Author: Money Mechanics

Key Takeaways Salaries for private-sector workers rose 0.7% in the fourth quarter, the slowest increase since 2021.The job market has turned against workers, with unemployed workers now outnumbering open positions, so employers are less motivated to give large raises.Despite the downturn, average pay raises outpaced inflation in 2025. If you weren’t happy with the raise you got this year, you were hardly alone.Wages and salaries for private industry workers rose 0.7% in the fourth quarter, the slowest pace since the second quarter of 2021, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Tuesday. Year-over-year, wages were up 3.4%, the same as in…

(BOE Report) – Presidio Investment Holdings is working with Goldman Sachs on a first-of-its-kind debt facility worth up to $1 billion to give the U.S. oil and gas producer a war chest to pursue acquisitions as it becomes a publicly listed company, Presidio’s executives told Reuters. The energy producer is set to list in the coming weeks via a combination with blank-check firm EQV Ventures Acquisition Corp. Presidio’s business model involves improving production from existing oil and gas wells through more efficient operations, rather than prospecting for new drilling locations, to provide steady returns to investors. The debt facility will…

Key Takeaways Chocolate is made from cocoa, which comes from trees that take years to mature and are stressed by climate, pests, and disease.Turning cocoa into chocolate is a labor-intensive, energy-heavy process that spans farms, factories, and global shipping routes.High-quality chocolate costs more because it uses better cocoa and careful production, trading scale for flavor and traceability. Why Chocolate Is Expensive Long Before You Buy It Chocolate is expensive because cocoa, its key raw ingredient, is difficult to grow and increasingly stressed by climate change. Long before it becomes a finished product on the shelf, cocoa is constrained by biology…

Welcome to the first edition of Market Metrics That Matter, your monthly briefing on European cash equities trends. In next month’s edition, we’ll also begin exploring off-exchange activity.Don’t forget to visit Cboe Europe’s Market Share page for leading insights into European equity trading activity.January 2026 HighlightsEuropean equity trading volumes start the year strongly as activity shifts to Lit and Dark order booksTotal on-exchange average daily value traded (ADVT) in European equities reached €59.6bn, up 35% versus December 2025 (€44.3bn) and 30% versus January 2025 (€46.0bn).Market-wide activity continued to shift away from open and closing auctions towards lit and dark order…

(Image credit: Getty Images)Any discussion of income-oriented exchange-traded funds, including weekly income ETFs, should start with a basic reality of how fund distributions work. When an ETF pays a distribution, its net asset value, or NAV, typically falls by roughly the amount of that payout on the ex-distribution date.The NAV is simply the total value of the fund’s assets minus liabilities, divided by the number of shares outstanding. The ex-distribution date is the cutoff date after which new buyers are no longer entitled to the upcoming payment.In plain terms, the cash you receive doesn’t come from nowhere. It comes out…

People who live in one state but work in another can feel caught in a tax tug-of-war. Both states may have a legitimate claim to the income taxes — the first state because that’s where they reside, the second because that’s where the money was earned.That means there’s a potential for double taxation. Fortunately, some states have taken steps to mitigate the possibility. But…other states have not.If you’re living and working in two states, here is how you might fare during any tax season. From just $107.88 $24.99 for Kiplinger Personal Finance Become a smarter, better informed investor. Subscribe from…

Key Takeaways AI tax preparation tends to work best if your return is low to moderate complexity and your records are clean.Today’s AI tools still fall short when your taxes involve complex business ownership, multi-state filings, foreign income and other situations that may require judgement calls.There are also important privacy and data security issues to consider when using AI tools for tax filing preparation. Not long ago, doing your taxes with artificial intelligence meant chatting with a bot while you manually entered numbers into boxes. Today’s AI-powered tax tools deliver much more, allowing you to upload your forms, answer questions conversationally…

The Social Security program has been expanded, updated, or shored up by almost every occupant of the Oval Office for over 90 years. Most presidents in the modern era have left a unique fingerprint on your monthly check.From Franklin D. Roosevelt’s historic stroke of a pen in 1935 to the recent tax-cutting measures of the Trump administration in 2025, the program has evolved from a simple safety net into a complex system of retirement, disability and health insurance.Think you know the history of your benefits? We’ve put together a quick, 8-question challenge to see if you can match the policy…

Key Takeaways Strategy recently acquired 1,142 more bitcoin for $90 million. The price of the cryptocurrency was recently around $69,000.The broad sell-off in tech and metals last week does not bode well for risk assets like crypto in the near term, experts say. Strategy is down on its bitcoin purchases—but it’s not out. Executive chair and bitcoin evangelist Michael Saylor in a Tuesday interview with CNBC said that Strategy (MSTR) is “not going to be selling” bitcoin anytime soon—and will continue to buy the world’s largest cryptocurrency every quarter “forever.” The price of the coin is hanging out under $70,000…

Taxes on Social Security benefits have been controversial for decades. Many retirees understandably argue that they already paid into the system and so should not face taxes on their Social Security checks at all.That argument is now back in the spotlight, raising new questions about fairness — especially when those taxes kick in under technical rules.The issue traces back to the Social Security Fairness Act (SSFA), signed into law by former President Joe Biden early last year. As Kiplinger reported, the law repealed provisions that had reduced or wiped out benefits for millions of public-sector workers whose careers included jobs…