In 1847, a teenager named Esther Howland received something unusual in the mail: A letter pasted with colorful, hand-cut flowers and ringed by an elaborate border of lace. In the center was a small green envelope containing a tiny poem.

She had just received her first Valentine.

Esther was so impressed and excited, she shared it with all her friends and family. What’s more, she convinced her father — who owned a stationary store — to give her the materials she needed to make her own. But she didn’t stop at just one. With painstaking precision, she handcrafted a dozen colorful, ornate cards which she gave to her older brother in the hopes that he could sell them. Maybe, if she was lucky, she might receive $200 worth of orders.

Within a few weeks, she had made $5,000 selling valentines to people across Massachusetts.¹

Soon, Esther was so busy filling out orders for more valentines that she enlisted all her friends to help. Together, they formed a kind of early assembly line. After Esther designed a prototype for each card, her friends would create multiple copies. Every girl had a job, whether it was cutting, pasting, coloring, embossing, or folding. Flowers, leaves, silk, satin, lace, vines, paintings, and even small mirrors were all used. Esther even developed some of the first “lift-up” flaps to appear on cards. The valentines weren’t just pretty to look at; they were tactile and interactive.

Esther’s business took off, capitalizing on what was already becoming a nationwide phenomenon. In 1849, the famous poet, Emily Dickinson, sent her cousin a letter on Valentine’s Day. It read:

The last week has been a merry one [here]in Amhert. Notes have flown around like snowflakes. [Even] ancient gentlemen and spinsters, forgetting time and multitude of years, have doffed their wrinkles in exchange for smiles. This aged world of ours has thrown away its staff and spectacles and now declares it will be young again.²

In 1853, one newspaper described what it was like to receive a valentine:

As the decades passed, Esther’s business flourished, and her valentines were seen all over the country until she finally retired in 1881 so she could spend more time with her ill father. By this time, companies were starting to produce simpler, mass-produced “machine cut” valentines, and eventually, Esther’s more elaborate, handmade designs faded into the past.  

These days, it’s not uncommon to think cynically of Valentine cards, and of the holiday itself. But in Esther’s time, Valentine’s Day was one of the highlights of the year. That’s because it was a genuine chance to let someone know how much they truly mattered, in an era when it wasn’t always socially accepted or even physically possible to do so. And to receive a Valentine was to know that you were loved, cared for, or desired — feelings that allhumans have wanted since the beginning of time.

Some historians, in fact, believe that Valentine’s Day played a big role in changing how people thought about love. In a time when most people still married for economic reasons, Valentine’s Day helped create “a shift toward widespread acceptance of romantic love, especially as a basis for marriage.”²

These days, Valentine’s is often seen as an obligatory thing, the domain of big greeting card companies and chocolate conglomerates. But beneath all the advertising is something much simpler, more wholesome, and more real: Valentine’s Day is a chance to let the people in your life know what they mean to you, whether romantic or otherwise.

That’s how our team sees Valentine’s Day, anyway…and it’s why you’re reading this message. So, while we unfortunately do not have Esther Howland’s skill with arts and crafts, please see this as our valentine to you. We are all so grateful for the relationship we share with you, and for the opportunity to know and work with you. It’s something we cherish and take pride in every day.

Valentine’s is just the day we wanted to let you know it.

On behalf of everyone here at Minich MacGregor Wealth Management, we wish you a very happy Valentine’s Day!

¹ “February 14, 1849: First American-Made Valentines Sold,” Mass Moments, www.massmoments.org/moment-details/first-american-made-valentines-sold.html
² “Mother of the Valentine”: Esther Howland,” The American Antiquarian Society, https://pastispresent.org/2011/good-sources/%E2%80%9Cmother-of-the-valentine%E2%80%9D-esther-howland-worcester-and-the-american-valentine-industry/
³ “Touching Sentiment: The Tactility of Nineteenth-Century Valentines,” Common Place, www.commonplace.online/article/touching-sentiment/

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Every January, we here at Minich MacGregor Wealth Management look back on the year that was. What were the highlights? What were the “lowlights”? What events will we remember? Most importantly, what did we learn? Then we send a Year in Review message to our clients that encapsulates it all. We thought you might be interested in seeing it, too.

When we play back the last twelve months in our heads, the theme of 2025, to us, can be summed up by three words, three dates, and three numbers. Here they are:

Let’s start with the words. Back in December, three of the world’s most popular dictionaries selected their “word of the year.” Merriam-Webster chose slop, which they define as “digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence.”¹

The Oxford Dictionary chose rage bait. Their definition: “Online content deliberately designed to elicit anger or outrage by being frustrating, provocative, or offensive, typically posted in order to increase traffic to or engagement with a particular web page or social media content.” ²

Finally, Dictionary.com selected six-seven (sometimes written as “67” but not to be confused with the number “sixty-seven”). Confused? So’s everybody else. Even the dictionary experts didn’t really know what to make of it, defining it as “a viral, ambiguous slang term” and describing it as “meaningless, ubiquitous, and nonsensical.” ² In other words, it doesn’t really mean anything.

If you’ve been online at all this year, you’ve likely encountered at least one of these terms. You may have seen AI slop in the form of fake, low-effort pictures and videos. You’ve likely come across rage bait in the form of an inflammatory Facebook post or fear-mongering news headline. You may’ve seen the various “six-seven” memes that circulated on social media.

Normally, we don’t pay much attention to these “word of the year” choices. But this time, we were struck by something: When you get right down to it, all three words are about things that are fake.Not just in the sense that they often represent things that don’t exist, but in the sense that they are almost never, ever, genuine.

So much of our time is spent trying to detect what is real and genuine. The videos we watch, the headlines we see, and the information we read. What is true, what is exaggerated, and what is downright fabrication? Those three words sum up just how much of what’s around us, especially on our devices, is fake… and how exhausting and demoralizing it can be to detect it.

Now, what does this all have to do with finance? Well, thinking about it made us realize how much time investors spend doing it, too: Trying to figure out what is genuine and what isn’t. Which leads us to the three dates and three numbers.

Rewind back to the start of 2025. When the year began, investors were in something of a mixed mood: Hopeful about the prospect of cooling inflation, falling interest rates, and lower taxes, but nervous about the possibility of tariffs and a new trade war with China. President Trump had repeatedly threatened a variety of tariffs on China, Canada, Mexico, and other countries. But would he do it? How would other countries respond? What kind of impact would it have? Was it real, exaggerated, or all just a bluff?

Macroeconomics is one of the most difficult areas to parse for investors. The economy and the stock market are not the same, but they can indirectly affect each other. We can still remember the questions that nearly every market commentator was asking: How will tariffs impact inflation? How will inflation influence interest rates? What will interest rates do to consumer spending? How much will spending continue to drive economic growth? Here at Minich MacGregor Wealth Management, we pondered those questions, too. But investors can easily twist themselves into knots trying to figure out what matters and what doesn’t; what is signal and what is just noise.

By February 19, despite a flurry of tariff announcements from the White House, most investors had decided to shrug off all the trade-war talk as not real. The S&P 500 reached 6,144, its second record high in two days, boosted by the hope that tariffs were more bark than bite.³

It would be the last one for a while.

Fast forward now to April 8. The S&P closed at 4,982, nearly 19% below its high on February 19.³ President Trump’s promise of “Liberation Day” tariffs, a broad and historically high slate of import duties on China, the European Union, and other countries, had so spooked investors that the S&P’s value had slid all the way back to where it had been a year prior.

Now investors had to wrestle with a new debate. Is this real? A real bear market, or just a correction? Are these tariffs permanent, or merely temporary? Everywhere you looked, there were headlines, videos, podcasts, and posts with different information, often with titles like “The Markets Are Just Like They Were in 19XX. Here’s What Experts Think You Should Do Next.” Or “The Last Time the Markets Did X, Y Happened.”

What was real? What was exaggerated? What was fake?

And now to our third date: December 26. On this day, the S&P 500 hit its most recent all-time high of 6,945.³(As of this writing, anyway. That number may be different by the time you read this.) The index later closed the day slightly lower, but for a moment, it was up a staggering 39% from where it landed on April 8.

What prompted this incredible turnaround? If we had to sum it up in a single sentence, it would be, “The normalization of things that previously caused uncertainty.” As many of the Liberation Day tariffs were canceled, suspended, or reduced, investors grew accustomed to the idea, emotions settled, and markets normalized. That enabled investors to turn their attention to other matters, such as falling interest rates and investments in AI by tech companies.

The result: 2025 was a fascinating and ultimately highly positive year for stocks.

But what was interesting about December 26 isn’t that the S&P hit an all-time high. That’s a common occurrence in a bull market. What was interesting is that gold also hit an all-time high on the very same day…something that hasn’t occurred since 1975.⁴ Gold is often used as a hedge against stock market volatility, so for both stocks and gold to hit record highs at the same time suggests many investors are feeling cautious about the future despite the stock market’s success. So, now the cycle begins again: What’s real and what isn’t? What’s signal and what’s noise?

All these questions are difficult enough. But modern investors also must contend with other distractions. You wouldn’t have to look hard, on any given day, to find hundreds of articles, videos, podcasts, and posts all designed to confuse you. “Invest in X/Don’t invest in Y.” “It’s time to buy/ It’s time to sell.” “Here’s what experts think you should know/Here’s what the experts don’t want you to know.” Some of this can be helpful…but much of it is slop, rage bait, or just plain wrong.

So, confronted with all this confusion, all this noise, what’s an investor to do? This, at last, brings us to what we think is the real theme of 2025. The most important lesson the year can teach us:

Success isn’t about constantly trying to detect what we think is fake.
It’s about valuing what we know is real.

What do we know to be real? For our clients, and we imagine for you, too, it’s the dreams and goals they’ve had for years. Those are far more real and significant than anything digital could ever be. By focusing on why we invest — for the places you want to see, skills you want to learn, milestones you want to reach, and the people you want to do it all with — we prioritize the meaningful over the distractive. Distractions like daily market movements or the bewildering deluge of slop and rage bait we get flooded with every day.

For our clients at Minich MacGregor Wealth Management, another is our investment process. A process far more tried and proven than trying to decipher headlines or wrestle with probabilities. By focusing on the process we know works, we can rely on the principles we know to be real… like diligence, patience, and discipline. That’s why our clients didn’t need to predict everything that would happen to have a successful year as investors. In 2025, we just needed to hold to our process.

And of course, there’s the most real thing of all: The people and relationships that bring true meaning to your life. There are so many voices on our phones, TVs, car radios, and social media feeds vying for our attention. But the more we tune them out and focus instead on the people who we know care about us, the more we fill our days with what’s genuine and authentic, the more everything that’s fake, frustrating, and unreliable gets filtered out. Slop, rage bait, it all just…fades away.

And that, to us, is why the real “word of the year” for 2025 isn’t slop, rage bait, or six-seven. It’s meaningfulness. For the more we hold to that word, the more we prioritize it in thought and deed, the more we will know that we are truly on the right path…to the life we were always meant to live.

So, that’s 2025! We hope it was a wonderful year. On behalf of our entire team, we look forward to making 2026 even better. As always, please let us know if you have any questions, or if we can ever help you and your family the way we help our client families. Have a Happy New Year!

¹ “2025 Word of the Year: Slop,” Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/word-of-the-year
² “2025’s Words of the Year, So Far,” Time, https://time.com/7334730/word-of-the-year-2025-cambridge-collins-dictionary-oxford-merriam/
³ “S&P 500 Historical Data,” Investing.com, https://www.investing.com/indices/us-spx-500-historical-data
⁴ “The S&P 500 and Gold Are at Record Highs,” Barrons, https://www.barrons.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-122625/card/the-s-p-500-and-gold-are-at-record-highs-that-s-not-supposed-to-happen–Ras47ZC0A5FwZ556upxY

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The new year is coming up very quickly. We could talk about New Year’s resolutions or New Year’s Eve, but this year we want to tell you about the origins of New Year’s Day.

Did you know that the calendar year used to consist of just 10 months, consisting of 304 days? Back then, the New Year started on March 1. Romulus, the founder of Rome, created this calendar. In fact, the month of January didn’t even exist until about 700 B.C., which is when Numa Pontilius, the second Roman king, added January and February to the calendar. New Year’s Day was moved to January because this is when the new Roman consuls were elected. The new holiday took a while to catch on, as many people stuck to celebrating on March 1. Old habits …

New Year’s Day used to be dedicated to the Roman god Janus, from whom the month of January derives its name. This calendar was used until it fell out of sync with the sun. As a result, Julius Caesar decided to re-evaluate the calendar in 46 B.C. He worked with mathematicians and astronomers to determine what the new calendar should consist of, resulting in the Julian calendar, which is much like the Gregorian calendar currently in use. Caesar decided that the first day of the year would remain January 1^st. He wanted to keep January the first month of the year since it was originally in honor of the Roman god Janus.

Back in medieval times, Christians replaced January 1 with days like December 25 and March 25 because New Year’s celebrations were considered pagan, but January 1 was officially reinstated as New Year’s Day in 1582. We suppose the thinking was that you don’t have to be in Rome to do as the Romans do.

That’s enough history to fill the next twelve months. From all of us here at Minich MacGregor Wealth Management, we wish you a Happy New Year! May you always stay in sync with the sun!

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_calendar
http://www.history.com/topics/new-years
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year’s_Day
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/newyearhistory.html

What if we’re in an AI bubble?

The “b” word is not one most investors like to discuss, but what began as a whisper has grown louder and more prominent in recent weeks. While stocks are up for the year, the word is starting to inject a note of uncertainty into the markets…and when uncertainty comes, volatility follows.    

Many experts and market commentators have begun talking about the prospect of an “AI bubble” in the media. So, while the markets have performed well — with all three major indices recently setting new record highs¹ — we believe it’s time for us to discuss the question, too. After all, there’s no better time to prepare for storms than when the sun is shining. So, in this message, let’s look at why the markets might be in an AI-driven bubble and what we should do about it.

Now, a quick note before we dive in. A bubble itself is not a problem. It’s whether that bubble will burst that worries investors. We are not predicting this bubble will pop. The thing about bubbles is that it’s difficult, if not impossible, to tell how big they are, or even if they’ll pop. Many a market commentator has predicted that an asset bubble will burst, only to be proven wrong. But where prediction fails, preparation succeeds, so consider everything you’re about to read in that light. We are preparing for a possibility, not predicting an inevitability.

Intro: Definition. First, let’s define the term. A bubble is when the price of something rises unsustainably high above its actual value. A bubble can form within the broader economy, as in the housing bubble of the mid-2000s. It can form in the stock market, as in the dotcom bubble that began in the late 1990s. Even a specific product can prompt a bubble, like the “Beanie Baby craze” of the mid-90s. (Perhaps the most famous example is the “tulip mania” bubble, which occurred in the Netherlands all the way back in the 17^th century.) In each instance, unprecedented levels of hype — for easily-financed houses, internet stocks, or even stuffed toys — drove demand far above supply. This caused prices to skyrocket far above what those things were usually worth.

In each case, investors eventually realized they were not likely to see a return high enough to justify their investment. This prompted them to sell, and quickly. The sudden drop in prices sparked a panic, with nearly everyone trying to sell at the same time, often at bargain-bin prices. The bubble had burst, and people lost money.   

So, why do some experts speculate that we might be in a bubble now? And what does that have to do with AI? It’s a complex question, but we’ll distill it into something simple by the end.

Part 1: Concentration. Let’s rewind to October 14, 2022. The S&P 500 closed at 3,583 that day.² No one knew it, but it was the bottom of a 10-month bear market. Now, fast-forward to October 28 of this year. On that day, the S&P finished at 6,890, a record high.² Between those two autumn days, the S&P rose by over 90%. That’s an impressive bull market by any standard!

But what has driven that bull market? This is where things get interesting.

When we talk about the stock market going up or down, we often envision it as a single entity moving in one direction. But this isn’t really an accurate way to think of stocks. At any given time, some stocks will be moving up, and some will be moving down. If more stocks are moving in one direction than another, then that’s typically what drives the overall direction of the market.

Sometimes, a mere handful of stocks moving in a big way can drag the overall index along with them. That’s been the case with this bull market. For several years, the majority of the market’s growth has been due to a small number of companies: Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, Meta (Facebook), Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla. Often referred to as the Magnificent Seven, these companies represent roughly 35% of the S&P 500’s total value.³ If you add the next three largest, Broadcom, Oracle, and Netflix, that figure rises to 40%.³ 

Think about that number for a moment—an index of five-hundred companies, but with only ten making up 40% of its total worth.

On the surface, you might think all these companies are very different from one another. But nearly all of them have one thing in common: They are investing billions of dollars into AI.

Part 2: Valuation. Excitement about AI is the main driver behind the market’s performance. There are other factors, like lower inflation and easing interest rates, but AI reigns supreme. In fact, there are now over 1,300 AI startups with valuations of $100 million or more, with nearly 500 valued at $1 billion or more.⁴ Eight of them — the Mag 7 plus Broadcom — are valued at over $1 trillion.⁵

So many investors want to board the AI train that they are willing to pay a hefty premium to buy tickets. For example, NVIDIA, the largest of the Mag 7, has a share price over 50 times its earnings.⁶ What does that mean in plain English? It means that, for every dollar of NVIDIA’s earnings that investors hope to receive, they are willing to pay fifty times more. In other words, most AI companies are valued at levels far above what they earn in revenue. (More on this in a moment.)

Okay, we have a stock market being driven by only a handful of companies, all focused on one specific type of technology. The question you’re probably thinking is, “So what?” So what if it’s just a few companies versus a few hundred? It may seem odd, but doesn’t it just show how great those companies are? So what if that much money is being invested in one area? Doesn’t that show how important AI is? These are all good questions, which leads us to:

Part 3: Expectation. The reason investors are willing to pay so much to own stock in AI companies is due to the expectation that, at some point, those companies will generate soaring profits. But there’s an elephant in the room: Many AI companies are not profitable. Quite frankly, most of them are not even close.

AI is expensive. It costs billions to build and operate the infrastructure necessary to support it. In fact, the tech industry is investing so much that total AI spending outpaced consumer spending in the first half of the year.⁵

But as any business owner will tell you, costs matter. For example, take OpenAI, maker of ChatGPT. It’s probably the most famous AI company in the world, so you’d expect it to make a lot of money. And it does — but nowhere close to how much it spends. Some analysts project that OpenAI had a net loss of $13 billion in Q3 alone.⁷ The company itself has said it only hopes to become profitable in 2030. Most other AI companies are thought to be operating at a similar loss. They simply aren’t generating enough revenue to do otherwise.

Now, the Mag 7 companies are profitable as they are large and mature, not startups. But even here, there’s a potential red flag. Companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and NVIDIA earn money by supplying data centers, computer chips, and cloud computing power to all those smaller AI companies. Many of the Mag 7 companies have also invested billions into these AI startups. If those startups never turn a profit and go under, it will dry up a lot of the big companies’ revenue and cause them to lose money on their investments.

For AI to become a profitable venture, the technology itself must become indispensable in everyday life. Only then would enough people and businesses pay these companies enough money to cover their costs. (And remember, we’re not just talking about turning a profit. AI companies will eventually need to earn enough to justify their sky-high valuations.) But this is not guaranteed. While AI can be beneficial in certain situations, a report from MIT found that large enterprises have collectively spent $30-40 billion to leverage AI, yet 95% of those organizations “are getting zero return.”⁸ And a recent report from Pew Research found that 50% of Americans say they’re more concerned than excited about the increased use of AI in daily life.⁹ (Only 10% are more excited than concerned.) Now, these numbers can obviously change in the future, but in the present, neither suggests that the premise — AI must become indispensable to be profitable — is on the verge of coming true. Which brings us at last to:

Part 4: Distillation. Hopefully, you’re still with us. If so, let’s take everything we’ve covered and distill it into something simple. Why might we be in an AI bubble? Here’s why:

The market’s growth has largely been driven by a few companies. Those companies’ growth is largely driven by a single technology. The hype around that technology is so great that most companies that supply it have stock prices valued far above what they earn in revenue. Current data suggests it may be difficult for those companies to earn enough revenue to justify their valuations. And when the price of something rises unsustainably above what it’s worth, you have a bubble.

So, that’s why we might be in an AI bubble. The question now is, what do we do about it?

The single worst thing an investor can do is try to “time” when that bubble might burst. There are several reasons for this. First, despite everything we just wrote, we may not actually be in a bubble. It’s perfectly possible that, as AI technology matures and people become both more accustomed to and more adept at using it, significant profits will follow.

Second, even if we are in a bubble, there is simply no way to tell when it will pop. It could be in three months; it could be in three years. While it would certainly be nice if we could stay invested and then get out right before the pop, that’s just not realistic. For that reason, attempting to time the bubble leaves us more vulnerable to simply being wrong. We might be way too early and miss out on further market growth. We might be too late and miss the rebound after the bubble. An investment strategy that requires us to be perfect —while at the same time increasing our likelihood of being wrong — is not a good strategy at all.

Third, it’s possible that AI is more of a balloon than a bubble and deflates rather than bursts. In this scenario, while certain companies may falter and drop out of the race, other, better companies may take their place. Valuations become more reasonable. Stock prices may fall — but not crash — before ultimately stabilizing. AI becomes a driver of growth rather than the driver.    

We don’t know which of these scenarios will unfold, but we do know this: The best way to prepare for all of them is to stay diversified and keep thinking long term. For proof of this, look at what happened after the dotcom bubble. Tech stocks crashed…but many other investment classes did just fine.¹⁰ Furthermore, what the bubble really did was reveal which tech companies were truly good companies, and which were emperors with no clothes on. The latter disappeared; many of the former grew into titans. Some of them, in fact, belong to the “Magnificent 7” today.

By being patient, by thinking long-term, and by staying diversified, we remain prepared for any scenario…and position ourselves to take advantage of each. It’s not always easy. But in an industry where bubbles, fads, and trends come and go, it’s this strategy that has stood the test of time.

We hope you found this information — written without AI, by the way! — to be useful, especially when you hear the term “AI bubble” in the media. As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please let us know. Whatever the future holds, our team will always be here to help. In the meantime, have a great holiday season!

¹ “All four U.S. stock market indexes just closed at record highs,” Morningstar, https://www.morningstar.com/news/marketwatch/2025102832/all-four-us-stock-market-indexes-just-closed-at-record-highs-heres-what-history-says-happens-next
² “S&P 500 Historical Data,” Investing.com, https://www.investing.com/indices/us-spx-500-historical-data
³ “With the Magnificent Seven at 35% of the S&P 500 and the Ten Titans at 40%, are AI Growth Stocks Poised for a Sell-Off or Is There Still Room to Grow?” Yahoo Finance, https://finance.yahoo.com/news/magnificent-seven-35-p-500-114500263.html
⁴ “Are we in an AI bubble?” CNBC, https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/21/are-we-in-an-ai-bubble.html
⁵ “AI spending is boosting the economy, but many businesses are in survival mode,” CNBC, https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/21/are-we-in-an-ai-bubble.html
⁶ “NVIDIA P/E Ratio,” Public.com, https://public.com/stocks/nvda/pe-ratio
⁷ “Big Tech’s Soaring Profits Have an Ugly Underside: Open AI’s Losses,” The Wall Street Journal, https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/big-techs-soaring-profits-have-an-ugly-underside-openais-losses-fe7e3184
⁸ “State of AI in Business 2025,” Massachusetts Institute of Technology, https://mlq.ai/media/quarterly_decks/v0.1_State_of_AI_in_Business_2025_Report.pdf
⁹ “How Americans View AI and Its Impact on People and Society,” Pew Research Center, https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/09/17/how-americans-view-ai-and-its-impact-on-people-and-society/
¹⁰ “Winners and Losers from the Dot Com Bubble Rate Hike Cycle,” YCharts, https://get.ycharts.com/resources/blog/winners-amp-losers-from-the-dot-com-bubble-rate-hike-cycle/

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Happy December! With the holiday season upon us, we expect most people to be preoccupied with the various holidays and parties. We know we certainly are! But if you find a bit of quiet time amid the rush, we’d encourage you to spend it doing something truly festive: conducting your own personal year-end financial review with just you and your family.

Alright, maybe that’s not exactly festive. But it is important. A financial review is a great way to determine exactly how your year went, so you know what mistakes to avoid next year, and which successes to replicate. It’s a chance to take stock: are your finances in the shape you want them to be? Did you accomplish the things you wanted to this year? Have you moved closer to your goals, or farther away?

Of course, you can do a review like this at any time…but there’s something about the end-of-the-year that really brings clarity. Here’s how we would do it:

1. Write down the following questions on a piece of paper:

• What were the best things that happened to me this year?
• What were the worst things?
• How much did I set aside in savings this year?
• How much did I invest, and how did my investments do?
• Did I take on any new debt this year?
• Did I pay my taxes on time, or did I have to apply for an extension?
• Have there been any changes in my life that could affect my will or insurance needs? (Think new kids/grandkids, illness concerns, new property or other possessions, etc.)
• Do I have a better idea about when and how I can retire, or is the situation foggier than ever? Did I even give it any thought?
• Did I spend the year doing enough of what I wanted to do, or only the things I had to do?

2. Think about these questions for a little bit. Discuss them with your family. Then write down the answers below each.

3. After you have the answers, study them to determine if they indicate the need for any financial changes or decisions for next year. For example:

• Why did the best things happen to you? Were they the result of any financial decision? If so, can you replicate that decision?
• Why did the worst things happen? If you did something different with your money, could one or more of those things have been avoided?
• Did you put more into savings this year, or spend more in debt? If so, can that be reversed next year?
• Do you feel closer to your personal and family goals, or further away? If closer, what activities or habits took you closer that you can replicate? If further away, what’s the single biggest reason?

And so on. You get the idea. After you’ve completed this exercise, you’ll have the beginnings of a plan in place for next year. A plan to make your finances healthier. A plan to make your family more secure. A plan to spend more time doing what you want to do instead of solely what you must do. A plan to make next year the best year ever.

That end-of-year review turned out to be insightful. And worth the few minutes it took to conduct it.

If you have any questions or need help with anything the review uncovered, feel free to let us know. We’d be happy to talk with you and do what we can.

In the meantime, happy December! Happy reviewing!

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A lot can happen in 75 minutes.

It’s enough time to settle in with loved ones for a classic like The Nightmare Before Christmas, bake a batch of cookies, or enjoy a peaceful, reflective walk through a snow-dusted park. These moments feel ordinary, comforting, and filled with life.

But 75 minutes can also change the course of history.

On December 7, 1941, in just 75 minutes, the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor claimed the lives of 2,403 service members and civilians and left 1,178 others injured¹. Five battleships were permanently lost, including the USS Arizona and USS Oklahoma².

In the span of 75 minutes, an ordinary Sunday morning became one of the most devastating and defining moments in American history. 

These numbers are staggering, but to truly grasp their weight:

• The 2,403 lives lost could fill five Boeing 747s.
• The 1,178 injured would fill over 23 full school buses—an entire fleet of vehicles, all packed with individuals affected by a single, tragic event.

Each of these numbers tells a story: a father who wouldn’t come home, a sister whose laughter would be missed, a best friend who left an unfillable void. 

But even amid such loss, remarkable acts of resilience emerged.

In the years that followed, all but three of the damaged ships returned to service, becoming symbols of determination. Millions of Americans stepped forward to defend their country, shaping a path to victory that changed the course of history.

Today, the memorials at Pearl Harbor stand as enduring reminders of the sacrifices made, the unity forged, and the strength that rises from adversity.

This Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day, we invite you to reflect on those 75 minutes that forever shaped our history. Consider how you might honor the lives lost and the bravery displayed—perhaps by dedicating 75 minutes to a cause that matters to you. Volunteer, share stories with loved ones, or take a moment of silence to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice.

Every small act of remembrance helps carry forward the legacy of resilience and unity born from that day.

Thank you for reflecting with us. Together, let’s turn remembrance into action, continuing to foster hope and connection for future generations.

¹ “U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command. Pearl Harbor Attack,” 7 December 1941. U.S. Department of the Navy, https://www.history.navy.mil/browse-by-topic/wars-conflicts-and-operations/world-war-ii/1941/pearl-harbor.html
² “Sunk But Not Forgotten: American Ships Lost During the Pearl Harbor Attack.” Pearl Harbor Historic Sites, https://pearlharbor.org/blog/sunk-not-forgotten-american-ships-sank-pearl-harbor-attack/