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Roth individual retirement account conversions jumped 41% in the first quarter of 2026 compared with a year earlier, a Fidelity Investments retirement analysis found.

The surge followed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which locked in lower federal brackets permanently and removed the sunset uncertainty that had frozen many conversion decisions.

An analysis from Charles Schwab warns that converting at the wrong time can erase years of compounding and leave retirement savings in worse shape. 

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act eliminated the ability to undo a Roth conversion made on or after January 1, 2018, meaning the decision is irreversible once funds move. 

How a single Roth conversion can push you into a higher tax bracket

A Roth conversion transfers pre-tax retirement savings into a Roth account, where qualified withdrawals are tax-free after a five-year holding period under IRS rules. 

The trade-off is that every dollar converted gets taxed as ordinary income in the conversion year, and large transfers can push income into higher brackets.

Hayden Adams, Director of tax planning and wealth management research at the Schwab Center for Financial Research, warned that a large conversion can require years of compounding just to recover the extra taxes paid.

“However, if the lump-sum conversion bumps you into a higher income tax bracket, it could take years of growth to make up for the extra tax hit, assuming you ever make up that lost ground,” Adams said.

The risk becomes concrete with 2026 bracket numbers from the Internal Revenue Service. A married couple filing jointly with $650,000 in taxable income sits in the 35% federal bracket, which caps at $768,700, Schwab showed. 

Converting over $118,700 (the difference between $650,000 and the $768,700 ceiling) in a single year would push income past that ceiling and into the 37% rate on every additional dollar.

Three signals a Roth conversion would work against you

Schwab’s research identifies conditions in which a conversion is more likely to hurt, and all three center on financial readiness.

The first signal is that you expect to be in a lower tax bracket after you stop working.

The strategy collapses for people who will pay less tax on traditional IRA withdrawals during retirement than they would pay on the converted dollars today, the Schwab analysis noted.

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The second signal, the Schwab analysis noted, is that you cannot cover the tax bill without tapping retirement savings or emergency reserves. 

A saver who converts $100,000 and withholds $22,000 from the balance for taxes only moves $78,000 into the Roth to grow tax-free. 

Applying a 7% annual growth rate over 25 years, that $22,000 would have compounded to about $119,000 in forfeited tax-free wealth, Income Lab showed.

The final signal Schwab flagged is that you cannot afford to wait out the five-year holding period. 

Each conversion starts its own five-year clock under IRS rules, and withdrawing earnings before the window closes can trigger ordinary income taxes plus a 10% early withdrawal penalty for savers under age 59½.

A Roth conversion can backfire if you expect lower taxes, cannot cover the bill, or need retirement funds before the five-year clock expires.PixeloneStocker / Getty Images

How Schwab’s bracket management approach limits the tax damage

Adams recommended a tactic Schwab calls tax bracket management as a safer alternative to a single large conversion for savers who still want Roth benefits. 

Adams said the approach can be repeated annually, building a Roth balance in stages while keeping each year’s tax bill within a known and planned rate. 

Bryan Strike, a Certified Financial Planner and Senior Director of Financial Planning at Mercer Advisors, noted that the years between retirement and the start of required minimum distributions at age 73 often present the best window for this graduated approach.

Adams identified one exception: savers already in the highest 37% bracket who expect to stay there may benefit from converting a larger sum to maximize tax-free growth time.

What the Roth conversion decision comes down to for your retirement

The Schwab analysis frames a Roth conversion as a tax-rate comparison that only pays off when today’s rate is lower than the future rate. 

Catherine Valega, a Certified Financial Planner and Founder of Green Bee Advisory, has stressed that savers at every life stage need to understand where they sit in the federal brackets, advice that applies directly to irreversible moves like Roth conversions. 

The Roth conversion coming out ahead depends on whether a saver’s current federal tax bracket is above or below the rate they expect to face in retirement.

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There was a time when augmented reality was going to change everything.

Phone makers were racing to add AR features. Samsung built an entire suite of them, gave them a home under a menu called AR Zone, and put them in commercials. Draw on the air. Measure your furniture without a tape measure. The pitch was that your Galaxy phone could see the world differently.

Nobody really cared. And now Samsung is admitting it.

Now, two of those apps are getting end-of-service notices. Samsung confirmed it is discontinuing AR Doodle and Quick Measure, with both apps shutting down on Dec. 31, 2026, Android Authority reported.

After that date, the apps will no longer be available for download from the Galaxy Store and will not be supported in future versions of One UI.

What AR Doodle and Quick Measure actually did

AR Doodle let Galaxy users draw in the air using the phone’s camera. Lines, shapes, and messages could be anchored to a face or a surface, making them appear to float in the real world.

On supported devices, a stylus could be used to draw. The feature showed up in Samsung’s promotional materials for years as an example of what Galaxy cameras could do that other phones could not.

Quick Measure did something more practical. It used the camera and augmented reality to estimate the dimensions of objects in the physical world. Point it at a wall, a piece of furniture, or a box, and it would give you approximate measurements without a tape measure.

While useful in theory, in practice, it was one of those features that most users discovered once and rarely revisited.

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Both apps had already been demoted before this announcement. When Samsung released One UI 7, it restructured the AR Zone app and made AR Doodle and Quick Measure optional downloads rather than built-in features.

Getting moved out of preloaded into optional is the first step on a slow walk out the door. Dec. 31 is the last step.

Why Samsung is retiring AR Doodle, Quick Measure and what comes next

The honest answer is that AR never became what Samsung hoped it would.

Think back to what the technology landscape looked like around 2020 and 2021. Augmented reality was going to be everywhere. The metaverse was coming. NFTs were the future of ownership. Blockchain was going to change finance.

Samsung, Apple, Google, and Meta all poured resources into AR features and let their marketing teams run with the story.

Consumers used them occasionally at best. AR Doodle made for a funny video once. Quick Measure was genuinely useful in a pinch. But neither became something people reached for every day.

Usage stayed low. The features stayed niche. And when generative AI took over as the technology story with actual consumer pull, the AR moment quietly ended.

Samsung has been building AI into its cameras, messaging, search, and productivity tools. Resources that once went to maintaining AR apps are now going there instead.

Samsung is not framing this as a clean kill, though. Android Central reported that Samsung says it is “committed” to returning these apps “with improved services in the future.”

The company acknowledged the inconvenience but stopped short of giving a timeline or any specifics about what the improved versions would look like.

This fits a pattern of Samsung quietly winding down older software. In July 2026, the company retired its own Messages app, replacing it with Google Messages. AR Doodle and Quick Measure are next.

AR Doodle let Galaxy users draw in the air using the phone’s camera.GREG BAKER / Getty Images

What happens to your Galaxy device after Dec. 31

The apps will not stop working the moment the clock hits midnight on Jan. 1, 2027. If you have AR Doodle or Quick Measure installed on your device right now, they will likely continue running for some time.

The problem comes with software updates. 9to5Google reported that as Samsung releases new versions of One UI, the apps will lose compatibility. A software update that improves other parts of your phone could be the update that breaks AR Doodle or Quick Measure for good.

Some newer Galaxy devices are already there. The Galaxy Z Fold 8 does not show the apps in the Galaxy Store at all. If you have a newer device, you may not be able to download them even now.

After Dec. 31, the download option disappears entirely. If the apps are not on your device by then, they will not be available to install.

What Galaxy users should do before Dec. 31

If you actually use AR Doodle or Quick Measure, download them now if they are not already on your device. Do not wait. The window to get them is open but is not unlimited, and newer devices are already being cut off.

If you use them and want to keep using them for as long as possible, hold off on major One UI updates. Future OS versions will break compatibility. That is a trade-off most people will not want to make, but for anyone who genuinely depends on Quick Measure for a workflow, it is worth knowing.

For everyone else, the practical answer is to look at what replaces these features. Android and most third-party apps have measurement tools built into camera apps or available separately.

A quick search for AR measurement apps on the Google Play Store will surface alternatives that work across devices and manufacturers rather than being tied to Samsung’s Galaxy ecosystem.

The broader takeaway is one that applies to any app tied to a single manufacturer’s hardware. Proprietary features are only as durable as the company’s interest in maintaining them.

Samsung built these, marketed them, and is now retiring them. If you built workflows around them, the time to find alternatives is before Dec. 31, not after.

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“The cost of building the house is expected to be about 30% of the property’s current value.”

If you were to ask your financial advisor how they get paid, they might answer that they charge a percentage of the assets that they manage for you. Or, they might say that you don’t pay them directly; rather, the fund company or the insurance company does.

This might sound simple, but in reality, financial advisor compensation can be quite complex. It’s critical to understand how your financial advisor, or any financial advisor you might be considering using, is paid.

3 main types of advisor compensation

The three main types of advisor compensation are fee-only, fee-based, and commission-based, according to Investor.gov.

They all sound a bit similar, but there are huge differences that impact not only your costs in working with an advisor, but also whether an advisor truly puts clients’ interests first when making recommendations.

Advisor compensationWho pays the advisor?Commissions received by an advisor?Fee-onlyClients onlyNoFee-basedClients and product providersYes (in part)CommissionProduct providersYes

It’s important to understand how your financial advisor is compensated and what types of fees and expenses you will pay.Dwight Burdette, CC-BY-3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Fee-only advisors

Fee-only is just what it sounds like. These advisors are compensated only from fees paid by their clients. These fees might be flat fees for a one-time financial plan or for ongoing advice.

Many advisors charge clients a percentage of the investment assets they manage for them. In some cases, advisors might charge clients an hourly fee for advice.

Fee-only advisors do not accept commission from the sale of products, nor do they take 12b-1 fees from mutual funds they place their clients in.

Most fee-only advisors serve as fiduciaries to their clients; they put clients’ interests first.

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Fee-based advisors

A fee-based advisor will generally charge an advisory fee, such as a percentage of assets managed for the client, while also receiving commissions from selling products such as insurance policies to their clients.

They can act in a fiduciary capacity when managing client portfolios, but then shift to a broker role when selling products. It is questionable whether this “dual role” constitutes acting in a true fiduciary capacity.

Commission-based brokers

Commission-based advisors/brokers make their money from commissions generated when you buy, sell, or trade certain products such as insurance policies, some annuities, mutual funds, ETFs, and stocks and bonds.

They may also earn commissions from ongoing fees generated by certain products, including mutual funds that generate 12b-1 fees and surrender charges on some annuities.  

Commission-based brokers, in essence, mostly generate income when you buy or sell something. This can create an inherent conflict of interest between what is best for their income and what is best for their clients.

This isn’t to say that commission-based brokers can’t have their clients’ best interests at heart, but unfortunately, that is sometimes the case.

Ask your advisor how they are paid

It is important that you understand how your financial advisor is paid and how much they earn from having you as a client.

Some questions to ask include:

Are you a fee-only fiduciary on all of my accounts and all of my holdings 100% of the time? If they answer anything but an unequivocal “yes,” there are a number of other questions to ask. Even if they say yes, take it a step further and ask: How will you get paid by me, and how much will/do I pay you?

Are you fee-based? If so, what will be paying you in terms of an ongoing fee or one-time fee? How will I be billed for any commissions from eligible product transactions? Will I incur other fees such as 12b-1 fees from certain mutual funds or similar fees from other products?

Are you commission-based? If so, how does this arrangement work, and what types of fees can I expect to pay over the course of a year?

Ask the advisor for a breakdown of the all-in cost of working with them on an annual basis.

If they hesitate to answer or you feel they are providing anything other than full disclosure, you might consider working with another advisor.

The bottom line

There is nothing wrong with a financial advisor earning a fair, fully transparent income for helping you grow and protect your wealth. However, how they are paid often dictates how they treat your money.

Push for a transparent, fee-only structure and understand the all-in costs of your portfolio. This helps ensure that your advisor’s primary incentive aligns with your financial success.

Accept nothing less than full fee transparency from your advisor, period.

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The last time Audi, a subsidiary of Volkswagen Group (VWAGY), tried to build the smartest small car in Europe, it lost money doing it.

The original A2, launched in 1999, wore an all-aluminum body, and one diesel version burned just three liters of fuel per 100 kilometers, a feat Audi’s own anniversary retrospective still calls a first for a four-door car.

Buyers admired it. They didn’t buy it.

Audi built the A2 at its Neckarsulm plant and pulled the plug in 2005 after roughly 176,000 units, according to Audi.

The car cost too much to build at scale, and Audi priced it accordingly, closer to a midsize A4 than a small hatchback. That mismatch, not the engineering, is why it failed.

On Monday, Sept. 7, Audi CEO Gernot Doellner brought the A2 badge back in Paris, this time on an electric car. The timing matters more than the nostalgia.

Audi is reviving its most famous commercial failure at the exact moment Chinese automakers are proving that cheap and small can win in Europe.

Efficiency, not a lower price, is the pitch

The new A2 e-tron uses 12.8 kilowatt-hours per 100 kilometers, which Audi says “consumes less energy than any other series-production model from the brand before it,” according to the company’s launch statement.

That translates into a WLTP range of up to 646 kilometers, meaning fewer charging stops during daily driving.

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None of that comes cheap. German pricing starts at 38,200 euros, or roughly $44,364, according to Just Auto.

Chinese entrants such as BYD’s Dolphin and Seagull compete in the same size class for a fraction of that price, which means Audi isn’t chasing the same buyer at all.

Audi spreads that premium across four power outputs, from 125 to 240 kilowatts, and battery sizes up to 84 kilowatt-hours, according to Yahoo Autos.

The trim range lets Audi capture multiple price points without dropping into budget territory.

Chinese brands are winning the segment Audi just entered

Chinese-brand vehicles overtook Tesla in European battery-electric sales for the first time in May 2025, according to Euronews, a shift the outlet linked to aggressive pricing, even after the European Union imposed tariffs on Chinese-made EVs.

The tariff didn’t reverse the trend. It only slowed it.

The scale of that shift is bigger than one brand. Chinese-branded vehicles held roughly 16.5% of the European Union’s passenger car market by March 2026, and about 31% of the battery-electric segment specifically, according to data from the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association.

That means almost one in three electric cars sold in the EU now carries a Chinese badge.

Audi’s own numbers show the pressure directly. Global deliveries fell 7% in the first half of 2026, with a nearly 20% drop in China alone, Reuters reported.

Audi blamed pricing pressure and shifting subsidy rules in China, the same forces now spreading into Europe.

The Audi A2 e-tron uses only 12.8 kilowatt-hours per 100 kilometers, consuming less energy than any other series-production model from the brand preceding it.Audi

The new Audi A2 skips its old hometown

Audi is building the A2 e-tron in Ingolstadt, not Neckarsulm, reusing more than 1,200 existing production parts and roughly 250 robots from other models to keep costs down, according to Yahoo Autos.

That detail is easy to miss and hard to ignore once you know what’s happening to Neckarsulm. It’s one of four German plants Volkswagen flagged as facing an uncertain production future under Future Plan 2030, a restructuring approved by the supervisory board on Sept. 3, Motor1 confirmed.

The plan adds another 50,000 job cuts on top of 50,000 already confirmed, pushing total planned reductions to 100,000, Reuters reported.

The financial backdrop explains the caution. Volkswagen’s operating margin contracted to 3.8% in the first half of 2026, down from a peak of 7.9% in 2022, according to Reuters. Building on old tooling, in a plant that isn’t under review, is a cost decision as much as an engineering one.

Volkswagen’s stock jumped, but the hard problem didn’t move

Volkswagen’s Frankfurt-listed shares rose more than 8% on Sept. 3, the day its supervisory board approved Future Plan 2030. Investors read deeper job cuts as a signal that fixed costs, not sales, would carry the turnaround.

That’s a bet on execution, not on China. Citi analysts noted the restructuring doesn’t change the competitive pressure in Europe, ongoing China losses, or raw material costs, and Volkswagen’s profit from its China joint ventures is projected to fall to as little as 200 million euros this year, down from 958 million euros in 2025.

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The company’s own target is a 9% operating margin by 2030, up from the 3.8% it posted in the first half of 2026.

Management has until June 2027 to decide the fate of the four plants under review, Neckarsulm included, so the market’s optimism has a fairly specific deadline attached to it.

For investors, the A2 e-tron is a small test of that larger bet. If Audi can build a premium EV on reused tooling without inflating costs, that’s an early sign the margin math behind September’s rally might actually work.

Germany’s answer to a price war might not be a lower price

Ford is reportedly in advanced talks to sell part of a Spanish plant to China’s Geely, and BYD has said it’s discussing idle European factory space with Stellantis and other automakers, according to Electrek.

Legacy manufacturing capacity in Europe is changing hands, and Chinese brands are increasingly the ones doing the buying.

Audi chose a different path. It revived a discontinued model and used domestic cost discipline, not a price war, to make the economics work.

Whether that combination sells better in 2026 than it did in 2005 is the real question hanging over Ingolstadt. The badge on the hood is the least important part of the bet.

Ordering opens in Germany on Sept. 10, and early reservation numbers will offer the first real signal.

If Audi’s efficiency argument draws buyers who could have paid far less for a Chinese compact, the A2 name gets its second chance. If it doesn’t, Audi will have relearned the same lesson twice.

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