Caution... there's a Santa Clause rally ahead! Today we reflect on how instant gratification, social media, and shifting consumer behavior mirror broader economic changes. We also talk practical year-end investing discipline, including portfolio “hygiene,” investor psychology alignment, rule-based decision making, and tax-loss harvesting strategies. We explore assesing holdings as if investing fresh today, managing oversized winners and stagnant losers, watching natural market turning points around year-end, while also exploring inflation trends, shrinkflation, housing affordability, and generational cost pressures. We also urge listeners to use the final weeks of the year to review risks, taxes, family financial clarity, and opportunities ahead. Thoughtful preparation, not momentum or emotion, drives long-term investment success. Today we discuss...
- The importance of year-end portfolio assessment, emphasizing reviewing holdings as if investing fresh today to determine alignment with investor psychology.
- Manage oversized winners, stagnant losers, and follow disciplined, rule-based investment practices rather than ego-driven decisions.
- Tax-loss harvesting is a key strategy, including the special advantage that crypto is treated as property and not subject to the 30-day wash-sale rule.
- Monitoring natural market turning points, particularly around year-end, to identify potential buying opportunities in beaten-down assets.
- Gold’s leadership in the rally, silver’s sharp recent gains, and the implications of JP Morgan shifting from short to long silver positions.
- Basel III banking regulations and the possibility of global banks increasing gold holdings if U.S. deficits rise above projected thresholds.
- Strategies for buying gold and silver, emphasizing buying for weight to minimize premiums and potentially profiting from historical spreads in coin pricing.
- Have caution with rare coin premiums, only experienced investors should consider numismatic factors, otherwise stick to weight-based purchases.
- Inflation indicators, using Campbell’s Soup can pricing as a proxy for quality-adjusted inflation over decades.
- Shrinkflation and the rising cost of essentials for younger generations, noting housing, insurance, and other expenses have outpaced wages.
- Recent trends in housing, including declining new home prices but smaller home sizes, illustrating hidden inflation and cost pressures.
"Cash is not trash... Cash is King" - Kirk Chisholm
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Today's Guest: Kirk Chisholm
Kirk Chisholm is a Wealth Manager and Principal at Innovative Advisory Group, an independent Registered Investment Advisor located in Lexington, MA. He has been providing wealth management services to individuals, executives, entrepreneurs, and their families since 1999. He is an outside the box thinker, risk manager, inflation expert, blogger, podcaster, and all-around interesting guy. Kirk is dedicated to developing lasting relationships with all of his clients and their families. One of the benefits of working with Kirk is his patience, empathy, and his ability to provide clear and easy-to-understand explanations to complex financial topics.
Kirk developed a unique philosophy for the wealth management industry called Risk Management First. The medical field has a similar way of thinking of âfirst do no harmâ. This philosophy focuses on risk management for clients in all aspects of their lives in ways the industry does not address. Risk management does not stop with investments. It also requires working closely with other professionals to address areas of their financial lives not currently being met.
In 2008, Kirk co-founded Innovative Advisory Group to address the needs not being addressed by the wealth management industry. It started with specializing in alternative assets held in retirement accounts (i.e. self directed IRAs/401ks). Then the company expanded into the specialization of college funding (i.e. planning, strategy, and paying the least possible for a high quality education), Risk Management First, exit planning for business owners, advanced planning (estate, tax, etc), and providing practice management and leadership training to other financial advisors, accountants and attorneys.
Kirk's Online Presence:
Today's Panelists
- Kirk Chisholm | Innovative Wealth
- Douglas Heagren | Mergent College Advisors








