder at the exuberance of youth embracing the great unknown. Are you missing out or will being old and tired eventually prevail?
Last year, I wrote an article suggesting returns from ASX stocks would trample those from housing over the next decade. One year later, this is an update on how that forecast is going and what's changed since.
The Future Fund's original purpose was to meet the unfunded liabilities of Commonwealth defined benefit schemes. These liabilities have ballooned to an estimated $290 billion and taxpayers continue to be treated like fools.
ASFA provides a key guide for how much you will need to live on in retirement. Unfortunately it has many deficiencies, and the averages don't tell the full story of the growing gender superannuation gap.
Unlike family trusts, testamentary trusts are activated posthumously, empowering you to exert post-death control over your assets. Learn how testamentary trusts offer unique benefits and protective measures.
Key lessons include expensive stocks can always get more expensive, Bitcoin is our tulip mania, follow the smart money, the young are coming with pitchforks on housing, and the importance of staying invested.
While the performance of the largest super funds has been admirable, they’ve become so big that it will make it difficult for them to outperform their benchmarks in future. It will be important for you to pick your fund wisely.