T&R Q&A

Talking Real Money - Investing Talk

Don McDonald

Education, Business, Investing, How To

4.5 • 811 Ratings

🗓️ 27 October 2025

⏱️ 25 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Tom Cock and Apella Wealth advisor Roxy Butner team up for a lively listener Q&A episode covering everything from the new wave of penny-stock IPOs to retirement readiness and tax traps. Tom opens with a warning about the surge in risky penny-stock offerings, then the two dive into listener questions about annuity sales pressure at Fidelity, portfolio diversification mistakes, CD taxation myths, Roth conversions, and one standout 21-year-old listener getting her financial life off to a stellar start. 0:05 Tom opens with a warning about the explosion in penny-stock IPOs 1:26 Why “lottery-ticket” stocks nearly always burn investors 2:21 Diversify, stay tax-efficient, and skip the hype 2:30 Roxy joins for listener Q&A 3:38 Fidelity’s annuity pitch — a listener wonders if it’s time to leave 5:05 Who’s truly fiduciary: Fidelity vs. Vanguard vs. Apella 6:14 Vanguard dipping a toe into crypto 6:51 Quabina from Ohio: $2.2M at 47 — diversified enough to retire at 55? 8:14 Missing global diversification and bonds in an all-U.S. portfolio 9:57 Early-retirement planning challenges and healthcare costs 10:20 How to design the right stock-bond-international mix 11:36 Daniel from California: Are long CDs taxed as capital gains? 13:04 Why CD interest is always ordinary income — and muni bond alternatives 13:29 Year-end planning: RMDs, Roth conversions, and tax optimization 14:45 Common tax mistakes and mis-placed assets 15:19 Emily from Ohio: “Young and Dumb” — a 21-year-old investing the smart way 18:51 Building a first Roth IRA and why bonds don’t belong yet 20:00 One-fund simplicity: AVGE vs. VOO 21:41 Long-term mindset: global diversification and patience pay off Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	at BP, we're delivering on our downstream plans, achieving 96% refining operating availability,
0:09.9	the best first-half performance in our historical portfolio since 2001,
0:15.9	helping to drive efficiency, reliability, and production to safely deliver for customers. Learn more at BP.com
0:25.0	forward slash strategy at work.
0:31.0	Reality Radio for a really great future.
0:37.9	We're talking real money.
0:40.3	Thank you for being part of Talking Real Money.
0:42.6	You know, we're here five days a week, plus Saturday's live on the radio to help you understand money.
0:48.8	More on investing than necessarily spending, but we do talk about that from time to time.
0:54.1	And every once in a while,
0:55.7	we're really happy to have Roxy Butner, one of our advisors, join us. And she'll be on in just a
1:00.9	moment. But first, I want to warn you about something that snuck up on me because I don't pay
1:06.9	close attention to these, but penny stocks, penny stock IPOs, initial public offerings.
1:12.6	The numbers are shocking. In the last year and a half, 164 of them have rolled out on U.S.
1:18.6	exchanges, primarily the NASDAQ. Compare that number to the 20 years prior where only 106 total
1:25.6	came out. And people have been talking about gambler
1:28.5	spirits being revived on Wall Street, et cetera, et cetera. And who is buying these things?
1:34.2	Who is running? And this is absolutely horrible because we're hearing about people drawn to
1:39.4	these investments with small chances of massive payoffs. Doesn't that sound like a kind of like a lottery ticket or something?
1:46.5	And Larry Swedro wrote recently from a traditional, traditional finance perspective,
1:51.5	this behavior is irrational.
1:53.6	These investors knowingly chase high volatility stocks with lottery like return distributions,
	...

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