Category Archives: Finance

Coronavirus Recession 2020?

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Ironically, I scheduled my vacation this week and sure enough what happened… my state government practically shuts down the entire state. Thanks, governor DeWine, for closing all schools and colleges too. Restaurants, theaters, gyms, and bars are all shut down at least until the end of the month. I already have enough toilet paper (lol, see https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/16/us/newport-911-toilet-paper-trnd/index.html and https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/business/toilet-paper-shortage.html for more details) all joking aside we did buy some extra food though. I have enough regular food for 1 month and enough “near food” stuff (protein powder) for at least another extra month.

So, what did I do this morning? I turned on the TV to CNBC and tried to determine the emotion of the masses in hopes of determining how long this downturn might last, and if I should start stepping up my purchases of stock (I’m already taking small nibbles now since most brokers have no commission fees for trades). Traditionally, I’m always early when I jump back into the stock market after a deep dip (I was a month and a half early calling the bottom in 2008).

So even though the mortality rate is not that high (around 2%, and could actually be less), and the young age groups up to the start of 60 aren’t affected much, the country is talking about shutting down everything except “needs” related businesses (grocery stores mainly). The reasoning is not without merit, it isn’t so much that a country shutdown prevents the spread of the virus, it just slows the rate of spread so the hospitals can accommodate the surge in patients. I put forth the argument that the virus is already more widely spread than we believe, but without data, there is no way of knowing.

A new game changer is that Regeneron has come up with a treatment (not a vaccine) that could treat the coronavirus and possibly help prevent it with an existing cocktail of drugs. Hard to say, we’ll see but it’s believed that it might be in circulation more quickly than a coronavirus vaccine. Too bad I didn’t hear about this treatment until after the market was closed! Regeneron – REGN, was up over 11% today…

I’m hoping that if what Regeneron is working on does the trick, then there is a good change that the downturn might start to cease by the end of the second quarter. Hard to say, well see.

Just to end with a little bit of humor, check out this video from Ginger Billy

How Rednecks prepare for the Coronavirus

Stay safe and sane during these very odd, but hopefully short, strange times.

Don

Flash from the past – my third financial comic strip

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Ha, I remember when I created this Mr. Penny comic strip (he’s the blonde, I’m the green dot), it was more criticism about the belief of what wealth is and how to successfully build it. Too many people spend their wealth in foolish ways, and really don’t build a true wealth build system.

In the comic strip I reference the book “The Great Gatsby” as a financial book, but the fictional character “Mr. Gatsby” isn’t really creating wealth, he’s just earning/accumulating money faster than he’s spending it. Earned income is not forever, and sometimes drops off quickly that’s why he should have been building an investment portfolio first! Mr Gatsby’s income was through selling illegal alcohol, but if he survived in the story, he would have lost his income either by incarceration or the loss of his business model when prohibition ended.

Below is my best personal work in the series from a drawing perspective. The only thing I would have changed was the communication bubble. It looks more like a thought bubble than actual speaking bubble. Then again, maybe he was imagining speaking to me…

To see the actual comic strip, click on this -> Mr. Penny learning finances.

Memories… lol

Have a great week!

Thanks,

Don

Flash from the past – my second financial comic strip

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Wow, this past week went fast! Okay, so I’m just going to jump into my second comic strip.

The non-colorized version of the strip below was actually my first pilot (or prototype) of my idea of a comic strip addition to this blog… I like the colorized version so much better than I decided to do the rest with color and made this my official 2nd comic strip.

In such a stressful day and time, via the coronavirus problem, I hope a little humor helps take of the edge.

Not to brag, but if you notice in the comic strip below that indirectly I’m criticizing the latte effect (before doing so was so mainstream) if you don’t take other things into perspective that are more damaging to your financial well-being.

To be entirely honest, the latte factor does makes sense, and it’s not exclusive to lattes. I believe David Bach said in a few of his books that it’s not just lattes, but really anything that is preventing you from accomplishing your wealth goals. The latte factor applies to anything that you don’t need that derails your efforst in wealth accumulation (cigarettes, booze, expensive cars leased ever year, etc).

color comic
MR Color Version Comic 2

I wonder if I should recreate this comic strip series again… I did enjoy it!

Thanks,

Don

Flash from the past – my first financial comic strip

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When looking for a picture from my last article, I ran across some of my old comic artwork that I was going to incorporate into my blog weekly…

Just for fun, I think I’m going to republish the very short series, just for the fun of it It was harder than I imagined, but a lot of fun too. I actually look back proudly on my shorted lived series!

The comic strip below was created a bit before Halloween on 10/22/2010. I really liked that date because of the way the numbers look, I actually created it on that date because if I added a zero at the beginning of the first 10, it would be a palindrome. In my world both 10 and 010 is still ten).

I’m the small black dot in the picture, I called my self MR (for Money Reasons and because I was a guy, so a mister… seemed clever at the time…) back then. I was slowly going to develop the black dot as the comic strip grew in popularity, but I gave up way before then, lol.

Notice in the last square I’m even running (rolling, whatever) in fear!

Thanks for letting me relive the recent (or not so recent) past, depending on your perception of time.