Impact of Bank Failures on Consumers

As first seen on CUInsight.com By John J. Gonner, CFA, President & CEO and Chief Investment Officer The U.S. economy received a shock on March 10th when Silicon Valley Bank collapsed. Two days later Signature Bank also failed. At the time these were the second and...

Four Ways the Secure Act will Impact Your Retirement Planning

The SECURE 2.0 Act was signed into law last year and contains retirement-related provisions that go into effect this year, altering the way Americans can save and withdraw money from retirement accounts.  These changes come at a time when Americans are facing...

Stocks and bonds should perform better in 2023

As first seen on biztimes.biz. By: John Gonner, President & CEO and Chief Investment Officer There is no doubt, 2022 was a bad year for investment returns. It was especially bad because while stocks entered a bear market (down more than 20%) bonds also were having...

Is it or isn’t it a recession?

As first seen on CUInsight.com. By: John Gonner, CFA President, CEO & CIO Most people have heard that a commonly used definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative GDP (Gross Domestic Product) growth. GDP measures the value of all the goods and...

Inflation is Putting Pressure on the Economy

As first seen on biztimes.biz John J. Gonner, CFA First Community Trust, N.A. July 1, 2022 Many times since the financial crisis 14 years ago, experts have sounded the alarm about the coming inflation, but it failed to materialize.  Well, it has arrived.  The Consumer...