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Uber Buys Drizly, Proves It Has No Real Value

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ubers-future

Uber Buys Drizly for $1.1 Billion Once upon a time, people believed that Uber had some form of value. Its app was revolutionary. Its concept of using ordinary people using their own cars to provide rides was revolutionary. But, it turns out that it wasn’t so much revolutionary, as just the first in an easily replicable line of use-your-own-car apps. Drizly Is Just GrubHub for Alcohol, Which Is Just Uber for Food Uber is paying Drizly $1.1 billion in a desperate grab for any shot at profitability and sustainability. Uber’s acquisition of Drizly proves that there is nothing special about Uber. A handful of engineers, a couple of months, and a few million of funding and anyone can copy Uber well enough. After that, the “special” comes from good old fashioned sales. Building Drizly was a lot less about building an app, and a lot more about signing up liquor stores, and then convincing people that it was worth shelling out $5 to stay on their couch instead of heading down to their favorite liquor store. This was a tough sale pre-Covid. Why pay $5 plus tip for a liquor delivery when you could just swing by your favorite liquor …

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What Else Is In New Covid Stimulus Bill

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new covid stimulus bill details

If you are interested in financial independence, you know you need to watch and manage your money beyond a new $600 stimulus check. You need to know what else is in the new Covid stimulus bill. Here are the new Covid stimulus bill details you need to manage your money. New Covid Stimulus Bill Breakdown New Covid Stimulus Checks By now, you have probably heard about the new $600 stimulus checks, and the fight over whether or not to get $2,000 stimulus checks. Mitch McConnell has blocked $2,000 stimulus checks and runs the Senate like he is the King of the Senate, so that means there is no debate, no compromise, and not chance of $2,000 stimulus checks coming, so don’t bother worrying about that. The $600 is per person, and includes children. So, if you are married with two kids, you can look for $2,400 stimulus checks. It works the same as last time with the IRS using your direct deposit information. If you did something to fix your direct deposit info last time, it should stay fixed for this time as well. There are income phaseouts again to keep the payments from going to higher-income earners. Couples making …

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Bitcoin Hits 20,000

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bitcoin 20000

If you’re a bitcoin fan, or if you just follow along, you know that today bitcoin hit 20,000. Meaning you can turn one bitcoin into $20,000. Is Bitcoin A Good Investment? Bitcoin, like the dollar, and Google stock, has no intrinsic value beyond the fact that people decided it is worth something, and there is a limited supply of it. Unlike the dollar, gold, and Google stock, bitcoin doesn’t have a history, or set of like assets that it can be compared against to determine its theoretical value. In short, bitcoin is so new, nobody really knows what makes it tick, although there are many people out there who claim to know. So, is bitcoin a good investment? It depends on what you are investing for, and what money you are using. Some bitcoin analysts are calling for much higher bitcoin prices than 20,000. Before you get caught up in bitcoin euphoria, don’t forget the previous high for bitcoin was set three years ago in December of 2017. That green arrow is very real, but that red arrow is very real too. If you invested your kid’s college fun in bitcoin in September of 2017, you were a genius, provided …

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New Home Sales Up During Covid

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new housing

An interesting wrinkle in the new Covid economy showed up today. The U.S. Department of Commerce reported that new home sales in August rose by 4.8%, on top of a spike 13.9% in July. Buying New Homes Overall home sales are having difficulty in no small part because home buyers are reluctant to do several showings in a day in a Covid world. Those showings are what motivate buyers to purchase existing homes. Unlike existing home sales, new homes are typically sold via model homes. Model home are shiny, bright, and seem cleaner, even though more people may actually move through them each day. Furthermore, rather than having to see numerous homes to find the perfect one, buyers need only find a model they like. Builders then allow buyers to tweak that model. Low Mortgage Rates Record low mortgage rates are also helping drive sales for new construction. Unlike existing home sales that are dependent upon subjective appraisals, lenders can easily get a feel for the current value of the one of many new buildings a particular buyer looks to purchase. Is Zelle a scam? Finding a mortgage, however, even for new construction is getting harder. It turns out lenders …

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What Does Oil Crash Mean for My Investments?

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oil prices zero

The expiring May oil contract trading for less than $0 made big headlines, but what is zero-dollar oil, and what does it mean for your investment portfolio? Zero Dollar Oil The trick to oil contracts, unlike similar stock options is that execution requires the delivery of a physical good. If you buy 100 options for IBM stock, on the day the contract expires, they put shares of IBM stock in your brokerage account. Obviously, this requires no effort, nor ability to “store” those shares somewhere. When an oil contract expires, its owner has to take possession of the barrel of oil. That doesn’t actually mean that an investor drives up a truck and loads it with barrels of oil. Instead, there are numerous storage and refinery facilities where that oil can usually be directed. However, as the May contract came up for expiration, there wasn’t any room for storage (which isn’t free), and there is no demand at the refineries, so investors were looking at having to take delivery of a good that they had no place to put, and no use for. In this case, it actually would cost such an investor less to dump his contract for pennies, …

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2023 Required Minimum Distributions

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2023 Required Minimum Distributions 1

If you have an IRA or 401k and you are over 70 1/2-year-old, you need to take a required minimum distribution, or RMD, from your retirement account each year. However, with the coronavirus pandemic, Congress passed specific relief for certain kinds of retirement accounts creating different rules for your 2023 RMD. New 2023 RMD Rules Normally, taxpayers over the age of 70 1/2 years old have to take money out of their retirement accounts like IRAs and 401k plans. The reason is simple. The IRS doesn’t want that money sitting there untaxed forever. So, when you get into retirement, it wants to tax that money that you enjoyed paying no taxes on for all of those years. With the coronavirus pandemic of 2020, however, Congress looked to provide some relief to taxpayers in the form of $1,200 payments, small business loans, and relaxing the rules on accessing and using retirement plan money. One of those benefits is the suspension of required minimum distributions, or RMDs, for 2020. All RMDs, regardless of the owner’s age, or how many required minimum distributions have already been taken are suspended for 2020. In other words, there are no required distributions during 2020. If you …

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How To Get Your Coronavirus Money

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How To Get Your Coronavirus Money 2

The coronavirus has upended the U.S. economy and sent millions of Americans into unemployment. While it isn’t enough to offset everything, Congress did pass some legislation providing a cash infusion to Americans as a way to both help people through a tricky time, as well as try and prop up the economy. Of course, getting funds out to all Americans isn’t an easy task. Really, the only way to handle such a thing is to tap into the one institution almost every American must interact with, the IRS. How To Get My $1200 Payment As is always the case when you try and get to “everyone” someone gets missed, and this big government payout is no exception. If you have the “average” interactions with the IRS your payment is on the way and you don’t have to do anything. If you have a less common situation, then things can get trickier. Check out my Acorns review Basically, if you filed income taxes in 2018, or if you’ve already filed for 2019, the IRS will use the same information you provided for any refund, or payment you had. If you didn’t file taxes, either because your income was too low, or …

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Stock Market Correction in 2019?

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rebalance not predict

Time is running out for all of those financial analysts, pundits, and economists who predicted a market correction, or worse in 2019. As always, there will be no accountability, nor any mention of the failure of these predictions when the same folks predict a correction in 2020 and then try and take credit for “calling the market.” Still, for those of us who don’t shamble along to the daily clutter of the financial media looking for some sort of clicks, it can be a funny exercise to watch. Every year, I tell my self that I’m going to keep a running tally of the “predictions” so I can create an easy to view table showing the failure of the majority of predictions. Unfortunately, that would be a very time consuming task considering the sheer number of financial professionals who confidently make bold predictions to grab a day or two of headlines. Rakuten and Ebates review. Don’t Listen To Predictions The reality, of course, is that nobody really goes out and makes investment decisions or trades based upon some analyst at Dewey, Cheatum, and Howe calling a market top in Spring 2020. In the end, such predictions are really about media …

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Stocks! China! Trade Deal!

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Stocks! China! Trade Deal! 3

The Trump presidency has been nothing if unpredictable. The President seems to wake up with new tweets on his mind every day, and the markets love overreacting to every one. The result is a stunning whip shaw effect of large market moves up and down, often during the same day. This morning, U.S. Trade representatives said that the new tariffs Trump announced in a tweet on August 1 would be delayed. Some tariffs will be delayed until September 1 and others until December. Does that mean that progress is being made on a trade deal? Only the President knows, although he doesn’t really know either. Depending on how talk show hosts talk over the next few weeks, and what he advisors say, he may or may not think he is getting a good deal. Or getting credit for a good deal. Or maybe just get bored. Long-Term Diversified Portfolio Every financial planner eventually gets tired of beating this drum, but the answer is always the same. A long-term, well-balanced, risk adjusted, annually rebalanced portfolio is the solution to the dramatic, unpredictable moves of the market. Sooner or later, this market will roll over. Although, the tons of analysts “predicting” it …

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China Is Officially a Currency Manipulator

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China Is Officially a Currency Manipulator 4

China has been a currency manipulator for years. Everyone knows it. China knows it. The U.S. knows it. Every economist in the world knows it. China has an enormous trade surplus with the world. Typically, when this happens, the value of that currency rises making its exports more expensive to other countries. This, in turn eventually reduces the amount of imports a country makes, thereby reducing the overall trade deficit. China, which requires its citizens to hold their savings in state run banks, uses the large amounts of currency it generates sending exports around the world to ensure that the value of the Yaun never gets above a certain amount. In turn, this both keeps its exports cheap, and prevents any closing of the trade gap between its trading partners. None of this is secret, or remotely new information Trump Calls Out China Currency Actions What is new, is that usually no one says it out loud, and no one ever actually makes it official by labeling China a currency manipulator. So, what does it mean now that China has been officially labeled? Nothing. You see, since China has been doing this forever, and the other countries have known about …

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