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30 April 2026
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If instead of lavishing your guests with expensive wine at an outrageously over-priced location with a million flowers and expensive bands, you had headed down to the Registry Office and had a drink at the pub instead, this is how much your wedding day lump sum would be worth. Note – it’s best to be seated whilst doing this when you realise how much your wedding expenses would be worth now. There are two messages from this: the value of saving and the power of compounding.
The wedding calculator comes from Slate.com, and was sent to us by Jonathan Hoyle, Chief Executive Officer at Stanford Brown, whose own numbers are shown in the diagram.
Wealth accumulation has four main drivers. Evaluating long-term investment risk requires shifting the focus on shorter-term losses and volatility towards failure to achieve long-term objectives.
We may prefer a fast pay off but a long-term approach to investing will result in a less stressful journey and a more successful outcome.
Watching the market each day to pick a winner is not the best way to handle a retirement plan. A better and less stressful approach for your investment portfolio is to avoid losers, sit back and watch the grass grow.
Stay on top of the latest changes to superannuation rates and thresholds for 2026, including increases to transfer balance cap, concessional contributions cap, and non-concessional contributions cap.
The Strait of Hormuz closure due to US-Iran conflict severely disrupted global energy supply chains. While various emergency measures mitigated the crude impact, the refined product market faces unprecedented stress.
The perceived underperformance of LICs compared to ETFs is due to existing comparison data excluding crucial information, highlighting the need for proper assessment and transparent reporting.
The Home Equity Access Scheme in Australia allows older homeowners to tap into their home equity for retirement income, yet remains underused due to lack of awareness and its perceived complexity.
Debate over the CGT discount is intensifying amid concerns about intergenerational equity and housing affordability. This analysis shows that the 'discount' does not necessarily favor property investors.
The new super tax, applying from 1 July, introduces more than just a higher rate on large balances. It brings into focus a misalignment between where wealth sits and where the tax on that wealth ultimately falls.
Here is a checklist of 28 important issues you should address before June 30 to ensure your SMSF or other super fund is in order and that you are making the most of the strategies available.
A retirement researcher's take on retirement and her focus on each of her six resource buckets to stay engaged during the transition and beyond.
What happens if market resilience in the face of ongoing geopolitical tensions ends? Potential decade-long market weakness shows the need for contingency planning.
Studies show that a drop in expenditure during retirement leads to a happier retirement. But when costs ramp up again later in life, it's a guaranteed income that makes spending more hurt less.
A cow for her milk, a stock for her dividends. Investors are too quick to dismiss this valuation technique.
The 33% CGT discount rate being floated isn’t random. It sits at the structural break-even between trust and company for the multi-property cohort. That’s driving the conversation we’re hearing now.
How passive investing has permanently changed market structure — and why sophisticated tools are now the price of survival.