Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing - Elon Hangs On
Episode Date: May 20, 2025Elon Musk is committed to Tesla for at least five more years. (00:21) Jason Moser and Ricky Mulvey discuss: - Investing in companies with a singular leader. - Earnings results from Home Depot. -... A listener's suggestion to create a “laziness” stock basket. Then, (17:04) Robert Brokamp answers listener questions about Roth IRAs and dividend investing. Companies discussed: TSLA, TTD, HD, DASH, UBER, DPZ, AMZN, WMT, NFLX, LYFT Host: Ricky Mulvey Guest: Jason Moser, Robert Brokamp Producer: Mary Long Engineer: Dan Boyd Advertisements are sponsored content and provided for informational purposes only. The Motley Fool and its affiliates (collectively, "TMF") do not endorse, recommend, or verify the accuracy or completeness of the statements made within advertisements. TMF is not involved in the offer, sale, or solicitation of any securities advertised herein and makes no representations regarding the suitability, or risks associated with any investment opportunity presented. Investors should conduct their own due diligence and consult with legal, tax, and financial advisors before making any investment decisions. TMF assumes no responsibility for any losses or damages arising from this advertisement. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Five more years, you're listening to Motley Fool Money.
I'm Ricky Mulvey, joined today by Jason Messer. J-Mo, good to see you, my man.
Ricky, happy to be here. How's everything going?
Oh, it's going great. Let's talk about Elon Musk, of all things. Elon Musk virtually joined
the Qatar Economic Forum earlier this morning. One big takeaway, JMO, is that Elon said he still
plans to be the CEO of Tesla in five years. Additionally, quote, in terms of political
spending, I'm going to do a lot less in the future, end quote. I guess I could say that as
well, but that quote is attributed to Elon Musk. Good news for Tesla shareholders, question mark?
I think it is.
I mean, I think shareholders are likely happy to hear that Musk intends to stay in his role
for at least the next five years.
Like you said, I mean, in the interview, when asked the question, he said, and I quote,
yes, no doubt about that at all, end quote.
So he seems to be committed.
And I mean, in regard to political spending, it makes a lot of sense.
I mean, I was reading about that, and he feels like, OK, well, I don't need to spend as much
because I don't see the use or the need for it. We all know Musk. He's a polarizing figure
regardless, but he's been a very polarizing figure as of late, of course, with his foray
into politics and his work on Doge. It could certainly be argued that Tesla has suffered
some brand damage because of it. Now, time will tell ultimately how forgiving consumers will be,
but I definitely think in regard to the business, the certainty of who's running the show for the
foreseeable future, I think is a net win for the company. And so I'd imagine shareholders
feel pretty good. I chatted with David Gardner on the show that's going to come out this Saturday.
It's about how rule breakers think about valuation. I really enjoyed the chat and I
think listeners will as well. And we talked about Tesla a little bit. And one of the things that I
want to highlight from that is basically how unpredictable, not just the stock market in
general is but specifically tesla like jmo if you knew every news story about musk and tesla
we went in a time machine to may 20th 2024 and you knew everything that was to come over the next
year every story but not the stock price would you buy sell or hold the stock well those are
i mean that's a fun sort of backward looking exercise chats with dg are just always so much
fund. Well, clearly, a lot of people did sell the stock, right? I mean, at least in the early days.
I'm not a Tesla shareholder. I've never been, and I probably will never be, because I really just
like to be able to follow the company more objectively and not worry about it from an
ownership perspective. Given what I've seen through the years with Tesla, I'd like to say
that I probably would have considered buying shares because, you know, those types of events
are, you could call it self-inflicted if you want, but you can recover at least. And knowing what we
know about Musk, I mean, he defies all odds, right? And so it's hard to ever bet against him
coming back. And so I'd like to think I would have bought, but I mean, obviously I didn't sell
or anything. I mean, I've never owned it, but yeah, you know, I mean, listen, time's going to
tell how the consumer really actually uh reacts to all this and how forgiving the consumer ultimately
will be but my suspicion is i i was i say never bet against musk man i think i think he'll i think
he'll be fun i i'm on your side don't bet against him but i'm also happy to look at that company and
say wow jason that is an interesting bird not one that i would personally own but that bird
she'll sure is interesting and i do not want to bet on what it will do next and there was an
immense amount of pessimism about this company. I was seeing people wanting to short the stock
on my Facebook feed. If they followed through on that at the time of peak pessimism, when
sales were going down, Musk was really involved in the White House, you'd have gotten absolutely
burned. And in fact, to answer the question, in the past 12 months, Tesla stock has almost doubled.
I think it highlights, again, the importance of separating your political beliefs
from your investing beliefs. And the other thing this story highlights to me is just
sometimes it's good to have a singular CEO leader firmly in control of a company.
Elon Musk has the voting rights at Tesla. If you are an investor in Tesla, you are an investor
in Elon Musk. And sometimes that control can be a good thing. So Tesla isn't inherently a
polarizing company. So maybe not that as an example, but there are any other companies you
look at and think, wow, I'm really happy to see this company with a, you know, a very solid vision
with a singular leader in control. Yeah. It's, it's nice to saddle up with the smartest, uh,
person in the room. And, and I think in, in regard to Tesla, certainly muskets has done something
that, um, really wasn't being done until he started it. I, I, so I do look, so a company I
do own, I own the trade desk. I've owned it for, for a long time. And, and Jeff green with the
trade desk, to me, he's one that comes to mind. Now, the proxy they just filed here in April
noted he's got 48% of the total voting power of the company. And obviously, the trade desk is
going through a little bit of a lull right now. I mean, shares are down a bit from recent highs.
But I look at the programmatic advertising space and the opportunity there. Jeff Green seems to me
to be one of the smartest people in the room. And so, I absolutely have no problem
signing up for for for that trip and i will say you know when tesla was getting smacked there's
a part of me i heard commentators oh this stock is going to continue to sink and um you know i
maybe i should short it but i didn't act on that and you know for me that was an important lesson
it's okay to separate your thoughts and your actions sometimes and also the trade desk a stock
that's absolutely gotten beat up lately and one that i personally own and i'm along for the ride
for. So glad to hear you say that, JMO. Let's move on to Home Depot. Home Depot reported this
morning, first, the business results, total sales up about 9%. But what investors really like
looking at are those comp sales numbers. Those were down a skosh overall, but backs rising in
the United States. When you broke down earnings from Home Depot, kind of a sleeper stock, what'd
you notice in the results? Yeah, this is another one that I own. And I think this was a good
quarter overall. They benefit from the SRS acquisition here. And that's about a year now,
close to a year since they closed that deal. Earnings per share down slightly from a year ago,
and that really was due to a little bit of a bump in operating expenses. But looking at,
when we talk about retail, you want to focus on traffic and ticket size, right? And during the
quarter, their average ticket was essentially flat. Transactions were down about half a percent.
So, not very surprising. One thing I did notice in the call, and I was a little bit surprised by
this, just given the language we've heard from so many leaders these days, big ticket comp
transactions, those are transactions over $1,000. Those transactions were actually positive. They
were up three-tenths of a percent from the same quarter a year ago. So, home ownership and just
just the housing market in general. I mean, it's sort of a necessity. And so, we kind of spend
there even when we may not necessarily want to, we may kind of have to, right? Your dishwasher
goes out, well, you kind of got to get a new one. I did notice inventories are up about 15%,
though. So, that's something worth keeping an eye on. Operating margin, as I said,
was down a full percentage point to 12.9% from 13.9% a year ago. But all in all, I think it was
also really encouraging to see that they reaffirmed their full year guidance, right? And I think we
talked about this on some shows here recently where, I mean, there's a lot of uncertainty out
there and a lot of companies are kind of, they're either pulling guidance or offering various
scenarios. Home Depot is pretty cut and dry with this quarter, which I thought was encouraging.
And again, I think that just speaks to the market that it serves. A huge part of the American
economy when you think about Home Depot. For listeners, to put this into context, this is the
second story of today. And yet over just one quarter, Home Depot does about the entire global
box office in revenue through their stores. And that's global box office over a year. Home Depot
does it in just one quarter. Now you mentioned guidance. This is a big dog. And CFO Richard
McPhail highlighting that no single country outside of the United States will represent
more than 10% of the country's purchases by next year. And kind of highlighting that nimbleness
to CNBC and also saying, quote, because of our scale, the great partnerships we have with our
suppliers and productivity that we continue to drive in our business, we intend to generally
maintain our current pricing levels across our portfolio. Basically saying, we're not raising
prices due to tariffs. You buying that? Yeah, I do. And I think when you look at Home Depot
and you compare it to something like a Walmart, for example, and Home Depot noted in the call,
right, they said today that more than 50% of their overall purchases are actually sourced
here in the U.S. And then to your point about the 10% number there, that seems to be plausible,
seems to be very reasonable. And so you compare that to something like a Walmart, where Walmart
is exposed somewhere in the neighborhood of 60% to 70% globally. Their supply chain relies on China.
But when you look at it from just the U.S. market, it's more like 75% or so. And so I think Home
Depot just has a little bit more flexibility there. They don't need to necessarily raise prices
because they just aren't as exposed, uh, to, to the current tariff environment. So it was good
news to hear. So one thing I've watched with home Depot and I'm a shareholder, but I've, I've sort
of, I've been paying attention to this. Um, you've heard about the long-term outperformance of home
Depot over the decades. And a lot of that has to do with the company becoming a cash cow story
in no small part due to share repurchases home Depot. Yes, they've made a big acquisition,
but still this quarter really chilled on, on share repurchases. I didn't see anything
in the, uh, the income statement on that. And while the stock has been a long-term outperformer,
it's significantly underperformed the S and P 500 over the past five years.
And if you want to use a more appropriate comp, we can let's use the Schwab high dividend ETF,
SCHD. It's basically tracked that, but paid a lower dividend. That's a lot of setup,
but all of it's to say, you know, what are your expectations for this thing over the next five
years? As a shareholder myself and as someone who's recommended the stock, I don't really look
at this as a stock to view over the course of five years. Truly, this is, and you said it,
the word decades. I think this is one of those stocks that you need to look even further out.
Five years for this company is a blip. This is one you want to think of in terms of decades.
A lot of that really is based on the housing market and how vital it is to our economy.
They noted in the call today more than 50% or I'm sorry, they noted that 55% of homes
here in the U.S. are 40 years or older. And we talked about that statistic before. I mean,
that just begets more spending on home improvement. And I think as rates become a little bit more
attractive, the housing market starts to loosen up and you see probably things work out even better
for the company. But again, I mean, I look at this company in the terms of decades. You look at the
10-year chart, total returns up close to 330%, outperforming the market and Schwab nicely.
They've paid dividend now for 153 consecutive quarters. And to your point on share repurchases,
no, they didn't really repurchase anything this quarter. Now, the share count is down about 8%
over the last five years, but I think it's important to note their priorities. And they
very clearly state this quarter in and quarter out. They say they're after investing in the
business. And after paying the dividend, then they intend to return excess cash to shareholders
in the form of repurchases. And so it's just a matter of priorities for the company. And I think
it makes a lot of sense for them to play a little defense right now. I mean, they don't need to
repurchase shares right now. They could kind of wait and see how this overall trade negotiation
or war or whatever you want to call it shakes out. But I think right now it makes a lot of sense to
stick with their explicit priorities. And that just boils down to reinvesting in the business
first, then paying the dividend. And if you got anything left over, they'll continue to
repurchase shares. And those repurchases will accelerate when the time is right.
You know, I think you said something there I really want to highlight. This is good
relationship advice for anyone listening. If you're unsure, just say, is this a negotiation
or is this a war? But I appreciate your perspective on zooming out there.
let's get to the mailbag so we have a personal finance mailbag questions coming up in the b
segment with robert brokamp if you've got a question for the show podcasts at fool.com
that's podcasts with an s at fool.com jml i thought this was a fun one comes from colin
uh long time listener first time caller idea from a show you did last week if you were to create a
basket of stocks focused on human laziness what companies could be included some ideas
DoorDash, Uber, Domino's, Amazon, Walmart, Netflix, and Lyft. Interested in more ideas.
A bit pessimistic, but thanks, Carl and Jamo. What do you think?
I love this idea. I think this actually dates back. I'm going to give a little bit of a shout
out to our former colleague, Ron Gross, because I think we've talked about this before on the
Motley Fool Money radio show many years back. It's always a fun exercise. I blame Amazon
ultimately for this because Amazon is the one that really re they sort of introduced to us this new
paradigm of being able to do other things with our time and we can be a little bit lazier I like all
of I'm as lazy as the next the next guy so just don't get me wrong here but I mean I love all of
those names that Colin mentioned there I mean I wouldn't say I would necessarily recommend them
all but I think they're absolutely all qualifiers for the basket some other names that could fit in
there. I mean, like Netflix, I think, hey, throw Spotify in the mix. I mean, it's basically the
same thing. Wayfair, I mean, we're talking about Home Depot, but man, Wayfair sure does make it
easy to furnish your home and update your home. I think Chewy, I'm a longtime Chewy user. My
daughters are shareholders. They make it very easy for us to take care of our pets. Instacart,
another one out there. And I would even look at something like Google. And the main reason,
or well, alphabet, I suppose. But I think one thing to keep an eye on with alphabet is,
I mean, hey, listen, Gemini is taking off. I mean, all of these large language models
and the capabilities there, you don't want to necessarily write a paper or put together the
research. I mean, if you have some decent prompting skills, you could probably get that technology to
do it for you. And I'll also say, some of this can be laziness and some of this is also fighting
for my wallet. You know, I've used this example before, but why would I go to a home goods store
and buy a refill of hand soap when I can get it on Amazon for the same price and have it at my
door in 24 hours? Is that, is that laziness or is that efficiency? Or, uh, let's use Uber and
Lyft as an example, both game changers. But if I'm driving back, if I'm coming back from an
airport while I'm traveling, is it laziness that I don't want to stand in a cab line and then
accept whatever fare may come my way or be able to price compare and take an Uber or a Lyft.
There is something in here too, where it's, you know, I think there's a cynical view,
but also a positive view, which is a lot of these companies have made your life better.
And it's also where you're spending money. My household, we're spending money on Chewy. We're
spending money on Netflix. We spend money on Uber, Walmart, and Amazon. All of those. Never
a bad idea to look at your debit card statement or your credit card statement and maybe get some
stock ideas from there, JMO? Oh, there's just no question about it. And I like to look at this,
rather than calling it laziness, I just like to call it the evolution of the consumer, right?
We're finding new ways to do things that make our lives better and more efficient, like you said.
And so, all of these companies, really, they're succeeding for a reason. And I think a big part
of that reason is just bringing the world to all of our fingertips. It's just the snap of a finger.
And come on, Colin, no cruise ships. We'll leave it there. Jason Moser,
thank you for your time and your insight. Appreciate you joining us on Motley Fool Money.
Thank you.
All right. Up next, Robert Brokamp answers your personal finance questions about buying a home
and Roth IRAs. The first question comes from Ted. I recall an earlier interview where Malcolm
Etheridge discussed self-directed IRAs and using funds for alternate investments. In part due to
that education, this past week, I opened a self-directed IRA with a focus on a specific
private equity offering via a SAFE, a Simple Agreement for Future Equity Instrument. A lot
of stuff in there I don't know about, bro. I would love to hear a foolish take on SAFE investments.
Love the show. Well, thanks, Ted. Thank you, Ted. Let's start here with, first of all,
what a self-directed IRA is. When you open an IRA with a typical broker like Vanguard,
E-Trade, Fidelity, whomever, you're basically limited to exchange-traded investments like
stocks, bonds, funds, ETFs, things like that. However, you can use your IRA to invest really
all kinds of assets, real estate, businesses, startups, private debt. However, to do that,
you'll have to find a specialized custodian that will let you hold these types of alternative
assets. They will offer what has been termed a self-directed IRA. I think it's a bit of a
misnomer because, you know, if you have an IRA with Schwab, for example, you're picking your
investments, you're self-directing it. But this is a specific term meant to be an IRA that holds
these sort of offbeat investments. And these IRAs do tend to have higher costs, though it varies by
provider. And there are still a lot of rules about what you can and can't do. So for example,
you can't use the money to invest in a vacation home that you personally use. You can't use the
money to start your own business. And a lot of these are called prohibited transactions. And
if you engage in one of those, it could result in the whole IRA being taxed and possibly penalized.
So, you have to be very careful. Now, let's move on to a simple agreement for future equity,
aka a SAFE. Now, it's a way to invest in a startup and act sort of like a stock warrant,
if you know what those are. You basically invest a certain amount of money in a company,
a startup, not publicly traded yet, and it gives you the right to some form of equity based on a
specified future liquidity event, like maybe another round of financing or an IPO. It could
also result in a cash payout in the future, depending on the terms of the safe. So, it's not
a loan. You're not earning interest or anything like that. In most situations, you invest today,
often at a discount, in hopes of getting some form of equity or payout in the future.
Generally, I don't like to speak too favorably about investments without long track records.
Safes have only been around since 2013. So, there's no solid historical returns we can point
to. Plus, despite the fact that the S in SAFE stands for simple, these agreements actually
are very complex. You really have to understand the terms by which you'll actually see a return
on and of your investment. But of course, things like private equity, venture capital,
just investing in startups in general, that's been around for a long time. In fact, it's crucial to
capitalism. It can be summed up as very high risk with potentially high returns. The truth is,
most startups fail. But if you happen to invest very early in something that becomes successful,
it could be one of the best investments you ever make. So, my question for anyone considering
these investments is, what compels you to make that kind of trade-off? It may be that you're
an entrepreneur at heart, right? And you have experience maybe launching and supporting
businesses that have mostly been successful. And you feel that you have the knowledge and
insight to separate the wheat from the chaff. And if so, more power to you. Plus, investing
in startups is unquestionably just interesting, intellectually challenging, and just plain
exciting, so I understand the appeal. But for most investors, I don't think there's a need for
this kind of investing, and sticking with the stock market is good enough. If you're going to
invest in startups or private equity in any way, I would say limit it to no more than 5% of your
portfolio. The next question comes from Kevin. I'm saving up for a down payment on a home,
but I'm wondering if I should wait until the Fed cuts rates to get a mortgage. What do you think?
Well, you've likely heard, Kevin, that it's difficult or impossible to time the stock market,
and I would say the same mostly goes with interest rates as well. There are certainly times when it
seems very likely what the Fed will do, especially since they often give strong hints. But even that
can change very quickly depending on what's going on in the world or in the economy. On top of that,
the Fed has the most control over very short-term rates. The bond market is what mostly determines
intermediate to long-term rates, and those are the rates that determine mortgage rates.
And I would say what's going on right now is a perfect example. The consensus is that the Fed
will cut rates this year. But last week, Moody's lowered the credit rating for the U.S., which
pushed treasury rates upward this week, and I think mortgage rates are probably going to follow.
So, here's what I generally recommend. Buy a house when you find one you like,
and you can afford the payments based on current rates. If rates go down later,
you can always refinance. If rates go up, you'll be happy with the rate you have.
Also, once you're ready to buy a house and you're ready to lock in a mortgage rate with a lender,
you might consider getting something known as a float down option. That'll allow you to get a
lower rate if rates declined by a specific amount, but there's usually a fee charged
often as a percentage of the loan. So you have to decide if that option is worth the extra cost.
The next question comes from Ryan. I'm in my thirties and I'm trying to set myself up for
early retirement in 10 to 15 years. Should I invest in Vanguard's high dividend yield ETF?
I see some retired people making half a million dollars a year with a lot of interest income and
dividend income, and I want to follow their lead. Well, first off, Ryan, kudos to you for trying to
retire early. I always admire someone so young in their 20s or 30s planning their financial
independence. My first question for anyone who's considering adding a specific ETF to their
portfolio is, what will it add to your existing portfolio? And to answer that, you need to
understand how the ETF selects its investments. So maybe look under the hood, see what the top
holdings are, maybe how it breaks down by sector. So in this example, it's a Vanguard high dividend
yield ETF, ticker VYM. It tracks the FTSE high dividend yield index, which starts with large
and mid-cap U.S. stocks, then ranks them by their expected dividend yield over the next 12 months
and invests in the half with the highest yields. To give you an idea of what kind of stocks it
invests in, here are the current top 10 holdings. Broadcom, JP Morgan, Exxon, Walmart, Procter &
Gamble, UnitedHealth Group, Johnson & Johnson, Home Depot, AbbVie, and Coke. Only you can decide
whether those are the types of companies that would be appropriate for you. I own this ETF
personally because like many dividend-oriented ETFs, it's a good complement to the more
growth-oriented, maybe tech and tech-adjacent side of my portfolio. Also, these types of companies
tend to be less volatile than the overall market, though not always the case. But just as an example,
in 2022, the S&P 500 was down 18%. NASDAQ was down 33%. This ETF was down 0.5%. So it held up
pretty well. Also, as you suggest, I do think it makes sense to have a good dose of dividend-paying
stocks once you're in retirement, given that dividends have historically been a reliable
inflation-beating source of income. But if you're 10 to 15 years from retirement,
it sounds like you don't quite need that income right now. So, I'd be more inclined to choose
this ETF because you think these types of investments will get you closer to retirement
more than for the income it'll eventually produce in retirement.
And finally, despite the name of this ETF, it's a high-dividend yield ETF,
its current yield is only 2.7%. Ryan, you said that you see retired people generating a half
million dollars a year from their portfolios. To get that much from this ETF would require
an investment of more than $18 million. I would say dig more into the stories you're hearing
about the people generating $500,000 using an ETF like this. They're either exaggerating or
doing something else that might be more risky, or they just have an awful lot of money.
Next question from Save and Fool. I often see the recommendation that I should save in a Roth
versus a traditional IRA. I don't understand why I should save in a Roth since my tax bracket in
retirement is likely lower than when I'm working. Is there a tax bracket where I should prioritize
traditional IRA savings versus Roth savings? Well, Save and Fool, you have the math right.
If you expect to be in a lower tax bracket in retirement, then you should go with the
traditional IRA as long as you're getting the deduction. So that way you get the tax break
today when you're in the higher tax bracket. This really is an individual decision. It depends on,
again, your tax bracket today, and you do have to do a bit of an analysis of what you think your
income will be in retirement. But since you asked about tax brackets, I would guess that most
experts would say that once you're solidly in the 24% tax bracket or higher, the traditional likely
is the best choice. However, I will add a few other considerations. If you're contributing to
a traditional account and getting a tax break, make sure you invest the tax savings. In other
contributing to the traditional should allow you to save even more for retirement. If you're
instead spending it on something that doesn't appreciate in value, whether it's TVs, clothes,
trips, whatever, you're better off probably investing in the Roth. Also, if you're covered
by a retirement plan at work and earn above a certain amount of money, you won't be able to
deduct the contributions to a traditional IRA. In that case, go with the Roth IRA, at least until
you reach the point where your income prevents you from contributing to the Roth. I'll add a
couple of other benefits of the Roth IRA. First, contributions, not earnings, can be withdrawn at
any time tax and penalty free. And secondly, Roth accounts are not subject to required minimum
distributions at age 73 or age 75 if you were born in 1960 or later. So those benefits might
push you toward the Roth if you're on the fence, but it doesn't have to be an either or decision.
You can contribute to both the traditional and the Roth as long as the combined amounts don't
exceed the annual contribution limit. Last question is from Anonymous. My daughter is
starting high school in the fall, so college is hopefully four years away. Maybe a little too
short to keep her savings in the market. Should I move her from a growth portfolio to something
else? I'm assuming they're talking about a 529 plan. Yes, I would assume so as well. And I will
start with the typical Motley Fool advice that any money you need in the next three to five years
shouldn't be in stocks, but of course you can adjust that for your own risk tolerance. So that
would suggest that at least most of the money your daughter needs in the first year of college
probably should be in a high-yield savings account, or again, if it is in a 529, whatever
the highest-yielding cash option is in that plan. That way, it'll be safe and ready come the fall
of 2029. But college is a unique goal in that you don't need all the money in 2029. It'll be
spread out over four years, with the last payment coming due for the spring semester of 2033.
So, if you have the risk tolerance for it, you could still leave a good bit of your college
savings in stocks. If you are investing into 529, or even if you're not, you'll probably have
noticed that each program has age-based portfolios that provide a reasonable asset allocation based
on the college enrollment year, and they get gradually more conservative as the kid gets
closer to college. And I like to look at these allocations just to see what the experts think
is the right mix of cash bonds and stocks for college savings at different ages.
Let's take a look at Utah's plan, which is regularly rated as one of the best in the
country. Just so you know, you don't have to participate in your state's plan. You can
participate in another state's plan, but there might be some benefits to staying in-state.
But let's take a look at Utah's plan because it is considered one of the best.
For someone enrolling in college in 2028 or 2029, the fund is roughly 41% stocks,
59% bonds and cash. Then it gets more conservative from there. But interestingly,
their target enrollment funds always have some money in stocks, even for kids in college.
From what I can see, it looks like it's about 20% for freshman year, dropping down to 10%
for later years. Now, that violates the foolish rule of any money in the next three to five years
shouldn't be in stocks. It's not what I did. Once my kids were in college, all their money was in
cash. But the stock market does go up three out of four years on average or so. It's a small amount,
So I'm not going to argue with that asset allocation because in the end, you have to
adjust it for your own risk tolerance and really your need to take risk, right? If you've already
saved more than enough, maybe you don't need to take much risk at all. But I do think that looking
at these target age-based portfolios and 529s are a good starting point for most investors.
As always, people on the program may have interests in the stocks they talk about,
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please check out our show notes. I'm Ricky Mulvey. Thanks for joining us. We'll be back.
