Month: July 2021

You planned. You budgeted. You checked all the boxes on your financial wellness checklist, and now you’re sitting on a little extra cash. The question is, do you spend it on something that will break or fall out of style, or do you use it to maximize your financial future?

Here are five things to do with extra money that don’t involve buying something with little chance of lasting a lifetime.

1. Pay Off Credit Card Debt

In fall 2020, Americans carried an average credit card balance of $5,897—a not insignificant amount of money.

When you pay off your credit card balance in full each month, you avoid paying interest. But when you go from month to month with a balance, you rack up interest charges.

Given that the average APR (annual percentage rate) for a credit card that charges interest hovered close to 16% in early 2021, it’s in your best interests to lower your credit card balances to zero as soon as you can. If you’ve wound up with some extra cash, it’s a smart move to put at least some of it toward reducing credit card debt—especially if it is high-interest debt.

2. Start an Emergency Fund

About one third of middle-income Americans have enough money set aside to cover six months of living expenses, CNBC reports. If you’re among them, congratulations!

But if you’re not in that group, consider stashing at least some of your extra cash in an emergency fund (ideally in an interest-bearing savings account). This advice applies to anyone, not just middle-income folks. Experts recommend you squirrel away money in an emergency fund to cover at least three to six months of living expenses.

Remember that this money should be used only for an emergency. By “emergency,” we don’t mean a vacation or a new TV. We mean medical bills, car repairs, and other unexpected situations.

3. Save for Retirement

Retirement. It seems like it’s so far away. In reality, though, you get closer to retirement every day. So are you saving enough for the day you decide to quit working and start relaxing more?

A report released in 2021 found that one fourth of American adults lack any retirement savings, and those who are saving for retirement aren’t saving enough. When you wind up with some extra cash, it’s wise to earmark at least some of it for your golden years through an employer-sponsored 401(k), a traditional or Roth IRA, or another retirement vehicle like a self-directed precious metals IRA.

4. Explore Alternative Assets

You’re likely already familiar with traditional assets—things like stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and exchange-traded funds (ETFs). But what about alternative assets? The category of alternative, or less conventional, assets includes real estate, artwork, antiques, and precious metals like gold and silver.

Key advantages to alternative assets are that they can diversify your portfolio and combat market volatility. In addition, their returns might be higher than those of traditional assets. If you’ve accumulated some extra money, you might consider alternative assets to supplement your portfolio.

If you settle on gold or silver, keep in mind that you can purchase bullion bars and coins, which are widely viewed as safe-haven assets and a desirable way to store wealth.

5. Focus on Generational Wealth

In a recent article, The Wall Street Journal declared that the “greatest wealth transfer in modern history has begun.” The newspaper cited data predicting that older generations will hand down about $70 trillion in wealth between 2018 and 2042.

That’s an impressive number. However, are you in a good position to eventually pass along your own wealth to your children and grandchildren? If you’re not confident about the answer to that question, perhaps it’s time to allocate some extra cash for your family and future family. Generational wealth is a great legacy you can leave to your loved ones.

How do you build generational wealth? Among the methods are buying stock, contributing to a workplace retirement plan, purchasing real estate, taking out a life insurance policy, or adding precious metals like gold and silver to your portfolio. Watch the video below to learn more about turning your cash into a lasting wealth-builder, like gold!

The post 5 Future-Focused Things to Do with Extra Money appeared first on U.S. Money Reserve.

We all want to retire comfortably and live our best lives on the way to retirement. But as we all know, having a retirement portfolio means living with a certain amount of financial stress. If you’re a news junkie like me, you may find yourself watching the markets every day—and if you’re not careful, all those little market ups and downs can lead to a lot more worrying than is necessary.

Financial stress can even affect your health. According to HelpGuide.org, financial stress can lead to issues like insomnia, depression, anxiety, relationship difficulties, and more.

But there are steps we can all take to ensure that we experience as little financial stress as possible as we work toward retirement and, hopefully, a healthy and happy life.

Diversification is key to reducing your financial stress.

As I’ve said many times before, diversification is all about reducing risk. By allocating parts of your portfolio to multiple asset classes—and even multiple asset types within those classes—you expose yourself to a smaller amount of the risks associated with each asset class. If the market makes a big move in one asset class, the others may not be as strongly affected, which allows for more overall stability in your portfolio.

For example: On June 25, 2021, Reuters reported that $3.6 billion in cryptocurrency disappeared when two brothers who ran a crypto exchange in South Africa disappeared. And on June 27, 2021, Fortune reported that Binance Markets Limited, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, was banned in the United Kingdom by the nation’s Financial Conduct Authority, in what Fortune calls “one of the most significant moves to date by a regulator amid a global crackdown in the crypto industry.”

If your portfolio were mostly made up of cryptocurrencies, this news would be incredibly stressful. But with a high level of diversification, you could take comfort in knowing that even if you had some money in cryptocurrencies, your entire portfolio wouldn’t be at risk. Better yet, if you had diversified, you may have put money into assets that act conversely to cryptocurrencies, allowing for balance or even growth potential if the crypto market were to experience another downturn.

Gold is a time-tested store of wealth that tens of millions of Americans use to diversify their portfolios.

When it comes to alternative assets—those that folks turn to when they seek to diversify with more than paper-based assets like cash and stocks—I believe in the growth potential of gold and other precious metals. These assets have historically acted conversely to drops in the stock market, and precious metals have a much longer history as an asset class than cryptocurrencies, allowing us to see evidence of gold’s behavior during a variety of market situations. Best of all, gold is a tangible, physical asset—making it far harder for a pair of brothers to disappear alongside $3.6 billion worth of the metal.

In a 2015 interview with the American Psychological Association, psychologist Dr. Linda Gallo said that “it’s important to set aside time regularly for healthy and relaxing behaviors because…when stress arises, often we let go of the behaviors that could help us deal with it most effectively.”

I couldn’t agree more. It’s important to take steps to reduce stress, and when it comes to reducing financial stress, I believe that one of the best steps you can take is to diversify with precious metals.

The post Reducing Financial Stress Through Diversification appeared first on U.S. Money Reserve.

Kitco News

(Kitco News) – This commercial-scale production of rare earth carbonate by Energy Fuels from a U.S. mined rare earth resource positions Energy Fuels as the only company in North America that currently produces a monazite-derived, enhanced rare earth material.

The post Energy Fuels ships first batch of rare earth carbonate from White Mesa uranium mill to Europe for processing appeared first on WorldSilverNews.

Kitco News

(Kitco News) – Sandfire Resources (ASX: SFR) announced today that the Mining Licence has been granted for its Motheo copper mine in Botswana, representing the final major permitting milestone required for full-scale construction of the project to commence.

The post Sandfire secures mining permit for Motheo copper mine in Botswana appeared first on WorldSilverNews.

Kitco News

(Kitco News) – GoGold Resources (TSX: GGD) reported Wednesday production for the quarter ending June 30, 2021 of 575,302 silver equivalent ounces (“AgEq”), consisting of 315,632 silver ounces, 3,170 gold ounces, and 120 tonnes of copper, from its Parral tailings mine in Mexico.

The post GoGold reports Q2 2021 production increase in Mexico appeared first on WorldSilverNews.

Kitco News

(Kitco News) – Novo Resources (TSX: NVO) today reported a quarterly operational update from the first full quarter at the company’s Nullagine gold project, located in the Pilbara region of Western Australia.

The post Novo reports record monthly gold production in Australia appeared first on WorldSilverNews.