Despite the economic turmoil brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. households made notable financial gains in 2020 and 2021. According to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, credit card balances declined as many Americans used their stimulus payments to pay down debt. Late payment and default rates on credit cards dropped to historic lows, particularly among consumers with credit scores below 620. Meanwhile, emergency savings increased, and overall financial well-being, measured by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), reached record levels. This highlighted an unexpected silver lining in an otherwise devastating global crisis. There And Back Again Nearly five years…

Here’s The Latest On Trump DOGE Dividend Stimulus Check: Who’s For And Against It In the past 96 hours, the debate over the Trump DOGE Dividend stimulus check—a proposed dividend payment to eligible taxpayers funded by a portion savings from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)—has sparked myriad commentary and reactions. Here’s a rundown of the latest updates, featuring direct quotes from key players, summarizing who supports a DOGE stimulus check and who is more of a skeptic. DOGE Dividend Stimulus Check Supporters: President Trump On DOGE Dividend Stimulus Check: Perhaps most importantly, President Trump has continued to express…

The Trump administration’s Department of Education abruptly removed two critical applications related to student loan forgiveness and repayment on Friday, throwing an already troubled federal student loan system into greater turmoil. The department took down the online application portal for income-driven repayment, or IDR. IDR plans are repayment programs that allow borrowers to make payments based on a formula applied to their income and family size, with any remaining balance forgiven, typically after 20 or 25 years in repayment. The department also removed the online application to apply for a federal Direct consolidation loan. Both applications are critical for borrowers…

It’s difficult to say whether President Donald Trump is serious about every plan he suddenly announces, but a new one on top of tariffs and trade policies is potentially financially disturbing on a global level. Being called the “Mar-a-Lago Accord,” it would involve several stages. First, the U.S. would try to force some foreign creditors, which hold large amounts of long-term Treasury notes, to trade them in for special extra-long-term Treasurys. Swapping Debt Types Bloomberg reports that the replacements would be 100-year, non-tradeable zero-coupon bonds. That means the bonds wouldn’t pay interest. Instead, they would sell at a discount from…

True Link Financial offers a debit card with spending controls expressly designed for people with dementia, other cognitive deficits or addiction issues. It also manages special needs trusts. By Lindsey Choo, Forbes Staff In November 2020, Alana Peralez received the sort of emergency call she’d been dreading. Her then 84-year-old dad, a retired aerospace engineer who’d lived alone in his Arizona house since her mom died in 2006, had suffered a stroke. After months of rehab in a nursing home and then a group home, he still had problems with mobility and completing complex tasks. So in April of 2021,…

Hustle culture and the ever-shortening form of advice have led to the deification of undying devotion—whether to a cause, a goal, or a priority. This oversimplification is also prominent in financial planning. Of course, courage in the face of adversity is laudable, generically speaking, but wisdom is rarely rigid. Wisdom pauses, asks more questions, considers, calibrates, compromises, and yes—wisdom changes course. John Maynard Keynes, one of history’s most influential economists, put it simply: “When the facts change, I change my mind.” Ralph Waldo Emerson put it even more sharply: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” Former Pepsi…

Bybit, a major cryptocurrency exchange based in Dubai recently announced it had been hacked, losing $1.5 billion worth of the cryptocurrency Ethereum in the largest cryptocurrency theft of all time. Putting it into perspective, the previous largest cryptocurrency theft was of $611 million worth of cryptocurrencies from the PolyNetwork platform in 2021. The crypto research group Arkham Intelligence is attributing the theft to the North Korean hacking group known as the Lazarus Group. The Lazarus Group is an infamous cybercrime group tied to the North Korean government that has been conducting cybercrimes since 2009. Among their more notable attacks was…

Banks are not fans of heavy regulation. Few companies or individuals are. Paying attention to rules takes time, effort, and money. Although sometimes unnecessary and overzealous, quite often regulation is the result of companies not operating in ways one might expect them to. In this way, it resembles lawyers’ contracts. Sometimes attorneys put in highly restrictive language because once in earlier parts of their careers there was a situation when something ridiculous or terrible happened and they’re determined that it never will again. An example was the indictment of a TD Bank employee by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office. The…

In a seemingly off-the cuff television remark, President Trump said he’d protect Medicaid from government spending cuts. Don’t count on it, especially since at nearly the same time, and after dithering for months, Trump endorsed a draft House Republican budget framework that anticipates cuts of as much as nearly $900 billion in Medicaid over the next decade. Supporters of deep Medicaid cuts have two goals: to help pay for tax cuts and to end what they say is widespread abuse by requiring recipients to work. More than 90 percent of non-disabled Medicaid recipients already work. But their pay is low,…

The idea of “putting your money to work” probably appeals to you. You want your money to do something for you, right? But what does that really mean? After looking at a few financial websites, I’ve identified three broad categories of “money working” in current use: Using money wisely Maximizing your compensation Investing I can’t argue with using money wisely or maximizing compensation, but when I hear someone talk about putting money to work, my mind turns immediately to investments. Money is a unique asset. It serves as a medium of exchange, a store of value, and a unit of…