How to Form Good Money Habits in the New Normal

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There’s a lot about the pandemic period that you want to forget. For much of it, you’re either isolated, broke, or sick, which can be detrimental to your physical, mental, and financial health. As everyone is coming out and heading towards the new normal, good money habits are something everyone needs to keep. 

With so much uncertainty coming into the future, a better focus on money matters can help shift you into better habits. There are so many financial improvements we can do in our lives now that we’re going back outside. Here’s how you can form good money habits in the new normal and be more ready for the future. 

Start Your Financial Planning 

One good money mindset to have in the new normal is to “step back, then step forward.” In simpler words, you need to plan first before moving forward with any big spending. If you intend on going for a vacation or buying something big in the coming months, it’s time to reevaluate your future plans. 

Think about the bigger picture when it comes to your financial health. Sure, you can start cutting down on your coffee and save pennies on the dollar. Instead, you can take a step back and give your life a good, long think. How do you visualize where you are in a few years? 

Ask yourself a few crucial questions: 

How much savings do you have?
How much should you save every month?
Do you want to work from home or from an office?
What kind of investments are you comfortable having?
What kind of insurance do you have? 

Change your answers to these questions according to your long-term needs. Planning is an ever-changing exercise that needs consistent attention. You need to make sure that your plans are not “dreams.” You want them to be actionable, with a specific timeline to help you achieve them. 

Enjoy, But Don’t Go Crazy With Your Money 

Post-pandemic, people have pent-up energies. Everyone wants to go places, enjoy a vacation, and go out to town. There’s a big desire to go out into the world, do the things they’ve always done, and go wild if they can. It’s not bad to enjoy your hard-earned money but remember to go back slowly. 

Don’t go crazy with your money. Make sure that you have enough money to live through the month. Have a plan in place to pay for entertainment expenses so you can play around guilt-free. Even then, don’t go into debt just because you want to feel alive. 

Look for deals available out there, especially now that businesses are looking to get people walking through their establishments. Living your life means living beyond the moment. Saving some money now takes a good amount of discipline to do. 

Stick To A Budget 

One of the financial areas that everyone had to learn over the pandemic was budgeting. Sticking to a budget was a must because having cash on hand can be useful when emergencies happen. Being prudent with your disposable cash means you can take stock of your needs and potential expenses. 

Once we move on to a life post-pandemic, budgeting needs to stay. Not only will it help you prevent overspending, it will also give you a sense of control with your life. As everything gets better, you can generate long-term savings and help you get out of debt or, at least, avoid getting more. 

Practice frugal, rather than discretionary, spending. Once you’re in a pickle, it’s crucial to know which parts of your lifestyle to cut off. Less spending on travel, eating out, and going to concerts means more savings for you. Reevaluate your cash flow and stick to a set budget for every expense you have. 

Live Within Your Means 

The idea of “living within your means” can be a problematic aphorism but the truth is that you need to stay within how much you can pay for a certain period without going into debt. Many who lost their jobs suddenly had to cut back on credit card spending and learned that they were going beyond their means, which is never good news. 

Living within your means is not restricting yourself from your own money. Rather, you need to understand that spending for something out of budget means you need to pull it off somewhere. Even if you take out the credit card to pay for it, the payments that go towards your card should increase. 

There are many ways to monitor your spending and do your best to live within your means. It’s one thing to create a budget and it’s another to live within your budget. If you want to maximize some areas of your budget, you need to cut in some areas that are far less important for you. 

Build A Six-Month Emergency Fund 

The six-month emergency fund feels like a big number to strive for but you will thank yourself for getting it once you need it. The rule of thumb is to have six months’ worth of your monthly expenses prepared as your emergency fund. This money should also be easily accessible and not in any type of investment where you can’t easily pull it out. 

Six months’ worth of expenses can be the absolute bare minimum time you would need to find a new job. It can be your period of recovery from an accident or illness. If you can afford to, it’s best to create emergency funds for up to a year. It can be challenging to meet this astronomical number, especially for cash-strapped individuals, but it should be worth it. 

Start with a small amount. As you’re still healthy, build towards the number by chipping away at it. If any financial issue comes up, this should be money that you can fall back on. A 6-month fund should give you ample financial security to find your way back, while a 12-month emergency fund can give you better freedom of choice. 

The Bottom Line 

Forming good money habits in the new normal can be one of the biggest financial challenges you face. Apart from having to prepare for the worse, it’s a lot of the boring stuff that most people overlook like budgeting and staying within your means. Then again, these will benefit you and your loved ones over time. 

Follow the money tips above and see why you need to reevaluate your spending habits. As you make personal and financial adjustments, you will slowly achieve the life you want. 

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Useful Tips on How to Increase Your Profits from Crypto Investment

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Cryptocurrencies have made quite an impact on the financial landscape. Not only has it become very lucrative, but it has also allowed people to settle their debts faster. In fact, cryptocurrencies were able to make plenty of overnight millionaires when the price of Bitcoin suddenly skyrocketed. 

While the chances of investors catching lightning in a bottle like that again are slim, you can still profit from it. Here are a few ways you can make the most of your crypto investments and profit from them extensively. 

Watch out for FOMO 

One of the reasons people fail to make the most of their investments is because of FOMO. FOMO, or the Fear of Missing Out, is a compelling way of motivating people to invest. Since no one wants to miss the next crypto gold rush, they will soon jump in because everyone else is doing it. 

Granted, FOMO can be a good motivator at times, as it keeps you on your toes about specific investments. However, if you are looking to throw caution to the wind and trust other investors simply, it will not end well. It is even possible that you might fall for a scam. 

Look out for Bitcoin 

Bitcoin is the poster child of the crypto market and is easily the biggest platform there. But even if you do not plan on investing in Bitcoin, you should still look out for it. All other cryptocurrencies depend on it, as it can either raise or sink the entire market. 

Simply put, if the price of Altcoins is rising, chances are that Bitcoin is falling. Therefore, keeping an eye out for it can be essential to making your next move. 

Do your research 

Possibly one of the most important things to understand about the crypto market is that you cannot trust companies. Since there is close to no regulation throughout the market, scams, and fraud run rampant throughout the market. You might think that you have found the perfect investment opportunity, only to find out that it was a scam. 

So instead of believing everything that anyone says about crypto, try to do your own research. Look for the company’s website and try to see if you can find out more about their owners and their history. Most scams and fraudulent companies will avoid trying to give information that can hold them accountable, like the founder’s name. 

Be Selective About Your Altcoins 

Altcoins are most likely your first investment opportunity in the crypto space. But an important thing to understand about Altcoins is that they are not necessarily long-term investments. These smaller companies can rarely make it past the heavy waves of the industry, as their prices can start plummeting any second. 

But if you keep checking their volume, you can find out if it will last long or not. Most altcoins that have a possible future can show a lot of promise through their trading volume. As long as it is high, it can prove to be an incredible investment in the long run. 

Avoid Buying Crypto That Is Cheap 

Another important thing you should remember about the crypto industry is that it is very volatile. Therefore, there is a high chance you will find different cryptocurrencies that are cheaper compared to others. But just because they’re more affordable than other investments does not necessarily make them better. Furthermore, it does not mean that they may bounce back someday. 

In fact, affordability has very little to do with your choice of crypto. Instead, you should try to make a more educated decision about a cryptocurrency by considering its market cap. Simply put, the higher the market cap for a cryptocurrency, the more lucrative it can be in the future. 

Learn To Better Manage Your Risk 

The cryptomarket is the perfect place to run yourself into the ground trying to take big risks for big profits. However, it is more than possible to play the long run by making smaller but more assured profits. 

Whether you are looking to just make more money or settle your debt, you need to learn to manage your risk. It is better to invest in a coin that has minimal but constant growth rather than one that rises and falls constantly. 

Diversify Your Investments 

You should avoid putting all of your eggs in a single basket, as that is the fastest way to lose your investment. So instead of sinking all of your investment trying to get a single coin of Ethereumm, try something smaller. Buy a few tokens of some smaller altcoins and only buy half or even a quarter of a token of Ether. 

Final Thoughts 

Chances are that you want to make it big through cryptocurrency. But the unfortunate reality is that cryptocurrency will never be a miracle investment again. So even if you would like to settle your debt faster, this is not the way to go about it. 

Instead, you should treat it like every other asset and try to reap profits over a longer period. Because even if throwing caution to the wind could mean you could make it big, it is still risky. 

Lyle Solomon is a licensed attorney in California. He has been affiliated with law firms in California, Nevada, and Arizona since 1991. As the principal attorney of Oak View Law Group, he gives advice and writes articles to help people solve their issues, including debt problems. 

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Is America Becoming the New Leader in Crypto Currency?

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As China blocked all bitcoin mining and has declared a crackdown on its use, the United States is quite possibly becoming the leader for the future of cryptocurrency. With the recent changes in the global economy, markets are experiencing drastic and sudden change. But this news shouldn’t deter investors from seeking financial freedom here, as our nation is swiftly taking the lead in standing up for cryptocurrency. China has been the leader in the mining of bitcoin specifically, but now that they are deciding to stop its operations in the field many other nations are stepping up to take its place as China leaves itself behind in the market. 

As of April of this year, the United States accounts for 17% of all of the world’s bitcoin miners. This is a 151% increase from September of 2020, forecasting that no matter what the markets currently show, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are here to stay for the sake of continued financial freedom. Since these numbers do not include the Chinese mass exodus from the marketplace, the numbers could potentially be even much higher than that. 

Darin Feinstein, founder of Blockcap and Core Scientific, says, “For the last 18 months, we’ve had a serious growth of mining infrastructure in the U.S. We’ve noticed a massive uptick in mining operations looking to relocate to North America, mostly in the U.S.” 

Fred Thiel of Marathon Digital says, “500,000 formerly Chinese miner rigs are looking for homes in the U.S. If they are deployed, it would mean North America would have closer to 40% of global hashrate by the end of 2022.” 

The United States has been in the background preparing for such an event as this Chinese exodus to occur. We have been silently building up our infrastructure and hosting capability in expectation that we would see a future where more mining operations would desire to come and operate within our nation. Since the bitcoin fall in late 2017, investors took the risk and have been investing to prepare for the changes to come. 

Due to the Covid 19 pandemic and the recent changes with China, bitcoin mining engineer Brandon Arvanaghi said, “People were looking for places to park their cash. The appetite for large-scale investments had never been bigger. A lot of that likely found its way into bitcoin mining operations in places outside of China.” 

All of this happening together helped plant the financial seeds for a blossoming future for bitcoin miners, investors and cryptocurrency. We’re still in a transitional phase, where the global market is seeing the effects of China dropping out, but confidence remains high for those who believe in the power and freedom of cryptocurrency. But as said in a previous article I wrote, there is a time to buy and a time to sell. With the market today and with a bit of patience in mind, this could quite possibly be a wonderful time to buy. 

As of today, bitcoin prices are below 30,000. Still remember, at the end of last year, bitcoin was still under 25,000. Earlier this year in April before the decision from China to change, bitcoin hit an all-time high of well over 60,000. With prices this low, you may think that the market is crashing or that the idea is falling apart, but you may also be proven entirely wrong by that assessment. Now may actually be another one of the best times to buy into the market with prices so low and the infrastructure established for the United States to continue further growth. China leaving the market may ultimately be wonderful news for those who appreciate and love the power of free market capitalism. 

Of course, fear mongering in the marketplace currently continues to spread for the moment. Fox News has been spouting the ‘scary’ news of 100 billion wiped off the crypto market recently. This short-term thinking is miniscule compared to its future potential, and Fox is again playing the heartstrings of the moment for fast clicks of immediate concern. Yahoo! Finance had a recent headline reading, “Crypto Traders Loved Big Leveraged Bets Until Inexplicable Crash”, further touching on those fears. Even one of the co-founders of the cryptocurrency Ethereum has been out in the news speaking of being “done” with cryptocurrency due to his own fears of financial “safety”. 

The co-founder, Anthony Di lorio, says, “It’s got a risk profile that I am not too enthused about. I don’t feel necessarily safe in this space. If I was focused on larger problems, I think I’d be safer.” 

Playing it safe never wins in the game of life. You’ve got to take calculated risks and make bold investments in time and money to find success in the modern world. For investors, I would say to assess the market and see how China’s decision will not be the end of cryptocurrency. Just as one nation, even if it was the leading mining operation, chooses to leave the market, that does not stop the rest of the world from continuing to pursue those efforts and establishing a better future for the entire cryptocurrency market. From the looks of things now, it seems as if the United States has already taken the proper preparations for an event just like this to occur. Not only that, but we’re far from the only nation to take action in the face of modern events here. Again, instead of being afraid and leaving the market, maybe you should pay attention to the possibility that the future holds and make an investment today while the market is so low. You never know, it may never be this low again.

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A Time to Buy & A Time to Sell: Fearless Investing in Crypto

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When making investments in global markets, there always comes a time to buy and a time to sell. When it comes to cryptocurrencies, this is no different than making investments into any other market on the world stage. Values go up and values go down, and this is just the game we choose to play as investors. Knowledge is power here, and the more you know, the more you have the potential to grow or decline with the times. Playing it safe by merely only working for each dollar you generate will oftentimes not in itself create true wealth. This can also lead to missed opportunities as the market responds and changes to the daily economic occurrences all around us. You must be willing to take risks and be ready with an open mind towards the world of today, not merely just seeking new opportunities for work, but also consistently seeking information on new opportunities to invest. The key here is becoming fearless in your investment, and to become willing to make intelligently informed decisions as to how you move your money around global markets. 

When looking at cryptocurrency today, many are making the argument that the good days are over and the chance for economic growth here is in the past. As a prospective investor myself, I am not so sure that is the case today even despite the current news of the moment. Looking through the news of now, you may choose to believe that a crash is about to happen. Headlines across the globe have turned on cryptocurrencies as China itself has made the decision to shut down 90% of its Bitcoin. mining. This is a crackdown on the financial freedom of the people within China by the Chinese Communist Party. The CCP is mandating that its banks restrict financial services to anyone trying to make an exchange through crypto in efforts to support its own future of a digital yuan. China was formerly an early adopter of Bitcoin., but as the people empower themselves on the world stage through the currencies, China has switched its viewpoint to see it as a threat to the CCP’s power structure. While the digital yuan is a centralized, surveilled currency, most of the cryptocurrencies remain free and open on the world stage. This financial freedom is a threat to anyone seeking financial control over their people. The key to understanding here is that, despite China’s own backing out for the moment, this still leaves most of the entirety of the rest of the world stage open with the freedom to still make investment in whatever cryptocurrency that they choose. This decision by China may end up resulting in China being left behind in the marketplace, despite the momentary fears it produces for investors. 

Headlines of today continue to read of fear mongering from everything from ‘Dogecoin Falls 70% Since Musk on SNL’ to ‘Bitcoin turns Negative for Year’ experience the ‘Death Cross’. I’ve heard the same rhetoric and phrases being used about the stock market entirely since the ‘crash’ in 2008. But looking at the time since 2008, what else happened? Especially during the times of the Trump presidency, the economy experienced a boom unlike anything ever seen before created by production, confidence and investment. Of course, there will always be fear mongering and there will always be the potential for crashes, but with every crash there also comes again a time to rise. Successful investors with fearless intuition know this. There is no patience for impatience here, and each investor must pay attention to the markets to know when the best times to buy and the best times to sell are. 

When the Democratic media and China begin fear mongering, it is a good time for free market capitalists to step up and pay close attention to what is happening on the world stage. The mere idea of them spouting these fears should send off a signal that opportunity is on the horizon. 

Remember too, that countries and people around the world are accepting cryptocurrencies into their culture. Most recently, El Salvador has accepted Bitcoin as legal tender. Coinbase, the cryptocurrency exchange, has itself just been accepted onto the stock market exchanges as a company itself. The NRCC, or National Republican Congressional Committee recently declared that it will be directly accepting cryptocurrencies through Bitpay exchanges. The Netherlands, Estonia, Denmark, South Korea, Slovenia and Singapore all are countries that are integrating Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies into their everyday culture with rapid growth expected. Across the United States and Canada, Bitcoin ATMs can be found and people across the nations are making investments into the virtual currency landscape. Japan was the first country to accept Bitcoin as legal tender and has become a leader in what a nation can look like when adopting crypto into everyday modern culture successfully. All exchanges are being recognized and respected by governments in these areas. 

Remember, cryptocurrency is all about financial freedom and independence from centralized banks. Not every cryptocurrency will survive and thrive, but every cryptocurrency still has massive potential for growth here depending on the confidence and investments into which for the days to come ahead. Recently up to and as of today, cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Dogecoin have fallen from previous highs earlier this year. As of the writing of this article, Bitcoin is about 34,000 dollars in value. At its highest point this year, Bitcoin was at nearly 64,000 dollars back in April. This may seem like a sharp decline, but it is important to keep in mind that only a few months before that time it was valued around the 20,000 mark. These are individual days in the marketplace, and no decline decides the future potential. Like every other market, prices go up and prices go down. There is a time to sell and a time to buy. Looking at the world stage as a fearless investor, maybe, with all this news of today, it is just the right time to make an investment. 

In the words of Ziad K. Abdelnour, “the harder your money works for you, the less you’ll have to work for money.” If the problem here is modern media fear mongering people into being afraid to invest in cryptocurrencies, the solution is for investors who believe in its potential to continue learning and investing, especially as prices fall and new opportunities arise. Fearless investing and having the willpower to jump in and take a risk is the way entrepreneurs become wealth generators in the modern world. Here’s to self-education and self-empowerment with fearlessness in investment as a free market capitalist in the world economy. Cheers to all. 

Resources: 

  • Top 10 Bitcoin and Crypto Friendly Countries in the World 
  • Bitcoin Price Drops on China Crypto-Mining Crackdown 
  • Coindesk: Bitcoin Prices 
  • GOP House Campaign Accepts Cryptocurrencies 
  • El SalvadorBecomes First Country to Adopt Bitcoin as Legal Tender
  • DogeCoin Price
  • Bitcoin Forms Death Cross Selloff
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Real Wealth Creation: Wealth for Generations to Come

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Everyone wants to craft some “genius” plan to become wealthy, but how many people are actually planning to create long term generational wealth. To be honest, it’s quite easy to gain massive riches and fortune for yourself, but the challenge is creating and sustaining that wealth, not only for you, but for your family and generations to come. The goal should never be just to get rich quick, you want to make sure that you have a chance to make an impact on others and that your family is set for life.

So many people complain about the gap in wealth, but only want to accept solutions where wealth is just handed to them. This is not how real life works. Nobody’s going to give you anything in life for free. It’s up to you to go out and grab it, otherwise it’s going to come with a major price…your freedom. If you really want to make a difference in the gap in wealth, your focus should be on building wealth and passing on your financial knowledge. Building your legacy. Family wealth opens up other opportunities for the empowerment of other people when it comes to education and careers.

Don’t be fooled, building your legacy and working to close the wealth gap isn’t solely about leaving a large inheritance. Not everyone will be able to do that in their lifetime. But, we can all do our part to give the next generation the tools they need to succeed. If you are just reconciling yourself to building up your savings, the thought of saving for the next generation can be overwhelming. So don’t find yourself discouraged because you’re not saving millions of dollars to pass along. Generational wealth is just as much about money and wealth as it is having the right financial skills, and values that are passed onto the next generation. Your family will benefit long term just from giving them access to a deeper understanding of socioeconomic issues and barriers that would otherwise limit them.

Besides, if you don’t educate your children about money management, they are likely to go on a spending spree and take your wealth for granted. This means that the prosperity of the generations will last only one generation, which alone is unsustainable, and the third generation will start from scratch. That is why you can go a long way to ensuring that the value of your money is a priority when you are drawing up your plan to generational prosperity.

Outside of just passing along financial knowledge, there are a ton of ways for you to create generational wealth. And no, they don’t require you to be millionaires.

  • Investing in stocks is widely accepted as a way to build long-term wealth and probably the most obvious
  • You can also increase your generational wealth by investing in real estate or expanding your business. Unlike equities, real estate is an illiquid investment strategy, and can be bought and sold with a much higher return than equities, owing to its high volatility.
  • Creating a family business. When you think of real generational wealth, you often think about wealthy families who continue their generational wealth through their well-known companies, but most of these companies started extremely small and continued to grow over many generations. These companies not only created generational wealth for their families but have impacted whole communities through creating jobs and empowering the economy.

And these are just a few of the ways you can ensure that you pass on the wealth of your generations appropriately.

Of course, not all families will be billionaires, but you can pass on skills and values that your children can use to build a better life and create wealth that could eventually be passed on to your grandchildren. If you leave something behind for your child or grandchildren, it will also bring about the prosperity of the generations. For example, you can invest in stocks and real estate and build your business so that you can leave some of it with your children. Just imagine the difference it would have made for your life if your parents had fully funded your college education and made a down payment on your first house.

Once you have children, take the time to teach them about personal finances and start a vehicle to secure their financial future. Instead of paying off debt and saving for a down payment, you could invest and start a business, or even invest in your own business. Give them the financial headstart you wish your parents would have given you.

Trust and believe, waiting around for someone to save you and your family is a waste of time. If you want real wealth, you have to go out and grab it. Laying the foundation now is the first stepping stone. So, don’t fall for the media hype that makes building wealth seem like some huge secret that only an exclusive group has access to. That’s simply not true. You don’t need a deep introspection or personality test, just to find your motivation. You don’t need the media to define what is right for you and what is not. What you need is the knowledge, the drive, the willpower to reach out and grab the life of wealth and freedom that you desire.

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