The WealthArch Blog
Blog Posts By Earl Yaokasin, CFA
Picture a beautiful day at sea in a boat. The sun is shining, the sky is clear, and the waters are peaceful and still. Without warning, a storm rolls in. Amidst howling winds and crashing waves, your boat is tossed about, threatening to capsize. While this might sound like a day gone wrong, it’s also […]
Retirement is often thought of as a blissful state of leisure and freedom. It’s a time to relax, travel, and pursue hobbies without the constraints of a full-time job. For many people, it’s a reward for decades of hard work and dedication, a chance to enjoy the fruits of their labor. Retirement is more than […]
What does financial independence actually mean? It’s more than just having a lot of money in the bank; it’s the freedom to live life completely on your terms, knowing that your financial obligations are covered. Can you imagine waking up without the stress of working for a paycheck? For many people, financial independence isn’t a […]
Why Fiduciary Responsibility is Important to Clients A fiduciary financial advisor represents the pinnacle of trust and ethical standards in the world of financial management. However, what is the fiduciary responsibility they carry? What does fiduciary responsibility mean? Essentially, these professionals are legally obligated to act in the interests of their clients and must set […]
What Is Value Investing? Value investing is an approach to increasing wealth where investors actively search for stocks that are undervalued. After the initial investment, value investors usually hold on to these stocks for however long it takes for their share prices to increase. If these stocks appreciate and approach their underlying values, they need […]
Smart Stock Investing: Minimize Risk, Optimize Returns Losing Money is Easy Too easy. While no one will say they want to lose money, many investors just can’t help themselves. They focus only on the short-term. They see trendy stocks going up, providing great short-term profits for other people, and they want their piece of the […]
Two Most Common Misconceptions About Stock Investing Investing is simple, but not easy. Warren Buffett Regularly, I speak with many people about stocks, and I found that most people have at least one of these two most common misconceptions about stock investing: If the above sounds like they make sense to you, that’s because these […]
Saving for College – Is a 529 Plan Enough? Saving for College Does the thought of paying for your children’s college tuition scare you? According to bestcolleges.com, the average tuition and fees increased from $8,661 to $14,307 per year from 2000-2021. So, for a 4-year degree in 2024, you probably need to pay around $60,000 […]
International Women’s Day Women and Investing This year’s International Women’s Day is on March 8th. To celebrate, we wanted to write about women’s roles and views about investing. At first glance, it may be a little disheartening to see low investing participation numbers, but the future is bright as more and more younger women are […]
Investing 101 Saving for Retirement For the last 6 decades, it has become harder to save for retirement. Costs have skyrocketed and incomes haven’t kept pace with inflation. Do you remember the time when a one-income household was enough? Today, many households need two incomes to live comfortably. Planning for the future has become more […]
Should You Repair Your Car or Buy a New One? Things to Consider Similar to being asked whether someone should buy or rent a house, I received another question: “Should you repair your car or buy a new one?” My 2005 Honda Civic just reached 100,000 miles and I have my car scheduled for a […]
Should You Buy or Rent a House? A common question I’ve been asked a lot over the last decade is “Should you buy or rent a house?” Recently, I’ve been asked this question 5 times. This topic is so deep that it would require the research equivalent of a doctoral dissertation to answer this question […]
Do You Need an Emergency Fund? Having an emergency fund is the foundation for building and protecting wealth. Whether you have millions of dollars or are millions in debt, everyone needs an emergency fund. Your Financial Foundation If you have credit card debt (or other loans) and want to get out of it, you still […]
Is Your Financial Advisor Worth It? How Much Does Your Financial Advisor Really Cost? Financial advisors can provide valuable guidance and support as you work towards your financial goals, but how much does investing with a financial advisor really cost? Figuring that out will help you answer the question, “Is your financial advisor worth it?” […]
WealthArch vs. Index Funds What are Index Funds? Over the last decade or so, index funds (also called passive funds) have grown in popularity. Index funds are a type of mutual fund that is composed of stocks that mirror a financial market like the S&P500. Their popularity is well deserved, because these funds charge very […]
401(k) Tips and Tricks Flavors and Combinations Reviewing 401(k)’s is like visiting an ice cream shop. There are so many flavors and combinations you can get and making a decision may not be easy. I’ve provided a few 401(k) tips and tricks to help you figure out the right investment allocations. Assessing Risk Tolerance For […]
Investing Risk and Reward Evaluating Risk/Reward Propositions No guts, no glory! High risk, high reward; low risk, low reward. These clichés are true, but when it comes to investing risk and reward, there’s more to unpack from these sayings. One needs to have the courage to take risk, but to do so in an undisciplined […]
Tax Efficient Investment Management Tax Efficient Investing and Allocation Between Account Types To make trading and monitoring portfolios easy for them, many financial advisors structure their investments exactly the same way across multiple client accounts. At WealthArch, we customize client portfolios to not only fit their personal financial circumstances, but also to maximize tax efficient […]
Value vs. Growth Stocks Two Approaches There are two major approaches to stock investing, value and growth. In an over-generalized sense, value stocks are unloved, boring, and cheap, while growth stocks are expensive, high-flying, and popular. I talk more about value investing and the subtleties of these definitions on our website here. The purpose of […]
WealthArch Investments vs. Typical Mutual Funds What’s the Difference? A typical active mutual fund has more than 100 holdings, with some having around 300 positions. These types of companies are structured where analysts specialize in about 3 or more industries and cover stocks globally within those industries. These analysts give their recommendations to the portfolio […]
The CFA Program Difference Even before I graduated college in the Philippines, my mom kept repeating over and over that I should get an MBA (Master in Business Administration). Back then, my dream had always been to be an investment manager, and for a while I thought that getting an MBA would be the best […]
How a Not-So-Frugal Dad Thinks and Spends During This Halloween Weekend I wrote this update this Saturday morning (Oct 29, 2022) to all my clients, because one of them requested it. October 29, 2022 Dear Partners, On Thursday, Oct 27, 2022, one of you requested me to write more about tips and tricks on how […]
8 Steps to Becoming a Great Stock Investor A lot of people have been asking me, “How do you become a great stock investor? What books can you recommend?” There are thousands of websites and people claiming to have the best financial advice which makes you question, which ones are real. Who do I trust? […]
Non-term Life Insurance Products Are Not Good Investments Non-term life insurance products, such as annuities, and whole life and universal life products, generate very high commissions for insurance agents and high profit margins for the insurance company. These commissions and profits are coming out of your wallet. Additionally, you need to question the investment guarantees […]
The 10 Commandments of Investing “Price is what you pay, value is what you get.” – Warren Buffet One of the best pieces of advice given by the most famous business prodigy, who bought his first stock when he was 11 years young and amassed a fortune thereafter through buying stocks and companies, is now widely […]