The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Investors have flocked to artificial intelligence (AI) stocks in recent times thanks to the technology's promise of revolutionizing everything from our daily lives to how businesses are run. And we're just at the beginning of this high-growth story. Today's $200 billion market is forecast to reach beyond $1 trillion by the end of the decade. All of this has translated into double-digit gains this year for many companies that support the development of AI -- or are developing AI themselves.

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XY Planning Network

SEPTEMBER 30, 2024

As a business owner in the financial planning industry, we know you wear many hats to ensure the success of your business and the satisfaction of your clients. One of those hats might be bookkeeping. While taking on this task yourself can be tempting, the consequence of any mistakes could be costly. First, let's address the complexity of bookkeeping.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

It's no secret that Artificial Intelligence (AI) stocks have dominated the market for the last few years. With firms like PwC -- one of the "big four" accounting firms -- making claims that AI could add $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030 -- the hype makes sense. The revolution's poster child, Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) , saw its stock skyrocket nearly 1000% from late 2022 to today, but the last few months have not been as kind.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Most investors are drooling over Microsoft 's (NASDAQ: MSFT) jaw-dropping growth story. And let's be honest: With the company's $3 trillion market cap , it's hard not to. But a lesser-known perk to keep an eye on is its consistent dividend rewards to shareholders. Microsoft declared its first dividend for shareholders in 2003 and has been treating shareholders to consistent dividend increases for nearly two decades.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

This article is intended for educational purposes only and is not legal advice. For guidance on your personal situation, please contact a lawyer. There are many important steps you can take in the course of your estate planning to set your loved ones up financially upon your passing. One big step is to put a life insurance policy in place so that the people who depend on you financially aren't left in the lurch.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

If you're looking to maximize your income in retirement, delaying Social Security benefits until age 70 is one of the simplest and most effective ways to do so. Age 62 is the earliest you can file, but for every month you delay benefits past that age, you'll receive larger monthly payments. By waiting until age 70, you'll receive the maximum possible benefit, based on your work history.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) has been one of the best-performing stocks in the market, no matter which timeframe you look at. It has risen 47% over the past year, 115% in the last five years, and 1,060% in the past decade -- easily outperforming the market (measured by the S&P 500 ) over that timeframe. But none of that matters now, as you can't travel back in time to invest in Amazon earlier.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Retirement planning is one of the most important financial exercises you'll do with your spouse. Some aspects of your plan, such as saving and investments, have well-documented blueprints for success. However, there are some essential aspects of budgeting that you have to determine yourself. It's important to have a conversation with your spouse to set lifestyle expectations so that you can create goals and track your progress along the way.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

The internet boom culminated in a spectacular bust during the early 2000s, and it taught investors that it's difficult to pick winners and losers during a technological revolution. Many companies fail to survive once the dust settles, and only some manage to thrive. It's also difficult to predict what the economic landscape will look like in the years ahead.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

The rapid expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) lit a blazing fire under many tech stocks. The biggest winners so far are foundational companies like Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) and Microsoft. Nvidia supplies the high-end data center GPUs for processing complex AI tasks, while Microsoft owns a major stake in ChatGPT's creator OpenAI. Over the past five years, Nvidia's stock soared 2,590% as companies scrambled to upgrade their servers with its new GPUs.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Two of the most popular artificial intelligence (AI) investments right now are Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) and Palantir (NYSE: PLTR). These companies represent opposite ends of the AI investment spectrum, with Nvidia on the hardware side and Palantir on the software side. These two have dominated their respective industries, but which is the better investment choice between them?

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Image source: Getty Images Earning 2% cash back on the majority of your shopping is one of the best benefits of a Costco Executive membership. Many households will quickly earn enough rewards to cover the Executive membership fee and more. If you combine those rewards with a Costco credit card , you'll really be cooking with gas. There's a limit to how many Executive rewards you can rack up -- Costco caps the total at $1,250 a year.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Peter Thiel is best known as one of the co-founders of PayPal and an early investor in Meta Platforms , then known as Facebook. After leaving PayPal, he co-founded another company, Palantir Technologies (NYSE: PLTR) , where he serves as chairman. Thiel sold over $1 billion worth of Palantir stock over the last few days of September and the first day of October, according to Securities and Exchange Commission ( SEC ) filings.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

One of ExxonMobil 's (NYSE: XOM) defining features is its dividend -- specifically, the company's ability to increase the dividend year in and year out for 42 consecutive years despite the inherent volatility of the energy sector. But for some investors, the 3.2% dividend yield might not be compelling enough to make the integrated energy giant a buy.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

When it comes to growth potential, Palantir (NYSE: PLTR) attracted increased attention in recent months. The generative AI capabilities of its Artificial Intelligence Platform, better known as AIP, delivered massive productivity gains to customers. Indeed, some of that benefit should accrue to shareholders. The question is whether that gain is sufficient to deliver a 100-fold gain that might help smaller investors, an amount that could turn a $10,000 investment into $1 million or more.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

The great thing about investing is you don't need to start with a big fortune to eventually build a portfolio worth a life-changing amount of money. It is challenging, of course, to find in advance the big growth stocks that can generate those kinds of transformational returns. But the one key ingredient that is usually necessary is patience: Significant gains don't often come quickly.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

For almost 60 years, Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) (NYSE: BRK.B) CEO Warren Buffett has left professional and everyday investors in awe. Without the aid of fancy trading algorithms or specialized software, the "Oracle of Omaha" has consistently located plain-as-day value and absolutely crushed the benchmark S&P 500 in the return column. The greater than 5,500,000% cumulative gain in Berkshire Hathaway's Class A shares (BRK.A) since Buffett became CEO has earned him quite the following.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

One stock that looked like it was dead in the water last year was Lumen Technologies (NYSE: LUMN). The telecom company had a lot of debt, suspended its dividend, its financials looked awful, and the stock had been in free fall. It looked like an incredibly risky investment to own. Although those problems remain, as with anything these days, artificial intelligence (AI) and any related news can prove to be transformative for a stock -- even a risky one.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Investors are likely familiar with the S&P 500 , an index of 500 large and profitable U.S.-based businesses. This is often viewed as the bellwether for how the overall stock market is performing. However, the Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ: QQQ) deserves attention from investors, since it has crushed the S&P 500 in recent times. This exchange-traded fund (ETF) could continue to supercharge returns.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Image source: The Motley Fool/Upsplash Many of us take the money we have in the bank for granted. But as of 2022, a good 37% of Americans could not afford an unplanned $400 expense, according to the Federal Reserve. So if you're in a position where you're wondering if you have too much money in savings, that's a pretty good place to be. At the same time, you don't want to overfund your savings account , because doing so could mean missing out on better returns elsewhere.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

In 2021, many cryptocurrencies reached their all-time highs as stimulus checks, social media buzz, and a "fear of missing out" (FOMO) brought in a stampede of bulls. But in 2022, that rally fizzled out in a "crypto winter" as rising interest rates drove investors away from cryptocurrencies and other speculative investments. Bitcoin 's (CRYPTO: BTC) price sank from nearly $69,000 in November 2021 to less than $16,000 in November 2022.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

It's no secret that Nike (NYSE: NKE) has struggled lately. The sportswear giant has posted several quarters of weak growth and even said that revenue would decline in fiscal 2025, which began in June. That was before the company ousted CEO John Donahoe, who is set to be replaced on Oct. 14 by longtime company executive Elliott Hill, who is coming out of retirement to take the job.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU) released its results for fiscal 2024 on Sept. 25. The data released offers a clear indication that the memory chip market is hot thanks to favorable supply/demand dynamics. Micron reported $7.75 billion in fiscal Q4 revenue, a stunning increase of 93% year over year. Additionally, the company's operating income margin swung to a positive 22.5% from a negative reading of 30.1% in the same quarter last year thanks to the recovery in memory prices.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Semiconductors star Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) shot higher on Thursday morning, rising nearly 5% before retreating to about a 3% gain as of 11:11 a.m. ET. According to CNBC, there's no great mystery as to why. Citing comments made on the network's own Closing Bell: Overtime broadcast, CNBC quoted CEO Jensen Huang saying demand for Nvidia's new Blackwell chip for artificial intelligence (AI) functions is going "insane.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

The Social Security program undergoes several important changes each year to ensure benefit payments keep pace with inflation and wages. The most anticipated of those changes is the annual cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). That's especially true in 2025 given that inflation has been a serious burden for many Americans in recent years. The Social Security Administration will provide an official figure concerning the 2025 COLA next week, but beneficiaries should know what to expect.

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OCTOBER 3, 2024

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META) wowed the market with the unveiling of the Orion augmented reality (AR) glasses last week, but they won't go on sale for years. Meanwhile, Snap (NYSE: SNAP) showed off glasses developers will be able to get. Who has the upper hand, and what does the future look like? Travis Hoium digs into the industry in this video. *Stock prices used were end-of-day prices of Oct. 1, 2024.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

When I read that the median retirement savings balance among Americans aged 65 to 74 was just $200,000 as of 2022 (the latest year for which this data is available from the Federal Reserve), I was disappointed but not particularly shocked. It's not a secret that many people struggle with retirement savings. The problem, though, is that approaching retirement with a mere $200,000 IRA or 401(k) -- or less -- could put you in a very precarious financial situation once your career wraps up.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Investors have faced considerable difficulty owning Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU). As one of the few makers of DRAM and NAND memory, the company has played a crucial support role in running semiconductor-powered hardware and ensuring the smooth function of software applications. The semiconductor industry is also well known for its cyclicality, and the memory chip industry has experienced the most volatility.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Are Social Security benefits an important piece of your retirement income? If so, you might want to keep your eyes and ears open on Thursday, Oct. 10. That's when the cost-of-living adjustment for the coming year's monthly payments will be announced. These increases are intended to maintain retirees' buying power by keeping pace with inflation. Of course, sometimes they're still not quite enough.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

It's always an interesting time when a notable shareholder or executive at a major company buys or sells a lot of stock. Unfortunately for Dell Technologies (NYSE: DELL) shareholders, founder, chairman, and CEO Michael Dell disclosed a massive share sale on Monday. Dell had been thought of as a recent AI winner, and a relatively low-valued one at that.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Image source: Getty Images Costco's catalog of odd and delightful finds just keeps growing. Somewhere between the giant tubs of mayo and high-end massage chairs, you may find something you didn't expect: a 10'x12' studio shed for $16,999.99. Yes, you read that right -- Costco is selling a guest house. But before you start picturing a cozy tiny house tucked away in your backyard, let's dive into the details.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

If you have access to a 401(k) through your employer, it's wise to take full advantage of it. The 401(k) offers a higher contribution limit, allowing up to $23,000 per year, compared to $7,000 per year for both traditional and Roth IRAs. Many plans also offer employer matching contributions , which can effortlessly double your savings. But how much should you have saved in your 401(k) by the time you reach your 40s or 50s?

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Investors love to get inspiration from Warren Buffett. He has shepherded his holding company, Berkshire Hathaway , to incredible, market-beating returns over time, providing sage advice for followers along the way. Buffett has famously said that his favorite holding period is forever, and the ideal stock could sit in your account and multiply over many decades.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

The S&P 500 is the most widely followed stock market index in the U.S. and consists of the 500 largest publicly traded companies in the country. Given the scope of its membership, it is considered by many investors to be the most dependable gauge of overall stock market performance. To be included in the S&P 500, a company must meet the following criteria: Be based in the U.S.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 4, 2024

In this podcast, Motley Fool analyst Seth Jayson and host Dylan Lewis discuss: Why CVS has activists sniffing around, and how getting the insurance operations right could get the company and the stock back in motion. How interest rates are affecting the housing and auto markets, and other updates from KB Homes and CarMax. Motley Fool analyst Jason Moser and host Mary Long look at Uber , and its quest to become the everything app.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

It's nearly impossible to time the market, so investors shouldn't bother. However, it's a good idea for investors to be aware of big events that could move the market -- and potentially their portfolio -- in a big way. If nothing else, knowing about a big event in advance can help investors manage their stress better and ride out any volatility in a much calmer manner.

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The Motley Fool

OCTOBER 3, 2024

Dividend investing can create substantial passive income over time. A conservative example illustrates this potential: Investing $10,000 annually for 40 years in a stock yielding 3.1% with 2.5% annual dividend growth could generate $44,316 in yearly dividend income. This strategy would also build a portfolio worth over $1.4 million. Selecting the right dividend stocks is crucial.

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