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The Tom Dupree Show
Hosted by Tom Dupree · EN
Investing For Retirement.
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Is the AI Rally a Bubble? What Retirees Should Watch For | Dupree Financial Group
1w ago00:45:05Tap to summarize⚠ Publisher Reference Only — Do NOT paste this box into WordPress Meta Title (paste into Yoast/RankMath SEO title field) Is the AI Rally a Bubble? What Retirees Should Watch For | Dupree Financial Group Meta Description (paste into Yoast/RankMath meta description field — 149 characters) AI stocks are soaring, but so is the risk. Tom Dupree breaks down what retirees should watch for before the next shakeout. Focus Keyphrase AI stock bubble retirement investing Canonical URL (Yoast → Advanced → Canonical URL — never leave blank) https://www.dupreefinancial.com/is-the-ai-rally-a-bubble-what-retirees-should-watch-for/ Slug is-the-ai-rally-a-bubble-what-retirees-should-watch-for Publishing Steps Paste the content between the BEGIN/END GUTENBERG CONTENT markers below into a Custom HTML block (or the Code Editor) in WordPress. Paste the Meta Title and Meta Description above into Yoast or RankMath. Set the Canonical URL explicitly — never leave it blank. Paste the PodcastEpisode JSON-LD block (below) as its own SEPARATE Custom HTML block, and the FAQPage JSON-LD block as ANOTHER separate Custom HTML block, both placed above the footer. Publish as ONE page, filed under both the Blog and Podcasts categories. Add the episode audio player embed above the post body. Source and upload the two placeholder images with the filenames/alt text noted inline below. After publishing, request indexing in Google Search Console → URL Inspection → Request Indexing within 24-48 hours. Routes to Hudson Kemp (CCO) for compliance review before it goes live. Dupree Financial Group Blog & Podcast The Tom Dupree Show The Financial Hour · Hour 2 · August 8, 2026 Is the AI Rally a Bubble? What Retirees Should Watch For The Tom Dupree Show | Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 By Tom Dupree, Founder, Dupree Financial Group III Ii I is this AI Rally Built to Last? Turn on any market report lately and you’ll hear the same story: a handful of AI-linked names are doing most of the heavy lifting. On this week’s Financial Hour, Tom sat down with analyst James Dupree and market analyst Michael Dawahare to talk through what’s actually driving that rally — and it’s a more complicated story than “AI stocks are up.” The conversation opened with reshoring: American companies bringing manufacturing back from overseas, and the market slowly absorbing the idea that this makes more sense than the offshoring wave of the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s. From there it moved into the AI infrastructure buildout, the old industrial companies suddenly catching a second wind because of it, and a cautionary tale about a leveraged AI hedge fund that lost 78% of its value in three weeks. Tom, James, and Michael walked through the Gold Rush and dot-com parallels, why diversification matters more than ever in a fast-moving sector, and where Dupree Financial Group is finding value right now — financials, insurance, mortgage REITs, and energy. The short version: something real is happening in AI and in American manufacturing. But a real trend and a sure thing are two very different things, and knowing the difference is the whole job. “There’s gonna be people riding high on AI right now who in four years may not be. Don’t just focus on the new technology — ask what are the derivative trades, what can go wrong. Because something will.” — Tom Dupree Topics Covered Why the market is absorbing the reshoring of U.S. manufacturing — and why that’s different from a tariff headline The AI infrastructure buildout, and which “old economy” companies (Johnson Controls, Cummins) are catching a second wind from it The Leopold Aschenbrenner story: how a 4x-leveraged AI fund went from $45 billion to a forced $10 billion sale in about three weeks Gold Rush and dot-com parallels — and who actually made the money when a boom goes bust Regional mall traffic and the return of in-person, live entertainment spending as a signal worth watching Why financials, insurance, and mortgage REITs are on Dupree Financial Group’s radar right now The capital gains tax cost of trying to “sell at the top” and buy back in lower Why a “set it and forget it” approach is especially risky in a fast-moving sector like AI Security concerns as new AI models test the limits of their own guardrails Key Takeaways Reshoring is showing up in the data, not just the headlines. Manufacturing activity has expanded for several consecutive months, and reshoring initiatives have driven a meaningful number of announced U.S. manufacturing jobs since 2010 — a trend the show connected directly to the “picks and shovels” companies benefiting from it. AI infrastructure spending is running far ahead of AI revenue. The largest tech companies are on pace to spend hundreds of billions on AI infrastructure this year alone — spending that, by some estimates, is outpacing the revenue AI products are currently generating. That gap is exactly what Tom, James, and Michael were pointing to when they said “something will go wrong.” Leverage turns a good idea into a forced sale. The Leopold Aschenbrenner fund didn’t lose money because AI was a bad bet — it lost money because a 4x-leveraged position can only absorb so much of a pullback before it’s liquidated. That’s a lesson about position sizing, not about AI. History says the “picks and shovels” companies often outlast the flashiest players. Tom’s Levi Strauss story from the Gold Rush isn’t just a fun aside — it’s the show’s real thesis. When a boom happens, the companies supplying the boom sometimes outlast the speculative names chasing it. Diversification is what protects you when some AI names don’t make it. Nobody on the show argued AI is fake. The argument was that not every AI company will succeed, and a portfolio built around five or ten concentrated bets is a very different risk profile than one spread across sectors. Trying to time a pullback can trigger its own tax bill. Selling a highly appreciated position to avoid a possible drop means paying capital gains tax on the gain — which, as James pointed out, can functionally act like selling at the top even if the stock never actually drops that far. Dividend-paying sectors remain the core of the plan, regardless of what AI does next. Financials, insurance, mortgage REITs, and energy were named as areas of current focus — companies tied to real, ongoing economic activity rather than to a single technology cycle. “Set it and forget it” is the riskiest approach in a fast-moving sector. The show’s closing message: stay alert, stay informed, and know what you own — because in a sector that can move 10-15% in a day, being asleep at the wheel is exactly when it costs you. The Reframe: What This Means for Your Portfolio Here’s where we’d push the conversation a step further than the show had time for. The AI story and the reshoring story aren’t really two separate topics — they’re the same story told twice. Both are examples of real, durable economic activity attracting an amount of capital that may or may not be justified by what it produces. The five largest U.S. tech companies are on pace to spend somewhere in the range of $660–690 billion on AI infrastructure this year alone, nearly double the year before, according to industry analysis from Futurum Group. Other estimates put the ratio of AI infrastructure spending to AI software revenue at close to eighteen-to-one, per S&P Global research reported by ETF Trends. That doesn’t mean the technology is fake — it means the payoff isn’t set to arrive on the same timeline as the spending, and it may not arrive on that timeline at all. <p class="wp-block-paragraph" style="font-family:'Open Sans', Arial, sans-serif;fo...
Transcribe →Is Your Retirement Portfolio Too Concentrated? A $35B Hedge Fund Lesson | Dupree Financial Group
2w ago00:45:04Tap to summarizeDupree Financial Group Blog · The Tom Dupree Show From This Week’s Episode Retirement Investing · August 1, 2026 Is Your Retirement Portfolio Too Concentrated? A 25-year-old hedge fund manager lost roughly $35 billion in a matter of days this week. Here’s what his leverage and the market’s concentration in seven stocks have to do with your retirement account. By Tom Dupree, Founder, Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 This week, a 25-year-old former OpenAI researcher named Leopold Aschenbrenner watched roughly $35 billion disappear from his hedge fund in a matter of days. Two years ago, he wrote a 165-page essay predicting the future of artificial intelligence with such confidence that Silicon Valley treated it like scripture. This week, his fund — built on borrowed money layered on top of a handful of AI stocks — got forced into a fire sale to Ken Griffin’s Citadel at a steep discount. It’s a dramatic story. But here’s the direct answer to the question that actually matters for your retirement: if most of your money sits in a plain S&P 500 index fund, you may be more concentrated in a handful of the same stocks than you realize — and that concentration, not any single hedge fund’s collapse, is the real thing worth understanding before your next portfolio review. You don’t need borrowed money or a 165-page manifesto to be exposed to this. You just need to own “the market” and assume that means you’re spread across 500 different companies. Key Takeaways Leverage magnifies both directions. Borrowing money to buy investments can boost gains on the way up, but it can wipe out capital just as fast on the way down. That’s the entire story of this week’s hedge fund collapse. Seven stocks now make up a large share of the S&P 500. Depending on the week you check, the “Magnificent Seven” technology stocks account for somewhere between a third and roughly 40% of the entire index’s value. Owning an index fund is not automatically owning a diversified portfolio. A market-cap-weighted index gives its biggest companies the biggest influence — so when those companies wobble, so does “the market.” Know what you own and why you own it. That’s not a slogan — it’s the single most useful question a retiree can ask before the next headline-grabbing selloff. Why This Week’s Story Is Bigger Than One Hedge Fund Every generation produces an investor who seems untouchable — brilliant, early to a trend, riding a wave everyone else is still arguing about. Aschenbrenner’s fund, Situational Awareness, reportedly grew from roughly $200 million to as much as $45 billion in under two years, largely on concentrated bets in AI infrastructure names. Then, using leverage reported as high as 400% — meaning roughly four borrowed dollars for every dollar of the fund’s own capital — a sharp pullback in a handful of semiconductor and AI stocks triggered margin calls his prime brokers couldn’t ignore. That’s the mechanical part, and it’s worth understanding in plain English: when you borrow against an investment and that investment drops in value, your loan doesn’t shrink with it. At some point the lender requires more collateral — a margin call — and if you can’t provide it, your shares get sold for you, often at the worst possible moment. There’s no easy way around that math. It requires diligence, not confidence. Most retirees reading this aren’t using 400% leverage. But there’s a quieter version of the same concentration problem sitting inside a lot of 401(k)s and IRA rollovers, and it doesn’t require a single dollar of borrowed money to hurt you. What the Numbers Actually Show According to CNBC’s reporting on the collapse, Aschenbrenner’s fund held roughly $45 billion in assets at its peak, before margin calls forced the sale of its leveraged public stock positions — including major holdings like SK Hynix and CoreWeave — to Citadel at a discount, with the fund’s overall assets falling to around $10 billion within about 30 trading days (CNBC). TechCrunch’s coverage confirms Aschenbrenner had no prior professional trading experience before launching the fund in 2024, and that the losses came from both AI stocks falling and short positions in software companies moving the wrong way at the same time (TechCrunch). Meanwhile, the broader market has its own version of this concentration story. Reporting from Forbes notes that the “Magnificent Seven” technology stocks made up roughly a third of the S&P 500’s total market capitalization heading into 2026, with some advisors calling the resulting concentration risk a “legitimate concern” (Forbes). Separate reporting from CNBC put the figure as high as 35% to 40% of the index in recent trading, prompting some strategists to recommend equal-weighted alternatives to reduce that concentration (CNBC). The SEC’s own investor education office has published plain-language guidance on why borrowing to invest carries risks that go beyond the investment itself — including the fact that a broker can sell your securities to meet a margin call without waiting for you to act, and can do so without advance notice (SEC Investor.gov). It’s the kind of guardrail worth reading once, even if you never plan to use margin yourself. “Leverage is a thing to be used very judiciously and very carefully, because if you use it in a way that’s irresponsible, it can cost you everything.” — Tom Dupree The Reframe: This Isn’t a Bet on Whether AI Wins or Loses Dupree Financial Group’s Take Most of the commentary this week has been framed as a debate: Is AI spending going to pay off, or is it a bubble? That’s an interesting argument, and reasonable people disagree about it — Microsoft’s stock jumped double digits on one earnings report this year, while Oracle’s bonds have drawn scrutiny over its own AI-related spending. But that debate is largely beside the point for a retiree building income for the next 40 or 50 years. The actual lesson isn’t “buy AI stocks” or “avoid AI stocks.” It’s that when a market’s returns get concentrated in a small number of companies, your risk gets concentrated right along with it — whether you meant it to or not. That’s exactly why our approach starts with cash flow analysis, not headlines: dividend-paying companies across sectors like insurance, telecommunications, and financials keep generating income whether or not seven technology companies are having a good month. You get paid to wait, in good markets and choppy ones, instead of hoping a narrow slice of the market keeps carrying the whole index. What This Looks Like in Practice <p style="font-family:...
Transcribe →Oil Spikes, Stocks Shrug: What the Market Is Really Telling You
3w ago00:45:08Tap to summarizeDupree Financial Group Podcast Show Notes The Tom Dupree Show Episode · July 25, 2026 Oil Spikes, Stocks Shrug: What the Market Is Really Telling You The Tom Dupree Show| Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com |859-233-0400 By Tom Dupree, Founder, Dupree Financial Group Episode Description This week gave retirement investors a real-time lesson in how markets actually work. Renewed conflict near the Strait of Hormuz sent crude oil sharply higher — the kind of headline that can make anyone glance nervously at a 401(k) statement. Instead, the S&P 500 kept flirting with all-time highs anyway. Tom Dupree, Mike Johnson, and Michael Dawahare — the same team you can hear every week on the Tom Dupree Show podcast archive — dig into why the market’s reaction didn’t match the headline, and what that gap tells you about where to actually look when you’re evaluating your own portfolio. The team also unpacks a shift that’s been building all year. For the past two years, a handful of “Magnificent Seven” technology stocks carried nearly all of the S&P 500’s earnings growth. Michael walks through why that’s changing — and why the remaining 493 companies in the index are now projected to outpace the Mag Seven’s earnings growth, according to recent market data. Along the way, Tom and Mike connect that shift to two familiar names in Central Kentucky mailboxes — AT&T and Verizon — both of which addressed the SpaceX satellite-to-phone threat directly in their second-quarter 2026 earnings calls. The through-line Tom keeps coming back to: none of this is a reason to guess, and it’s not a reason to freeze either. It’s a reason to know exactly what you own and why you own it. That’s the same fee-only, fiduciary research-driven approach behind every account DFG manages — a portfolio built around dividend-paying companies doesn’t need Tehran, Washington, or Elon Musk to cooperate in order to keep generating income. “There’s no easy way to do this. It requires diligence.” Topics Covered •Why crude oil spiked this week after renewed conflict near the Strait of Hormuz •How the stock market processed the oil news without a broad sell-off •The two-year story of the “Magnificent Seven” carrying most of the S&P 500’s earnings growth •Why the “other 493” companies in the index are now projected to outpace the Mag Seven •The wide performance gap opening up inside the Mag Seven itself this year •Why the equal-weight S&P 500 has outpaced the market-cap-weighted version in 2026 •AT&T and Verizon’s earnings-call response to the SpaceX direct-to-phone threat •Why DFG owns companies based on fundamentals and dividends, not headlines or hype •The historical backdrop connecting Britain, oil, and the Strait of Hormuz •Reshoring “national championship industries” and what it could mean for long-term growth Key Takeaways A market reaction isn’t the same as a market verdict. Oil spiked hard this week, but the S&P 500 stayed close to record highs. That gap is a reminder the market is weighing probabilities, not reacting to a single headline — and a scary news cycle doesn’t automatically mean portfolio damage. The “other 493” are catching up. After two years of a small group of mega-cap tech stocks driving nearly all S&P 500 earnings growth, the broader market is now projected to outpace them. That matters if your retirement savings are concentrated in a handful of names. Not every “Magnificent Seven” stock is behaving the same way. Wide performance gaps opened up within the group this year. Owning “the market” through a single index doesn’t mean owning uniform results — it means owning whatever mix that index happens to be weighted toward right now. Fundamentals, not momentum, is the filter. DFG will own a Mag Seven name when the valuation and dividend profile make sense — the decision is driven by earnings, cash flow, and dividends, not by chasing whatever stock is trending. Even household telecom names get tested by disruption. AT&T and Verizon both addressed the SpaceX satellite-to-phone threat directly in this week’s earnings calls — a reminder that even steady, income-paying companies require ongoing diligence, not a buy-and-forget approach. Geopolitics and portfolios are more connected than they look. The long history of global oil markets and shipping lanes helps explain moves that otherwise look confusing scrolling through headlines — context that’s part of the research behind every position in the portfolio. Diligence, not diagnosis, is the DFG approach. Every position gets traced back to one question: how does this translate to your investment portfolio? That’s the filter for oil, tech earnings, telecom competition, or any other headline of the week. About The Tom Dupree Show The Tom Dupree Show is hosted by Tom Dupree, founder of Dupree Financial Group and a 47-year veteran of the investment business. Each episode covers the financial topics that matter most to retirees and those approaching retirement — in plain English, without the Wall Street spin. Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm based in Lexington, Kentucky. The firm manages separately managed accounts focused on income-generating, dividend-paying portfolios — no products sold, no commissions, no conflicts of interest. Past episodes are available at dupreefinancial.com under the Radio tab. Related Reading •Browse the full episode archive on the Tom Dupree Show podcast page <li style="font-family:'Open Sans', sans-serif;font-size:13.5px;color:#323339;line-height...
Transcribe →What Does Market Volatility Mean for Your Retirement Portfolio?
4w ago00:45:07Tap to summarizeWhat Does This Week’s Market Volatility Mean for Your Retirement Portfolio? By Tom Dupree, Founder, Dupree Financial Group Inflation cooled. The big banks beat expectations. And somehow, it was still a wild week in the market. If you’ve been watching your account balance bounce around and wondering whether any of it has anything to do with the actual value of what you own, here’s the short answer: usually not. Most of what moved the market this week wasn’t new information about businesses — it was leverage, technical trading, and forced selling. That distinction matters more for your retirement than almost anything else you’ll read this month, because it tells you when to act and when to simply hold on. This week’s episode of The Tom Dupree Show walked through four separate stories — cooling inflation, strong bank earnings, a leveraged-ETF blowup on the other side of the world, and a regulatory fight over how often companies should report earnings — that all point to the same lesson: know what you own, know why the price is moving, and don’t confuse someone else’s forced selling with your own emergency. Key Takeaways Inflation cooled to 3.5% year-over-year in June, but the Fed’s new chair has questioned whether the 2% target is even the right one — the ground rules for bonds and rate-sensitive investments could shift. Bank profits this quarter came mostly from paying less on deposits, not from a borrowing boom — a reminder that cash flow, not headlines, tells the real story. A leveraged single-stock ETF collapse in South Korea forced hundreds of thousands of retail accounts into liquidation — a case study in what daily-compounding leverage does to a portfolio. Semiconductor stocks have swung hard on technical signals, not fundamentals — which can create real opportunity for patient, long-term owners. A federal proposal to let companies report earnings twice a year instead of four times has reignited a real debate about transparency versus short-termism. Why Does the Market Feel So Unpredictable Right Now? If you’re 55, 65, or 75 and watching a retirement account that’s supposed to fund the next 30 or 40 years of your life, a week like this one is unsettling. The headlines contradict each other: inflation is cooling, but chip stocks are getting hammered one day and ripping higher the next. Banks are thriving, but somewhere on the other side of the world, hundreds of thousands of retail investors just lost their entire trading accounts overnight. It’s a lot to hold at once, and it’s reasonable to wonder whether any of it should change what you do with your own money. Here’s the honest answer: for most retirees holding a diversified, income-producing portfolio, almost none of it should. But understanding why requires pulling apart what actually happened this week — and separating the noise from the signal. What Actually Happened This Week — The Data Start with the good news. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that headline inflation cooled to 3.5% year-over-year in June, with core inflation (which strips out food and energy) coming in at 2.6% — both below what economists expected, and producer prices actually declined for the month. That’s a meaningfully better inflation picture than markets were braced for. But the Fed’s target isn’t necessarily fixed anymore. Kevin Warsh, who was sworn in as Federal Reserve chairman this spring, has openly questioned the assumptions behind the central bank’s longstanding 2% inflation goal and launched a broader review of how the Fed operates. For retirees who own bonds or rate-sensitive income investments, that’s not a footnote — it’s a reason to pay attention to what “the target” even means over the next few years, rather than assuming the old rules still apply. Meanwhile, bank earnings came in strong — but not for the reason most people assume. The lift came primarily from banks paying less to fund themselves (short-term deposit rates have fallen faster than the loans on their books have repriced), not from a fresh wave of borrowing. It’s a good environment for financial stocks, but it’s a funding-cost story more than a booming-economy story, and that distinction matters if you’re trying to judge whether the rally has legs. Then there’s the semiconductor sector, which has been the market’s most volatile corner. Taiwan Semiconductor, the company that manufactures the vast majority of the world’s advanced AI chips, reported June revenue up nearly 68% year-over-year, a genuinely extraordinary number driven by AI infrastructure demand. And yet chip stocks broadly have been whipping up and down for reasons that have very little to do with numbers like that one. A lot of that action is technical: when a stock breaks below a widely watched moving average, institutional trading algorithms are programmed to sell, regardless of what the underlying business is doing. That selling then triggers more selling. It looks like panic. It’s often just mechanics. The starkest illustration of what leverage does in a downturn came out of South Korea this month, where a wave of new single-stock leveraged ETFs tied to semiconductor giants Samsung and SK Hynix triggered margin calls on more than 1.2 million retail trading accounts, with roughly 320,000 to 360,000 of those accounts fully liquidated in a matter of days. These products were designed to move twice the daily price swing of a single stock — which sounds appealing on the way up and is devastating on the way down, because the losses compound daily rather than tracking the stock’s actual return over time. It’s an ocean away from Lexington, Kentucky, but the lesson travels: leverage doesn’t just add risk, it changes the math entirely. Finally, there’s a quieter but genuinely important story developing in Washington. The SEC has proposed letting public companies choose to report earnings twice a year instead of four times, a change championed by President Trump and SEC Chairman Paul Atkins as a way to reduce short-term pressure on management teams. The idea splits reasonable people: less frequent reporting could free executives to run their businesses for the next several years instead of the next ninety days, but it could also mean investors — including retirees who depend on knowing exactly what they own — get less information, less often. This week’s news cycle also included a primetime presidential address in which Trump alleged that newly declassified intelligence showed foreign interference — including from China — in the 2020 election, along with claims of voter registration fraud in Michigan. Election security officials, including the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, have said they’ve found no evidence that any votes were altered in past elections. Whatever your read on the speech, it fed into a broader theme running through the whole hour: how much can you trust the numbers an institution hands you, whether that’s a vote count or a government inflation report? It’s why we do our own research instead of relying solely on government st...
Transcribe →Is the Fed's Shake-Up Good for Your Retirement Income? | Dupree Financial
Jul 1100:45:06Tap to summarizeIs the Federal Reserve’s New Shake-Up Good or Bad for Your Retirement Income? By Tom Dupree, Founder, Dupree Financial Group Short answer: it’s genuinely both, and which one matters more depends on whether your retirement income is built to keep pace with rising costs. New Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh has launched a formal, five-part review of how the Fed operates — covering everything from how it talks to markets, to how it collects the inflation data that moves interest rates, to whether artificial intelligence is quietly reshaping the economy in ways the old playbook never anticipated. On this week’s episode of The Financial Hour, James Dupree, Mike Johnson, and Michael Dawahare sat in to break down what this shake-up actually means — and, more importantly, what it means for anyone relying on their portfolio to produce real, spendable income in retirement. Key Takeaways A new Fed chair is auditing the Fed itself — five task forces are reassessing communications, the balance sheet, data quality, and the inflation target. The Fed’s own bond portfolio carries an unrealized loss in the hundreds of billions — proof that duration risk applies to everyone, including the Fed. AI is cutting both ways on inflation — boosting productivity in some areas, raising input costs like memory chips in others. A tariff-driven price bump and true monetary inflation are not the same thing, and the difference matters for how policymakers respond. Income that doesn’t grow — money markets, CDs, old bonds — quietly loses ground to rising costs every year it sits still. Who Is Kevin Warsh, and Why Is He Changing How the Fed Operates? Kevin Warsh has been a student of the Federal Reserve for most of his career, and one of his first moves as chair was to launch five task forces to reassess the institution’s core functions: communications, balance sheet policy, data quality, productivity and jobs (including AI), and the inflation framework itself. According to CNBC’s reporting on the review, the task forces are directed to start from first principles and question existing practice rather than simply fine-tune it — Brown Brothers Harriman strategist Scott Clemons described the approach as “regime change, but in a velvet glove.” The philosophy behind it is simple: stop, assess, and pivot where needed — the same discipline any well-run company applies when a board challenges management on why things are done a certain way. Warsh is asking the Fed to do that to itself, publicly, for the first time in a long time. What Did the Federal Reserve Get Wrong in 2008 and 2021? To understand why this review matters, it helps to look at the Fed’s actual track record. In 2006 and 2007, as the housing market was cracking, the Fed’s regional offices were on record saying there was no housing problem. There was. Then, in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, the Fed held interest rates near zero for over a decade — a policy commonly called ZIRP — creating what our team described on-air as a “wet blanket” over markets that made honest price discovery difficult. The more recent example is fresher: in 2021, as trillions in pandemic stimulus moved through the economy, the Fed described the resulting price increases as “transitory.” They weren’t. Prices rose at the fastest pace in decades, and by the time policy caught up, households had already absorbed the damage — a miss the current review is squarely aimed at preventing from happening again. Why Does the Fed Have a Balance Sheet Loss in the Hundreds of Billions? Source: Federal Reserve Bank of New York, System Open Market Account (SOMA) Annual Reports, 2022–2025. Here’s a detail that surprises a lot of listeners: the Fed itself is sitting on a large paper loss. During the zero-rate years, the Fed bought enormous quantities of bonds with very low coupon payments as part of a policy known as quantitative easing. When interest rates rose in 2022, the market value of those bonds fell — the same way any bond’s price falls when rates rise. According to the New York Fed’s own 2025 System Open Market Account report, the unrealized loss on the Fed’s securities portfolio stood at $844.2 billion at the end of 2025 — down from over $1 trillion the year before, but still historically enormous. The Fed can’t easily sell these bonds without disrupting the very bond market it’s trying to stabilize, so for now, it’s simply absorbing the loss. It’s a useful, if uncomfortable, reminder: interest rate risk doesn’t spare anyone — not even the institution that sets interest rates. The Reframe: What the Fed’s Own Mistake Teaches Retirees About Bonds Here’s the part of this story that doesn’t show up in the news coverage of Warsh’s review: the Fed’s $844 billion paper loss isn’t just a Washington curiosity. It’s a live demonstration of the exact risk that quietly erodes many retirement portfolios. The Fed bought long-duration bonds when rates were near zero, on the assumption that those rates — and the value of those bonds — would hold. They didn’t. If the most sophisticated balance sheet in the world can misjudge duration risk that badly, it’s worth asking whether a retirement plan built around the same assumption — that a fixed-rate bond bought today will still meet your needs in ten or fifteen years — is really as safe as it feels. A bond doesn’t know what a gallon of milk costs in 2035. It just pays what it promised to pay in the year you bought it. This is precisely why our firm’s approach leans on dividend-paying, financially strong companies rather than a bond-heavy “set it and forget it” allocation. A healthy company’s board can raise its dividend as costs rise — a bond’s coupon is frozen the day you buy it. The Fed just proved, at a scale of nearly a trillion dollars, what happens when income doesn’t adjust to a changing rate environment. Retirees don’t have the option of just holding to maturity and calling the loss “unrealized.” That gap has to show up somewhere in a household budget. Is Artificial Intelligence Good or Bad for the Economy? One of Warsh’s five task forces is specifically looking at how AI affects productivity and jobs, and our hosts see it as a genuinely mixed picture. On one hand, AI is already making certain kinds of work dramatically more efficient; our hosts pointed to real examples of complex technical projects being completed in a fraction of the time they used to take. Historically, technology has tended to be deflationary — it lowers the cost of producing things over time. On the other hand, the buildout of AI infrastructure is pushing some costs up right now — memory chips being a clear example, which in turn affects the price of consumer electronics. So the net effect on inflation isn’t a simple yes-or-no answer. It depends on which part of the economy you’re looking at, and over what timeframe. What’s the Difference Between a One-Time Price Increase and Real Inflation? This distinction came up repeatedly in the episode, and it matters more than it sounds. A tariff, for example, can raise the price of a specific good once — that’s a one-time adjustment, not ongoing inflation. True inflation, by contrast, is a monetary phenomenon: more money in the system chasing the same amount of goods and services, which pushes prices up broadly and persistently. <p style="font-family:'Open Sans', sans-serif;font-size:16px;color:#323339;line-height:1.65;m...
Transcribe →How Do Insurance Companies Make Money? Lessons for Retirement Investors.
Jul 300:45:05Tap to summarizeTHE TOM DUPREE SHOW | PODCAST SHOW NOTES How Do Insurance Companies Make Money? Lessons for Retirement Investors The Tom Dupree Show | Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 Episode Description Tom Dupree, Mike Johnson, and Michael Dawahare open with a Charlie Munger parable about the difference between memorized information and true understanding, then apply that lens to the week’s market headlines. They cover how SpaceX’s move into the cellphone business is reshaping the investment case for Verizon and AT&T, why property and casualty insurance stocks quietly outperformed in June, and what “combined ratio” and investment float actually reveal about how insurers make money. The conversation closes with a candid look at reshoring and globalization, and a reminder that even familiar, reliable dividend payers deserve a fresh look when the competitive landscape shifts. “Information is table stakes now — everybody has the same information. What separates a good investment decision from a bad one is understanding.” Topics Covered • How property and casualty insurance stocks quietly outperformed the market in June • What “combined ratio” reveals about an insurance company’s underwriting discipline • How insurance “float” works, and Warren Buffett’s disciplined approach to it • Charlie Munger’s “chauffeur knowledge” parable and why it matters for investors • SpaceX’s entry into the cellphone business and what it means for Verizon and AT&T • Reading stock technicals: what a broken 200-day moving average signals • Comcast’s spin-off of its media business and the market’s reaction • The case for U.S. manufacturing reshoring and its ripple effects on commercial insurance • Knowing when to trim a position that’s run up quickly, using Verizon as an example • A candid conversation on globalization’s impact on American manufacturing towns Key Takeaways • Combined ratio is a key health check. A combined ratio under 100 means an insurer is collecting more in premiums than it pays out in claims — a simple number that reveals whether underwriting discipline is paying off. • Insurance companies can be quiet compounding machines. A disciplined insurer that prices its risk well collects a “float” — premium dollars it can invest — that can become one of the most powerful long-term wealth-building tools in a portfolio. • Understanding beats information. Anyone can look up a stock’s numbers online — the real edge comes from understanding how a business, its competitors, and the broader market actually interact. • Technicals matter alongside fundamentals. A stock breaking below its 200-day moving average, as Verizon did, is a signal worth watching — but it doesn’t replace a full evaluation of dividend, valuation, and long-term outlook. • Outperformance can be a signal to trim, not just celebrate. When a holding runs up quickly, as Verizon did earlier this year, it may be time to take some profit and reassess valuation rather than assume the gains will continue. • Watch how a thesis plays out in the data. Rather than assuming a trend like reshoring is correct, disciplined investors track whether the facts and market behavior continue to support it. • Not every “safe” dividend payer carries the same risk today. Long-held positions can face new competitive threats, so it’s worth revisiting whether the original reasons you bought them still hold true. About The Tom Dupree Show The Tom Dupree Show is hosted by Tom Dupree, founder of Dupree Financial Group and a 47-year veteran of the investment business. Each episode covers the financial topics that matter most to retirees and those approaching retirement — in plain English, without the Wall Street spin. Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm based in Lexington, Kentucky. The firm manages separately managed accounts focused on income-generating, dividend-paying portfolios — no products sold, no commissions, no conflicts of interest. Past episodes are available at dupreefinancial.com under the Radio tab. Schedule a Complimentary Portfolio Review If you’re not sure whether your portfolio still reflects the reasons you first bought it, or whether new competitive and market forces have quietly changed the picture — we’ll take a look. No charge. No pressure. Just an honest conversation about what you own and whether it’s working for you. Call: 859-233-0400 | Visit: dupreefinancial.com The post How Do Insurance Companies Make Money? Lessons for Retirement Investors. appeared first on Dupree Financial.
Transcribe →Staying Invested During Market Volatility: When to Hold and When to Sell | Dupree Financial
Jun 3000:45:08Tap to summarizeTHE TOM DUPREE SHOW | PODCAST SHOW NOTES When to Hold, When to Sell: Staying Invested Through Market Volatility The Tom Dupree Show | Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 Episode Description When markets get choppy, the instinct to move to the sidelines can feel overwhelming — but acting on that instinct often costs investors far more than the volatility itself. In this episode, Tom Dupree and Lead Advisor Mike Johnson walk through the discipline behind staying invested, explaining how Dupree Financial Group evaluates when to hold a position, when to trim, and when to walk away entirely. The conversation covers real examples from their current portfolio — including dividend-paying holdings, pipeline stocks, and a diesel engine company that became a quasi-AI play — to illustrate how valuation and income generation shape every buy, hold, and sell decision. Tom and Mike also explain why the firm carries a significant cash position right now, and what that signals about how they view current market valuations. “Income from the portfolio tilts the table in your favor — it puts time back on your side while you wait for price appreciation.” Topics Covered Why panic selling during volatility almost always harms long-term returns How dividend income changes the calculus on whether to hold or sell The difference between timing the market and assessing individual stock valuations Real portfolio decisions: oil companies, pipeline stocks, Kroger, and an AI-adjacent diesel play Why the firm is holding more cash than usual — and what it says about current valuations The perma-bull vs. perma-bear debate and why optimism is essential for long-term investors How a team-based investment approach produces better decisions than any single viewpoint Why most 401(k) holders don’t know what they own — and why that matters more than ever Key Takeaways Dividends give you staying power. When a holding generates consistent income, missing that payout by selling too early is a real cost. Income from your portfolio buys you time to wait out price swings without being forced to sell at the wrong moment. The market’s best days cluster around its worst ones. Nearly half of the 50 best market days over the past 30 years occurred during bear markets. Investors who exit to avoid the drops frequently miss the recoveries that follow within days. Valuation — not emotion — should drive selling decisions. Tom and Mike trim positions when the math no longer makes sense: oil company stocks trading 25% above where they were when oil prices were identical, or a grocery chain whose core margin driver is eroding. Logic, not fear, triggers the sell. You can’t time the market, but you can prepare for it. As investor Howard Marks has noted, the goal isn’t prediction — it’s preparation. Knowing what you own, why you own it, and at what price it becomes expensive puts you in a position to act with clarity rather than react with panic. Not all stocks are meant to be held forever. Some positions are designed to be traded; others are core long-term holds. Understanding the difference — and building that distinction into your process from the start — is what separates disciplined investing from guesswork. A cash position is itself a valuation statement. Dupree Financial Group currently holds a significant cash and bond allocation because valuations look stretched. That defensive posture has allowed the portfolio to perform comparably to fully-invested indexes while taking on meaningfully less risk. Know what you own. Many retirement investors hold mutual funds or target-date funds without understanding the underlying holdings. If price movements in your portfolio are a mystery to you, you’re letting emotions — not analysis — make your decisions for you. About The Tom Dupree Show The Tom Dupree Show is hosted by Tom Dupree, founder of Dupree Financial Group and a 47-year veteran of the investment business. Each episode covers the financial topics that matter most to retirees and those approaching retirement — in plain English, without the Wall Street spin. Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm based in Lexington, Kentucky. The firm manages separately managed accounts focused on income-generating, dividend-paying portfolios — no products sold, no commissions, no conflicts of interest. Past episodes are available at dupreefinancial.com under the podcast tab. Schedule a Complimentary Portfolio Review If you’re not sure whether your portfolio is built to generate income through market volatility — we’ll take a look. No charge. No pressure. Just an honest conversation about what you own and whether it’s working for you. Call: 859-233-0400 | Visit: dupreefinancial.com Dupree Financial Group is an SEC-registered investment adviser. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. The information presented is for educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. All investing involves risk, including the possible loss of principal. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Securities mentioned are for illustrative purposes only and are not a recommendation to buy or sell. Please consult a qualified financial professional before making any investment decisions.The post Staying Invested During Market Volatility: When to Hold and When to Sell appeared first on Dupree Financial.
Transcribe →Sell Discipline Retirement Investing: When to Sell a Stock
Jun 2100:45:08Tap to summarizeThe Tom Dupree Show | Podcast Show Notes Buying a Stock Is Easy. Knowing When to Sell Is Everything. The Tom Dupree Show | Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 Episode Description Every investor knows how to buy a stock. But the moment that determines real wealth — or real loss — is the moment you decide to sell. In this episode of The Tom Dupree Show, Tom Dupree, Lead Advisor Mike Johnson, and in-house analyst James Dupree lay out the sell discipline that has guided Dupree Financial Group’s portfolios for decades, including what triggers a trim, what triggers a full exit, and why waiting for someone else to tell you to sell is one of the costliest mistakes in investing. The conversation covers the full range of situations investors face: growth stocks valued on revenue and margin guidance, dividend payers evaluated on current yield, bonds that raised red flags in a management meeting, and legacy holdings kept alive by emotional attachment rather than logic. The team also addresses taxes, risk profile management, dry powder strategy, and the very human pull of FOMO that causes investors to ride winners too long — and losers even longer. “Buying a stock is easy. Selling a stock — regardless of whether it’s up or down — is a lot harder to do.” Topics Covered ● Why sell discipline is the foundation of a sound investment process — not an afterthought ● Valuing growth stocks on revenue guidance and gross margin targets rather than earnings alone ● How current yield signals when a dividend stock has priced in too much optimism ● The role of FOMO and emotional attachment in holding positions too long ● Real examples: Freddie Mac, WorldCom, Kraft Heinz, and a local company that went up 20x and back to zero ● Trimming vs. full exits: how partial sales create dry powder for new opportunities ● Tax-smart selling: harvesting losses, the 30-day wash sale rule, and gifting low-basis shares to charity ● Risk profile management: why one position becoming overweight is itself a sell signal ● Why Intel’s 26-year performance history is a cautionary tale about holding without a thesis ● The danger of relying on a single analyst’s buy list — and getting no sell guidance when markets turn Key Takeaways ● Have a sell target before you buy. When you purchase a stock, establish the price or valuation level at which you would be satisfied selling. If the stock blows past that target, revisit the thesis — don’t just let momentum make the decision for you. ● Valuation drives both buying and selling. A great company at the wrong price is still the wrong investment. Conversely, a mediocre company can become a strong buy when it gets cheap enough. Regularly re-evaluate what you own against current valuations, not just original purchase logic. ● Current yield is a sell signal for income stocks. When a dividend-paying stock rises sharply, its yield compresses. If a stock yielded 6.5% when purchased and now yields 3.4% solely because the price doubled, the market is pricing in a level of optimism worth locking in. Consider trimming. ● Trimming creates options. Most sell decisions don’t have to be all-or-nothing. Taking partial profits — and parking proceeds in money market as dry powder — gives you the flexibility to redeploy into new opportunities when they appear without being fully out of a strong holding. ● Watch your risk profile, not just your returns. If one position grows to become the largest holding in the portfolio due to price appreciation alone, that concentration is a risk even if the company is excellent. Rebalancing is not a sign of doubt — it’s disciplined portfolio management. ● Don’t let outdated advice run your portfolio. Tom shared the story of a widow who refused to sell two stocks because her late husband said never to — leaving her with a 2.1% yield when a redeployment could have generated 7%. Circumstances change. Investment advice should too. ● Emotions are the enemy of good sell decisions. FOMO causes investors to hold too long on the way up. Denial causes them to hold too long on the way down. An investment committee, a written thesis, and objective valuation metrics help counteract the emotional pull that derails individual investors. ● Taxes are part of the sell equation. In taxable accounts, realized gains have a cost. Pairing gains with losses (tax-loss harvesting), utilizing the 30-day wash sale rule carefully, and gifting low-basis shares to charity are all legitimate tools to make selling more tax-efficient. About The Tom Dupree Show The Tom Dupree Show is hosted by Tom Dupree, founder of Dupree Financial Group and a 47-year veteran of the investment business. Each episode covers the financial topics that matter most to retirees and those approaching retirement — in plain English, without the Wall Street spin. Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm based in Lexington, Kentucky. The firm manages separately managed accounts focused on income-generating, dividend-paying portfolios — no products sold, no commissions, no conflicts of interest. Past episodes are available at dupreefinancial.com under the Radio tab. Schedule a Complimentary Portfolio Review If you’re not sure whether your current portfolio reflects a real sell discipline — or whether you’re holding things longer than you should be — we’ll take a look. No charge. No pressure. Just an honest conversation about what you own and whether it’s working for you. Call: 859-233-0400 | Visit: dupreefinancial.com Dupree Financial Group is a Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. The information presented on this program is for educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice, a solicitation, or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Investing involves risk, including the potential loss of principal. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please consult with a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions. The post When to Sell A Stock appeared first on Dupree Financial.
Transcribe →Nike’s Fall: Leadership Lessons for Retirement Investors
Jun 13Tap to summarizeThe Tom Dupree Show | Podcast Show Notes The Nike Cautionary Tale: What Happens When Leadership Loses Touch With Its Customers The Tom Dupree Show | Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 Episode Description Nike spent decades building one of the most recognized brands on the planet — the Swoosh, the Air Jordan, high-heat basketball shoes that consumers lined up for, and a presence in every major sporting goods retailer in the world. Then, in 2020, the company handed its future to a CEO who believed physical retail was a dying model, and what followed became a study in how quickly a great company can lose its way. Tom Dupree and analyst Michael Dawahare walk through the full arc of Nike’s rise and decline — from its origins in performance athletics to a stock that traded at $180 and has since fallen to around $44. They examine the strategic decisions that caused the damage, the board failures that let it compound, and what retirement investors can take directly from the story. “You cannot put your own lenses on the lenses of your customer — you have to ask how they see the world, not how you see it.” Topics Covered • How Nike’s origins in performance athletics shaped the brand — and why that foundation was eventually abandoned • The 2020 appointment of CEO John Donahoe and the pivot toward a direct-to-consumer distribution model • Why walking away from wholesale partners like Foot Locker and specialty running stores was a catastrophic miscalculation • How competitors — HOKA, On Cloud, New Balance, ASICS, and Brooks — filled the shelf space Nike gave away • The role of groupthink and board failure in allowing the strategy to continue long after warning signs appeared • The Jordan Brand challenge: what happens when a generational endorsement ages out with no succession plan • Nike’s attempted course correction, the arrival of new CEO Elliott Hill, and why recovery is proving harder than expected • The parallel between Nike’s story and retirement portfolio management: proven strategy, fundamentals, and the danger of chasing new models Key Takeaways • Know what your portfolio is actually built on. The moment Nike shifted focus from technical performance products, competitors filled the gap. The same risk applies when an investment strategy drifts from its core principles. • Never surrender your shelf space. Giving up distribution — or abandoning a proven income strategy during volatility — is almost impossible to reverse. Re-entry is rarely seamless. • Leadership bias is one of the most expensive mistakes in business. Donahoe was an outstanding digital executive who ran a physical consumer company through a digital lens. Bias in a CEO — or a portfolio manager — costs real money. • Boards exist to prevent catastrophic decisions. Most don’t. Nike’s board approved a strategy that effectively fired its wholesale customer base. Institutional oversight is only as good as the willingness to ask uncomfortable questions. • Consumer loyalty, once transferred, is remarkably sticky. Runners who switched to HOKA or On Cloud did not come back. When a customer finds something they prefer, you may have lost them for good. • Recovery takes far longer than the damage itself. Nearly two years into Elliott Hill’s tenure, Nike still cannot get traction. A few years of bad decisions can take a decade to undo — in business and in retirement portfolios. • Proven strategies deserve skepticism about replacement, not abandonment. When a new model sounds compelling, always ask: What is the process? Has it been tested? And who benefits when you believe in it? About The Tom Dupree Show The Tom Dupree Show is hosted by Tom Dupree, founder of Dupree Financial Group and a 47-year veteran of the investment business. Each episode covers the financial topics that matter most to retirees and those approaching retirement — in plain English, without the Wall Street spin. Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm based in Lexington, Kentucky. The firm manages separately managed accounts focused on income-generating, dividend-paying portfolios — no products sold, no commissions, no conflicts of interest. Past episodes are available at dupreefinancial.com under the Radio tab. Schedule a Complimentary Portfolio Review If you’re not sure whether your portfolio is built on the same principles Nike abandoned — proven strategy, staying close to what works, and never losing sight of the fundamentals — we’ll take a look. No charge. No pressure. Just an honest conversation about what you own and whether it’s working for you. Call: 859-233-0400 | Visit: dupreefinancial.com Dupree Financial Group is a Registered Investment Adviser (RIA) registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. The information presented on this podcast is for educational purposes only and should not be construed as personalized investment advice. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Investing involves risk, including the potential loss of principal. Please consult a qualified financial professional before making investment decisions. The post Nike’s Fall: Leadership Lessons for Retirement Investors appeared first on Dupree Financial.
Transcribe →Hidden Fees in Mutual Funds & Annuities | The Tom Dupree Show
Jun 12Tap to summarizeWhere Did My Returns Go? The Cost of Mutual Funds and Annuities The Tom Dupree Show | Dupree Financial Group | dupreefinancial.com | 859-233-0400 Episode Description Time Stamps 00:00 Keep Truckin Intro 01:31 Show Opens Fees 03:22 Mutual Fund Basics 05:46 Share Classes Loads 07:14 Portfolio Fee Transparency 10:05 Tax Drag Distributions 14:01 Constraints Versus Drift 16:29 Managed Accounts Example 21:16 Break Segment Promo 22:05 Inflation Market Pinch 26:09 Mutual Fund Fee Reality 26:38 Annuities Insurance Wrapper 27:27 Index Annuity Caps 30:20 Fixed Annuity Tradeoffs 32:27 Immediate Annuity Inflation 37:32 Commissions And Incentives 40:29 Counterparty Risk Warning 44:30 Final Portfolio Checkup Most investors look at their mutual fund statement, see a return number, and assume that’s the whole story. It isn’t. Fees are deducted before that return ever reaches your statement, which means you could be paying anywhere from a fraction of a percent to well over 1.5% a year without it ever showing up as a line item. In this episode, Tom Dupree and Mike Johnson explain exactly how those costs are built into your returns — and why two people holding what looks like the “same” mutual fund can actually be paying very different amounts. The conversation also digs into a real-world example involving a major fund family, where a change to share class minimums forced a wave of investors to realize years of embedded capital gains — and a hefty tax bill — all at once. From there, Tom and Mike shift to annuities, breaking down how index annuities, fixed annuities, and immediate annuities are each priced, where the commissions come from, and why the financial strength of the insurance company behind the contract matters just as much as the product itself. Whether you’re holding mutual funds inside a 401(k), an IRA, or a taxable account — or you’ve been pitched an annuity recently — this episode gives you the questions to ask before you invest another dollar. “If you don’t know what you own in your portfolio — and why — that’s the first thing worth fixing.” Topics Covered How mutual fund fees get absorbed into your net return instead of appearing as a separate line item The difference between A shares, C shares, and institutional share classes — and why the same fund can cost twice as much depending on which one you hold What a 12b-1 fee is and who actually receives it Why actively managed funds tend to carry higher expense ratios than index funds How capital gains distributions can create a tax bill on gains you never benefited from A real example of how a fund family’s share class changes forced unexpected tax consequences on shareholders Portfolio constraints versus portfolio drift, and why both can work against you Index annuities, fixed annuities, and immediate annuities — how each is structured and where the cost is hidden Why surrender charges exist and how they relate to commissions Counterparty risk: why the insurance company’s own investments matter to your guarantee Key Takeaways Your net return already has the fee built in. Mutual fund statements show what’s left after fees are deducted — not a separate fee line — so two investors holding what looks like the same fund can actually be paying very different amounts depending on share class. Share class matters more than most investors realize. One example discussed in the episode showed a global fund charging roughly 0.8% on its A shares versus 1.8% on its C shares — more than double, for the same underlying portfolio. Tax inefficiency can be just as costly as the stated fee. Because mutual funds are pooled investments, other shareholders’ buying and selling can trigger capital gains distributions you owe taxes on — even if you never participated in those gains. A fund’s holdings can drift far from what you originally bought. Without firm constraints, a manager’s strategy can shift significantly over a few years, leaving you holding something very different from what your original research showed. Annuities are mutual funds wrapped inside an insurance contract — and you pay for both layers. Whether it’s an index annuity’s capped participation rate or a variable annuity’s rider fees, the cost is built into the structure even when it isn’t itemized. Surrender charges exist largely to recoup the seller’s commission. Annuity commissions can run as high as 6–8%, and the multi-year surrender schedule helps the insurance company recover that cost if you withdraw early. The insurance company’s financial strength is part of what you’re buying. An annuity’s guarantee is only as good as the company behind it — and recent industry reporting has noted that some insurers are taking on more investment risk, including exposure to private credit, than before the 2008 financial crisis. Transparency is something you’re entitled to ask for. Whether it’s a mutual fund, an annuity, or a managed account, you have the right to know exactly what you own, what it costs, and where your income is coming from. About The Tom Dupree Show The Tom Dupree Show is hosted by Tom Dupree, founder of Dupree Financial Group and a 47-year veteran of the investment business. Each episode covers the financial topics that matter most to retirees and those approaching retirement — in plain English, without the Wall Street spin. Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm based in Lexington, Kentucky. The firm manages separately managed accounts focused on income-generating, dividend-paying portfolios — no products sold, no commissions, no conflicts of interest. Past episodes are available at dupreefinancial.com under the Podcast tab. Schedule a Complimentary Portfolio Review If you’re not sure whether the funds or annuities in your portfolio are quietly costing you more than you realize, we’ll take a look. No charge. No pressure. Just an honest conversation about what you own and whether it’s working for you. Call: 859-233-0400 | Visit: dupreefinancial.com Dupree Financial Group is a fee-only, fiduciary, SEC-registered Registered Investment Advisor. The information presented in this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only and should not be considered a solicitation for the purchase or sale of any security. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Investing involves risk, including possible loss of principal. Please consult with a qualified professional before making any financial decisions.The post Hidden Fees in Mutual Funds & Annuities | The Tom Dupree Show appeared first on Dupree Financial.
Transcribe →