We are living through a grand experiment, some kind of double-blind economic study. Once we open our eyes to this possibility, the immediate question to follow is “who is getting the placebo?” The answer may be all of us. The second question then...

Eighteen years ago, Mike Barancyk traded nine years in the engineering field, six of which he spent in the U.S. Navy, for a career move to the financial services industry at Oak Partners, Inc. Since then, he’s been impacting clients’ lives as a...

After my son Ethan was born with Down syndrome, I began to integrate financial planning for families with special needs individuals into my practice at Oak Partners. Over the past 11 years, I have continued to gain more and more experience with this...

With stocks marching back toward levels seen at the beginning of the year, investment statements are looking much less unsettling than they were a few weeks ago. While investors I talk to are reassured by the recovery in stocks, they are also at the...

I didn’t think we would ever get there, and while the concept fills me with curiosity, I am also quite anxious about the idea of negative interest rates in the U.S. Nevertheless, this week President Trump referred to negative interest rates as a...

I am answering the same question a couple times every day now, “Marc, with the economy shut down and everyone locked down at home, how can the stock market be going up?” It is a great question, and I wish I had the entire answer. To be candid, I...

Who doesn’t remember the “just wait till your father comes home” line? I know I do. As a hyperactive 10-year-old, I was always committing some egregious mischief. Our poor, exasperated mom would use the line to instill dread, and instill dread...

Ask me a week ago, and I would have said it would be hard for the world to get any stranger than it has been over the past two months. But Monday morning, the world once again went deeper into the rabbit hole when headlines blaring “Oil Prices Turn...

In my opinion, investing lines up as much in the column of a social science as it does in the arena of a financial discipline. I’ve long viewed the financial markets not only as a pricing mechanism for profit and risk, but also as a form of...

A second generation financial advisor and a managing partner at Oak Partners, Inc., Mario Ruiz had a unique tool at his disposal when he decided to pursue his industry: observation.  Ruiz’ father, Fred, founded Oak Tree Financial Services in...