St. Joseph Business Summit 2010

Once again, Family Investment Center is sponsoring the St. Joseph
Business Summit this year! One of the pillars of economic
prosperity is the success of businesses all around the United
States. This half-day program has been created to help local
business people get better and to spur budding entrepreneurs on
to great things.

This year's keynote will be Danny O'Neill, "the Bean Baron"of The Roasterie, Inc., a specialty coffeeroasting company which services espresso bars and coffee houses, fine restaurants, high-end grocers, offices and retail accounts. Danny started The Roasterie in thebasement of his Brookside home in November 1993, but his passion for coffee began in high school when he spent a year in
Costa Rica as an exchange student. He spent several weeks picking
coffee. Since then, Danny has made hundreds of trips to origin,
touring different segments of the coffee industry and locating the best coffees in the world. Since The Roasterie's inception, Danny has become a sought-after expert in the ever growing coffee industry. He has judged cupping and barista competitions all around the globe since 1995.

For more about the program and registration information, click here.

Thursday, November 18th
8:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
MWSU Fulkerson Center

Event: Impact of the Recession on Non-profits

By Dr. Jason White
Family Investment Center

In a few weeks, I'll be speaking to Mainstream, Inc. and the Kansas and Missouri Non-Profit Associations on "Future Impact of the Recession on Non-profits." The event is set for Thursday, August 26, from 1 to 4 p.m. at Cabela's in Kansas City, Kan.

It's a timely topic, as the Recession that we're currently enduring has hit them twice as hard. Many non-profits have seen an increase in requests for assistance, as many people have lost their jobs, but they've also seen a decrease in donations and, if they're living off endowment interest, a decrease in the amount of income from their endowments. It's incredibly stressful.

What I hope to do is present non-profits with strategies that can help them weather this time. I plan to cover the following points:

• Economic stress on non-profits, and how they are coping.

• Why some non-profits are weathering the storm, while others are bankrupt or headed
in that direction.

• The combined impact of lower revenues; higher costs; declining endowment values; and slower cash flow collections.

• The "nimbleness" of some non-profits that have mitigated financial damage.

• Suggested coping strategies to survive, and even thrive, this Great Recession we are enduring.

If you want to attend, you can register here: http://bit.ly/cWYW6x

Hope to see you there!

Large job fair in North Kansas City this week

By Robyn Davis Sekula

For many who live in St. Joseph, Missouri, (where our principle office is located), a drive to North Kansas City for a job is a fairly easy commute. It's not too far, and it expands your job opportunities, particularly if you've been on the hunt for a while.

On Friday, May 28, a large job fair will be held there at the Northland Cathedral. We read about it on the Dollars & Sense blog by the Kansas City Star, and wanted to pass it along to you.

Read all about it here - and note, free lunch to the first 300 people!

http://economy.kansascity.com/?q=node/7255

You can register for the job fair here:

http://www.northlandcathedral.org/jobfair/

Family Investment Center welcomes FBI for presentation

By Dan Danford
Family Investment Center

We're happy to welcome the FBI to St. Joseph this week. Jim Asher of the Kansas City Federal Bureau of Investigation to present on the topic of identity theft on Thursday, May 20th. The event will be held at the East Hills Public Library in the basement auditorium. Refreshments will be served at 6:30 p.m. and the presentation will begin at 7:00 p.m.

Agent Asher will cover the following topics:


What is identity theft?
Methods thieves use to steal personal information
Actions criminals take after stealing an identity
How at avoid becoming a victim of identity theft
Actions to take if a victim of identity theft

This event is free and open to the public.

For more information, call Family Investment Center at (816) 233-4100. We'd love to have you join us!

Presentation gives valuable stock-picking tips

By Jason White, Ph.D.

Family Investment Center recently hosted the latest installment in its investor education series. The event was held at the East Hills Public Library rotunda classroom at 7 p.m.

Jason Votruba, CFA and portfolio manager for the UMB Scout Small Cap Fund (UMBHX), shared his philosophy of stock-picking in the small company investment universe. Votruba currently hold about 120 different positions in his small company fund. Since Votruba took over management of the fund on January 1, 2001, he has earned a total return of 24 percent, soundly outperforming both the Russell 2000 (2 percent) and the S&P 500 (-21 percent) benchmark indexes.

Votruba's strategy is to invest in stocks that have the highest probability of going higher, and sell those that are likely to decline. His philosophy involves studying the biggest winners in the stock market to find common shared characteristics of company's prior to a big upside move. He describes his approach as 80 percent fundamental analysis and 20 percent technical.

Attendance at the event was good for a beautiful summer evening in St. Joseph. Several investors in the crowd asked thought-provoking questions. Overall, the event was viewed as quite positive.

The next Family Investment Center education evening will be held in mid-summer.

Come learn more about investing in small caps

By Dan Danford

At the Family Investment Center, we believe strongly in investor education. We hold periodic free events for our clients, friends and members of the public. Next Thursday, May 28, we will host Jason Votruba, CFA, who will present “A Winning Strategy for Investing in Smaller Capitalization Equities.” Jason has served as a Portfolio Manager for the UMB Scout Small Cap Fund since 2002 and has more than 10 years of investment management experience.

The presentation will be held in the East Hills Library's basement auditorium in St. Joseph, Mo., beginning with refreshments at 6:30 p.m. and the presentation at 7 p.m.

At FIC, we believe that a properly diversified portfolio should own a variety of asset classes and sizes. UMB Scout Small Cap is one of the funds we've been using for client portfolios. This is a great opportunity to meet the fund manager, and get a face-to-face report on the strategies and stocks that make them so successful.

Want to put the markets in perspective? This is your chance

We're hosting what promises to be a terrific, informative event later this week at the East Hills library in St. Joseph. If you want to look at the larger picture, you won't get much better than the expertise offered at American Century. Here's our press release about the event.
Event set for Thursday
Investors have spent the past year watching the markets fall and worry about their future, or current, retirements. American Century Investments is ready to help investors try to make sense of the market’s downfall and put it into perspective.
Family Investment Center is providing an evening of educational enrichment for investors this week that will present a knowledgeable and intelligent take on the markets. The program will be presented by B.D. Horton, a certified financial planner and certified public accountant who is Vice President of Territory Sales for American Century Investments. He has been in the financial services industry for more than 10 years.
The presentation topic will be “Putting Today’s Market in Perspective.” The presentation will take place on February 26, 2009 at the St. Joseph, Mo., East Hills Library, 502 N. Woodbine Road, in the Basement Auditorium. Refreshments will be available at 6:30 p.m. and the presentation will begin at 7 p.m.
B.D. brings a unique and fresh perspective that his clients appreciate and enjoy as he works with them to accomplish their goals.
For more information about this event, please call the Family Investment Center at (816) 233-4100.