Month: December 2022

Once upon a time, I found out my wife had braces when she was really young. Since she has such a beautiful smile, that made a ton of sense. However, this whole situation made me wonder how much braces might cost if all four of our kids wound up needing orthodontic care.

When we had this conversation, I initially joked that we would need to set up “braces savings accounts” for them instead of 529 college savings plans. That seemed really funny at the time, but this joke eventually turned into a financial reality.

When you actually do the math, traditional braces or Invisalign can easily cost $24,000 or more for four kids!

That’s not quite as much as a college education, but it’s still an expense that needs to be planned far in advance. 

Braces vs. Invisalign

Not surprisingly, there are a lot more options today for orthodontic care

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HEICO (HEY)

HEICO shares gained more than 1% in after hours trading on Monday after the aerospace company reported quarterly earnings which beat consensus estimates by a penny.

The company announced a fourth quarter profit of 70 cents per share on revenue of $609.64 million, which came ahead of Wall Street expectations for $602.2 million

HEICO also boosted its semi-annual dividend by 11% to 10 cents per share.

Stitch Fix (SFIX)

The online personal styling service announced that Kofi Amoo-Gottfried, chief marketing officer of DoorDash, has joined Stitch Fix’s Board of Directors, effective immediately. Amoo-Gottfried has also held senior positions at Meta (META) and Bacardi.

FuboTV (FUBO)

The sports-centric streaming service announced a carriage agreement with Scripps Networks, the national television network division of The EW Scripps Company. The move is aimed at further diversifying the platform’s programming into entertainment and news content. Shares rose about 0.5% in extended

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Amazon’s (AMZN) stock is sucking wind into 2023 as investors fret about still-bloated costs and what is shaping up to be a disappointing holiday shopping season.

Shares of the tech giant are now hovering at a fresh 52-week low and down 50.3% year to date, according to Yahoo Finance data. The stock is rivaling dreadful performances from its partners in the closely followed FAANG (Facebook/Meta, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google) complex, as Meta Platforms (META) has suffered a 63% drop and Netflix (NFLX) has plunged about 53 %.

The stock has shed about 12% in December alone, pressured more recently by a lackluster government retail sales report for November.

“Consistent with our recently published 2023 uutlook report, we are lowering our estimates and price target on Amazon in the wake of several proprietary datapoints that suggest ongoing softness in online retail and cloud computing demand,” EvercoreISI tech warned Mark Mahaney

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The Financial Planning Association of Australia (FPA) and the Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) have entered the second round of consultation with members on the proposed merger of the two associations.

The FPA and the AFA agreed in principle in September 2022 to explore a merger between the two associations, with a goal of creating a united voice for the financial advice profession.

Recently, members have been invited to complete a survey to help guide the development of a new name for the proposed merged association.  And this week, members have also received a merger summary document and a draft constitution for the proposed merged association, and are encouraged to provide their feedback.

Sam Perera, National President of the AFA, said the boards of each organisation are gathering valuable insights from members through the consultation process.

“We have had the opportunity to meet and consult with

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