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Episode 34: Protecting Your Purchasing Power  Thumbnail

Episode 34: Protecting Your Purchasing Power

Segment 1 (Show Open): 

Good afternoon, everyone! Welcome in. Welcome to Coasting in Retirement! Thank you for joining us today. We have another great show coming your way, we have another great guest host, and, I believe, we probably have one of the most important investment topics we’ve ever covered on our show. Regular co-host Michelle is off this week, and in her chair, let me introduce Mr. JD Gardner, the CIO and Founder of Aptus Capital Advisors. JD, how are you doing? Would you mind to briefly describe Aptus and your role? 

Listeners: JD and I are here today to discuss financial topics relevant to those of you in or near retirement, living your best life along our part of the gulf coast. Here’s what we’ve got in store for you today: First segment – deep dive on our topic of the day. 2nd segment - at about 25 minutes past the hour - “News of the Week”. Then at roughly 45 minutes past the hour, stick around for our 3rd segment, we call it ” Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth”. Of course, this time will see if JD’s had any predictions of his own that either hit the bullseye or…maybe he would like a re-do on. So buckle up, we’ve got a lot to get to!

Quick background on me for those new to the show. Again, my name is Josh Null, I am a fee-based financial advisor, I hold my FINRA Series 65 securities license, and I am the owner of Gulf Coast Financial Advisors, we are an independent investment management and financial planning firm with offices in Fairhope, Orange Beach, and Mobile! You can find more information on me and Gulf Coast Financial Advisors by visiting our website gulfcoastfa.com, or feel free to give us a call at 251-327-2124. If you missed that contact info, do not worry, we will repeat our contact info several times throughout the show! 

I’m also going to do a quick disclaimer to help the listeners understand the role of Aptus with Gulf Coast Financial Advisors. As I mentioned in the opening, JD Gardner is the CIO and Founder of Aptus Capital Advisors. JD also holds the esteemed credentials of CFA, which stands for Chartered Financial Analyst, and CMT, which stands for Chartered Market Technician. JD’s firm Aptus Capital Advisors serves as a Sub Advisor to my firm GCFA, which means that Aptus helps me with my client’s investment accounts, including portfolio construction and trading, among the many other services they provide. What it does not mean that JD or Aptus is employed directly by or for GCFA. JD’s advisory services are offered through Aptus Capital Advisors, a Registered Investment Advisor registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and based in Fairhope, Alabama. Aptus Capital Advisors and Gulf Coast Financial Advisors are not affiliated.

Alright, back to the show. JD, your firm Aptus has played a critical role in getting my RIA firm, GCFA, off the ground and headed for success. We also have a personal relationship that goes back several years, starting with our back court domination of the Fairhope Methodist’s men’s basketball league. Well, your domination anyway, my job was to get you the ball and get out of the way! A few weeks ago when you agreed to join our radio show, I asked you for 2-3 topics you thought would be important for our listeners to learn about, and to my surprise, you immediately came up with one – in fact, you said there’s one primary issue that should be on the top of every investor’s mind, and that is “How to Protect Your Purchasing Power.”. So let’s start with that, why did you say that, and what does it mean? 

Open discussion between JD and Josh around this issue. I want to make sure we talk about Aptus’ history with ETFs, and why you chose that path vs forming a mutual fund. Also briefly describe the differences. 

Listeners, we’re going to continue our discussion around this topic in our next segment, but if you heard something that caught your attention, then please feel free to reach out to us, we are very easy to get ahold of. You can start the conversation by calling 251-327-2124, or you can reach us through our website gulfcoastfa.com. One our site, you can choose to send us a direct message, or you can click on the blue button in the upper right-hand corner to set up a 15-minute introductory phone call on my calendar. 

Alright folks, coming up next - There’s always a lot going on in the world! Particularly the world of finance, investments and money. Every week we scour what Michelle calls the interwebs for financial articles related to our topic of the day, especially articles that pertain to those in or near retirement. So join us after the break to hear JD and I discuss this week’s relevant headlines in our “News of the Week” segment. Stay tuned!

Segment 2 - News of the Week:

Josh: “Welcome back to Coasting in Retirement, your host Josh Null here! As we discussed before the break, every week we scour the interwebs for helpful financial articles related to our topic of the day, especially articles that pertain to those of you in or near retirement. Our job is to help you all understand how these headlines impact you, especially when it comes to your money! Note – if you want to read our referenced articles yourself, we also include the links on our show transcript, which you can find on our website gulfcoastfa.com under the podcast tab. We upload our episodes every Monday after the show airs on Sunday. So JD, Michelle usually reads the headlines, but I’ll take her place this week. So without further ado, here’s the “News of the Week” 

1. Josh: First up JD, a recent article from InvestmentNews.com, titled “Is Growth Stock Domination Coming to an End?”. I picked this article because I wanted to get your feedback in 2 areas. First, can you describe the role that individual stocks play in Aptus’ approach to investing, and 2, this article primarily describes the difference opinions that money managers have regarding growth and value stocks, and I wanted you to weigh in on these 2 broad classes of stocks. Listeners, quick explanation, a growth stock is broadly defined as a company that has greater growth expectations related to other stocks, think many tech stocks over the past several years, and typically you don’t see much if any profit sharing with growth stocks, in the form of dividends. When someone refers to value stocks, technically they are referring to companies that have a share price below what their fundamentals say it should be, but I would argue the term value is also applied very broadly to mature businesses in mature industries that don’t see a lot of volatility in their stock price. So let’s see what JD has to say about the role of individual stocks in an investor’s portfolio, and what he thinks about the value vs growth argument:    

https://www.investmentnews.com/investing/news/is-growth-stock-domination-coming-to-an-end-254435

2. Josh: Alright JD our next article is from Morningstar and is titled “ETFs vs Mutual Funds: The Benefits That Really Matter”. I picked this article because I wanted to have the opportunity to expand on the brief conversation JD and I had in the opening segment about the differences between these 2 investment vehicles. I felt that this article did a good job of laying out the differences in tradability, tax efficiency and transparency between ETFs and Mutual Funds. It also talks about the general differences in fees charged by ETFs vs Mutual Funds. So JD, I think it’s fair to say you’re a big proponent of the ETF package, so would you mind to expand on what you think are the most important differences that investors should focus on when deciding where to place their money? 

https://www.morningstar.com/funds/etfs-vs-mutual-funds-benefits-that-really-matter   

3. Josh: Ok, so regular listeners will know that every so often I will pull an article from my website gulfcoastfa.com for our news of the week, so in the spirit of that I would like to reference an article on the Aptus website. In fact, JD, I think both of the most recent Aptus articles have a lot of value for investors, so I am going to spring a 2-pack on you. The first article is the most recent on Aptus blog site and is titled “Leverage Your Way to Better Risk-Adjusted Returns”. When we discuss this article, I really want to focus on explaining what leverage is and how the retail investor can use it to their advantage. The 2nd article is one that gets updated weekly, and my main reason to bring it up is because I think it’s a solid way for investors to stay informed about the market on a weekly basis, it’s titled “The Market in Pictures”. So JD let’s start with the article about leverage, then will finish with a brief explanation of what investors will learn from the weekly Market in Pictures article:

https://aptuscapitaladvisors.com/leverage-your-way-to-better-risk-adjusted-returns/

https://aptuscapitaladvisors.com/the-market-in-pictures-june-14/

4. Josh: Last article for today JD. Regular listeners will know that I have a particular irritability around market predictions, especially when someone uses fear tactics to sell a product, which is all too often an insurance product. You know what I’m referring to JD, the ol’ “the market is going to crash so let’s lock your money up over here in this “safe money” play. I mean, how many times do we have to hear the phrase, “forecasters were off their mark with recent (insert blank) predictions”. Heck, I even have an entire segment of this show dedicated to showing our listeners that someone even as measured and skeptical like me can still swing and miss badly when trying to predict the stock market. I say all that because I included this next article with a little tongue in check smirk, it’s from Business Insider and it has an overwrought title of “Stocks are in a sweet spot but bears still fear a bubble is near bursting. Here’s what 5 forecasters are saying about a potential crash”. Here’s the point I want to hit on with this article JD, I don’t want to go and pro/con each forecaster’s segment, but instead I want you and I to try to guide investors on what news they should be paying attention to vs what news to ignore, including the majority of forecasters. What say you? 

https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/stock-market-crash-bubble-correction-dot-com-tech-overvalued-ai-2024-6

Josh: JD, great job discussing these headlines, I know I learned a lot and I’m sure our listeners did too. Listeners – if you have questions around the topics in our headlines of the week, or questions related to your investment strategy, financial plan or retirement plan, then why don’t you give us a call at 251-327-2124 to have a conversation or to set up an appointment, or you can reach out to use via our contact page on our website gulfcoastfa.com.

Alright folks, coming up next: Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth. What have been some of my predictions? Have I been right? Was I ever wrong? How wrong? What’s JD had to say in the past or what does he have to say about the future? We talk about all of these things and poke a little fun at my big mouth, and maybe we get to pick on JD a little too. Stay tuned! 

Segment 3 – Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth: 

Welcome back! Your host Josh Null here, along side guest co-host JD Gardner. So, JD, I am opinionated, so are you, I have strong opinions at times, so do you, I would say a radio show host that isn’t probably wouldn’t be very interesting to listen to. And we are both paid in our respective professions to offer professional guidance and opinions to our clients, otherwise what use would we be? Sometimes I feel so strongly about something that I talk about it publicly, sometimes I’ll even make predictions, and while I feel I’m usually proved right because I tend to be skeptical of my own industry, there are times I swing and I miss. So listeners, want to hear where JD or I was right, or maybe, an example of when we missed the mark? Then let’s get at with Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth. 

1. Josh: Alright JD, for this first one, I’ll give you an example of when my big mouth was way wrong and my crystal ball was broken. Waaaay back in July of 2022, on a sister podcast I have called Every Dollar Counts with Josh & Jay, I predicted that the current rate of inflation at that time – I believe it was screaming around 8 or 9% then - I predicted that the current rate of inflation at that time would being going down sooner than expected because typically that’s how inflation math works, it’s a measure of the rate of change, not of the total change. Obviously, I was way off, and I now fall into the other camp where I’m not sure when, or even if, the Fed is ever going to get back to this goldilocks fairy tale target of 2% core inflation. You, on the other hand, appear to have been considerably more skeptical of inflation easing quickly than I was back in 2022, in fact, I believe you doubled down on your prediction that stocks are a MUCH better protector or purchasing power, i.e., a much better protector against what inflation does to the value of our dollars. Is this true, and if so, what was the logic behind your prediction? 

Well listeners, I hoped you enjoyed a peak behind the curtain on how JD and I form our opinions and predictions, and more importantly, that we’re willing to admit when we are wrong. Which isn’t very often, but still. Listeners, if you’ve liked what you’ve heard today, or maybe you just want to have a conversation, we invite you one last time to reach out to us. Call us anytime at 251-327-2124 to make an appointment or shoot us a message our website at gulfcoastfa.com. Remember, you can always put a 15-minute conversation on my calendar, just click the blue link in the upper right corner. 

Folks, that is a wrap for this week on Coasting in Retirement! I want to give a huge thank you to my guest co-host, JD, a thank you to our awesome radio station FM Talk 106.5, a thank you to our awesome show producer, Mr. Chaesare Gray, many thanks to the provider of our show music, local band Sloth Racer, and as always my sincere appreciation for all of your out there that have been listening and joining us on this journey. We would love to be a part of your journey as well. Until we talk again next Sunday, have a wonderful and productive week. This has been Coasting in Retirement with Josh Null! 

GCFA Disclosure:

Gulf Coast Financial Advisors, LLC ("GCFA”) is a registered investment adviser offering advisory services in the State of Alabama and in such other jurisdictions where it is registered, filed the required notices, or is otherwise excluded or exempted from such registration and/or notice filing requirements. Registration does not indicate or imply that GCFA has attained a particular level of skill or ability, nor does it constitute an endorsement of the firm by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) or any state securities regulator.

The Coasting in Retirement radio program serves mainly to disseminate general information including those pertaining to GCFA’s advisory services, together with access to additional investment-related information, publications, materials and links. The publication of this radio show should not be construed by any client and/or prospective client as GCFA’s solicitation to effect, or attempt to effect transactions in securities, nor should it be interpreted as GCFA providing personalized investment advice, or any type of professional advice, for compensation, wherever this program is broadcast. Any subsequent, direct communication by GCFA with a prospective client will be conducted by a representative that is either registered or qualifies for an exemption or exclusion from registration in the state where the prospective client resides.

Certain information, news stories, headlines, data, charts, graphs, figures or statistics presented on this radio program may have been obtained from third-party sources that are believed to be generally reliable but which GCFA may not have independently verified. GCFA does not and cannot guarantee the timeliness, accuracy, or reliability of any such third-party information and undertakes no obligation to update or correct any information that may become obsolete, unreliable, or inaccurate. The radio program also contains the opinions, views, and perspectives expressed by Josh Null and any other GCFA representatives which are solely their own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, or perspectives of GCFA as a firm. Such personal views and opinions should not be construed as endorsements or professional advice from GCFA. GCFA makes no representation or warranty regarding the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of any information on this radio program, and disclaims any liability for any direct or indirect loss or damage incurred from using or relying on such information.

Aptus Disclosure:

Aptus Capital Advisors and Gulf Coast Financial Advisors are separate and distinct organizations, and are not affiliated. Aptus receives payment for investment management services directly from Gulf Coast Financial Advisors and not from clients' accounts. There are no revenue sharing or referral fees paid to, or received from, in regards to Aptus Capital Advisors' role with Gulf Coast Financial Advisors.

For more information about Aptus, or to receive a copy of our disclosure form ADV and Privacy Policy contact us. Information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any securities. Aptus Capital Advisors website and its associated links offer news, commentary and generalized research, not personalized investment advice. This website is for informational purposes only and does not constitute a complete description of our investment services or performance. Nothing on this website should be interpreted to state or imply that past results are an indication of future. All investments involve risk and unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed. Be sure to consult with a tax professional before implementing any investment strategy. Aptus Capital Advisors is a Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and is headquartered in Fairhope, Alabama. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training.

GCFA, Aptus, Providence Benefits and Providence Partners are not affiliated, nor are any of their respective representatives.