The financial news that actually matters
Texas homeowners aged 65 and older now stand to save hundreds of dollars a year on school property taxes after the state raised an additional homestead exemption from $10,000 to $60,000. The change, carried out through S.B. 23 and the companion constitutional amendment S.J.R. 85 during the 89th Legislature, represents a sixfold increase in the…
Senior homeowners across New York State can now qualify for a property-tax exemption that erases up to 65% of their assessed home value, but only if their local government votes to activate the new option. Governor Kathy Hochul signed legislation S5175A/A3698A into law as Chapter 581, amending Real Property Tax Law Section 467 to give…
Current and former Whole Foods employees stand to recover a share of $2 million after the grocery chain finalized a class settlement over fees that quietly reduced balances inside its 401(k) retirement plan. The deal resolves claims that plan participants paid more than they should have for recordkeeping and administrative services, costs that compounded year…
Families holding appreciated stock face a tax fork that can cost heirs tens of thousands of dollars depending on when shares change hands. Under federal law, a lifetime gift of stock passes the donor’s original purchase price to the recipient, preserving the full embedded gain as a future tax liability. If those same shares transfer…
Millions of Americans with savings parked at the largest U.S. banks are earning just 0.01% annual percentage yield on their deposits, even as competitive accounts and government-backed savings bonds pay more than 4%. The gap between what big banks offer and what savers can actually get has widened to a striking degree in 2026, with…
Workers across the United States have earned retirement benefits they never collected, and a federal agency has been quietly holding that money for years. The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, an independent agency within the federal government, maintains unclaimed benefits from terminated pension and retirement plans. When employers shut down a plan and cannot locate every…
Henry Paul Regan Jr., a New York man and former stockbroker, faces federal criminal charges for allegedly running a Ponzi scheme that collected more than $50 million from hundreds of ordinary investors. Prosecutors in the Southern District of New York say Regan sold products called “Next Level” and “Yield Wealth,” promising returns as high as…
A federal grand jury in Chicago indicted Illinois investment adviser John Myers on wire fraud charges for allegedly operating a Ponzi scheme through Sterling Capital Investments, LLC, deceiving clients out of $4 million between 2022 and 2025. The indictment, filed June 4 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois under case number…
Families with three or more children stand to receive up to $8,231 through the Earned Income Tax Credit for tax year 2026, an increase from $8,046 the prior year. The IRS announced the new figure as part of its annual inflation adjustments, which this cycle also reflect changes enacted through the One, Big, Beautiful Bill….
Couples who hold a joint bank account at a single FDIC-insured institution can protect up to $500,000 in deposits, exactly twice the $250,000 ceiling that applies to an individual account holder. That doubled coverage is not a special product or promotional feature. It follows directly from the FDIC’s formula: $250,000 per depositor, per insured bank,…