Is Your Portfolio Ready for Energy Price Swings? Plus, Tackling Debt on a High Income

NerdWallet's Smart Money Podcast

NerdWallet Personal Finance

Business, Investing, Education, How To

4.3 • 893 Ratings

🗓️ 16 April 2026

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Learn what rising oil prices mean for your investments and how to make savings work on a high income with heavy debt. How worried should you be about oil market swings? With global energy prices reacting to geopolitical conflict, senior news writer Anna Helhoski joins hosts Sean Pyles, CFP®, and Elizabeth Ayoola to speak with NerdWallet investing writer Sam Taub about what rising crude oil means for your investments, which portfolio sectors are holding steady, and whether the current calm around a fragile ceasefire is masking deeper volatility ahead. Then, what do you do when a hard-earned PhD and a $168,000 salary still leave you feeling behind? A listener named Melise shares how decades of living paycheck to paycheck, with $127,000 in debt across eight payment plans, and a late-in-life neurodivergent diagnosis are making financial progress feel impossible — even with her highest income ever. Sean and Elizabeth break down how to navigate scarcity trauma, impulse spending, quarterly tax obligations, and building an emergency fund when you're stretched thin. Learn how underpayment penalties work: https://www.nerdwallet.com/taxes/learn/underpayment-penalty-what-it-is-how-to-avoid-it Learn how to set up an IRS payment plan: https://www.irs.gov/payments/online-payment-agreement-application Learn about the IRS failure-to-file penalty: https://www.irs.gov/payments/failure-to-file-penalty Learn how estimated taxes work: https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/estimated-taxes Want us to review your budget? Fill out this form — completely anonymously if you want — and we might feature your budget in a future segment! https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScK53yAufsc4v5UpghhVfxtk2MoyooHzlSIRBnRxUPl3hKBig/viewform?usp=header To send the Nerds your money questions, call or text the Nerd hotline at 901-730-6373 or email podcast@nerdwallet.com. Like what you hear? Please leave us a review and tell a friend. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Security program on spreadsheets. New regulations piling up? An audit dread. It's time for Vanta.
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0:20.6	calm compliance. Get it? or call it calm clients.
0:22.0	Get it.
0:22.8	Join the 15,000 companies using Vanta to prove trust.
0:26.8	Get started at vanta.com slash calm.
0:30.4	Hey, Elizabeth, we have to talk about the newsletter.
0:34.0	What newsletter are you talking about, Sean?
0:35.4	You mean the new, free, smart money email newsletter? Yes, and I have to say it is so good. It really is. It has clips, episode roundups, and behind the scenes takes from me, you, and our producer, the stuff that makes you feel like you're really part of the show. And listeners, for the record, you actually are part of the show. I'm going to be sharing personal stuff.
0:55.4	You know, I love sharing my business, and I'm going to be sharing parenting tips from an eight-year-old and a single mom perspective.
1:01.5	And I am loading up the newsletter with my favorite gardening tips and lots of cute photos from my garden, including my pets, just napping among my flower beds.
1:10.3	It's kind of adorable.
1:12.1	And the best part is that this newsletter is totally free. So head to nerdwollet.com slash
1:16.9	podcast to sign up. For the record, that's nerdwollet.com slash podcast. Come hang out with us.
1:23.6	Sometimes it feels like you could never just get ahead of your finances. Maybe you're trying to overcome debt.
1:29.1	Maybe you keep making more money, but then you spend it.
1:33.0	Today, some tips and tricks for pushing yourself forward.
1:38.8	Welcome to Nerd Wallet's Smart Money Podcast, where you send us your money questions and we answer them with the help of our
1:44.5	genius nerds. I'm Sean Piles. And I'm Elizabeth Ayola. Later this episode, we're going to be
1:50.3	talking to a listener who's making good money, but unfortunately she doesn't feel like she's saving
1:55.5	enough. But first, our weekly Money News Roundup, where we break down the latest in the world of finance
	...

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