Sora’s Top Personal Finance News Articles
Week of 11/14
Each week, we are giving you Sora’s weekly report highlighting top insights and relevant articles. This week’s roundup includes the increased use of HELOCs, the mortgage market and how it affects bank profitability, the silver lining of inflation, and insight into recent Big Tech layoffs.
More Homeowners Using Heloc As Financial Safety Net (Veronica Dagher, The Wall Street Journal)
“As high interest rates drive up the cost of borrowing money, more people are tapping the equity in their homes.” A HELOC is credit that is backed by your property which has a much more favorable interest rate compared to a credit card APR. Read on to see why HELOCs are up 40% from a year prior.
U.S Home Sales Fell for a Ninth Straight Month (Nicole Friedman, The Wall Street Journal)
“U.S. existing home sales fell for a ninth straight month in October as the highest mortgage rates in more than a decade pushed buyers out of the market. Sales of previously owned homes declined 5.9% in October…” Read on to understand where the housing market currently stands.
Mortgage Market Upheaval Spurs $17 Billion in paper Losses for Banks (Jennifer Surane and Hannah Levitt , Bloomberg)
“Higher interest rates helped Wells Fargo & Co. land more than $3 billion in profit in the third quarter. From a capital perspective, they also wiped out nearly three-quarters of that.” Read more to see how increasing mortgage rates are affecting banks profitability.
Advisors Say Even Inflation Has A Silver Lining (Jacqueline Sergeant, Financial Advisor Magazine)
“It’s hard to fathom inflation being anything other than a gloomy trend when many Americans are feeling the pain of sticker shock at the gasoline pump, grocery store and elsewhere. But advisors say there are indeed some bright spots to high inflation.” These bright spots include a likely bump in income, increasing yields on cash vehicles like bonds, and more.
Why Are Tech Companies Laying Off So Many Workers? (Q.ai, Forbes)
“Every week seems to bring a new round of layoffs in the tech sector. It started earlier in the year with smaller, growth companies who need to keep a close eye on their ongoing spend, and has now extended to the behemoths of the industry like Meta and Amazon.” Read more for insight into tech layoffs.
