Investments Archive
New IRS Holistic Audit Program
The federal government recently has enacted several laws increasing the reporting obligations of both U.S. resident and non-resident taxpayers and imposing...
Investment and Tax Strategies for A Changing Environment
For decades, the United States had a top marginal tax rate as high as 50, 70 and even 90 percent.1 As a matter of fact, for the past 50 years there have...
Mid-year 2010 Investment Outlook
As the Obama administration and Congress struggled to push financial reform legislation over the finish line, the financial markets enjoyed strong and...
Committing to Creating and Maintaining a Private Foundation
Choosing among various charitable-giving options can be a challenging proposition for your clients. The most common options are creating a private foundation...
The Real Allure of Emerging Markets
The conventional investment wisdom of going where the growth is would suggest increasing equity allocations to emerging markets. But our research shows...
The Illusion of Calm?
The financial markets enter 2010 on a much calmer note than they entered 2009, when the worst effects of the financial crisis were still being felt. By...
Soften the HEART's Blow
These days, all estate planners must be prepared to attend to the needs of multinational clients. And that means advisors must be familiar with the Heroes...
Stability or False Hope?
The financial markets are no longer trading as though the end of the world is nigh, and for that we can all be thankful. Liquidity has been restored to...
Build America Bonds
Among the many economic stimulus provisions in the American Reinvestment and Renewal Act of 2009 is a short-term program to expand financing alternatives...
(Re) Entering the Market?
The study of behavioral finance tells us that people's fear of financial loss exceeds their desire for gain...
Is This Time Different?
One of investors' greatest fears today is that the world is on the edge of an economic downturn that may be deeper and longer than anything experienced...
Great Expectations, Disappointing Realities
These days everyone is suffering. The media has been all over the story of the credit bust, the drop in housing values, the stock market's dive since...
Let's Get It Right
Back in the summer,1 I warned that the financial markets were headed for serious problems. But even my worst fears pale in comparison to what actually...
Holistic Diversification
A few years ago, Paul, a successful owner of a home-building company, wanted to reinvest his wealth in his business. The real estate market was booming...
Who Are These People?
RIAs Wirehouse Reps Obligation to Clients Fiduciary duty to act in clients' best interests at all times Can put his firm's interests first, as long as...
Asset-gathering Machines
In the first half of 2008, Camden Capital Management, a fee-only registered investment advisor (RIA) in El Segundo, Calif., added $100 million to its...
TIC Alternative: The Delaware Statutory Trust
The tougher financing climate is prompting some tenant-in-common (TIC) sponsors to pursue a more alternative: the Delaware statutory trust. Both investment...
It's Going to Get Worse
Half a century ago, the economic historian Karl Polanyi argued in the classic book The Great Transformation that self-regulating markets never work and...
Clients Cashing Out?
What do clients do with the cash when they receive large cash payments from, say, the sale of a business or a significant asset, such as a house or a...
A SARBANES-OXLEY FOR CHARITIES
David T. Leibell and Daniel L. Daniels of Cummings & Lockwood LLC in Stamford, Conn. report: On June 14, 2007, the Internal Revenue Service released for...
HOW THE HARVARD CRT TECHNIQUE WORKS
Dear Editor: The March issue's, Charitable Giving, column in the Briefing section described private letter rulings issued to Harvard University in 2003...
Alternative Investments: Perils for IRA Trustees
Trustees of individual retirement accounts (IRAs) have increasingly seen participants turning to nontraditional or alternative investments in their accounts....
The Market at Mid-Year
Something funny happened on the road to nirvana. After an unusually extended period of calm, the financial markets began acting like markets again at...
Longevity Planning
Sara and John Fisher are in their mid-50s. Their professional careers are successful and they've amassed about $5 million in assets. While they could...
Alternative Investments The Fiduciaries' Primer
The variety of alternative investments available to the public has exploded in the last 10 years just as prudent investor standards have empowered trustees...
New Customers For Alternative Investments
A recent ruling by the Securities and Exchange Commission has made it easier for private foundations organized as not-for-profit corporations with at...
Commodity Link?
As we begin a new year, one very old but important lesson is worth remembering. While consensus investment views are often correct, the strategies used...
Funding the Ventures Of Family and Friends
Private equity is a hot investment these days. And while you may be referring your ultra-high-net-worth clients to established private equity firms, don't...
Donating Real Estate
Real estate has been the fastest appreciating investment for many people during the past several years. With interest rates rising, however, recently...
Commodities In Trust Portfolios
While investing in commodities ranks among the oldest of financial endeavors, commodities today are underrepresented in most trust portfolios because...
ESOP-Assisted Buyouts
One of the most financially attractive exit strategies for the owner of a closely held business is to sell his company stock to an employee stock ownership...
Behavioral Finance Not To Be Ignored
One of the pillars of modern portfolio theory is the efficient market hypothesis (EMH), a theoretical framework for understanding how securities are valued...
Use a 529 Plan?
The primary and most tangible benefit of a 529 plan is the tax-deferred growth of the assets in the plan (growth is tax free to the extent the plan assets...
The King Is Dead, Long Live the King!
It remains to be seen whether anybody was playing a cosmic joke when Hurricane Wilma was tearing South Florida apart at the same time that President Bush...
Private Foundations'Investing Options
Private foundations are usually organized as trusts or not-for-profit corporations. When choosing between the two, advisors tend to focus on ease of formation...
Let's Get Personal
The Institute for Private Investors' annual Family Performance Tracking surveys have found over the past few years that most high-net-worth investors...
Why Not to Invest In Non-Deductible IRAs
People who are too wealthy to qualify for either a deductible individual retirement account (IRA) or a Roth IRA have the option of contributing to a non-deductible...
Lessons From the Case Of the Invisible Picasso
Many art collectors try to avoid paying sales tax, capital gains and, ultimately, estate taxes. They craftily build collections below the radar by paying...
If the Price Is Right
Ever since stock options were listed on the Chicago Board Options Exchange in 1973, the most popular and widely practiced option strategy has been selling...
GRATS: On a Roll
The impact of decisions that planners make about GRATs in transferring wealth can now be more precisely quantified. Advances in quantitative modeling...
Investment Challenges For Private Foundations
Private non-operating foundations in recent years have faced increasing governmental scrutiny of their compliance with the Internal Revenue Code1 and...
Rating the Quarterback
Who do wealth owners trust most for financial advice? Outside their family officers, it's their lawyers and accountants. Clearly these advisors are not...
JOINING T&E INVESTMENT COMMITTEE
The editors of Trusts & Estates are pleased to announce the addition of Jeffrey L. Evans to the advisory board's Investments Committee. Evans, whose article...
Avoiding the Auction Block
On Oct. 28, 2004, a teleconference was hosted by Stephen Wolff of the Ashton Group in Newport Beach, Calif., on the subject of Priceless New Tax Ideas...
Strong Portfolios For An Uncertain Future
In today's accelerated world, true long-term planning seems almost old-fashioned. Unfortunately, emphasis on the immediate creates the potential for shortsightedness...
Valuing Art
Boris Leavitt amassed a fortune in the mail order business and left a contemporary art collection that was appraised at $12.4 million when he died in...
Tough Times
The year 2004 wasn't one in which to take chances; and 2005 is shaping up the same way. The global economy is dependent on two commodities: oil and the...
