Interesting reads this week include: (1) This recession is already deep. If Congress fails to act, a lot of damage could be permanent; (2) Behind the Vast Market Rally: A Tumbling Dollar; (3) FDA’s Shifting Standards for Chinese Face Masks Fuel Confusion; (4) The 'Sweat' you drink: Inside the meteoric rise of Asia's answer to Gatorade; (5) Supreme Court Signals Federal Judiciary Won’t Mediate Fights Over Voting and Virus; (6) Two virtual school meetings ‘zoom-bombed’ with porn in Tri-State districts and a Bonus - This Pennsylvania farm has 320 kinds of tomatoes. You’ll want to try them all.

The news recently reports dismal economic numbers. At the same time, they report record gains for the stock market. What is going on?

Interesting reads this week include: (1) TikTok’s Chinese parent is scrambling to hang onto its hit app; (2) What China Learned From Cold War America; (3) King dollar's decline ripples across the globe; (4) How Does Gender Equality Affect Women in Retirement?; (5) Here are five charts illustrating U.S. economic trends amid the coronavirus pandemic; and a Bonus - Lockdown was the longest period of quiet in recorded human history.

Interesting reads this week include: (1) How to Sell Books in 2020: Put Them Near the Toilet Paper; (2) A second Great Depression? Unemployment crisis hits big cities hard; (3) The S&P 500 Grows Ever More Concentrated; (4) In Electric Car Market, It’s Tesla and a Jumbled Field of Also-Rans; (5) ‘Let’s Go Fly, for God’s Sake.’ Behind American Airlines Chief’s All-In Strategy; (6) The Fed Is Setting the Stage for a Major Policy Change; (7) Baseball Will Start Its Weirdest Season Ever. Will It Finish?; and a Bonus - World Surf League announces the five nominees for the 'Wipeout of the Year' category, an award that shows surfing is one of the most dangerous sports in the world.

Interesting reads this week include: (1) Even groups that regularly disagree on labor issues said there should be significant public investment in programs that can upgrade the skills of American workers; (2) A combination of low interest rates and industrial demand propel silver to new highs; (3) Resignation of DeAnne Julius from the advisory board to China's sovereign wealth fund indicates a hitch in investment and business relationship with China; (4) Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan said that managing the coronavirus is the most important issue for the economy now. “If we all wore a mask, it would substantially mute the transmission of this disease and we would grow faster,” he told Fox Business; (5) A decade of economic progress for America’s Black workers suddenly stopped in the mid-1970s. Why things had been improving, why that reversed, and what trade had to do with it; and a Bonus - This Pickle is Cake!

Interesting reads this week include: (1) The road to a durable economic recovery still has a lot of twists and turns left; (2) Improvement of roads and rails has accelerated, but the crisis has strained budgets, muddling prospects for the projects and the real estate developments that count on them; (3) Creative workers with multiple gigs are among the worst hit by the recession and face long roads to recovery; (4) The breadth of the Hong Kong security law and rapidly deteriorating relations between China and the West raise the prospect that international businesses or their employees could eventually become targets; (5) Some accountants have filed an SEC complaint saying the company should write down the value of shale driller XTO Energy. Exxon says it is in compliance with standards; and a Bonus - A Black-Market Fireworks Dealer Explains This Year’s Boom

The coronavirus crisis has changed the economy and the way you invest in it. Does that make your 401(k) or 403(b) investments out of date? Here are three tips with action items to help you update your account today.

This week's reads feature: (1) Wirecard scandal’s U.S. face: $2B vanishes in Asia, CEO arrested in Germany; (2) A Moral and Economic Imperative to End Racism By Raphael Bostic, President and CEO of the Atlanta Fed; (3) The Activist Investor Done With Finance; (4) Apparent suicide by 20-year-old Robinhood trader who saw a negative $730,000 balance prompts app to make changes; (5) How Are Americans Using their Stimulus Payments?; (6)‘Banking While Black’: How Cashing a Check Can Be a Minefield; and (7)How Meat plants were allowed to become coronavirus hot spots

This week's reads feature: (1) How's the Economy Doing? Watch the Dentists; (2) New filing shows Robinhood brought in close to $100 million by offloading order flow in the first quarter; (3) The Story Behind Shundrawn Thomas’s Open Letter to Asset Management; (4)The Illusion of a Rapid US Recovery; (5) Top US pension fund aims to juice returns via $80bn leverage plan; and a Bonus - Remembering Sara Little Turnbull, Whose Bra Cup Design Became the N95 Mask

The irony of COVID happening in the year 2020 has not been lost on me. If we could ever hope to benefit from hindsight, that time is certainly now. While we have all spent years complaining about our daily grind, we suddenly miss it terribly; and the choices we once took for granted seem like luxuries. (I know that I am going through serious movie theater withdrawal.) Alas, changes must be made, and we humans have an incredible history of adaptability. I have been a financial advisor for more than 20 years, and I know there are positives even during tough times like these. From conversations with clients, friends, and family these past weeks, I would say that priorities have shifted. Most are missing family, some are cooking more, and many are recognizing that their personal finances cannot survive on autopilot. When I sat down to write this article, I immediately went to the thesaurus to look up alternatives to the word “plan.” Some people, like me, are natural planners. They make lists; they thrive on routine; they worry about what they may have missed. Others, quite literally, avoid any reference to the word. This article is for the latter group…and you know who you are.