Before You Say I Do

The wedding season is nearly upon us, and if you're planning one, you're probably knee deep in details.

Hi, I'm Rob West. Yes, there are hundreds of items to sort out before the big day, but experience shows that one of the most important things is overlooked. That is, how will you and your spouse handle money? I'll talk about it today with Howard Dayton, and then it's on to your calls at 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Well, I can't think of a better person to talk about how couples should handle money than our guest, Howard Dayton. He literally wrote the book on it.

It's called Money and Marriage God's Way. And Howard, such a delight to have you with us today. Rob, it's always great to be with you.

Well, we love it, Howard. And the very first thing you advise couples planning a wedding is to give complete disclosure with their finances. Let's start here.

This is a critical idea, isn't it? It sure is. I mean, you should be fully transparent with your finances and make this commitment to each other. No secrets about money, period.

Yes, that's right. You know, so swap your financial statements to disclose all your assets and debts, trade credit reports and credit scores, and talk over any financial struggles you've experienced. This is big, Rob, because when you're honest, even if there's bad news, it builds trust.

Your fiancé will appreciate your integrity. Yeah, no doubt about that. And of course, Howard, it goes without saying, this has to continue throughout your marriage. Financial infidelity is a bigger problem than we probably realize, right? Absolutely. I mean, how many times have you had a caller where, you know, they've confessed, you know, I haven't been handling money in a way that my spouse knows about, and you really need to focus on no secrets about money when you're married.

Yeah, that's exactly right. All right. Well, when we've gotten that one out of the way, the next item is talking through your financial goals, values and expectations.

So help us out with that one. Well, Rob, you really want to get to know each other, learn each other's financial personalities and attitudes, then answer questions such as, what do we want to accomplish in our financial lives? What things mean the most to you?

It's just really important to have this conversation. Howard, in addition to goals, the word values is there for a very specific reason. That is, if we set goals without first starting with our values as believers, we may not get to the right goals. Isn't that true?

That's exactly right. Values are really the foundation. Yeah.

All right. Now you've compiled a list of questions you should ask each other as an engaged couple. So let's start working our way through these, Howard. Well, I got to give you a heads up, Rob.

It's a long list, but here are some of the critical ones that you should ask yourselves. Who's going to be the breadwinner? If both are breadwinners, what happens when we have children?

Does the wife stay at home to raise them? How much of your income do you want to give? Who do you prefer to give to? Your church, ministries, the poor and needy? You need to talk these things over, and then how much of our income do we want to save? Then I love this question. What's your attitude towards debt, and is paying off debt a really high priority for you? Yes. Then who will handle the bookkeeping and paying the bills, and how often should we meet to review our finances?

Wow. What an important list of questions there, Howard. These are things that we might think, well, we can just wait and deal with that when we get married, but why is it so important to start talking through giving and the breadwinner and the bookkeeping before marriage?

Well, you don't want to have surprises. That's the bottom line. I think one of the healthiest things that I've done with Lynn, we made a list of issues that we wanted to talk to, and front and center were financial issues, to be able to share our heart with one another to find out exactly what motivates us and drives us.

Yeah. And so much of this, Howard, can be shaped by how we were raised with regard to money, some of our earliest memories, how our parents handled it. All that plays into your money personality today, doesn't it?

It sure does. And do you have a biblical perspective of the money that you've been entrusted with? I mean, that's huge, because I can say in my own life, Rob, what I do today has been largely shaped not by my parents so much as what Scott's words tell us.

That's so critical. Well, we're just getting started here. When we come back, we'll talk about a money date.

What is that and what role can that play? What about some other questions like how are we going to handle two becoming one in our finances? And what about our lifestyle?

How do we settle on that? We're talking with Howard Dayton today, founder of Compass Finances God's Way and the author of Money and Marriage God's Way. Your questions around the corner as well at 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live. We'll be right back. Great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West. Our guest today, Howard Dayton, one of my great friends and mentors, former host of this program.

He's the founder of Compass Finances God's Way and the author, among many other books, of Money and Marriage God's Way. And that's our topic today. It's wedding season. And so we're talking about the preparation you need to do as an engaged couple to prepare for money and marriage. And Howard, this is a critical one.

We all know the stats. 70% of couples will have conflict about money. And I think what you're instructing us in today can really set us up for success so that we're not a part of that statistic when we're married. Absolutely. And the sooner that you begin to communicate with transparency, with honesty with each other, the better.

Remember my mantra? No secrets about money when you're talking about your wife or your fiancé. Exactly right. And so critical. Howard, you mentioned a couple of questions before the break that engaged couples should ask one another. One of those is what percentage of our income do you want to give and where do you want to give? Why is this whole topic of giving so important to be addressed before marriage? Well, it's on God's heart, Rob.

That's the bottom line. He encourages us to be givers. He knows that it is critical for our spiritual health to be generous people. And for the husband and wife, in many cases, in most cases, probably they're going to come from different backgrounds, maybe with a family that's been generous, maybe with a family who has not been generous. So it's really important to discuss this. And I would say this is a good time for the folks to, you know, dive into the Bible, to get a book that would be helpful for both of them to learn together. What God says about handling money and especially about the issue of generosity. Yeah, that's such a critical one. The other that you mentioned, Howard, among several, is what is your attitude toward debt?

How will we use it? And is paying it off a high priority? You know, this area of debt is one of the biggest problem areas in terms of not only the bondage that comes with it, but conflict in marriage.

So how do you get started on the right foot with regard to debt? Well, you know, Rob, if a couple has a lot of debt, there's a lot of stress that comes with that. It's bondage, especially if they're having great difficulty in servicing that debt and making progress and getting out of debt. So the earlier the couple can agree to do everything they can to eradicate their debt and stay out of it, the better. It just relieves so much stress in a family. I mean, I haven't had debt since the late 70s, thanks to God's word, and just all the struggles and arguments that we never had because we just made that decision as a couple. We would live a more modest lifestyle than we would have if we had a lot of debt, but it was worth it. Yeah, I love it. And I know it's paid huge dividends in your life.

I've certainly seen that to be the case as well. Now, we talked about reviewing our finances together as a couple. That's something most couples just don't do or think about.

You've been recommending this for years. Tell us your thinking there. Well, I think it's super important for us to have a regular money date. That's when you get together and go over the week's income, spending, how well you've kept up with the budget that you've established.

It is just so important for the husband and wife, even before they're married, to stay on track. It helps them be accountable to one another when they have this money date. And it doesn't have to be a, oh, boy, here's the money date.

This isn't going to be fun. I mean, you should seek to make it fun and rejoice when you make progress. That's one of the really key elements of a money date. You set a goal.

We're going to pay off this debt. And then when you reach that goal, celebrate it. I mean, do something crazy. Go out for a milkshake together. I mean, whatever it might be to celebrate progress that you're making.

Yeah, that's really helpful. All right, Howard, there's a few other key questions that you recommend future couples ask one another. Share a few of those with us. Well, I think the most important one, Rob, is that how can we become one in our finances? When you marry, the Lord wants the two of you to become one in every area. So I recommend that you combine your finances early, work together to save and pay off any debt as quickly as possible. And then secondly, address what are your expectations concerning our lifestyle? What do you want for a home, furniture, cars, clothes?

I mean, you name it so that you can get on the same page as early as possible. And then third, what do you think we ought to spend for the wedding? Let me tell you a quick story. I made the decision that with my daughter, I was going to offer or set boundaries of $8,000 for your wedding. And with the provision that anything she came in under that would be used for the down payment on their first home. And so she came in at $3,500. And I was so proud of them. I mean, they had friends from her college class on photography take the pictures of the wedding. It was just a wonderful experience for them to actually use a budget because they were motivated. We need more money for the down payment on our first house. And that really got them on the same page, helped get them on the same page.

I love that. All right, there's a few others. Howard, you talk about putting an estimated spending plan together.

Why is that so important? Yeah, spending plan, a budget. You just learn so much about each other when you craft that spending plan because it really shows one another what your your mate's heart is. Secondly, you both need to learn God's way of handling money. If you don't already, it's one of the most important steps an engaged couple can take is to learn what the Lord says about handling money. It radically changed our marriage when we learn that. You just can't overemphasize how important it is to have the God of the universe caring enough about you that he's given you guidelines and principles on the handling of the resources that you're going to be entrusted with for the rest of your lives.

Yeah, that's exactly right. And Howard, if you find that you're misaligned on one of these, lifestyle, giving, how you're going to handle money, where do you go next? Well, it's a good idea if you have access to a counselor who can help you walk through that or a certified kingdom advisor. I mean, I would be looking for somebody who has expertise and a biblical perspective of how to handle resources. It's just really helpful often to have a third party, Rob, who can help you navigate an issue where it's not so personal.

You've got somebody like a certified kingdom advisor who's really an expert in this area and can be a huge help to a young couple. Howard, we've got just a few seconds left. I know you've taught us to make prayer really a critical part of your money relationship as a couple. Talk about that as our last point here. Yes, whenever you have a money date, Rob, you need to open in prayer and end in prayer.

And specifically, when you end in prayer, if there are some issues that really are thorny issues or exciting issues, make that a part of your prayer. Wise advice, Howard. Thanks for stopping by, my friend. My pleasure. Love it, Rob.

All right, grateful for you. That's Howard Dayton, folks. You can read a lot more in his book, Money and Marriage, God's Way. All right, your calls are next, 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. I'm Rob West, and this is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Much more just around the corner.

Stick around. Grateful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. We've got some phone lines open today.

We'd love to hear from you. 800-525-7000 is the number to call. Again, 800-525-7000. All right, let's head to the phones.

We'll dive into James in Indianapolis. Go right ahead, sir. Hey, Rob.

Thanks for taking the call. All right, so I just recently found my way back to Christ within the past couple of months. I'm 23. I was doordashing and Ubering to make money, but I totaled my car this past week, so I'm kind of lost.

I'm just kind of looking to figure out how to attack life, whether it be from home or what. I've got a degree in cybersecurity, so I figured out. Yeah, boy, I'm so sorry to hear that, James. Do you have a mode of transportation now, or did you have insurance? I had insurance. It was a lease, though, so I don't get anything for it yet. Okay, all right.

But it is totaled? Correct. Okay, all right. And are you currently employed under your degree in the work that you have in cybersecurity, or are you still kind of out there looking on the job market? No, it's been difficult to find a job.

I'm going back to school on May 1 just to get a four-year, but most companies require a four-year or they require experience, but to get experience, you have to get hired, so it's kind of this counterintuitive system, I guess. Yeah. And what is your means of supporting yourself in the meantime? I'm just blessed to have my parents, I guess, Rob.

Yeah. All right, well, obviously that is a blessing, but we need to make the most of it, right? And so this is an opportunity for you to leverage what is still a pretty strong job market and get out there and do whatever you have to do to get some income coming in while you figure out where you're going to go from here. Are you going to have to borrow to go back to school? Yeah, I borrowed from my parents, so I'll pay them back.

I applied for a country club down the road that I could bike to just to kind of network maybe with people who are in IT. Okay. Yeah, there you go.

I like that idea. Are you leveraging the online job listings? Not as much as I should be. Yeah.

Okay. Well, I mean, I think that's really the big idea here is that looking for your next job is your full time job. And so you need to not only leverage every network you have, and I like the idea of bringing in some income and perhaps, you know, having access to a clientele that might know of something. At the same time, you know, majority of jobs are being filled online right now. And so you could be out there applying for all kinds of things.

And given that you have experience in the cybersecurity area, potentially you could even find somewhere you could work remotely. Are you sensing that that's long term where you'd like to be if you had the right job? Or are you thinking that perhaps that may not be the thing that lines up with your passions and skill set? No, yeah, I want to be a I want to be a penetration tester ethical hacker hacker. So I've been kind of breaking technology since I was four or five.

So kind of definitely right up my alley. It's just I find it difficult because I feel like I get automatically filtered out by the HR hiring AI or whatever, you know, they see no four year degrees and go on to the next. Yeah, I guess that would be the next step is to determine how important that is. I mean, there are other certifications that might be more directly in line with the work that you're doing that would be even more desirable on the part of an employer than just a general four year degree.

I don't know. But that would be worth looking into because perhaps you could go, you know, take some classes specifically around a certification that might shorten the timeline less cost and give you, you know, on the job skills that you could deploy immediately that would be seen as valuable for a company. So perhaps you need to get out there on monster or indeed, and just start scouring each of these jobs that are available in this space, just to see what the prerequisites are. Do you feel like you have a sense of that whether there's a particular certification or training program that might be more valuable than a four year degree or just based on the work you've done to this point? Do you feel like the four degree four year degrees is critical? Yeah, there are definitely certifications. I already have a few, but the four year degree is kind of what happens is HR requires it. So I feel like it's just kind of an older system for it. Whereas the certificates definitely matter more than the degree.

But the hiring process for the company, the how it works, or whatever the legalities are, they still require it. Yeah. How much do you owe on student loans? Nothing. Okay, and how much will you need to borrow to finish out your degree? Only 4400 so it'd be through WGU, which I'm going to try and just get my bachelor's in six months. So I can kind of work at my own pace. Okay. Well, it sounds like you've got a plan here. I mean, at least you know where you're headed, what you want to do. Obviously, it's a job, you know, it's a profession that is going to be around and increasing in viability and importance in the the job markets of the future and just given where are, you know, the the role of technology in our society.

So that's good. I mean, it's there's a bright future there. It sounds like you have a plan to get this on a reasonable.

Cost basis, you're not going to have to take on 30 40 $50,000 worth of debt. I think the key for you right now is to, you know, take advantage of this job, you've got start networking, get some money coming in, start saving, use this time while mom and dad are being very gracious to you to, you know, build up a nest egg that when you're ready to go out on your own, you've got some money for maybe a first last insecurity and to go ahead and buy that car that you need to get around that type of thing. But let's continue just to scour the web and see if there aren't other opportunities in your field that you could get in the meantime, especially if they know you're pursuing a degree, they might look at it as an opportunity to get in early with you.

So make this a matter of prayer. You keep on the track you're going and I'm confident you'll get there when you get that job and you're you're finally on board. Give us a call back and let us know. But I think, James, this is the time for you to just kind of keep your head down and, you know, make some things happen.

Take every opportunity to let folks know what your skill set is and let's see what the Lord does. We appreciate you being on the program. Folks, we're going to take a quick break.

When we come back, more of your questions. Mike, Wayne, we're coming your way. A few lines open, 800-525-7000. We'll be right back.

Thankful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West. Got some lines open, 800-525-7000. Coming up in the next segment, Jerry Boyer stops by. It's Friday.

He joins us each Friday for his market analysis and an update on the work he's been doing as of late with corporate engagement. Back to the phones, we go to Tampa. Hey, Mike, thanks for calling. Go ahead, sir. Thank you for taking my call. So, yeah, I wanted to give a testimony. I heard you was asking for testimony. So I started listening to, you know, Faith and Finance, Money Matters and all those other ones with Larry Burkett and Howard Dayton years ago.

Yeah. And through that time, I've been faithful, try to be faithful in my finances, getting out of debt. And so now I'm completely out of debt. My home is paid off. My car is paid off.

No credit card debt, pay it off every month. I got a pretty decent emergency fund. So in, you know, for any case of emergencies or whatnot, you know, I got a pretty decent debt. I got a pretty decent emergency fund.

So in, you know, for any case of emergencies or whatever. But I just wanted to give you a testimony for that. And I read, I've been reading Howard Dayton book, Your Money Counts and actually give it out to other people as well. Excellent. Well, thanks for sharing that. That's great. Yeah. Yeah. But but I do have a question. So given that, that I do have assets, properties and stuff like that, I was wondering, how should I protect that?

Should I consider put it, you know, put it in a trust or maybe get an umbrella policy? Yeah. You know, it's a great question.

First of all, thanks for sharing your story. You know, as we apply these principles, we put ourselves in a position to experience God's best. It doesn't mean we'll be without challenges. We live in a fallen world.

We're certainly going to have them. But when we faithfully handle over a long period of time, God's money, following his wisdom, limiting our lifestyle, living simply, avoiding the use of debt, living within our means, giving generously, saving for the future, having margin, you know, that results in the fruit that Mike is describing here today. The testimony for that goes to the Lord, because obviously those principles come right out of scripture. Mike, in terms of asset protection, yeah, I think the first thing you want to look at is an umbrella policy, you know, that is going to step in with any kind of lawsuit beyond existing coverage. So if you were to have a car accident and, you know, something catastrophic happened and you exceeded the limits on your coverage, your automobile coverage, that's where that umbrella policy would kick in. And for a fairly reasonable amount of money, you could get a two or even a five million dollar policy that would, you know, immediately kick in and cover something beyond that. The same would apply with a homeowner's policy. If you had somebody that was injured on your property and it exceeded the limits of that homeowner's policy, that umbrella policy would kick in.

So I think that makes a lot of sense. You can have whoever you get your insurance from, property and casualty, quote that for you and you'll probably be surprised at how reasonable it is. Of course, disability insurance in the event you have an accident or a medical condition in terms of a trust. I mean, you could certainly talk to an estate attorney. I am not one just about extra asset protection. My general knowledge would tell you that that would have to be an irrevocable trust. And you probably don't want to do that because you no longer have control over those assets and a living or revocable trust won't protect your assets in the same way because, well, it can be revoked or closed and a court could order that you do that. And so, you know, that's where I think that umbrella policy for most folks is really the next step to protect assets once you've accumulated some significant wealth. So I would check with your insurance agent on that.

But if you wanted to go a step further, I would contact an estate attorney, someone who could really guide you on asset protection beyond an insurance policy. Does that make sense? It does.

It does. Thank you very much. Also, you had a caller on earlier who was in cybersecurity and looking at cybersecurity.

I have a friend of mine. He works for a company, works from home from a company called Midpoint Group that's out of McLean, Virginia. He does have a degree in cybersecurity, so I'm not sure if that caller had a degree in cybersecurity. But again, he works from home and he works for a company called Midpoint Group. Okay, that's great.

Well, thanks. I hope he's still listening and perhaps he could at least explore that. And if not, maybe they could refer him to a few others. That's obviously a field that's in high demand. And perhaps that could be the solution he's looking for, that the Lord provides in incredible ways.

And perhaps, Mike, you are the conduit for his next job. So we appreciate you mentioning that very much. Listen, all the best to you, my friend. Thanks for your kind remarks. We appreciate you being on the program today. To Fort Myers, Wayne, you're going to be next on the program. Go ahead, sir. Thanks. I had a simple question.

Wayne and Fort Myers. We've got a 26-year-old disabled son. He gets a disability and he works part-time, as many hours as he can. But we've saved about, we've pretty much saved all of his money. So I'm in my 70s. My wife is almost 70. And we were just wondering what would be the best way to invest his money so that he can have it available for him long term.

Yeah, yeah, that's really important. Have you looked at a special needs trust? Has anybody recommended that to you?

No, never even heard of it. Okay. Yeah, so an estate attorney could set that up for you. Essentially, a special needs trust allows you to receive income. You place assets in the trust and then he would be able to receive income throughout the rest of his life. But the key for the special needs trust is it doesn't reduce his eligibility with those assets inside it for public assistance disability benefits provided by Social Security, SSI, or even Medicaid. So those assets would be able to be there and you would be able to give direction as to even beyond your life how they're to be distributed to him.

But the fact that they don't reduce his eligibility for that public assistance disability benefits, I think is really key. It costs you a little bit of money to set it up probably somewhere between, you know, one and $2,000. But at least you'd know that, you know, those assets were in there and would be protected and there could be very specific instructions as to how it's distributed. Does that make sense? Oh, it sounds great.

I just had never heard of that. But that's kind of what we were looking for. We figured there must be something out there.

We're just into that. Yeah, very good. So what I would do is contact an estate attorney to ask about a special needs trust. You could call your church and see if there's someone there that they might recommend. Otherwise, just head over to our website, faithfi.com.

That's faithfi.com. Click find a CKA. And when you call any certified kingdom advisor there in the Fort Myers area, just ask for a referral to a godly estate attorney. They'll all have one that they refer to and you could schedule a visit and perhaps get that put in place. If you already have an attorney who maybe did your will or a living will or a health care surrogate, you could go back to that individual as well.

It also may be a good time just to update any of those documents or put them in place if you don't have them. So hopefully that's helpful to you, Wayne. We appreciate you being on the program, sir.

God bless you. Well, we've covered a lot of ground just around the corner. Jerry Boyer stops by. We'll get Jerry's take on what's going on in the economy.

Interesting times here. Market about flat today. We'll get Jerry's take on just kind of this week as we continue to get more economic data, more corporate earnings.

The prospect of the recession is still looming. We'll find out what Jerry's watching, what key indicators he's tracking right now. Plus, he'll also give us an update on the work he's been doing as of late in corporate engagement. Hey, before we head into this break, let me mention Faith and Finance Live is listener-supported, which means we rely on your generous support to do our work here to equip stewards to manage God's money faithfully. If you'd like to be a supporter of the ministry, we'd certainly appreciate it. You can head to our website, faithfi.com. That's faithfi.com. Just click the Give button. You can give online, through the mail, or over the phone. Again, faithfi.com. Just click Give.

Thanks in advance. All right, folks. Much more around the corner. Jerry Boyer, plus Rhonda and Jim coming your way next. We'll be right back.

Great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West, your host. All right, let's head back to the phones.

Kansas City, Kansas. Hi, Rhonda. Thank you for your patience. Go ahead.

Hi, Rob. Thanks for taking my call. I had heard one of your previous callers talking about TOD on their house, and that prompted me to call because I'm currently in the process of setting things up for, you know, at the time when I would pass away. And I have a house that has quite a bit of equity, which is pretty much all that I have that I could leave my kids. And I have three adult children. So my question is, is it possible to do a TOD of my house to all three?

Or would that make things really complicated for them? Or would it be better to leave it to the oldest and, you know, put in the will that it gets divided up? Yeah, well, it's never a bad idea to talk to an attorney about this. Do you have a will already in place? No, that's what I'm doing. My mother recently passed away. And so, you know, I realized, oh, I really need to take care of some things, you know, you never know.

Yeah, yeah. So I think that's your next step. And you can talk through all of this with that attorney as you put in place a will, perhaps a TOD, as well as maybe a healthcare surrogate and a living will and a durable power of attorney, just so all the pieces are in place for you to effectively transfer what God has entrusted to you, but also make some of those end of life decisions for you and your family. What they will probably tell you to do is, yeah, a TOD would most likely want to be done in terms of dividing it with the TOD among those children so that when it passes, it passes to them as an inheritance. They each receive their part of the property as an inheritance.

They get the stepped up basis. So the new cost basis for the property is as of the date of death and as opposed to you quickly, you know, deeding this over to them now before your death, which would then allow that cost basis to transfer. So when they sold it, they'd have to go back to your original cost basis and pay taxes on it. But if they receive it as a part of an inheritance, they won't.

The reason I would probably prefer and again talk to the attorney about this, you go ahead and name them on the transfer on death is that if you leave it all to your son, then he's going to have to turn around and gift it to his siblings. And I think you'd be better served to go ahead and, you know, do that as a part of the TOD now. Does that make sense?

Yeah, yeah, that's what I was wondering. So do you guys have like on your website, do you have like kingdom advisors who are specifically attorneys for things like this? Yeah, so we do have certified kingdom advisors that are estate attorneys, but there's certainly not as many of them.

There's 1300 in the financial planning and investment space, and there's a fewer number that are estate attorneys. So I would start by doing a search and you can limit that search at our website. faithfi.com when you click find a CKA by attorneys.

If you don't find one in your area, then just contact any certified kingdom advisor and ask for a referral to a godly estate attorney. Okay, sounds good. Thank you so much. Very good, Rhonda. Thank you for your call today. We appreciate it. 800-525-7002. Let's see, actually, Jerry Boyer is with us.

So let's go ahead and head there next. Jerry's president of Boyer Research. He joins us each Friday. Jerry, good afternoon, my friend. Hey, buddy, how you doing? I'm doing great. Hey, tell us what you're watching this week as we wrap up the week.

What are the kind of numbers and data that you're focused on? Well, I'm watching markets go down. That's what I'm watching.

I assume you're watching the same thing. I mean, some of them are up today, but in general markets are down. And that includes both stock markets and bond markets. And as you know, when both stock and bond markets go down the same time, that's usually an indicator of Fed tightening.

So why is that? Well, if I sell stocks and buy bonds, that means I'm scared. So stocks go down and bonds go up. If I sell bonds and buy stocks, that means I'm confident. So bonds go down and stocks go up. But if they're both going down, that means the money isn't swooshing back and forth, I guess sloshing back and forth between the two asset classes.

Money is being pulled out of the system altogether. And that's the central bank because that's the thing that creates the money supply or also shrinks the money supply. So when stocks and bonds go down at the same time, that's usually a sign that the Fed is following the tightening of its, you know, it's got a tightening and a loosening of part of its dual conflicting dual mandates. And this week, the dynamics are that it's tightening.

So why? Because the head of the New York Fed, who is a very influential Fed member, said the inflation is still too high, which is right. And he also said the economy is really strong, which is wrong. But if he thinks inflation is too high and he thinks the economy is too strong, that's a signal that the Fed is going to keep pulling money out of the system. And markets don't wait until the Fed pulls out. Markets try to get out before the Fed pulls out.

And that's what we saw happen this week. So that's hawkishness. I don't know why easy money is a dove and hard money is a hawk. I don't know who made that up because like the bull and bear thing, I don't know why markets going up.

But for whatever reason, that's called hawkishness. So it was a hawkish week, which means stocks went down and gold went down. The dollar gets stronger and you see anti growth trades rather than pro growth trades and you see anti inflationary trades.

Why? Because if the Fed is going to fight inflation harder, well, then maybe we'll get less of it. And that's we know they pretty much everything falls in line. That's the mandate this week was the inflation fighting mandate. Last week it was the golden fight inflation.

So from week to week, they're back and forth between their two conflicting dual mandates. Jerry, in terms of the looking out the front of the car, out of the windshield, obviously the market is a helpful indicator there because it's the consensus among those who have capital to invest as to where the economy is headed. What else are you watching as a key indicator?

Yeah. So like you said, the front of the windshield markets are forward looking, right? But the stuff you get from the government or even the stuff you get from businesses like right now, we're getting the earnings reports.

Well, the earnings reports are last quarter. That's all rear view mirror. And one of the things that's odd is so much of the forecasting and so much of the reporting is about the rear view mirror. But, you know, I wouldn't recommend driving by looking in the rear view mirror. I mean, sometimes you look in the rear view mirror, but if you're mostly looking in the rear view mirror, you're probably not a very safe driver. You know, when you do a parallel parking event, it counts. Otherwise, move forward, look to the windshield. But you can look at a few rear view mirror statistics. One of them I like because it's maybe a little closer. Maybe it's a side mirror, if we're continuing the analogy, are these real time surveys of purchasing managers. So these are people who they're very much in touch with the details of what's going on in the supply chain. And those things are, you know, they're like a week or two old rather than something like a GDP report might go back five or six months. So that's really rear view mirror.

I like those pretty well. And those are pointing towards recession as well. Definitely manufacturing recession. And they're showing the slowing in the service sector. I think markets looking forward last year, I think they registered a high probability of a recession. I think this year they're registering that will probably be a shallow recession because markets are mostly up this year. This week they're saying, yeah, shallow, but not too shallow. So they're always kind of honing in. They're always like zooming in as more information comes in about what they think is going to happen. So at this point, I think markets are saying, yeah, we're going to get a recession and it's not going to beat inflation, but it'll decrease it a little bit. The Fed will muddle through and it'll probably be a shallow recession.

And I don't think I'm smarter than the billions of people who all together make the decisions that make up the market. So I'm going to go with what they say. All right.

Sounds good. We'll leave it there, Jerry, for today. Thanks for stopping by, my friend. My pleasure. God bless. All right, Jerry Boyer, president of Boyer Research. He joins us each Friday. All right, quickly back to the phones. We'll try to get to two more calls before we round it out today.

Miami. Hi, Joyce. Go ahead. Hi.

Thank you for your service to the body of Christ and all around us. Could you tell me a little bit something about the high bonds? I spoke to you before, but, you know, tell me about it. I want to get like a thousand dollars for one year. Sure.

Yeah. You can put in up to ten thousand per person per calendar year. The only way you get in more is through a tax refund.

You could get an additional five thousand. You have to buy them electronically, Joyce. So you'd go to Treasury Direct dot gov. That's dot gov.

If you're not comfortable on the Internet, you could get a friend or a family member to help you. You'll set up an account and then you'll transfer the money in however much you want to purchase up to ten thousand for the year. And when you do that, then you'll purchase the electronic bonds. Now, these are 30 year bonds, 20 years with a 10 year extension. But you can pull the money out after 12 months.

You just have to leave it there for a year. It's a two part rate. One part is at zero right now, but the other part is pegged to the consumer price index, which is why it's paying an attractive six point eight two percent right now. Now, you've got to do that this month to get six months at six point eight two, because as of May, the rate's going to change. And I think it's going down.

It's backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government. So as long as it's money where you have a more than a one year time horizon, but probably less than three to five years, I would say that's a good option for you. Again, treasury direct dot gov. Quickly to Boca Raton. Cedric, I have just about a minute.

How can I help? OK. All right. So we own our property, we own our cars, our kids, our college is being paid for through Florida prepaid. Our money is good in terms of that. What is kind of unsettling is this new BRICS currency and how they're trying to devalue the dollar.

As a Christian, should we be doing in terms of preparing for something like this? And yeah, it's kind of a you know, we've spent some time on this in the past. We're going to do a lot more on it because it's concerning a lot of folks like you, Cedric.

It's a great question. Bottom line is we're still very early on having a central bank digital currency. They've done research. They want to move in this direction. It's going to take Congress and the president to get it done. There's going to be a lot of debate about it. I'm not a big fan and a lot of congressional leaders aren't either because of the privacy invasion. It's going to give government reach and insight into our finances in a way that we don't want, in my opinion.

But it's a long way off. So I would say right now, stay the course, dump debt, live within your means and invest for the long term. Thanks for your call. Faith in Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and FaithFi. Thanks for being with us. Also, thank you to my team, Clara, Dan, Amy and Jim. We'll see you on Monday. God bless you. Bye bye.