VESTED Winter 2020

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Let Food Be Thy Medicine

Ravila Gupta Startup Superstar PLUS Finding the Best in an Empty Nest Wishes and Worries for 2020 Homegrown and Healthy Four-Legged Fostering

WINTER 2020

At CAPTRUST, we believe we have a profound responsibility to share our success with those less fortunate than we are. One way we do that is through the activities of the CAPTRUST Community Foundation, our in-house, employee-run charitable foundation. Its mission is to enrich the lives of children in communities we serve. The foundation, a registered 501(c)(3) charity, was formally organized in 2007 to provide our employees with opportunities to participate as a group in community outreach efforts and to offer their time, passion, and financial support as a way to give back.

“ I continue to believe that if children are given the necessary tools to succeed, they will succeed beyond their wildest dreams!

David Vitter

We invite you to like the CAPTRUST Community Foundation on Facebook.

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COMMUNITY FOUNDATION

capcommunityfoundation.org | toll-free: 855.649.0943 4208 Six Forks Road, Suite 1700 | Raleigh, NC 27609

Volume 6, Issue 1 | Winter 2020 PUBLISHER

The new year is here, and CAPTRUST is off to another roaring start. It will be hard to top last year—great markets, excellent investment returns, and record growth for the firm—but we are going to give it a shot. I hope you’re as optimistic as I am about 2020.

This issue’s Second Act hero is Ravila Gupta, chief executive officer of the Research Triangle-based Council for Entrepreneurial Development and a lifelong learner. After a long and successful career as an engineer, attorney, and president of the U.S. subsidiary of a multinational corporation, Gupta is paying it forward by leading the transformation of a 35-year-old nonprofit that’s fueling the creation and growth of entrepreneurial companies in North Carolina.

This issue also features a wide range of other topics, including: • making the most of becoming an empty nester; • vegetable gardening for better eating and better health; • ABLE accounts, a powerful new savings tool for loved ones with disabilities; • overcoming the pull of your possessions; and • the case for fostering man’s best friend.

This issue’s must-read feature, “Let Food Be Thy Medicine,” by Kim Painter, explores the journey of acclaimed chef and restaurateur Seamus Mullen and the

J. Fielding Miller Chief Executive Officer EDITORS John Curry Editor-in-Chief

Alysa Cronin Managing Editor

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD

everything-old-is-new-again idea of food as medicine. After years of chronic health issues and a near-death experience, Mullen found real healing in a healthy approach to eating.

Lastly, in this issue’s installment of Investment Strategy, Chief Investment Officer Kevin Barry and Investment Strategist Sam Kirby look ahead at their biggest worries and best wishes for the global economy and financial markets in 2020.

As always, we appreciate your article ideas, reactions, and feedback. Please keep them coming.

Jeremy Altfeder Financial Advisor

Mike Gray Senior Vice President, Financial Advisor

Hugh (Trae) Cole Financial Advisor

Land Hite Senior Vice President, Financial Advisor

Ellen Crowley Vice President, Financial Advisor

Greg Middleton Director, Advisor Group

Nick DeCenso Senior Manager, Wealth Strategy

Aaron J. Morris Vice President, Financial Advisor

Karen Denise Senior Director, Wealth Client Services

Teri Parker Vice President, Financial Advisor

Philip D’Unger Specialist, Wealth Solutions

Alysia Tacinelli Client Management Consultant

Justin Gartman Client Management Consultant

Kyle Tucker Senior Vice President, Financial Advisor

Tiffany Walker Senior Wealth Planner

ART DIRECTION AND MARKETING Lonzetta Allen Associate Art Director

Harrison Brackett Graphic Designer

Elizabeth Altman Distribution Manager

John Curry Art Director

All the best, WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF

J. FIELDING MILLER CAPTRUST Chief Executive Officer

Azul Photography Raleigh, NC

Worth Higgins & Associates, Inc. Richmond, VA

Gabrielle Burke Pittsburgh, PA

Getty Images Seattle, WA

Justin Gartman Raleigh, NC

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CONTENT AND CONTRIBUTORS

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9

20

Gabrielle Burke

28

KEVIN BARRY

JENNIFER BROOKLAND

JOHN CURRY

NEIL DOWNING

Kevin Barry is CAPTRUST’s chief investment officer and leads the Investment Group, the team responsible for investment manager due diligence, asset allocation, and discretionary investment management for the firm’s wealth management and institutional advisory clients.

Barry studied finance at La Salle University in Philadelphia and the University of London, where he received a Master of Science degree in financial management.

Jennifer Brookland is a writer, editor, and radio producer living in Durham, North Carolina. She spent three years working in communications for international development organizations before moving to North Carolina. As a freelance journalist, Brookland writes and edits for a variety of local and international print and digital media, including the World Bank Group, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Our State magazine, and North Carolina Public Radio.

As chief marketing officer, John Curry is responsible for all areas of strategic marketing and branding for CAPTRUST. In the industry since 1986, Curry has served in senior management roles with firms such as ProShares and AllianceBernstein and has experience in areas of strategic marketing, including product development and design, market research, branding, and sales campaign management.

Neil Downing is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professional and enrolled agent, licensed by the U.S. Treasury Department to represent taxpayers before the Internal Revenue Service. A newspaper reporter, editor, and columnist for 35 years, Downing has authored several publications focused on maximizing the value of employee benefits and retirement savings vehicles.

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Features 4

Columns

LET FOOD BE THY MEDICINE

16

PASSION PURSUITS

34

MONEY MINDSET

STARTUP SUPERSTAR

19

GLEANINGS

37

LASTING LEGACY

FINDING THE BEST IN AN EMPTY NEST

25

EXPERT ANGLE

40

CLIENT CONVERSATIONS

WISHES AND WORRIES FOR 2020

33

MARKET REWIND

42

CAPTRUST HAPPENINGS

by Kim Painter

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20

by Jennifer Brookland

by Kim Painter

28

Homegrown and Healthy

by Jeanne Lee

Room to Grow

Four-Legged Fostering

by Jeanne Lee

To Have and to Hold

by John Curry

A Look at ABLE Accounts

by Neil Downing

by Kevin Barry and Sam Kirby

SAM KIRBY

JEANNE LEE

KIM PAINTER

As leader of CAPTRUST’s Investment Strategist team, Sam Kirby works with the firm’s financial advisors to assist clients with investment strategy, portfolio construction, and monitoring. He has 15 years of financial services experience. Kirby earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism from the University of North Carolina and a Master of Science degree in management from North Carolina State University. He is a CFA charterholder.

Jeanne Lee is a freelance writer living in the lovely college town of Oberlin, Ohio. She has written about consumer and business topics for 20 years, including stints at Fortune and Money. Her work has appeared in publications like USA TODAY, Fortune Small Business, and Health. She loves thinking about ways for people to hack their finances and daydreams of paying off her mortgage before she has to pay for college for her two boys.

Kim Painter is a freelance writer specializing in health and lifestyle issues. She was a USA TODAY staffer for many years and has continued to contribute to the newspaper as a reporter, columnist, and blogger. She lives in McLean, Virginia, where she practices what she preaches: wearing sunscreen, eating broccoli, and getting at least 10,000 steps a day.

All publication rights reserved. None of the material in this publication may be reproduced in any form without the express written permission of CAPTRUST: 919.870.6822. ©2020 CAPTRUST Financial Advisors. The opinions expressed in this report are subject to change without notice. This material has been prepared or is distributed solely for informational purposes and is not a solicitation or an offer to buy any security or instrument or to participate in any trading strategy. CAPTRUST does not render legal, accounting, or tax advice. If you require such advice, you should contact the appropriate legal, accounting, or tax advisor. The information and statistics in this report are from sources believed to be reliable but are not warranted by CAPTRUST Financial Advisors to be accurate or complete.

Performance data depicts historical performance and is not meant to predict future results.

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Let Food Be Thy Medicine

by Kim Painter

Seamus Mullen grew up on a farm in Vermont and trained as a chef in Spain. By his mid-30s, he was a New York City restaurateur, earning rave reviews and celebrity attention.

He also was a physical and mental wreck.

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Winter | 2020

“My body was just falling apart at the seams,” says Mullen, known for appearances on TV shows such as The Next Iron Chef and Chopped.

The once-athletic Mullen had been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), a chronic inflammatory autoimmune disease that causes pain, swollen joints, and severe fatigue—and requires patients to take medications that dampen the immune system. He’d also endured two spinal surgeries, a pulmonary embolism, and a nearly fatal bout of bacterial meningitis.

He walked with a cane, weighed far too much, and was reduced to using his beloved racing bike as wall décor.

“My mindset was, I don’t have time to be sick, so just tell me what medication to take,” he says. After each crisis, he dutifully took his medicines and “went back to my normal state of being, which was pretty terrible but functional,” he says.

After a particularly harrowing two-week hospitalization in 2011, Mullen says, “I realized that something had to change.”

And that something started with his diet.

Despite his training, the chef, like many of us, was eating a lot of junk: indulging in potato chip cravings and gulping down pizza, pasta, ice cream, or whatever he could find in the wee hours after work. He says he knows now that he was eating and living in a way that made his problems worse.

Today, Mullen is a firm believer in the idea of “food as medicine”—that the foods we choose can play a central role in the prevention and treatment of illness. He’s written two books, Real Food Heals and Hero Foods, to spread the word.

“There is no illness on the planet that doesn’t benefit from a healthy relationship with food,” he says.

In his case, Mullen says, the benefits have been life-changing. Now, he says he’d like to see another change: a healthcare system that recognizes the healing power of a well-planned meal.

Photo by Daghan Perker

Seamus Mullen

Today, Mullen is a firm believer in the idea of “food as medicine”—that the foods we choose can play a central role in the prevention and treatment of illness.

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That’s a goal that an increasing number of healthcare professionals heartily endorse.

Food as Medicine

“

The idea that food has medicinal power is hardly new. Hippocrates, the ancient Greek physician, supposedly once said, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.”

It’s a concept that “Western medicine forgot” for a while, says James Gordon, founder and executive director of the nonprofit Center for Mind-Body Medicine in Washington, DC. Gordon, who is a psychiatrist and a clinical professor at Georgetown Medical School, says, “We are now starting to recover that understanding.”

Certainly, 30 years ago, anybody who was talking about nutrition in medicine was looked at quite skeptically by the medical establishment. There’s still skepticism, but also more interest in investigating.

James Gordon

”

For the past 20 years, Gordon’s center has offered food-as-medicine training programs to health professionals, educators, and others. Gordon devotes a full chapter of his latest book, The Transformation: Discovering Wholeness and Healing After Trauma, to the power of diet for people recovering from trauma.

“Certainly, 30 years ago, anybody who was talking about nutrition in medicine was looked at quite skeptically by the medical establishment,” Gordon says. “There’s still skepticism, but also more interest in investigating.”

While experts debate the details of exactly what to eat, even the most mainstream medical organizations now include diet in guidelines for treating conditions such as heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

For example, the American Heart Association says that people with mildly elevated blood pressure should exercise more and change their diets—adding fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, and limiting salt and sugar—before trying medication. Cancer patients also are urged to eat healthfully during and after treatment to aid recovery and help prevent recurrences. The American Institute for Cancer Research recommends survivors focus on a plant-based diet. The group also says that obesity, fueled by junk-food diets full of sugar and fast foods, is an important cause of inflammation, an underlying cancer cause.

Meanwhile, Gordon says evidence is growing around the role of diet in treating mental health conditions, such as depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder.

Despite the evidence, he says, “Nutrition is not taught or is very scantily taught in most medical schools.”

And all those dietary guidelines? Patients are lucky, he says, if they get a fact sheet about them from their doctors—much less detailed information about how to incorporate them into their lives.

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Translating Science to Action There are places, though, where the science of food and health is making its way into the healthcare system’s bloodstream and onto patients’ plates.

“I see patients all the time with diabetes and hypertension. I prescribe them medicine and tell them this is just half of the equation,” says physician Rita Nguyen, an assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of California San Francisco and an assistant health officer at the city’s public health department.

But Nguyen and her colleagues don’t stop at handing out a few diet tips. Instead, they invite many of their patients to weekly “food pharmacies.” The Saturday events are set up like farmers’ markets, with tables of fresh produce, cooking demonstrations, and samples of spices, olive oil, and other healthy staples. Participants also can speak with dietitians and get information on food assistance programs. A local food bank and several business partners donate the goods.

While experts debate the details of exactly what to eat, even the most mainstream medical organizations now include diet in guidelines for treating conditions such as heart disease and type 2 diabetes. treatment plans, says Brenda Rea, an assistant professor of preventive and family medicine. The university is also one of a few in the nation with a residency program in lifestyle medicine.

Rea, a physician, says she became passionate about the need to help patients change their diets in her first career as a physical therapist seeing stroke survivors. “I saw my patients coming in with second heart attacks, third heart attacks, second strokes,” she says. Many of those people, she says, got no help with their diets.

A Chef Heals Himself—with Food

Nguyen also is part of a research project in which patients with heart failure spend two months eating only meals carefully designed for them by dietitians. Such “medically tailored meals” have been shown to improve diabetes control and increase HIV medication adherence in previous studies. One big question is whether such short-term interventions can permanently shift eating habits, Nguyen says.

For Seamus Mullen, the turning point came after he was hospitalized for bacterial meningitis, suffering from a brain-boiling 106-degree fever and terrible headaches. He recalls a classic near-death experience: “My body, my internal organs, everything started shutting down,” he says, and then he felt himself drifting toward a “peaceful light.” He believes he willed himself back to consciousness.

Change also has come to some of the nation’s medical schools. At Loma Linda University Medical School in California, all students learn about incorporating diet and other lifestyle factors into

After recovering, Mullen went back to his daily routines, taking medications that warded off painful RA flare-ups but left him in a low-energy daze. Mullen now believes that many of his health

SEAMUS MULLEN: Chef, Author, and Nutrition Expert Seamus Mullen is an award-winning chef and restaurateur, and a leading authority on food, health, and wellness. Mullen first rose to national prominence in 2006 with Boqueria, one of the first critically acclaimed Spanish restaurants in New York. In 2009, he was one of three finalists on the Food Network’s The Next Iron Chef. He can be seen as a frequent guest on programs such as CBS This Morning, Today, and The Martha Stewart Show.

He has been named Chef of the Year by Time Out New York and was a semifinalist for Best Chef in NYC by the James Beard Foundation three years Daghan Perker

in a row.

Mullen’s debut cookbook, Hero Foods, pairs traditional Spanish cuisine with rustic farm-to-table fare. His second book, Real Food Heals, features 125 Seamus Mullen

paleo-inspired recipes designed to support daily healthy living.

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problems stemmed not only from the bodywide inflammation associated with RA, but also from a gut ravaged by multiple infections and antibiotic treatments.

Until that point, he says, none of his doctors had said much about his diet. Then a friend introduced him to a new doctor, a specialist in integrative medicine—a field that combines conventional and alternative approaches. He convinced Mullen to fight for his health with a familiar weapon: his fork.

HEALTHY HABITS Changing your health through food is about more than what you eat. How you eat matters too. Here are some of Seamus Mullen’s tips:

With the doctor’s guidance, Mullen made major changes, cutting added sugar and refined carbohydrates and loading up on colorful vegetables and what he calls “good fats and proteins”—foods such as wild seafood, avocados, and nuts.

• Set aside time to eat proper meals, ideally with friends and family. That means eating at a table, not on the couch or in your car. Put away electronics, too.

For a while, Mullen says, he took pictures of everything he ate and learned which foods made him feel best. He learned, he says, that he can’t eat much dairy and should stay away from gluten—the proteins in wheat and some other grains that cause trouble for people with celiac disease and other forms of gluten intolerance.

• Savor the meal. Eat slowly, take breaks, and give your body a chance to notice when you are full.

He also learned to load up on foods that feed healthy gut microbes, including cruciferous vegetables and fermented foods such as sauerkraut and kefir.

“It was six months before I noticed any difference, but when I did, it was radical,” he says. “I went from not being able to get out of bed without having extreme pain in my hands and feet to one day walking down the stairs and not having any pain at all—and only realizing it when I was halfway down.”

He also started losing weight—lots of it, eventually totaling 70 pounds. “My objective was to feel better,” he says. “Weight loss was an unintended side effect.”

At the same time, Mullen started prioritizing sleep and exercise.

Soon, his racing bike came off the wall, and in 2014, he raced in La Ruta de los Conquistadores, a difficult three-day trek across Costa Rica.

By then, Mullen says he had achieved an even more unlikely goal: He had lost all symptoms and biological markers of RA and no longer needed painkillers or drugs to suppress his immune system and fight inflammation. He says he remains free of RA signs today.

Mullen concedes that not everyone who follows his lead will see such dramatic changes: “Everyone is an individual.”

In fact, while many patients with RA report symptom improvements after dietary changes, research has not proven a cause and effect

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Winter | 2020

• Don’t feel compelled to clean your plate.

There’s nothing wrong with saving leftovers—even if it’s just a small amount—for the next day.

• Forget metrics. Counting calories and tracking pounds can contribute to a love-hate relationship with food.

• Eat only when you are hungry—and let yourself get a little hungry between meals. You want to avoid mindless snacking.

relationship, says Marcy O’Koon, senior director for consumer health at the Arthritis Foundation. She says there’s no research suggesting diet is a “substitute for disease-modifying drugs,” but “that doesn’t mean diet has no influence.” And it’s quite likely, she says, that weight loss helps, because body fat has proven inflammatory effects. In general, she says, it’s smart to eat lots of vegetables, fiber, and healthy fats, including inflammation-fighting omega-3 fatty acids found in nuts and fish.

Mullen, who now lives in California and works as a podcaster and nutritional consultant, says he has no doubts that changing his diet totally transformed his life.

In his most recent book, Real Food Heals, he puts it this way: “Each day, I feel a little bit stronger, a little bit more complete. This experience has been nothing short of a miracle for me.”

STARTUP

SUPER

STAR

by Jennifer Brookland

On an early December night, in a North Carolina Central University classroom, Ravila Gupta sat exhausted as a law school professor discussed torts. Night school was Gupta’s only option, since she was working full-time as an engineer. She was making use of every moment, memorizing legal outlines in her car when she pulled up to red lights, and opening her books to study when she got home at 10 p.m. every night. Every minute was precious.

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Gupta felt like she’d chosen to step off of the world for four years, exiling herself from her friends, from her life—giving up time with her family and time for herself. It was all so hard.

But was it worth it? “I just can’t do this anymore; it’s far too much,” Gupta thought. “This is too big a price to pay.”

Then she thought about something else. Her six-year-old son, Neel, sitting in the back of the law classroom with the other children whose parents didn’t have childcare. If she quit now, what message would that send him? If she didn’t do something because it was hard, what kind of role model would she be?

The questioning moments of defeatism Gupta felt as a law student were out of character.

Gupta is a charge ahead, tackle anything kind of doer who is not at all prone to self-doubt.

The decision to stay the course, get her J.D. and keep forging ahead was a more accurate reflection of the woman who today is the president and chief executive officer of the Council for Entrepreneurial Development (CED).

Forging Ahead Founded more than 35 years ago, CED is North Carolina’s oldest nonprofit dedicated to strengthening startups in the state. It connects foundling companies and visionary entrepreneurs with resources, financial backing, mentorship, and each other.

Gupta took its helm in 2017. At the time, she had no entrepreneurial experience save watching her parents open and run a furniture business in their retirement. It didn’t matter. Gupta had no doubt she could do it. In fact, she knew the job would combine all the skills and ways of thinking she’d honed over an ambitious and winding career path.

Gupta started out as an engineering student, along with her two sisters.

They were the first trio of female siblings to graduate from McGill University’s engineering program.

But to the girls, their accomplishments were simply expectations met—to-dos checked off a list.

“We lived in a house where hard work was something that you just did,” Gupta says. In the 1960s, her parents emigrated from India to the U.S., where they hoped to make a better life for themselves. Her mother rose through the ranks as an executive, and her father was an engineering professor. For their daughters, there was no option: Education was the ultimate priority.

“School was just what you did,” Gupta says. “There was no question about how hard you’d study or that you were going to continue studying.”

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Ravila Gupta poses for a photo with her son, Neel.

Fortunately for Gupta, the pressure to excel in school never created an aversion to learning. Instead, learning became a lifelong passion. This quest for knowledge has propelled her every professional move, from her early days as a chemical engineer who switched into environmental engineering.

Then, as an engineer who went to law school. A lawyer who became a company president. And a president who took a look at everything she had to offer and decided to give back.

This thirst for learning kept Gupta in her seat in that law school classroom three nights a week, where she hoped she’d learn a new way to approach problems and gain a new skill set.

Studying the law indeed provided a whole new lens through which to view things. Her engineering experience had trained her to Ravila Gupta and others listen to President Barack Obama speak with business leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. see the world as a series of problems and solutions. What was wrong—and how she could fix it. But from a legal perspective, nothing was binary or empirical; the solutions were always tempered with pros and cons and consequences.

“When you’re trained as an engineer, there’s always a problem, and you’re trained to find answers,” Gupta says.

“As an attorney, you’re trained to look at options and downsides.” As both, Gupta says she became solutiondriven but also aware of the bigger picture, cognizant of all the possibilities and repercussions.

“

BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images

Well, Why Not Me?

When you’re trained as an engineer, there’s always a problem, and you’re trained to find answers. As an attorney, you’re trained to look at options and downsides.

Ravila Gupta

”

Gupta took a job at a Raleigh law firm after graduation, but in 2008, she moved on to be general counsel at Umicore USA, a subsidiary of the Brussels-based materials technology and recycling company that employs more than 10,000 people and brings in more than $10 billion. Three years later, Gupta was Umicore USA’s president.

It was a heady position, punctuated by surreal opportunities. During a roundtable discussion on foreign investment that Gupta was invited to at the White House, she strolled around the table looking for her name card. She finally found it, next to an unmarked place with a blue folder and a cup of green tea: President Barack Obama’s seat.

“Well, why not me?” Gupta thought as she took her seat beside the president’s.

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“

I’ve constantly been on a journey. Every single job. It was like, OK, what can I learn from this person? What can I learn from this decision? What can I learn from this industry? I didn’t realize early on that that’s what I was doing—I felt like I was just being myself, and I was constantly searching for knowledge from people or new ideas.

”

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Winter | 2020

She was the only woman at the table. Indeed, Gupta is the only woman and person of color at many of the tables she sits at. But those are aspects of her identity that don’t take up much headspace.

“I don’t lead with that. I have a heritage and culture that’s really rich, and it’s shaped who I am, but I just view myself as trying to do the best I can,” she says. “It doesn’t even come to my mind a lot of the time.”

What does come to mind—all the time—is how to keep learning.

That manifests in simple, day-to-day things, like Gupta’s obsession with nonfiction reading.

Gupta is never without a book, and she reads constantly, everything from biographies to a recent release explaining all facets of the human body. “I can’t put that book down because I’m gaining knowledge at all times,” Gupta says.

“I just have this insatiable desire to know things and understand, and it helps me connect dots in the world.”

After nine years at Umicore, Gupta was also connecting the dots of her own career. She loved her job at Umicore USA, and it was a company she felt great about working for.

But was there something new to learn elsewhere?

Connecting the Dots “I’ve constantly been on a journey,” says Gupta. “Every single job. It was like, OK, what can I learn from this person? What can I learn from this decision? What can I learn from this industry? I didn’t realize early on that that’s what I was doing—I felt like I was just being myself, and I was constantly searching for knowledge from people or new ideas.”

Gupta knew herself and knew what motivated her. She needed to master something new.

And she wanted to do something beyond learn; she wanted to teach. Over the course of her career, she’d amassed not just a wealth of skills and a trove of knowledge, but multiple ways of viewing and solving problems.

She’d also shaped herself into an astute leader. Inspired by executive coaching she received as Umicore’s president, Gupta had gone back to the classroom yet again, to earn her coaching certificate. She learned that the way she tended to jump in and solve problems her team was having was not as effective as helping them realize and develop their own solutions.

“I noticed that my coach never told me what to do or how to do it, but she asked me questions,” Gupta says. “And I began to realize that the answer is actually inside, you just need to pull the answer out.”

As she learned to coach and applied the practices to her own team, Gupta saw how powerful an approach it was. It forced her to step back and to allow space for creativity. And it allowed her to build strong, invested teams.

Gupta decided she wanted to apply all of her executive and leadership experience to a smaller team she could really influence, with a mission-driven focus she could feel passionate about.

She wanted to lead an organization she could personally reshape.

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Paying It Forward It was perfect timing for CED, whose chief executive officer and president was stepping down just as Gupta was looking for that unicorn role that would make use of her combined experiences.

“I was looking for a place where I could take everything I had and all the leadership skills I’d developed and be super impactful, just really help an organization transform itself,” Gupta says. “Can I take everything and put it in one place and see the results of my work in a very quick manner?”

Less than three years later, the answer seems to be yes.

Gupta has already presided over a major overhaul of the organization’s business model and strategy, a move she expects to result in increased funding, financial sustainability, and improved engagement.

project. She personally helps companies understand how they can share the story behind their company and the importance of doing so. She tries to keep them feeling steady as they weather the ups and downs of an uncertain and high-stakes life.

Gupta also gets to see her work transforming CED reverberate through the entrepreneurial companies it supports.

“The nice thing about CED is you have direct impact to an entrepreneurial company, and that impact can be large,” she says.

“That’s what’s really exciting about it. As a small team of nine people, when we touch a company, we see it right then.”

There are plenty of those ambitious young companies to reach out to. North Carolina is home to a unique and incredibly collaborative ecosystem of startups of many stripes. Having both tech and life sciences in the same, supportive scene is special in and of itself.

And they’re not just ambitious, but incredibly successful, too.

Companies in North Carolina brought in a record $2.7 billion in venture funding in 2018, led by Epic Games, Precision BioSciences, and Humacyte.

“This area is so special. It’s grown so much in the last however many

Winter | 2020

CED helps entrepreneurs navigate their way around this ecosystem, providing connections, support, and guidance as they look for assistance of all sorts. “I think that’s really, really important, just to make sure that they know this community’s behind them and wants them to succeed,” says Gupta.

Failure is not an option. Gupta doesn’t believe in it. There are setbacks and obstacles, challenges, and perhaps disappointments.

But she doesn’t trade in doubts or fears. Not when it comes to her own life and work, and not when it comes to others’. That kind of certainty can be a kind When Gupta speaks with entrepreneurial of sword and shield all its own leaders, she keeps them in touch with their for the startups Gupta works with. why—the passion behind their all-consuming

After Hurricane Florence foiled CED’s biannual tech conference plans, Gupta quickly rebounded by combining it with the organization’s upcoming life sciences conference—a revenuesaving move that also produced a synergistic joint event she now plans to replicate every year.

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years, and the ecosystem here has really blossomed a lot,” Gupta says.

“It’s very collaborative, and it’s very encouraging for companies.”

The Greatest Joy

When Gupta speaks with entrepreneurial leaders, she keeps them in touch with their why—the passion behind their all-consuming project. She personally helps companies understand how they can share the story behind their company and the importance of doing so. She tries to keep them feeling steady as they weather the ups and downs of an uncertain and high-stakes life.

For Gupta, her why is simple. It’s her team. And it’s there that Gupta feels she’s made the greatest contribution. She encourages their passions and sets a unified direction. She brings them opportunities for professional development so that they can keep learning and growing.

“For me,” she says, “that’s been the greatest joy.”

Perhaps a new learning opportunity will present itself alluringly to Gupta in the future—maybe even a startup idea of her own. But for now, there’s plenty of pleasure to be found both within and beyond work. In the pages of a fascinating book, of course. But also, in her travels around the world. In foreign cities, Gupta makes it a special mission to find the best and most authentic restaurants to try. She especially loves embarking on those quests with her son—the 30-yearold venture capitalist in London who was once a little boy sitting in the back of the classroom looking up to his mom.

ABOUT THE COUNCIL FOR ENTREPRENEURIAL DEVELOPMENT Formed in 1984 by a group of business leaders, the Council for Entrepreneurial Development (CED) is a North Carolina nonprofit organization dedicated to connecting regional entrepreneurs with the resources they need to build and launch successful businesses.

For more than 35 years, CED has partnered with a network of supporters, giving startups the chance to get mentoring, financial backing, education, and other resources needed to turn a new company into a success story.

If you’re just getting started with a new company and need support, or if you’re an experienced entrepreneur wanting to foster a young company’s success, CED facilitates the ideal connections.

600 Park Offices Drive, Suite 100, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709 919.549.7500 | cednc.org

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HOMEGROWN B HEAlthy

by Jeanne Lee

“To nurture a garden is to feed not just the body, but the soul,� said 18th-century English poet Alfred Austin. He was a lover of nature and wise to the fact that growing your own food turns out to be wonderful for your health. With its many therapeutic benefits to the gardener in addition to supplying fresh and colorful produce, gardening is a double win.

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Tending a vegetable garden is a prescription-free way to lower blood pressure, promote heart health, and reduce the risk of age-related memory loss, research from Good Housekeeping shows.

Weeding and digging also burns lots of calories while exposing you to vitamin D-producing sunlight.

And, of course, gardeners are more apt to eat plenty of nutritious plant-based foods.

Select a Spot Inspect the sunny areas in your yard. Most leafy and root vegetables need six to eight hours of direct sunlight to thrive, while plants with fruits—like cucumbers and tomatoes—require eight to 10 hours. That’s because generating flowers, fruits, and seeds requires the plant to use more energy from sunlight.

You don’t need a big garden at first. “Start small, even as small as A vegetable patch can be a very effective stress reliever. Gardeners four feet by four feet,” says Lucy Bradley, professor of urban who worked outdoors for 30 minutes were found to have brighter horticulture at North Carolina State University and extension moods and lower levels of salivary cortisol—the stress hormone specialist at North Carolina State Extension. It’s better to be that contributes to belly fat—than those successful with a small garden than to who relaxed by reading indoors for the overextend. If you don’t have a yard, a same amount of time, according to a few 12-inch pots on a deck are enough In a 2006 Australian study of 2011 Dutch study in the Journal of to provide a household with plenty of more than 2,800 people over Health Psychology. lettuce, carrots, radishes, and herbs for salads. You can expand the garden next age 60, daily gardening was Light gardening and yard work can year as you gain experience and keep you trim by burning about 330 confidence. associated with a 36 percent calories per hour—that’s more than decrease in the risk of dementia. you’d burn while walking, bicycling, or Gardens tend to do better on high doing a light workout with weights, ground where there is good air according to the Centers for Disease movement and less frost. Vegetables Control. need an average of one inch of water per week, so choose a plot that’s convenient to a water source—that way you won’t have to Gardening can keep your mind sharper longer. In a 2006 drag a hose too far.

Australian study of more than 2,800 people over age 60, daily gardening was associated with a 36 percent decrease in the risk of Decide What to Plant dementia. Getting your hands in the dirt regularly also exposes your immune system to healthy microorganisms, according to Make a list of what you want to plant, noting the target planting researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder. date for each vegetable. “Grow what you and your family like to eat, what is hard to find, expensive to purchase, and what thrives in Inspired to start your own garden? Spring is still a way off, but your climate and soil,” says Bradley. the frosty months ahead are the perfect time to make preparations for a vegetable and herb garden for when the first If you like making homemade pizza, plant heirloom tomatoes, signs of spring appear. basil, oregano, and peppers. Baby lettuces, dill, and cucumbers could go outside your back door, accessible for salads. Foodies A rich resource for beginner gardeners is a local cooperative might want to plant specialty vegetables like broccolini or bok choy extension office, which provides information for homeowners that aren’t always available in stores. For yards with limited sun, about gardening basics and what grows well in their area. Each stick to shade-tolerant options like broccoli, cabbage, kale, lettuce, county in the U.S. has an extension office that works closely with spinach, beets, or carrots. experts from universities and helps provide information about gardening, agriculture, and pest control.

Plan for a staggered harvest. Arugula and butter lettuce are fast-growing for early harvest. Kale and spinach are known as cut In most cases, you can find the phone number for your local and come again vegetables, because you can snip some leaves and county extension office in the government section of your phone come back for more a few days later. Peas and green beans take book or by Googling your state name followed by “extension time to ripen, though their flavor when you snack off the vine is office.” bright and alive compared to store-bought ones.

But no matter how you plan to get going on your garden plot, there are a few key things every aspiring vegetable gardener should consider.

Consider adding some edible flowers to your garden like early American settlers did. Marigolds and chrysanthemums, in addition to being a treat for the eyes, provide a habitat for

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beneficial insects, enhancing pollination. Squash flowers are a delicious treat when battered and fried. Bright orange and red nasturtiums add a peppery punch to salads, plus they deter deer.

Minced fresh flowers can be folded into cheese spreads, herb butters, or pancakes.

“Raised beds are useful where the ground soil stays too moist for healthy roots or the soil is highly compacted or contaminated,” says Bradley. Raised beds can be fancy or simple, and they can be built from wood, stone, or any materials that haven’t been treated with chemicals, since those could leach into the soil.

Evaluate the Soil

A common approach is to use stacked 2" by 6" boards joined in the corners by 4" by 4" posts. Another approach is to use concrete blocks. While less pleasing to the eye, they are inexpensive to source and easy to use. On the market are also prefab raised garden bed solutions, which are made from long-lasting polyethylene that is UV stabilized and food grade, so it will not leach undesirable chemicals into the soil or deteriorate from being outside in the elements.

The ideal soil holds air, water, and nutrients in a balance of sand, silt, clay, and organic matter. The easiest way to find out what kind of soil you have is to pick up a trowel’s worth and hold it in your hands. Rich, healthy soil is something you know when you feel it: It’s easy to dig and drains well.

A simple home soil test purchased from your local gardening store can help you identify your soil so you can improve it—whether it needs fertility, absorbency, or drainage.

Keep in mind that using native plants from your region and climate will make your job easier,

as these plants Or you may want to have your soil evaluated professionally by your local adapted to the extension office. In most counties, you would simply dig up a few soil samples for testing and mail them in. In a few weeks, you’d receive an online report about the makeup of your soil, the pH level, nutrient content, and recommendations for lime or fertilizer to apply to fortify it.

You want soil that is dark, crumbly, and literally full of life. Based on region and climate, though, soil can be gritty, powdery, or sticky when wet. But if you’re working with the red clay of Georgia, the sandy clay of Texas, or the caliche of Arizona, it doesn't mean you won't be able to grow a healthy garden.

Keep in mind that using native plants from your region and climate will make your job easier, as these plants are likely welladapted to the soil of your area.

Consider Raised Beds If your soil isn’t the best, a raised-bed garden may be a good option. This method of gardening can help keep pathway weeds from your garden soil, prevent soil compaction, provide good drainage, extend the planting season, and serve as a barrier to pests such as slugs and snails.

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Start Seedlings Indoors

For a head start, you can start seedlings indoors while it’s still cold out. About six to eight weeks before the planting date, sow the seeds in containers of soil, are likely wellfollowing the packet directions. As a rule of thumb, plant the seeds two or soil of your area. three times as deep as the diameter of the seed, and cover lightly but firmly, making sure there is good contact with the soil.

Cucumbers, for example, need soil temperatures of at least 60 degrees, but you can plant the seeds about one inch deep in cups or pots. Once they reach four inches in height, they’re ready for transplanting. Before moving seedlings, take a few days or a week to harden them to the weather by putting them outside for a few hours each day. The plants should be spaced two feet apart in rows that are four feet apart, or near a trellis so they can climb upward.

After the danger of frost is past, you can plant the rest of your seeds and add small plants from garden centers, catalogs, or online.

Staggering planting of, say, sections of lettuce, at one- to two-week intervals, sets you up for continual harvest later in the season. As you harvest a crop, you can replant that area.

As you care for your green charges, you might find yourself so absorbed by their natural rhythms that time flies by unnoticed, worries fall away, and your heart rate slows. Between eating lots of fresh produce, spending more time in the sunshine, and getting regular exercise, don’t be surprised if your next medical checkup shows positive results.

Room to grow Looking for a simple and organized way to build a produce garden? Square foot gardening is a popular method of creating small, orderly, and productive vegetable gardens. We’ve been digging through Food Grown Right, in Your Backyard: A Beginner’s Guide to Growing Crops at Home to get the facts on how many square feet you would need to feed yourself, your family, or a gang of hungry friends.

Bell Pepper

Number of 4'x8' Garden Beds Needed to Feed Your Family

Eggplant

Head Lettuce Cucumbers

Corn Leaf Lettuce

Leeks

Peas

Cilantro

Spinach

Garlic

Carrots Green Onions Radishes 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

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Number of Plants per Square Foot (according to mysquarefootgarden.net)

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Finding the Best in an Empty Nest

by Kim Painter

A couple of years after Sheryl Lynn and Curtis Johnson sent their younger son off to college, they had a slightly awkward phone conversation with him.

“Connor called and said, ‘I think I’m going to come home for spring break,’” Curtis recalls. “But we had to tell him, ‘No, you’re not.’”

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It turns out that Connor had forgotten a small detail: His parents had recently sold the family home in Moorpark, California, and moved into a recreational vehicle on a nearby avocado ranch they’d purchased years earlier. Curtis, 59, an executive pastor at a large church, and Sheryl Lynn, 56, a Realtor, ended up living in that RV for more than two years while building their new dream home there.

In other words, once they had an empty nest, they flew out of it themselves—and into a new phase of life.

“We didn’t sit around and mope,” Curtis says. While the couple loved raising their sons, now ages 28 and 25, they were excited to “pursue the things we wanted to pursue,” he says.

Happy or sad, the transition is big. And, experts say, it pays to do some planning and soulsearching before the day you find yourself sitting in a quiet house and wondering, “What’s next?”

Not everyone leaps into the empty nest years with such gusto.

Many shed at least a few tears when their last child leaves home. Some struggle with the adjustment. Still, experts say full-blown empty nest syndrome—characterized by depression, loneliness, and yearning for the lost joys of the child-rearing years—is more a media invention than a widespread reality.

Another common belief is that marriages fall apart after kids leave home.

It’s true that some do. But studies show that couples who stay together actually tend to get happier once they have the house to themselves.

Still, happy or sad, the transition is big. And, experts say, it pays to do some planning and soul-searching before the day you find yourself sitting in a quiet house and wondering, “What’s next?”

Time for You to Take a Back Seat More than a decade ago, Natalie Caine went to a meeting at her daughter’s high school. The headmaster wanted parents to think about the fact that they “were all about to become empty nesters,” Caine said.

That reality knocked her back on her heels. “I turned around to my friends and said, ‘If I start a support group, will you come?’”

Caine, 68, who trained as a speech therapist, has since made a new career of helping others manage life transitions. She speaks about the challenges and joys of empty nesting at spas, corporate retreats, and other settings.

Along the way, she’s learned that most parents still in the thick of carpooling, curfews, and family vacations are not very focused on what comes next. But they should be, she says, especially as children move through high school.

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Among the essential tasks, she says, is starting to let go. “It’s time for you to begin to take a back seat,” she says. “Let your child lead more.” That means cheering them on and offering support, rather than telling them what to do. It means commiserating, rather than criticizing, when they make mistakes.

Equally essential, she says, is to think about “what matters to you now,” and to prepare for new possibilities.

EMPTY NESTING ISN’T WHAT IT USED TO BE The empty nest isn’t what it used to be. For better or worse, the experience of being a parent to young adults has changed dramatically in recent decades, according to research reviewed by Karen Fingerman, a professor of human development and family sciences and co-director of the Texas Aging and Longevity Center at The University of Texas at Austin. In a research paper published in 2017, Fingerman and her colleagues said that when compared with their own parents and grandparents, today’s parents of young adults can expect:

Susan Gross, a career coach and human resource manager who lives in Cape Coral, Florida, agrees: “Wouldn’t it be beautiful if parents would take a minute to say, ‘Life is about to get crazy. What am I doing to prepare myself?’”

Gross, 58, who is the mother of sons ages 24 and 26, is the co-author of a book of advice and personal stories called The Empty Nest Companion. She says she was not prepared when her first son left for college.

“I fell apart dropping off my child” at a college just a few miles from home, she says.

She remembers thinking, “Life will never be the same; this is the beginning of the end.”

But what if “never the same” isn’t so bad?

Gross and her co-author, Briget Bishop, 62, a professional life coach who lives in Williamsburg, Virginia, agree with Caine that the best way to deal with change is to embrace it.

Do you have a social life built around kids’ activities? Maybe it’s time to make some new friends. Do you have a job you kept because the hours worked with parenting? Maybe you could think about a new career. Did you leave the workforce? Maybe it’s time to get some training and jump back in. Have you let physical fitness, old hobbies, or spiritual practices fall away in the chaos of family life?

Guess what? You are about to have another chance.

“It’s a chance to explore parts of you that went dormant,” Caine says.

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More frequent contact with their offspring. In surveys conducted several decades ago, just half of parents said they had contact with a grown child at least once a week. In more recent surveys, most parents report contact at least once a week with at least one grown child, and half report daily contact. Cheaper phone calls, air travel, and new technologies, like texting, have made staying in touch easier.

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More spending on grown children (and not just for college).

Today’s parents spend an average of 10 percent of their income on grown children, rivaling amounts spent by parents of young children and outpacing amounts spent on teenagers. By some estimates, more than a third of the financial costs of parenting occur after children reach age 18. And parents from the higher socioeconomic levels provide the most support.

More emotional and practical support of their children.

Parents help young adults with everything from making doctors’ appointments to filling out tax forms. Parents also are more available than in the past to offer emotional support about everything from romantic difficulties to job woes. When they become grandparents, many offer parenting advice and child care.

More children who stay in the nest—or come back. In 2015, young adults in the U.S. were more likely to live with their parents than with a romantic partner. As of 2016, 15 percent of 25- to 35-year-olds were living in their parents’ homes. That’s up from 10 percent in 2000 and 8 percent in 1964, according to a separate report from the Pew Research Center.

EMPTY NEST AUTHORITIES: SUSAN GROSS AND BRIGET BISHOP Author Briget Bishop, 62,

Author Susan Gross, 58, of

a professional life coach

Cape Coral, Florida, is a

who lives in

career coach and human

Williamsburg, Virginia,

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is the mother of two

two grown sons. She

grown daughters. Here’s

shares her philosophy in

how she talks about her life

The Empty Nest Companion:

now in The Empty Nest Companion:

“Life is a series of transitions—some good,

“New patterns and new traditions are now

some bad, some just plain difficult. Life is

a daily part of my life. I embrace change

about moving forward, and to do so, you

where before I would run from it. I am

have to be nimble and learn how to navigate

trying new things that I would have never

the changes; it’s a matter of choice on how

done before.... The empty nest gave me a

we deal with the emotions.”

What About Your Marriage?

One of the things that can go dormant, especially in our kid-centric times, is marital bliss. While it’s true that most marriages improve once the kids move along, the years when your children are in high school are prime time for assessing the state of your union, says Daniel Dashnaw, a marriage and family therapist with Couples Therapy, Inc., in Boston.

totally new perspective.”

Do you have a social life built around kids’ activities? Maybe it’s time to make some new friends. Do you have a job you kept because the hours worked with parenting? Maybe you could think about a new career.

The key to navigating any predictable transition as a couple— whether it’s retirement or empty nesting—is talking about it for at least five years in advance, he says.

“You have to start envisioning everything, from what you will do to where you will live,” he says. Couples with a “shared dream,” vividly imagined, he says, are more likely to invest in making that dream a reality.

Of course, some couples will discover that they don’t share the same vision.

At that point, some “decide they will stay together for the sake of the kids, then get a divorce” once the kids leave home, Dashnaw says. But, he says, that strategy often backfires, because parents underestimate the effect a divorce has on grown children. Some come to believe “their whole childhood was a lie,” he says.

Dashnaw urges couples to work on their issues, to divorce only for “hard reasons,” and then to be honest with children, no matter what their ages are. He stresses that honesty does not mean using your grown children as sounding boards for your complaints about your spouse or ex-spouse.

For parents who make it through the transition, the key to reigniting or keeping the spark alive is novelty, Dashnaw says. “It’s very important to have novel experiences together,” he says, to build emotional bonds.

And the new experiences don’t have to be big exotic vacations or cross-country moves. “It can be trying miniature golf,” he says. “It can be going to a play if you always go to movies. It can be going to a rock concert if you usually go to symphonies.”

Caine agrees. She suggests couples explore a new neighborhood in their town or a new aisle in their favorite bookstore.

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For Curtis and Sheryl Lynn Johnson, the couple who built a new home soon after their children moved out, part of the fun of the empty nest is the ability to take laid-back vacations with friends. For each of the past six years, they’ve headed out with another couple—CAPTRUST Financial Advisor Mark Davis and his wife, Tricia—for an autumn empty-nesters trip.

“We do what we like to do,” Curtis says. “We like to walk. We like to eat. We like to sleep. We like a nice glass of wine.”

And, yes, the couples do discuss their kids, Curtis and Sheryl Lynn say, but only for about one day out of the week.

Change Is Inevitable

An empty nest does not mean the end of the parentoffspring relationship, especially in our age of easy texting and cheap phone calls. But it does change that relationship.

An empty nest does not mean the end of the parent-offspring relationship, especially in our age of easy texting and cheap phone calls.

But it does change that relationship. Ideally, adult children become masters of their own lives, and parents take back seats. That can be tough at times, Gross says. Even today, she says, “I miss my daily routines of seeing my kids after school every day and knowing what they are doing.”

But it helps, she says, that her younger son often calls her on his way home from work and shares news about his brother. The brothers, both launched on careers, own a home together. It also helps, she says, that she’s made her own life in a new community, where she lives with her longtime partner, and has made new friends at her synagogue and elsewhere.

“Sometimes routines can be stifling,” she says. “As long as you understand that change is inevitable, you can navigate this in a positive and exciting way.”

Her co-author, Bishop, says she struggled after her two daughters, now in their early 30s, left home around the same time that her marriage fell apart. In an essay in the book, she remembers walking every Saturday morning with two friends going through similar issues: “We talked about our sadness and our difficult journey for the first two miles, then we turned around and took turns praying for one another during the second two miles.”

Today, Bishop is happily single and lives near both daughters, one of whom has two children.

She has found purpose and meaning in her family life and volunteer work.

Her message for anyone struggling with the empty nest: “You’re not done yet. There’s life out there, and you have to go get it.”

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Winter | 2020

Foyr-Legged Fostering

by Jeanne Lee

In 2015, Karen Denise walked into an animal shelter to volunteer as a dog walker.

Having grown up with dogs, she had always loved spending time with them, though her busy work schedule precluded getting her own permanent pet. “I have commitment issues,” she joked. While there, she learned about a new opportunity—fostering dogs.

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It’s said that when you foster an animal, two lives are saved. The dog that’s removed from an overcrowded shelter is spared from possible euthanasia, and a space is opened up for another dog. “That altruistic part really appealed to me,” says Denise, senior director of wealth client services at CAPTRUST in Raleigh.

She signed up for the foster program and soon got a call about Mighty Mouse.

deeply fulfilling, without the commitment.

“A lot of people don’t know about fostering. They think adoption is the only way to help,” says Denise. If you have the space for a four-legged guest, there are foster opportunities ranging from a few hours to a few years.

“There are always animals needing to be fostered. The summer is especially busy for puppies and kittens, because animals go into season in the spring and have litters,” says Chelsey Bosak, foster home recruiter and programs department administrative coordinator for Helping Paws, Inc., of Hopkins, Minnesota.

A three-year-old shepherd mix who had been a stray, Mighty Mouse had a comical appearance due to a medical condition that caused his eyelids to roll back. The animal shelter had scheduled corrective surgery to make him healthy for adoption, but wanted Denise to take him afterward and provide a calm environment for recovery. As he healed in her home, he became relaxed and playful, and he seemed to know she had helped him.

“I felt Mighty Mouse was very grateful to be out of the shelter,” says Denise, who kept him for a few months until he was adopted.

Denise felt she had gotten as much, if not more, out of that fostering experience as Mighty Mouse did. So, she kept going. And going.

Helping Paws relies heavily on foster families, although it doesn’t work with shelter animals. The nonprofit organization trains service dogs who are bred for the job for two and a half years and places them with individuals with physical disabilities, veterans, or first responders with posttraumatic stress disorder.

The volunteer foster home trainers take home the puppies when they are eight weeks old and take them to classes each week to learn necessary skills, such as opening doors, picking up items, and taking care of their people. “It’s a big responsibility, like having a child in your home. By the time the dogs graduate, they’ve been trained into service dogs,” says years.

Bosak.

The next call that came was for a pit bull mix, Lucy. “A lot of people are drawn to puppies the same way they are drawn Puppies are adorable, but many to babies,” says Denise. At eight years old, Lucy was an older dog who was households aren’t ready for a at risk of being euthanized. “She had partnership that can last 12 to 15 the saddest eyes, and she was on doggy death row with a ‘final hold But fostering a dog can be deeply date’ for the following week. So I said fulfilling, without the commitment.

‘OK, I’ll foster this dog.’”

With Lucy, it was not love at first sight, but it grew into love. Lucy proved to be fiercely protective, and the two bonded to such a degree that Denise would find herself in tears when families showed interest in possibly adopting Lucy. It soon became clear that she was meant to keep Lucy for life. “She was the sweetest dog, and I had her for four years,” says Denise.

Benefits of Fostering

A growing body of research shows that fostering, even short term, greatly improves shelter dogs’ wellness and helps them get adopted.

Animal foster programs have evolved to offer more flexible options to volunteers, so that people with limited time or resources can host a pet, too.

When you’re a dog lover without a pooch in the house, nothing else can really fill that dog-shaped hole. Though you crave the companionship of a furry friend, there’s often some good reason or other—travel, complicated lives, commitment phobia—why it’s not the right time to add a permanent pet to the family.

Foster programs save shelter animals’ lives and help them find homes more quickly. When foster families take dogs out to restaurants and parks, they’re more likely to attract the attention of potential adoptive families who might otherwise have gotten pets from breeders or pet stores, according to a 2014 study published in the journal PLoS One.

Puppies are adorable, but many households aren’t ready for a partnership that can last 12 to 15 years. But fostering a dog can be

Fostering relieves pressure on overtaxed animal shelters and makes dogs more adoptable. In one study, dogs with low chances of

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The Helping Paws team

adoption due to poor health or age were placed in foster homes temporarily. After returning to the shelter, their average odds of eventually finding a permanent home increased fivefold, according to a 2018 study published in the journal Animals.

Short foster home stays help dogs get socialized and bring out attractive aspects of their personalities. “The shelter is kind of a depressing place. The dogs, especially if they came from a home, can be very confused, and their personalities don’t come out,” says Denise.

Even a one- or two-night stay in a comfortable home gives pups a break from the shelter and decreases their stress. Dogs awaiting adoption at four animal shelters had lower levels of cortisol, a stress hormone, and showed other physiological benefits after spending two nights in a foster home, according to an Arizona State University study.

Types of Dog-Foster Programs Want to foster a dog? Short outings and weekend programs are becoming popular, along with adult dog fostering. Options run the gamut from an hourlong walk in the park to a hosting and training relationship of a few years.

• Field trips. If you can’t have a pet due to your schedule, or you’re considering adoption, a brief doggie date can be a fun way to get familiar with different breeds and learn what would suit you. Shelter dogs delight in a trip to a park, a walk in the woods, or a chance to practice basic obedience commands like “sit” or “stay.” Plus, the resulting photo ops can improve adoption chances.

• Sleepover or weekend fostering. A one- or two-night visit provides a fun experience for humans and measurable health benefits for the dogs. Check to see whether animal shelters in your area offer weekend or holiday fostering events that could be something novel for your family to do.

• Adult dog fostering. Since people love adopting puppies, adult dogs often languish in shelters. Older dogs are in desperate need of temporary homes where they can feel cared for and calm.

They show improvements in happiness, mood, and friendliness after just one day in foster care, with even greater well-being after longer periods, according to Maddie’s Fund, an animal welfare foundation with headquarters in Pleasanton, California.

• Service dog training. This intensive volunteer opportunity isn’t for everyone, but long-term foster families are needed to host service dogs in training. “We have all different kinds of people fostering—college students, families with kids, and couples with other animals in the home. We get some empty nesters who are looking for a passion project. The biggest thing we look for is someone who can commit to the two-and-a-half years, and then be able to pass that dog along to the person who is going to receive the service dog,” says Helping Paws’ Bosak. Saying goodbye to a dog you’ve helped train from a puppy might be the toughest part, but you’ll have the satisfaction of sending him or her on to a useful career.

To find service dog opportunities near you, Bosak suggests searching for an accredited service dog organization through Assistance Dogs International (assistancedogsinternational.org) and contacting them to ask about fostering.

For those who believe they could never foster a pet because it would be too hard to say goodbye when the pet is adopted, consider the alternative. You become an important part of the mission to save homeless pets by not only giving that individual animal hope, but also by making a difference for all animals.

It may be hard to say goodbye to a dog after you’ve bonded with him or her, but it’s important to remember that by opening your home, you are saving a life—and each pet you foster is a new life saved.

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Wishes and Worries for 2020

by Kevin Barry and Sam Kirby

One of modern investment theory’s key underpinnings is the idea that markets is true—and markets are efficient—then prices should change when new information emerges. When companies announce good or bad news, prices should quickly adjust to reflect the new state.

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Winter | 2020

Gabrielle Burke

are efficient and that security prices reflect all available information. If this

However, prices reflect not only the current state of things; they must also embed assumptions about the future. And the greater the degree of uncertainty surrounding the future, the more compensation—in the form of return—investors should demand.

government shutdowns and gridlock. On top of that, investors and policymakers alike worried that the global economy was heading toward recession.

Over the course of 2019, as these worries resolved or diminished in investors’ minds, markets rallied. Equity markets climbed the wall to the tune of 31.5 percent returns for the S&P 500. Meanwhile, credit spreads—a measure of bond investors’ risk perceptions—shrank to within striking distance of all-time lows.

Simply put, markets rely on investors’ collective assessment of the likelihood and magnitude of potential negative events—or worries— and the continuation of positive events—or wishes. When worries don’t materialize and wishes do, sentiment improves and prices rise.

An often-heard phrase in the financial media is, “The markets are climbing a wall of worry.” This means that reluctant investors become more and more willing to buy risky assets at higher prices as they tick their worry-list items off, one by one. The reverse is also true. When wishes already baked into prices fail to materialize, both sentiment and prices are likely to fall.

Further, the Federal Reserve resolved a major market worry when it reversed course, making three interest rate cuts. Against concerns over escalating trade tensions, markets celebrated progress toward the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) as a replacement for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and, late in the year, the announcement of a phase one trade deal between the U.S. and China. Lastly, despite much rancor, the current political divide has not translated into stock market volatility or another government shutdown.

Worries and wishes represent opposite sides of the same coin: Yesterday’s resolved worries becoming today’s embedded wishes.

When investing, it’s important to remember both—and say out loud the things you are assuming to be true—to avoid falling off the cliff of wishes that lies at the top of the worry wall.

In this issue of VESTED, we update the list of worries and wishes on the minds of investors in early 2020.

Worry #1: Meager corporate earnings growth

In December 2018, investors stared up at such a wall. After experiencing the worst year for stocks since the financial crisis— with the S&P 500 Index down nearly 20 percent from its high point—investors faced a troubling list of worries. This included concerns over escalating U.S.-China trade tensions, worries that the Federal Reserve was not positioned for slowing global growth, and anxiety that a divisive political environment could lead to

Although you wouldn’t think it given soaring stock prices, U.S. corporate earnings growth was paltry in 2019. As shown below, S&P 500 earnings per share in 2019 had grown only 2 percent year over year, compared to an 18 percent advance in 2018. The earnings pop last year was fueled by the significant reduction in the corporate tax

Figure One: Year-over-Year Earnings per Share Growth vs. S&P 500 Calendar Year Price Return 30% 27%

26% 23% 19%

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2% 0%

-1% -1% -6%

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Year-over-Year Earnings per Share Growth

2015

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2018

2019

Calendar-Year Price Return

Source: CAPTRUST Research

29

rate from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. This tax cut led to a surge in business spending and investment as well as an increase in stock buybacks that serve to elevate earnings on a per-share basis.

It is not uncommon to see S&P 500 earnings growth and price returns move out of sync, and there have been many instances over the past decade when price returns eclipsed earnings growth, or vice versa. But with prices at all-time highs and price-to-earnings ratios indicating that stocks are fully valued, much of the support for future price appreciation must come from growth in corporate profits. Earnings expectations for 2020 reflect improvement from 2019’s low levels toward mid-to-high-single-digit levels. However, it is important to remember that annual earnings estimates have a tendency to start high and trail down as the future becomes clearer.

Worry #2: The state of global economic growth Global economic growth is a critical precondition for rising corporate earnings. One of investors’ largest concerns in 2019 was the decline of gross domestic product growth across the globe, particularly in parts of the world more sensitive to trade conditions, including China, Germany, and emerging market economies. Recently, we have seen signals that global growth conditions may be finding a bottom, including a steepening of the yield curve and improving economic conditions in Europe.

Typically, investors demand higher yields when they tie their money up in bonds for longer periods. This gauge of the market’s confidence in future economic growth conditions can be measured by the yield curve, the difference in yield between short-term and long-term yields.

When the Treasury yield curve flattened and briefly inverted in late summer, many interpreted this event as a prediction of recession. The Fed seemed to take notice and introduced its first rate cut since the financial crisis.

More recently, the yield curve has begun to steepen, a healthy sign. The yield differential between 10-year and 2-year Treasurys recently topped 0.3 percent, the highest point in more than a year for this measure.

Continued stabilization across Europe and reacceleration of growth in China would support the case of an improving global growth backdrop.

Germany’s economy is sensitive to trade conditions with China and the U.S., and Brexit uncertainty, so it represents an important bellwether for global growth conditions. Recently, the country has seen an uptick in auto sales as conditions have firmed across Europe, and its industrial production appears to have stabilized. A closely watched index of economic conditions published by the ifo Institute for Economic Research in Munich increased in December, and measures of economic sentiment have also moved sharply higher, to the highest levels since February 2018.1,2 Continued stabilization across Europe and reacceleration of growth in China would support the case of an improving global growth backdrop.

Worry #3: Political uncertainty Political stability provides a foundation for global economic growth. But here in the U.S., 2020 looks to be a doozy of an election year. As Figure Two shows, stocks have tended to perform reasonably well during presidential reelection years, with average returns of 6.3 percent since 1948 and less volatility than open presidential election years. This reflects investors’ expectations that incumbents tend to win reelection. They view the outcome as more certain, and the markets like certainty. This time may be different given the current level of uncertainty and political fluidity emanating from Washington.

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Winter | 2020

Figure Two: S&P 500 Index Average Performance in Presidential Reelection Years vs. Open Election Years (1936-2016) 112 110

108 106 104

102 100 98

96

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Presidential Reelection Years

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

Open Presidential Election Years

Source: Strategas

A majority of institutional investors believe that President Trump will be reelected. An RBC Capital Markets survey of nearly 120 institutional investors released in December reported that 76 percent of respondents thought he would win.3 If that were to occur, it would likely bring a continuation of current policies and priorities—likely a positive for markets—along with the potential for more trade conflict and tweet-induced volatility.

Wish #1: Trade truce

The phase one trade deal announced in December between the U.S. and China represents progress toward resolving a major obstacle for the global economy—and a positive sign for trade-sensitive economies and companies, business confidence, and profits. The announced truce suspended the tariffs on $160 billion of Chinese imports that had been scheduled to begin on December 15 and However, one worry is the size of the gap between market rolled back some tariffs imposed earlier in the year, in exchange for expectations and approval ratings. The reelection chances cited Chinese purchases of U.S. agriculture products and other above would be more understandable if President Trump’s approval concessions that have not yet been detailed. Both sides of the ratings were similarly high—not dispute have strong incentives to desub-50 percent in the midst of escalate, even if the chances for a more The phase one trade deal impeachment proceedings. This comprehensive trade deal with structural disconnect poses a significant risk if reforms before the elections are small. announced in December between the political environment changes in a the U.S. and China represents way that markets don’t expect.

Once again, this agreement was announced via Twitter, in lieu of a joint progress toward resolving a major If the winds were to shift toward a announcement or other traditional obstacle for the global economy. higher likelihood of a Democratic means. The details of the agreement are wave, then markets would have to not yet public and are likely still in flux. digest the policy uncertainty represented by a change in administration. This is particularly true One reason that trade uncertainty is so troublesome is that it’s right now when the name at the top of the ticket is unclear and the unpredictable. When Congress passes a budget, we know we’re in Democratic candidates represent a wide range of policy views. the clear for a year, until the next budget cycle. But when a trade Depending upon who the nominee is, certain sectors, including truce is announced, even if tensions ease in the short run, there is healthcare, energy, financial, and large technology companies, could no guarantee that it will be formalized or that future milestones face potential headwinds. will be reached.

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And with the 2020 election in sight, there is some concern that a de-escalation with China could merely shift the trade war to other parts of the world. Automobile tariffs on Europe, for example, could be popular among auto workers and Rust Belt voters while damaging Europe’s fragile recovery.

Wish #2: Accommodative policy environment Following its series of three interest rate cuts in 2019, the Fed has signaled a pause as it watches incoming economic data. After the last of these cuts, the minutes of the October Fed meeting explained that policymakers viewed the cuts as sufficient to support growth conditions, a healthy job market, and inflation moving toward its 2 percent target.

At the same time, Chairman Powell’s comments also served to quell the potential worry of negative interest rates (despite pressure from the White House to move in that direction), stating that it did not see negative interest rates as an attractive policy tool.

Despite its pause, the Fed has other ways to supply economic fuel—namely through open-market operations to buy securities and increase the size of its balance sheet. Since mid-October, the Fed has pursued such purchases to the tune of $60 billion per month. When it last employed quantitative easing in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, the Fed was clear that such measures were intended to stimulate lending and investment. This time, it has struck a different tone. In an October speech, Chairman Powell stated that these security purchases were intended as structural measures to “maintain an appropriate level of reserves.”4 Call it what you will, the market reaction has been the same: a green light to lend and invest. If an injection of liquidity increases risk taking and dampens volatility, it has a stimulative effect on markets. However, one potential concern is whether the structural issues cited by the Fed could point to other unforeseen issues.

This year has been a stark contrast and provides a reminder of the perils of market timing. Few years have boasted 30 percent returns from the S&P 500 Index, along with high-single-digit returns for bonds.

From Miserable to Merry The change in tone and sentiment over the past year has been striking. Last December, faced with a range of serious economic worries, stock prices were falling and recession fears were rising. Investors were miserable, and not many strategists were calling for a blockbuster year in 2019.

“ifo Business Climate Index Rises at Year-End (December 2019),” ifo Institute

1

2

“Renewed Rise in Expectations,” ZEW

3

Maranz, Felice, “More Investors Expect Trump to Win in 2020: RBC Survey,” Bloomberg.com

4

Powell, Jerome, “Data-Dependent Monetary Policy in an Evolving Economy,” federalreserve.gov

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Winter | 2020

Gabrielle Burke

This year has been a stark contrast and provides a reminder of the perils of market timing. Few years have boasted 30 percent returns from the S&P 500 Index, along with high-single-digit returns for bonds. When years like this come along, long-term investors can’t afford to miss them. And the only way to reap the rewards is to have and follow a well-constructed and well-understood financial plan. Such a plan provides confidence and ability to stay the course during periods of market uncertainty. The more confident you are in your plan, the less confident you have to be in the markets.

STRONG FINISH TO 2019 All asset classes posted solid results for 2019. U.S. and international stocks and bonds performed well as the Federal Reserve and other central banks implemented policies to counter fears of slowing global economic growth. Despite distracting headlines along the way, patient investors were rewarded with generous gains during this news-driven year.

• While the economy grew only modestly in 2019, U.S. stocks logged their best year since 2013, aided by easing U.S.-China trade tensions and a boost from the Fed. The technology sector was especially strong last year.

• International developed and emerging market stocks also posted strong gains last year despite headwinds created by sluggish economic growth in Europe and China and a strong U.S. dollar.

• Bonds recorded their best year in more than a decade as interest rates fell significantly during the calendar year.

• Public real estate benefited from the helpful combination of low interest rates and favorable market demand.

• Strategic opportunities managed a modest gain for the year but lagged other asset classes.

31.0% 28.9%

21.5%

MARKET INDEX PERFORMANCE (as of 12.31.2019)

Q4 2019

YTD 2019 8.7%

8.9%

9.1%

4.3% 1.6%

0.8%

0.2%

Strategic Opportunities

U.S. Bonds

International Stocks

Real Estate

U.S. Stocks

LOOKING FORWARD Central bank actions to support economic growth have encouraged investors, and, although U.S. economic growth is slowing, consumer spending remains strong, reducing the chances of a recession this year. Meanwhile, two of 2019’s major uncertainties—the U.S.-China trade dispute and Brexit—showed signs of progress as we approached year end, but complete resolutions will take time and may create new turbulence in 2020.

Despite several positive market developments, we are mindful of risks that could cause increased market volatility, such as the presidential impeachment process, the U.S. presidential election, or an uptick in tensions with North Korea or Iran. After last year’s strong gains, stock valuations are relatively full, which could limit further gains unless earnings growth accelerates significantly.

Asset class returns are represented by the following indexes: Russell 3000 Index (U.S. stocks), MSCI All-Country World ex-US Index (international stocks), Bloomberg Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Index (U.S. bonds), Dow Jones U.S. Real Estate Index (real estate), and HFRX Absolute Return Index (strategic opportunities).

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TO HAVE AND TO HOLD

by John Curry

Sooner or later, there will come a time in each of our lives when we will want to downsize. Some may want to simplify their lives after launching their now-adult children into the world. Others may want to rid themselves of their cumbersome earthly possessions to pursue a life of travel and adventure. In other cases, the catalyst may be a difficult life event. For example, keeping up with home maintenance after a health decline or spouse’s death may force the need to downsize.

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Winter | 2020

Regardless of the catalyst, when that time comes, many of us find that the actual act of downsizing is fraught with emotional hurdles and anxieties that can cause us to delay or indefinitely pause moving forward.

A wall full of books, a china set (or two), rooms full of furniture that sit unused, clothes, photos, souvenirs, and memorabilia from a life well-lived: Rather than owning these things, sometimes it feels like they own us.

A significant body of research has also shown that we place value on the things we own because we view them—consciously or not— as an extension of ourselves. And we view gifts as an extension of the giver. These feelings can make letting go of these possessions feel like an abandonment.

We’ve lived with some of our possessions so long that they become part of our stories—and how we define ourselves. Some of our things stir deep memories and carry sentimental value.

But what is this mysterious hold that our possessions have on us? What can we do about it so that we can move forward with less stress and anxiety?

Hold on Tight I paid good money for it, so I can’t just give it away, right? And besides, I may need it later, so I’ll just put it back in the closet.

Does this sound familiar? If so, you’re not alone. And it’s not a phenomenon driven by American consumerism or conspicuous consumption, both of which are recent developments on the human timeline. It goes way back.

For example, in the first sermon after his enlightenment, the Buddha observed that attachment is the root of much of our suffering. Attachment can take many forms: attachment to people, possessions, ideas, or a way of life. Our desire to have these things—or our fear of losing them—is what causes this suffering. That was 2,500 years ago.

Modern behavioral science seems to bear out this ancient wisdom.

One explanation is the endowment effect, a well-studied human behavioral bias toward valuing objects we own more highly than objects we don’t own. Simply put, once something becomes ours, it becomes harder to let go of. The endowment effect applies to ownership of things large and small—from houses and cars to pens and coffee mugs—regardless of how often we use them. We weigh their worth more heavily because we possess them.

Loss aversion, a survival mechanism that served our species well through periods when food, shelter, water, and other necessities of life were difficult to obtain, is a closely related behavioral bias. This fear of losing what we have causes us to place a higher value on things already on our possession.

A significant body of research has also shown that we place value on the things we own because we view them—consciously or not—as an extension of ourselves. And we view gifts as an extension of the giver. These feelings can make letting go of these possessions feel like an abandonment.

These complementary behavioral biases conspire to cause us anxiety when we are faced with giving something away—or even thinking about it. But you don’t have to fall prey to these biases.

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FIGHT THE POWER Once you’re resolved to downsize, put together a plan for what will go where. Be realistic about what you can sell—and the prices you might get—and recognize that even your family may not value your heirlooms as highly as you do. An industry of service providers has sprung up to assist, so don’t feel like you have to go it alone.

The more organized you are, the better able you will be to deal with the endowment effect when it rears its ugly head. While it can have a strong hold on our minds and behavior, a few helpful tricks can help break—or at least lessen—its grip, allowing us to liberate ourselves from our stuff: • Become aware. The first step toward liberation comes from recognizing the pangs of anxiety caused by the endowment effect. If you’re downsizing, that shouldn’t be hard to do. It’s the feeling you get when you open the cupboard and imagine giving your wedding china to one of your grown children. It’s the feeling you get when you consider adding your alma mater sweatshirt to a bag headed for Goodwill. When that pang hits, hit pause.

• Reframe it as a mind trick. The moment you hit pause, you’ll be staring the endowment effect in the face. Tell yourself that the feeling you’re experiencing is a mind trick trying to make you do its bidding. It’s not real. It’s an unhelpful behavioral pattern, and it’s not what you want. When you do that, you separate yourself from the feeling, lessening its hold on you. Interestingly, even imagining that you no longer own it—whatever it is—will weaken your mental attachment to it.

• Refocus on your vision. Remind yourself of what you’re doing and why. Imagine your new life without a big house to keep clean, a mortgage to pay, a leaky roof to fix, or leaves to rake. Walk through your future in your mind, noting only the things you will need. If you’re still having trouble, it may be helpful to write out the reasons why you are downsizing and keep them where you can see them. You do not have to respond to every impulse your brain generates.

• Reinforce your goal with action. With that vision of your uncluttered future etched in your mind, pull the trigger. This is the toughest step. Load your excess furniture into the truck. Seal up the box of books (or china or knickknacks). Put it in the trunk, drop it at its destination, and don’t look back. You won’t regret it. The funny thing is, the more you do it, the better you’ll feel. And the better you feel, the more you’ll do it. A virtuous cycle will begin.

• Take a picture of it. Snap pictures of items with deep sentimental value—and then get rid of them.

It’s the memory you value, not the item itself. And the human brain cannot differentiate between high-resolution images and the real thing, so your digital photo album should allow you to relive those pleasant memories just as effectively as the item itself.

• Make a time capsule. You may find there are some things that you’re on the fence about. If so, put them in a box, seal it up, and date it. Store it in a cool dry place. In six months, if you have not opened the box or needed any of its contents, send it off to an appropriate recipient. Six months out of sight and out of mind should be enough to break the tie.

While the process may seem daunting, one bright spot is the fact that practice makes perfect when it comes to downsizing. If you’ve edited your belongings over the course of your life, it will be easier to make bigger changes later on. And if you’ve got the luxury of time before your big downshift, start practicing now. Weed through your drawers and closets. Donate unused furniture, electronics, and clothes. Doing some of the work now will prove to you that your possessions don’t own you and lighten the burden later.

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Winter | 2020

A Look at

ABLE Accounts

by Neil Downing

When Denise Gehringer talked with friends early on about plans for her son, Jacob, who has Down syndrome, she often heard the same refrain.

“From the day Jake was born, people said, ‘Don’t save anything in his name,’” Gehringer recently recalled. They told her that if someone with a disability had more than $2,000 in cash or other resources, the person might not be able to qualify for certain government benefit programs, such as payments from the federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program and home and community-based services from the joint federal-state Medicaid program.

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So, whenever Jake received cash, checks, or other such gifts—on his birthday, for example—the money typically was spent, not saved, she recalled.

Today, the picture is different. Jake, now 24, is the owner of an Achieving a Better Life Experience (ABLE) account. It’s a special type of savings account intended to help individuals with disabilities pay for disability-related expenses—and it does not count against the individual’s qualifying for government benefit programs.

Congress approved legislation in 2014 creating ABLE accounts “to encourage and assist individuals and families in saving private funds for the purpose of supporting individuals with disabilities to maintain health, independence, and quality of life,” according to the bill.

The bill was also intended to “secure funding for disability-related expenses on behalf of designated beneficiaries with disabilities that will supplement, but not supplant, benefits provided through private insurance” as well as through Medicaid, SSI, the beneficiary’s employment, and other sources.

The federal law allowed states to establish their own ABLE programs. The first, in Ohio, launched in 2016. As of November 2019, 42 states and the District of Columbia have ABLE account programs, said Miranda Kennedy, director of the ABLE National Resource Center, which was founded and is managed by the National Disability Institute in Washington, DC, and serves as an independent clearinghouse for information on ABLE accounts.

“Having a disability is expensive,” Kennedy said. The ABLE account “gives people with disabilities who need public benefits the chance to get out of a life of poverty, to be able to save and grow their money” without jeopardizing those benefits, she said.

Account Basics An account can be opened online, usually for a minimum initial investment of $25 or less. Anyone can contribute, including family members, friends, and the account owner.

Investment options, which vary by state, are typically pretty conservative and often include not only mutual funds, but also

Winter | 2020

Contributions are not federally tax-deductible, but money invested in an ABLE account grows on a tax-deferred basis. Thus, interest, dividends, and capital gains earned inside the account are shielded from federal income tax.

Withdrawals escape tax if used for the disabled person’s needs. The list of what counts for tax-free treatment includes expenses for education, housing, transportation, employment training and support, assistive technology, personal support services, health, prevention and wellness, financial management, administrative services, legal fees, expenses for oversight and monitoring, and funeral and burial expenses, according to Internal Revenue Service Publication 907 (“Tax Highlights for Persons with Disabilities”).

Although some programs in some states require the account owner to be a resident of that state, programs in a majority of states are open to residents and nonresidents alike, Kennedy said.

The ABLE National Resource Center website has a tool to compare all of the available programs, summarizing features such as tax breaks for in-state residents, investment options, and debit cards or checking accounts for withdrawals: www.ablenrc.org.

Congress has made some changes to the law since its enactment.

Under one of the changes, some funds now may be rolled into an ABLE account penalty-free from the designated beneficiary’s own Section 529 college-savings plan.

An account can be opened online, usually for a minimum initial investment of $25 or less.

Anyone can contribute, including family members, friends, and the account owner.

The person with the disability is the account owner—the designated beneficiary—although a parent or other authorized person can have signature authority over an account established on someone’s behalf, such as a minor.

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savings and checking accounts backed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), said Stephen Dale, an attorney at The Dale Law Firm, PC, in Pacheco, California, a disability-rights advocate whose law practice works with families that have members with disabilities, focusing mainly on special needs trusts.

Limitations ABLE accounts have limits. For example, you’re eligible to open an account only if you have a significant disability (generally based on Social Security Administration rules) and the disabling condition arose before you turned 26 (even if you’re now older than that).

If you clear that hurdle, and you’re already receiving benefits under SSI or Supplemental Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), you’re automatically eligible to open an account. If you’re not receiving either benefit but otherwise meet the guidelines, you can still open an account if you obtain a letter of certification from a licensed physician, Kennedy said.

A designated beneficiary can have only one ABLE account, and contributions from all sources are generally limited to $15,000 a year in the aggregate. The limit can increase annually with inflation. Also, an ABLE account owner who has a job generally can contribute an additional sum, within limits, from his or her work earnings.

There’s also an overall cap on the amount that an ABLE account can hold. For California’s program, for example, the cumulative balance limit is $529,000; for North Carolina’s, it’s $450,000, according to the ABLE National Resource Center’s state-by-state summary.

In addition, although amounts in an ABLE account—and withdrawals used for qualified expenses—are typically disregarded for purposes of Medicaid or certain other government benefit programs, if the account balance exceeds $100,000, the person’s SSI benefit will be suspended until the account balance falls beneath the threshold.

As of June 2019, there were 51,000 ABLE accounts with $292 million in assets under management—even though an estimated eight million people are potentially eligible for the accounts, Kennedy said. “People are certainly learning about [the accounts], but there’s a lot of fear” that the rules could change regarding eligibility for benefits programs, Gehringer said.

schizophrenia, or traumatic brain injury. Often in such situations, “families are looking for some sort of oversight,” and a special needs trust may be more appropriate because they offer more control, he said.

Compared with special needs trusts, ABLE accounts are especially useful for making housing payments for the beneficiary, feature less scrutiny overall when it comes to distributions, provide more autonomy to the beneficiary, and offer the opportunity for the beneficiary to learn financial literacy, Dale said.

But ABLE accounts and special needs trusts aren’t mutually exclusive. “You can have one or the other—or both,” Kennedy said.

For a number of families, “The ABLE account is not so much a savings account as a distribution vehicle,” Dale said. For example, the trust can supply a limited amount of funds to the ABLE account, giving the beneficiary the chance to spend a portion of the money with some autonomy. “If there’s a problem, we can cut it off,” Dale said.

Jake Gehringer currently lives with his mother, 52, who is executive director of an organization that builds apartment communities for individuals with intellectual disabilities, and his father, Jeff, 53, a computer specialist, in Papillion, Nebraska. Jake contributes to his own account, mainly out of his earnings from a part-time job as an office assistant at a local learning center.

Special Needs Trust Another option is the special needs trust, in part because it can accept and hold significantly larger sums; there’s no annual contribution limit and no limit on the accumulated balance, Dale said. The trusts come with their own requirements, as well as legal costs and other matters, including the appointment of a trustee.

A number of families with whom Dale works have individuals with cognitive challenges, such as autism,

Jake contributes to his own account, mainly out of his earnings from a part-time job as an office assistant at a local learning center.

His long-term goal is to live independently in his own apartment.

The money that the family saves in his ABLE account will eventually be used to help pay for furniture, housewares, and other items he’ll need when he moves, his mother said. “The ABLE account is a great tool for him so he can save up for things that are more expensive,” she said. The account also means “having savings for him when we’re no longer here to help him,” she said.

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READER Q & A

?

In this issue we explore the new Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement (SECURE) Act and how it may affect your benefit planning, along with how some early retirees may have a unique window of opportunity to take advantage of Roth conversions.

I’ve just heard about the SECURE Act. What does it mean for retirees?

A

If you’re just hearing about the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement (SECURE) Act of 2019 now, you’re not alone. As a part of the government’s spending bill, Congress passed—and the president signed into law—this significant piece of retirement legislation late in December as the holidays were kicking into high gear. And while the headlines at the time were focused on other, more sensational issues, the SECURE Act quietly brought about the most comprehensive changes to the U.S. retirement system in more than a decade.

Among the more than two dozen provisions contained in the SECURE Act are several that directly affect individual retirement account (IRA) holders, including: • Pushing back required minimum distributions (RMDs) from IRAs and 401(k)s from age 70 1/2 to 72.

Previously, IRA and 401(k) account holders were required to begin taking required distributions based on life expectancy from their accounts starting in the year that they turned 70 1/2. The SECURE Act delays the age at which retirement account holders must take RMDs to 72. That means that those not inclined to take distributions can push back both their distributions and the resulting tax consequences a bit longer.

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Winter | 2020 2019

• Eliminating the age cap for IRA contributions. Prior to passage of the SECURE Act, Americans weren’t allowed to make IRA contributions after age 70 1/2—even if they had earned income. The SECURE Act eliminates the age cap to allow continued tax-deferred savings in recognition of increasing life expectancies and longer working lives.

• Forcing faster withdrawals from inherited IRAs. The new legislation still allows spouses to treat an inherited account as if it belonged to them.

However, non-spouses must take a full payout from an inherited IRA within 10 years of the original account holder’s death. This provision eliminates the stretch IRA, a popular tax and estate planning concept, for the heirs of account holders who die in 2020 and later.

• Penalty-free distributions for birth or adoption. The SECURE Act allows IRA account holders to take up to a $5,000 distribution penalty-free as a “qualified birth or adoption distribution” within one year of the birth or adoption.

The changes brought about by the SECURE Act will create taxsaving opportunities or complications for many Americans, so you should seek the advice of your tax and financial advisors, who can guide you based upon your personal facts and circumstances.

I have just retired. Does it still make sense for me to do a Roth conversion?

A

Since you have just retired, it may make sense for you to convert some of your traditional IRA or retirement plan savings to a Roth IRA, depending on where your income is coming from and your effective tax rate. First a little background.

Introduced in 1997, the Roth IRA is a retirement savings vehicle that allows for contributions to be made on an after-tax basis. While these contributions to a Roth IRA are not tax-deductible, if you meet certain conditions, withdrawals from a Roth IRA are income tax-free, including both contributions and investment earnings. And unlike a traditional IRA, the Roth IRA rules do not force you to take required minimum distributions (RMDs) every year after you reach age 72 (formerly 70 1/2), so your money can stay in the account and keep growing tax-free—for you or for your heirs. These unique characteristics make Roth IRAs a potent financial planning tool.

Roth IRA

Roth IRA contributions are limited based upon a taxpayer’s modified adjusted gross income, but Internal Revenue Service rules allow the conversion of some or all of a traditional IRA or pre-tax balance in an employer-sponsored plan—like a 401(k), 403(b), or 457 plan—to a Roth IRA. A Roth conversion is typically a taxable event, so you will pay income tax on the conversion amount. That’s an instant turn-off to some people but demands a closer look.

Because recent retirees cease having income from work, may not yet be receiving Social Security benefits, and aren’t yet required to take required minimum distributions (RMDs) from their IRAs and retirement plan balances, they may find themselves in a low tax bracket—sometimes significantly lower than when they were working. This is especially true for those retirees who are withdrawing living expenses from their taxable accounts early in retirement.

If this sounds like your situation, now might be a good time. But you’ve got to be careful; a Roth conversion could actually bump you into a higher marginal tax bracket for the year you convert—potentially undoing some of the benefit. The good news is that conversions can typically be made over a several-year window, so you can manage how much you convert to take advantage of the lower tax bracket. The latter part of the year is generally the best time to do a Roth conversion so that you have a good idea of what your income— and tax rate—will be for the year.

If this sounds complicated, it is. It’s important to get it right because Roth conversions can’t be undone, and the merits are highly dependent upon your unique financial circumstances.

That’s why you should always consult with your financial and tax advisors before undertaking a strategy like this to make sure it is right for you.

If you have a question for the VESTED team, we’d love to hear from you and see if we can help. Please send your questions to us at VESTEDmagazine@captrust.com.

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GIVING BACK

COMMUNITY FOUNDATION

During 2019, the CAPTRUST Community Foundation provided more than $350,000 of financial support to more than 85 deserving charities serving the needs of children around the country. Included in this amount was a $100,000 donation to CORRAL Riding Academy, 2019’s Charity of Choice.

CORRAL aspires to shepherd girls through their difficult middle and high school years and into college. The five-pillar approach they use allows girls to take what they learn at the program and apply it in their lives far beyond the horse farm.

In 2019, the CAPTRUST Community Foundation contributed to the following organizations: • Activate Good

• Cycling for Water

• Julie Billiart Schools—Akron

• Alexander Youth Network

• Cystic Fibrosis Foundation

• Just Keep Livin Foundation

• Amazement Square

• C2Adopt

• KidsPeace

• Autism Society of Greater Akron

• Darby’s Dancers

• Lawakua Charitable Fund

• BASE Camp Children’s Cancer Foundation

• Elim Christian Fellowship

• Loving Hands Nursery

• Families Together

• Binkeez for Comfort

• Feed My Lambs

• Make-A-Wish Foundation of Eastern North Carolina

• Boys & Girls Clubs

• First Congregational Church of Hudson

• Michigan Ovarian Cancer Alliance

• Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Kansas City

• Friends of Sagamore Hill

• Mitey Riders

• Boys & Girls Clubs of the Coastal Plain

• Girl Scouts of the USA

• Boys & Girls Clubs serving Wake County

• Girl Scouts of Eastern Pennsylvania

• MOXI, The Wolf Museum of Exploration + Innovation

• Cameron County Outdoor Youth Activities

• Great Trail Council, BSA

• Capital City Steelers • The Capital Quilters Guild • Charlotte Bilingual Preschool • The Children’s Dental Center of Greater Los Angeles • Children’s Flight of Hope • Children’s Skin Disease Foundation • Community Partners of Dallas • Connect-Us • CORRAL Riding Academy • Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) of Orange County

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Winter | 2020

• Greensboro Youth Rugby Association • Habitat for Humanity of Summit County • Halo Foundation • Harris YMCA • Healthy Birth Day • Holt Brothers Foundation • Hope Reins • Hugh O’Brian Youth Leadership • IMPACT Repertory Theatre—New Heritage Theatre Group • Inter-Faith Food Shuttle • John Owen’s Adventure, Inc. • Jubilee Family Development Center

• Nebula Dance Lab • New Alternatives for Children • North Raleigh Ministries • NYRR Team for Kids • ourBRIDGE • Parkland C.A.R.E.S. Food Pantry • Peabody Charter School Foundation • The Peaceful Place • Penrickton Center for Blind Children • Pinellas Association for Retarded Children • Poe Center for Health Education • PORCH-Western Wake • Portage Path Behavioral Health

Foundation Board Members

(Top) Jeanie Wyatt Memorial at the beautiful Amarillo Botanical Gardens in Amarillo, Texas.

The CAPTRUST Community Foundation (CCF) is pleased to welcome 11 new board members who will serve two-year terms, along with announcing a new organization president. The board welcomes new members Melissa Colley, Vickey Collins, John Curry, Greg Delage, Rhonda Downum, Philip D’Unger, Mary Hime, Kim Griggs-Murray, David Wahlen, Cheryl Wickham, and April Winters.

CCF president Tiffany Larew will be supported by the following board officers in 2020:

(Right) CCF Co-President Devyn Duex presents to colleagues at the CCF’s year-end wrap-up lunch.

• QuickStart Tennis • Reading Partners NYC • Ronald McDonald House Charities • Ronald McDonald House Akron • Ronald McDonald House Charities Charlottesville

Tiffany Larew President

Ray White Vice President

Vickey Collins Secretary

April Winters Treasurer/Finance Chair

David Wahlen Events Chair

Philip D’Unger Grants Chair

Alex Badger Fundraising Chair

Jessica Johnson Volunteer Chair

John Curry Marketing Chair

• Saint Augustine’s University • The Salvation Army • The Salvation Army of Wake County • The Sheridan Story • Sid Jacobson Jewish Community Center • Sleep in Heavenly Peace • South Street Ministries • St. Baldrick’s Foundation • St. Paul the Apostle Catholic School • Swim Across America • TeamSmile • Triangle Aphasia Project Unlimited • Triangle Family Services • Together in Pajaro • United Way of Wyoming Valley • Variety, The Children’s Charity • WakeEd Partnership • Wildwood Hills Ranch of Iowa • YMCA of the Triangle

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CAPTRUST GROWTH We are pleased to announce one new regional office, four new financial advisors, and one key hire.

Louise Loehwing

In October, Louise Loehwing joined our Allentown, Pennsylvania, office as a financial advisor responsible for providing retirement plan advisory services to corporate fiduciaries. Prior to joining CAPTRUST, Louise held the position of senior consultant at Westminster Consulting. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in finance from Rider University.

Louise has been working in the financial industry since 2004.

Brendan Nosovitch

Brendan Nosovitch joined the firm in October as a financial advisor working in our Allentown, Pennsylvania, office. His primary focus is providing retirement plan advisory services to corporate fiduciaries. He came to us from Merrill Lynch Wealth Management. Brendan earned his Bachelor of Science degree in finance from the Darla Moore School of Business and a Master of Business Administration degree in business administration and management from the Boston College Carroll School of Business.

Bradley Pendzick

Bradley Pendzick joined the firm’s Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, office in November as a financial advisor responsible for providing investment advisory services to high-net-worth individuals, families, and institutions. Prior to CAPTRUST, Bradley was assistant wealth manager at Legend Financial Advisors. He earned his Bachelor of Science degree in finance from the University of Pittsburgh.

Tanya Runyon

Tanya Runyon joined us in November from Transamerica Retirement Solutions where she was a vice president, sales, for institutional markets. Based in our Dallas, Texas, office, she serves as a financial advisor responsible for providing retirement plan advisory services to corporate fiduciaries. She earned her Bachelor of Business Administration degree in finance from the University of Mississippi and has been in the financial industry since 1991.

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Winter | 2020

New Office in Boston Boston Advisors, a boutique investment management firm with more than 35 years of experience managing assets for institutions, affluent individuals, and families, joined CAPTRUST in October.

Led by President and Chief Investment Officer Michael J. Vogelzang, Boston Advisors’ Private Advisory Group team brought 15 people and more than $1.5 billion of client assets under management to CAPTRUST’s growing wealth management business.

Please welcome financial advisors Michael Collins, Keith E. Faulkner, Lauren Lambert, Lawrence C. Manning, John H. Peterson, Kristen Stewart, Jamie Taloumis, and Michael J. Vogelzang.

Marie Pasquale

As an asset liability manager in CAPTRUST’s Consulting Solutions Group, Marie Pasquale supports client service and business development initiatives focused on asset allocation, investment manager selection, and long-term investment strategy creation.

Prior to joining CAPTRUST, Marie was an associate portfolio manager at Amundi Pioneer. She earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics and sociology from the College of the Holy Cross. Marie is a CFA charterholder.

CAPTRUST RECOGNITION Top 50 Privately Held Companies

FT Top 401

CAPTRUST was (again!) named in the Triangle Business Journal’s list of the Top 50 Privately Held Entities in the Triangle region of North Carolina. The list ranks companies by total number of employees and includes data on the number of Triangle-area employees, revenues, and business type. At number 34, CAPTRUST moved up 10 spots from last year!

NAPA Aces The National Association of Plan Advisors (NAPA) recently announced its 2020 list of Top Retirement Plan Advisors Under 40—also known as Aces. CAPTRUST’s Kyle Campbell, Shaun Eskamani, Patrick Flint, and Evan Holmes were among the 100 advisors named to the list. This year the list was rebranded as Aces from its previous title of Young Guns.

2019 Brick Award Winners CAPTRUST presented its annual Bricks of Success Awards at the company’s Advisor Kickoff held in January in Raleigh, North Carolina. Award nominations and final voting are employee-driven, and the awards recognize employees and contributions that exemplify the very best of our company’s values, mission, and vision. Winners were presented with an engraved marble brick, symbolizing that our best colleagues are the building blocks of CAPTRUST’s culture and that any great company is built one brick at a time.

Congratulations to this year’s Brick Award winners in the following categories: CLIENT SERVICE Michelle Miller Kris Jackson

STEP-UP Margaret Jarocki Meryl Golder

COMMUNITY SERVICE Ray White Veronica Karas

MOST VALUABLE PLAYER Colby Warren

INNOVATION Cybersecurity Enhancements

The Financial Times included 23 CAPTRUST advisors in the publication’s 2019 list of the 401 Top Retirement Advisors. The prestigious list recognizes financial advisors who specialize in serving defined contribution retirement plans, such as 401(k) and 403(b) plans.

Top Women Advisors The National Association of Plan Advisors announced its 2019 Top Women Advisors list acknowledging the women who are making significant contributions to the retirement industry and bringing excellence to their profession. CAPTRUST’s Beryl Ball, Deanna Bamford, Patricia Bills, Karen Casillas, Heather Darcy, Jean Duffy, Devyn Duex, Erica Blomgren, and Abigail Russell were recognized.

Thrive Awards In November, Wealth Management included CAPTRUST in its first listing of Thrive Award recipients. This first-of-its-kind program acknowledges companies, individuals, and teams who have turned out blockbuster revenue growth over the past three years. CAPTRUST made the list with 85 percent year-over-year organic growth in the wealth management business.

Excellence Award Winners

The Excellence Award is a way for CAPTRUST associates to recognize coworkers who consistently perform at the highest levels and exemplify the firm’s culture. Award winners represent an elite group whose attitudes and performance positively impact CAPTRUST’s clients and the firm more broadly.

The following Excellence Award winners were recognized at our October Synergy meeting:

Dale Delserone Manager, Finance

Clark Kerschner Client Management Consultant

Michelle Swart Manager, Performance Reporting

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We know that investors are looking for experienced and trusted advisors who can provide wealth management services that are focused on their unique circumstances and tailored to their goals.

In more than 30 years of acting as a fiduciary to some of the country’s biggest retirement plans, we have gained valuable insights that we can apply to your wealth planning and investment challenges.

Lauren Lambert, CFA® Senior Vice President, Financial Advisor Boston, MA Keith E. Faulkner Principal, Financial Advisor Boston, MA Kristen Stewart Senior Vice President, Financial Advisor Boston, MA Michael J. Vogelzang, CFA® Principal, Chief Investment Strategist Boston, MA

captrust.com • 919.870.6822 | toll-free: 800.216.0645 • 4208 Six Forks Road, Suite 1700 | Raleigh, NC 27609