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Logan Roy’s Estate Planning Problem

*Spoiler Alert: I’ll be discussing the climactic ending of Succession. If you are still working your way through the series, I would suggest saving this article for later. If you’ve not yet watched the show, be forewarned that you’ll hear some of the most colorful and creative expletives in television history. * Now that my […]

January 10, 2024

2023 Market Review: Asset Prices Climbed the Wall of Worry

Market Recap At the beginning of 2023 (and a few months in), the mood in the markets was downright dour. 2022 had not been kind – with both equities and bonds suffering some of their worst returns in over a decade – and the conventional view of the future was equally bleak. The laundry list […]

January 8, 2024

How A Multi-Family Office is Creating A Diverse Talent Pipeline

We are pleased to have a spotlight in Financial Planning Magazine about our Ballentine Partners Scholarship to Create A Diverse Financial Planning Profession with The CFP® Board. Click here to read the full article.

December 18, 2023

Giving Away the IRA

Since their introduction in 1974 under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs) have been widely used by investors as a tax-efficient way to prepare for retirement. Savers take a deduction on contributions during working years, investments grow tax-deferred, then income tax is assessed as the funds are distributed in […]

December 14, 2023

Ballentine Partners has been recognized as one of Pensions and Investments Best Places to Work in Money Management in 2023

We are pleased to announce that we were selected as one of Pensions & Investments Best Places to Work in Money Management in 2023 based on our efforts to create a culture that supports employees and fosters their best work. Read more about our efforts here. Pensions & Investments partnered with Best Companies Group, a research […]

December 13, 2023

Charlie Munger: Overconfidence is Everywhere

For those that follow the financial news, you no doubt heard about last week’s passing of Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett’s friend and investment partner at Berkshire Hathaway for almost sixty years. Financial websites, blogs, podcasts, LinkedIn, and other social media are jam-packed with remembrances, all sharing quotes and anecdotes from Charlie’s life, and all are […]

December 5, 2023

A Tale of Two Headlines

Same data. Two very different headlines. One to scare you. One to calm you. Guess which one gets used? In the last few days, four different colleagues at my firm sent me links to some financial blogs and posts that referenced the chart below from FRED – Federal Reserve Economic Data, the official website of […]

November 16, 2023

Ballentine Partners Sponsors and Participates in the 2023 CFP Board Center for Financial Planning’s Fall Events

We are proud to continue our relationship with the CFP Board and strive to be a leader in diversifying our industry and wealth management advising space. We have committed to funding a $100,000 scholarship – funded equally over 4 years beginning in 2021 – in partnership with the CFP Board’s Center for Financial Planning, to […]

November 9, 2023

Taxable Investors: You are not dating your portfolio managers. You’re marrying them. Therefore, you need excellence AND persistence.

For taxable investors, it is not enough to get excellent long-term after-tax performance from an investment fund. Persistence – the ability to remain good to excellent through time — matters just as much. Why? The journey matters. If the road is too rocky, investors will lose faith and feel compelled to fire a fund manager. That issue […]

November 7, 2023

I Married a Robot: How Artificial Intelligence Will Change Our Lives

EDITOR’S NOTE: In only the last few months, it seems that Artificial Intelligence has moved from a futuristic concept rarely mentioned in mainstream media to a technology that has the potential to radically change the nature of work, leisure, and how we interact with others. Since the introduction of the ChatGPT large language Model (LLM) […]

October 26, 2023

Consumer Cash: While The Amount is Down, It’s Still A Mountain

It is tempting to paint a picture today of consumers struggling or on the edge. And let me be clear, many are. The rising cost of rent, food, gasoline, airplane tickets…heck, essentially everything… has been well-publicized in the financial press and certainly felt in the pocketbook. This could be worrying on its face, given that […]

October 17, 2023

Q3 2023 Market Review: When Good News Was Bad News

Market Recap There is an old saw in the investment business that “the market is not the economy.” This past quarter proved once again it might just be true. While the U.S. economy continued showing strength — good news, right? — This was bad news for stocks and bonds, both. The U.S.’s economic resilience surprised many. In […]

October 10, 2023