THE SUPER BOWL, TU B’SHVAT AND YOUR PORTFOLIO

As originally appeared in The Jerusalem Post on February 1, 2018.

A lot of people have their big dreams and get knocked down and don’t have things go their way. And you never give up hope, and you really just hold on to it. Hard work and perseverance. You just keep getting up and getting up, and then you get that breakthrough.

-Robert Kraft

I don’t know about you but if I even see another dried apricot I am going to get sick. After stuffing ourselves on all kinds of fruit over the last couple of days celebrating the Tu B’shvat holiday, it’s now time to turn to stuffing ourselves with meat! No it’s not yet Yom Haátzmaut, rather it’s the Super Bowl. In our home that means thick beef hot dogs, kabobs and even my teenage son wants to get in on the act and has offered to make spicy chicken wings!

I got a call a few days ago from an American ex-pat living in the UK. She had some questions about her IRA and how she can hold it not that now that she is living outside the US. After explaining how she can work with a licensed US advisor and keep her IRA, she told me how disappointed she was in her portfolios’ performance in 2017. She said that she made about 1.5% and she knew that the stock market went up much more than that. She was going on and on about how poorly she had done, and I stopped her and started explaining how we all can learn from the big football game as well as Tu B’shvat.

Some of you may think that I must be desperate for a topic if I am going to try and tie these events together, but there is a lesson that can be learned. It pays for investors to think about both Tu B’shvat and the Super Bowl and how they can relate to their investments.

Hope springs eternal

Speaking about the power of Tu B’shvat, Karen Wolfers Rapaport writes on Aish.com, “The earliest blooming trees in Israel are awakening from a long, deep, winter’s nap. The trees have spent many months in hibernation. Until now, our beloved nurturing sources of shade and breath have been absorbing water from deep beneath the ground. This God-given survival mechanism has sustained them up until now. But now begins a new cycle in their lives. In this moment, they will draw sustenance from their own sap in order to grow, bloom and prosper. The trees will regenerate utilizing their own resources. They will become the giving entity that they were meant to be.”

What’s the moral? A new start. What happened in the past is the past. We need to focus on being the best that we can be and try to maximize our potential in the present and the future.

Keep the faith

Look at the quarterback of the Philadelphia Eagles, Nick Foles. Once he had a promising future but the last few years basically had him holding a clipboard as a backup. This year he was serving as the backup for Carson Wentz, a second year quarterback who was in the running for the league’s most valuable player award. Then Wentz got injured, and it was up to Foles to save the season. He could have dwelled on how far he had fallen from grace and sulked, but instead, he looked at this as an opportunity, a second chance. He has certainly made the most of his second chance and has led the team to the championship game.

Remember the Super Bowl last year? How the Patriots accomplished the biggest comeback in Super Bowl history. The inner fortitude and never give up attitude shown by leader Tom Brady and the rest of the Patriots team was inspiring. They didn’t focus on how bad they had played for the first half of the game, and quit. They focused on playing the way they knew how to play and the rest is history.

Both of these quarterbacks successfully put the past behind them and concentrated on the job at hand. Investors need the same character trait. Have you had lousy investment returns? Forget about the past and concentrate on positioning your investments to be in line with your current financial goals and needs; you will be much better off by doing this.

The information contained in this article reflects the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of Portfolio Resources Group, Inc. or its affiliates.

Aaron Katsman is author of the book Retirement GPS: How to Navigate Your Way to A Secure Financial Future with Global Investing (McGraw-Hill), and is a licensed financial professional both in the United States and Israel and helps people who open investment accounts in the United States. Securities are offered through Portfolio Resources Group, Inc. (www.prginc.net). Member FINRA, SIPC, MSRB, FSI. For more information, call (02) 624-0995 visit www.gpsinvestor.com or email aaron@lighthousecapital.co.il.