Articles this month cover a range of themes that are central to our lives today.

It’s often been written that it’s the psychology of sport or of investing that’s most important in achieving goals. When volatility and uncertainty abound, reminding yourself of your goals helps you to stick to the long-term plan and not be swayed by short term issues. In markets, while returns can be negative in a 12 month period, over any 5 year period they have only been negative twice in the last 40 years – and that was after the GFC – when for two years the running 5 year return was slightly negative (approximately -0.2%).

Keep 2 years of spending available in cash so that it can’t be affected by the markets.

Climate change and the move to Electric Vehicles are considered in 2 articles. The persistence of inflation is apparent and fuel prices are a major contributor. Cyber-security and artificial intelligence are also represented … there’s a range of themes that we wouldn’t have been thinking about even 5 years ago.

Wishing you well and especially thinking of those in bushfire-prone areas.

Tom

At Financial Springs