US Stocks were 1.5% lower last week the worst week since September after the failure of a vote on the Presidents health care bill.  The difficulty over the health-care bill is likely to serve as a wake-up call for investors who had bid up stocks in anticipation of more business-friendly and pro-growth policies from Trump.

Starbucks held their annual meeting last week where they announced plans to open 12,000 new stores globally over the next five years that will result in more than 240,000 jobs worldwide. That includes 3,400 stores, representing 68,000 jobs, in here in the U.S.  This was the last annual meeting of the long-time CEO Howard Schultz who has done a fabulous job running the company.

When Amazon began offering free two-day shipping to Prime members, that fast shipping time became the new expectation for many customers who were previously accustomed to waiting much longer for their packages.  Now, the Seattle-based e-commerce giant is setting the bar even higher with initiatives such as Prime Now and Amazon Flex, which ship goods to you in two hours and in some cases promise one-hour delivery.  It is getting more and more difficult for brick and mortar retailers to compete.

The wealth and number of the super-rich fell for the first time since the Great Recession. The number of the world’s billionaires fell by 3% last year to 2,397, according to the “Billionaire Census.” Some 283 people or 10% of total billionaires lost their billionaire status in 2016

With Northwest Quadrant Wealth Management I’m Tyler Simones