Suze: April 4th, 2025. Welcome everybody to one of the first
Suze: Suze Pop-Ups. A pop up is where I really want
Suze: you to know something right now. I don't want you
Suze: to have to wait till a Thursday or a Sunday.
Suze: I want you to know right now. And given that
Suze: I'm not in my studio, Sunday, as you will hear,
Suze: is not a normal Suze School, but one that's really,
Suze: really important.
Suze: But here's what I want you to know right now. Listen,
Suze: I get it. I know many of you are afraid
Suze: of what's happening in the economy and the stock market.
Suze: And I cannot blame you. Please listen to me closely now.
Suze: I have posted this also on the Women and Money
Suze: Community app, but I know that many of you don't
Suze: use that app, which is why I am doing a
Suze: Suze Pop-Up just for you. So here's my take, everybody.
Suze: We are looking obviously at another down day for the
Suze: markets today, and you have to ask yourself why, why
Suze: are the markets continuing to go down, and truthfully I'm
Suze: sorry to say the answer is very easy because number one,
Suze: China has retaliated.
Suze: They have put on retaliated tariffs, and that has gotten
Suze: the investors on edge. Therefore, the markets are projected to
Suze: go lower as a result. Now I know that many
Suze: of you, do you have your Suze notebooks out? You should. Anyway,
Suze: I know that many of you are dollar cost averaging.
Suze: You're thinking, oh, the markets are going down. This is
Suze: the time for me to buy. I'm going to get
Suze: a bargain, whatever. Now that's still OK. All right.
Suze: But you have to hear me on this. If you
Suze: are going to continue with that strategy right now, you
Suze: are to do it with seriously tiny amounts. Have you
Suze: ever heard the saying, Don't catch a falling knife?
Suze: This might be a falling knife because we don't know
Suze: how other countries are going to react. There's time to
Suze: get in. It's not like if these markets start to
Suze: go up again that they're going to go all the
Suze: way back up to the top. You have time, so
Suze: this is not where I want you to be aggressive
Suze: and go, I've gotten in at the bottom. So no
Suze: bottom fishing here. Do you hear me?
Suze: Because in my opinion we're seeing signs, and to me
Suze: this feels a lot like 2022 where it's volatile, it's emotional,
Suze: it's uncertain.
Suze: So I want you to breathe. Markets obviously will eventually recover,
Suze: but not all at once. It's impossible now because they
Suze: have gone down too much, too fast, and they're down here.
Suze: And if these tariffs stay in place, it's going to
Suze: take a long, long time.
Suze: So remember, money you have in the market should have
Suze: been money as I've told you over and over again
Suze: is money that you did not need for at least
Suze: 5 years. So just let this play out and stay calm.
Suze: If you are contributing to a retirement account, especially an
Suze: employer retirement account, I am begging you not to stop
Suze: your monthly contributions. Just stay the course, especially if you
Suze: have 5, 10, 15 years or longer. Keep investing steadily
Suze: because consistency, I am promising you, is your power. It's
Suze: your secret weapon. Let's talk about fear which all of
Suze: you are having right now.
Suze: The VIX, remember me telling you about the VIX. It's
Suze: a measure of market volatility. Well, it just surpassed 45,
Suze: and that number means that it's the highest that it's
Suze: been since the spike in August. When the VIX is
Suze: this high, it means fear is absolutely overwhelming logic and historically.
Suze: When sentiment is this fearful, it is not the time
Suze: to sell, so just stay put right now. Now this
Suze: doesn't mean that the market can't bounce, because even in
Suze: the middle of a down trend, it can bounce but
Suze: just don't react emotionally. But you know there are bright
Suze: spots here that I want you to be aware of.
Suze: Bond yields are absolutely collapsing.
Suze: So if you've got bonds, your portfolio may be back
Suze: to even or even showing gains. Remember a long time
Suze: ago I had many of you buy 20 year bonds,
Suze: 10 year bonds, or longer term bonds, and you were
Suze: also upset because interest rates continued to go up and
Suze: the value of those bonds went down.
Suze: Well, you're either even now or you are making money
Suze: just that simple. There's always a silver lining somewhere if
Suze: you are diversified in your holdings. Now listen to me.
Suze: The 10 year treasury as I'm recording this is below 4%.
Suze: It's at 3.8%.
Suze: Now that's great news for mortgages. It's great news for
Suze: many things, but you might be thinking about refinancing sooner
Suze: than later. Now, obviously when interest rates are going down,
Suze: interest rates everywhere are going to go down.
Suze: And I've said it before and I'm going to say
Suze: it again, but you've got to listen to me right
Suze: now and take action today when you are hearing this,
Suze: if you want your money to be safe and sound.
Suze: My favorite CD is the Alliant Credit Union CD, and
Suze: interest rates at Alliant are not going to last, in
Suze: my opinion. I give it at most one more week,
Suze: all right.
Suze: Now one year treasuries are at 3.8%.
Suze: Two year treasuries as I'm recording are at 3.6%.
Suze: That's why I want you to take advantage. I don't
Suze: make money if you do this, everybody. I want you
Suze: to make more out of your money. So if you
Suze: want to keep money safe and sound right now, you
Suze: have to take advantage of the 12 to 17 month
Suze: CD at .com.
Suze: They're at 4.25% APR for amounts of $1000 to $74,999
Suze: and 4.3% APR for $75,000 and up. That is a
Suze: big difference than what treasuries are paying. So seriously for
Suze: safe money.
Suze: You might want to take advantage of it right now
Suze: cause that rate is incredible and I don't want you
Suze: to miss out on it.
Suze: Now the dollar is weak.
Suze: So if you're thinking about traveling to Europe or doing
Suze: things like that, now is not the time.
Suze: Gold, however, and I told you a while ago, I
Suze: want you to be investing in gold. Gold has soared.
Suze: At one point it was almost $3,200 an ounce. It's
Suze: back at $3,065 but it is turning out to be
Suze: the safe haven. Bitcoin is not holding up as a
Suze: safe haven, for when things like this is happening, gold
Suze: is still the safe haven.
Suze: If you have been considering Roth conversions, a lot of
Suze: you are like, Oh, I want to put some money
Suze: in a Roth. I have it in a traditional retirement account,
Suze: and I want to do a Roth. Maybe it's time
Suze: to start doing that slowly, a little bit at a time,
Suze: and take advantage of these down markets. Remember when you
Suze: convert from a traditional to a Roth retirement account, you
Suze: owe taxes on whatever your portfolio or the amount you're
Suze: converting is at the time.
Suze: When markets are going down, your portfolio value is going down,
Suze: and that's the time to convert. WTI crude, I have
Suze: to tell you now, has dropped sharply, and I mean
Suze: sharply below its long term support near $65 per barrel.
Suze: And if this breakdown holds, it could head towards $45
Suze: a barrel, and that is a major shift in oil,
Suze: and you will absolutely see that at your pump. As
Suze: for the stock market, I'm just going to reiterate one
Suze: more time. I want you to stay diversified. Now is
Suze: not the time to bottom fish. Don't get angry at anybody.
Suze: Don't blame this. Just, just stay smart. Stay calm.
Suze: And this is when the dividend paying stocks, everybody that
Suze: I was telling you about can really help stabilize your portfolio.
Suze: I looked at all my dividend paying stocks where I
Suze: have a lot of money in them, and I am
Suze: only down from the beginning of the year 0.5%, and
Suze: I'm getting the dividend. So companies like AT&T, Verizon, and
Suze: so forth, they've held up pretty well. So here's the
Suze: bottom line.
Suze: I want you to take this one day at a time.
Suze: I want you to stick together.
Suze: I want you to be kind to yourself. I don't
Suze: want to read in the post or anything where you
Suze: are blaming anybody. It doesn't matter. All the blame, shame,
Suze: and everything in the world isn't going to help your money.
Suze: Taking action, the right action, from a place of courage,
Suze: not fear, from a place of power, not weakness is
Suze: what is going to make your money, make more money.
Suze: I want you to be kind to others.
Suze: And always remember you are stronger than your fear. I
Suze: hope you enjoyed this Susie pop up for now. Bye bye.