Are we at the point where regulation and investing are finally in sync to do something BIG when it comes to plastic waste? Where regulation is done right, society benefits, and usually, investor opportunities follow. One of the areas where we’re seeing this happen in real-time is with the further development of a policy concept called Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) for plastic packaging. The idea is that brands pay fees based on how much plastic packaging they sell into a market. When it works well, those fees are used to prevent plastic pollution and advance the circular economy. When it…

The second Trump administration is headed for a colossal collision with the Federal Reserve. Make no mistake, almost all of the media will be siding with Fed head Jerome Powell and his institution. They will parrot the central bank’s party line that any attack is a highly dangerous assault on its indepen- dence—and a formula for future inflation. Don’t buy this baloney. The looming big battle isn’t about the Fed’s independence; it’s about the performance of our central bank. More particularly, it’s about the models on which it bases its decisions. The core premise of these models is that pros-…

One of the first tasks of the Trump Treasury Department should be to abandon the Basel regime of banking regulations. These are rules emanating from the Bank for International Settlements, an institution owned by 63 central banks, including the Fed, and based in Basel, Switzerland. The Basel Accords are recommendations concerning capital requirements and risk measurements. We’re on the third round, hence the nomenclature Basel III. U.S. banks overall are more than adequately capitalized. Regulations are stifling bank lending and unnecessarily increasing costs. JPMorgan Chase’s boss, Jamie Dimon, estimates that regulations add as much as 80 basis points to mortgages.…

Newtek Bank is an online bank, headquartered in Miami, that features high rates and minimal fees on its consumer savings account and certificates of deposit. The high-yield savings account earns an annual percentage yield of 5.25% for balances of $0.01 and up. There are no monthly fees or minimum balance requirements to open or maintain the account. Funding an account requires an external bank account, and the bank doesn’t have same-day transfers, such as through a partnership with Zelle.CD terms have a standard range from six months to five years, and there’s a minimum deposit of $2,500, which is somewhat…

With average global temperatures rising, are cold weather hazards a thing of the past? Quite to the contrary. Deep freeze is still a very potent risk for Northern Hemisphere businesses through the middle latitudes. Even amid an overall warming climate, very low temperatures are possible and should be expected in otherwise warmer regions. One cause is the polar vortex, a pattern that brings very cold temperatures to normally warmer areas in the South. This phenomenon is not particularly rare or new, and it is happening about once every other year, as it has since the 1950s. Abnormally low temperatures can…

Our Nerds say:“When choosing a savings account, a high rate isn’t the only thing you’ll want to consider. You’ll want to see whether there are any monthly fees or withdrawal limits. “It’s also important to pick an account that meets your overall banking needs. If you want your checking and savings accounts to be at the same bank, for example, you’ll want to go with an institution that offers both checking and high-yield savings.”- Margarette Burnette, NerdWallet banking writerBest high-yield savings accounts: full list of editorial picksWhen selecting the best high-yield savings accounts, NerdWallet uses multiple data points, including monthly…

Most U.S. banks are not allowed to hold bitcoin directly. Despite this, CFTC data shows they are sitting on big post-election crypto gains. According to data from the Commodity Futures Exchange Commission (CFTC) Wall Street banks started loading up on bitcoin futures a few weeks prior to the U.S. presidential election. Their timing was opportune, as the cryptocurrency surged from $62,000 to nearly $90,000 recently. According to the CFTC’s Commitment of Traders report from November 5, the brokerage units of big banks took long positions amounting to $3 billion in bitcoin futures at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). This massive…

The U.S. population hit a significant milestone, this year, when the number of 65-year-olds reached its highest point in history. Dubbed the “silver tsunami” by AARP, the trend is important because 65 has historically represented the average retirement age, and in the case of the 4.1 million Baby Boomers who celebrated the event this year, the transition represents a major wealth planning moment. It also has big implications for the wealth management industry, which has helped make the Boomers the wealthiest generation ever and must now start thinking about their children and grandchildren. Much has been written about the financial…

OBSERVATIONS FROM THE FINTECH SNARK TANK Conclusions from a new Apple study might make consumers rethink using ChatGPT—and other Generative AI tools—to get financial advice. And it should temper the plans of bank and credit union executives to use artificial intelligence (AI) to offer financial advice and guidance to consumers. Americans Use Generative AI To Get Financial Advice A survey from the Motley Fool revealed some surprising—and, frankly, hard to believe—statistics about Americans’ use of the Generative AI tool ChatGPT for financial advice. The study found that: 54% of Americans have used ChatGPT for finance recommendations. Six in 10 Gen…

OBSERVATIONS FROM THE FINTECH SNARK TANK In the past few weeks, two contacts of mine announced new jobs on LinkedIn. Nothing unusual about that, right? Except that both of them had announced their retirements in the past two months. As one of them told me, “I failed at retirement.” The Rise of the ReBoomers These examples are a sign of a much bigger trend. Baby boomers aren’t “retiring” in a traditional sense. They’re downshifting to become gig workers, have side hustles, and become influencers. They don’t call it any of those things, though—they call it “consulting.” Or, they’re coming back—full…