The SECURE act was a very impactful piece of legislation that would still be top of mind if it weren’t for the events and changes that have followed since its passage in December 2019. Among other things, the SECURE act increased the age of Required Minimum Distributions (RMD) to 72 from 70.5.
Before employers rush to ask for forgiveness on their Small Business Interruption Loans issued under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) they may want to check their eligibility for the Employee Retention Credit (ERC) first. New legislation from the Consolidated Appropriations Act (CCA) 2021 created the opportunity for businesses to take advantage of both the PPP and the ERC.
While the expression often goes “time is money,” at Buckingham Advisors we believe a more fitting expression would be “money is time.” No one can have more time, and money cannot directly buy happiness, but having more wealth could allow you to focus more of your time on what you enjoy. Money is a tool, not something to be loved or feared in and of itself.
It is said that there often seems to be a disconnect between Main Street and Wall Street. Despite all the social and economic pain endured last year and the fastest market decline for the S&P 500 into bear market territory, 2020 ended with the S&P 500 rising 18.4% and reaching 33 new record closing highs. After last year, we really should be used to expecting the unexpected from markets.
At the end of 2020, Congress passed, and President Trump signed a new law that provides for additional relief related to the coronavirus pandemic. This law, the Consolidated Appropriations Act 2021 (CAA 2021), includes a second draw of Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans (PPP Second Draw Loans), as well as an expansion and extension of the Employee Retention Credit.
Happy New Year! We hope you had a healthy and wonderful holiday season. Here are some financial tips and ideas to help you start off on the right foot as we move into 2021.
As of this afternoon, the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act had been passed by both the House and the Senate, but not yet signed by President Trump. Though President Trump is calling for some changes to the Act before he will sign, we wanted to address a summary of this bill that is over 5,500 pages and to highlight the areas that will impact a large percentage of our clients.
It's worth noting that the S&P 500 has marked 30 new closing highs this year and rallied 64% from its March low as of yesterday’s close. The technology heavy NASDAQ Composite has registered 50 new closing highs so far this year. I am not sure if that is a record number of new highs in a single year for that index, but it is certainly impressive. In addition, after years of lagging their large size peers, small company stocks tracked by the Russell 2000 index have reached nine new record closing highs year-to-date.
During the holiday season, scammers are hard at work attempting to steal anything they can phish out of us. Be on the lookout for fake shopping notices or shipping e-receipts. Scammers are sending messages via email and text that contain links to malware or phishing sites that are designed to steal our various account login information. Amazon, UPS and FedEx are commonly imitated in these scams.
The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) established by the CARES Act in March 2020 provided loans to eligible small businesses. If the borrower used the loan proceeds to pay certain eligible expenses, then the amount of the loan up to eligible expenses could be forgiven and the loan forgiveness amount would not be treated as taxable income to the borrower.