France Football has awarded the Ballon d’Or for the Best Male Player. Here, we explain more about the prestigious accolade and its winner.
SUCCESS
AARP warns Americans on 401(k), Roth IRA changes
While financial advisors often praise Roth IRAs for their tax-free distributions in retirement, AARP warns Americans that changing from (rolling over) a long-held traditional 401(k) to a Roth IRA warrants caution, because securing that future tax shelter requires swallowing a potentially substantial tax bill today.
“That doesn’t necessarily mean you should abandon a Roth conversion,” wrote Sandra Block of the AARP. “Just be sure you understand the pitfalls and can navigate around them.”
When an individual rolls over a 401(k) account into a traditional IRA, taxes are generally deferred until funds are eventually withdrawn, allowing the savings to continue compounding tax-free for the future.
“If you don’t roll over your payment, it will be taxable (other than qualified Roth distributions and any amounts already taxed) and you may also be subject to additional tax,” explained the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
“If you’re getting a distribution from a retirement plan, you can ask your plan administrator to make the payment directly to another retirement plan or to an IRA,” added the IRS.
Because Roth IRA contributions are funded with money that has already been taxed, qualified withdrawals are completely exempt from taxes and penalties once an account holder reaches age 59½ and satisfies the five-year holding rule.
“Unlike traditional IRAs, Roths don’t require you to start taking required minimum distributions when you turn 73, so you can allow your account to continue to grow uninhibited by taxes,” AARP wrote.
“And if you leave the asset to your children, they can take tax-free withdrawals as long as they deplete the account in 10 years.”
Ashley Akin, CPA at RKO Tax told me about a key mistake people make related to traditional and Roth retirement accounts.
“The most common mistake when dealing with a retirement account is to consider solely the maximum contribution, while ignoring the tax aspect completely,” Akin said. “Traditional and Roth accounts have different implications when it comes to taxation; therefore, depending on personal income and other factors, one should consider which of the two is more suitable.”
AARP: Rolling over 401(k)s to IRAs involves drawbacks
When one pays taxes on the amount of pretax contributions they convert, it is best to pay those taxes with funds outside of their 401(k), according to AARP.
“If you withdraw money from your plan to pay the tax bill, you’ll shrink the account, reducing the amount available for tax-free growth,” wrote AARP.
Even if covering the tax bill is manageable, converting a substantial balance can bump a person into an upper tax bracket, driving up the tax rate applied to the rest of their income.
More on personal finance:
Charles Schwab, Fidelity alert workers to forced 401(k) rule
Dave Ramsey warns Americans on 401(k)s, IRAs (he’s not wrong)
Congress research arm sounds alarm on 401(k), IRA penalty
Additionally, executing a Roth conversion raises an individual’s adjusted gross income (AGI), which can trigger higher Medicare Part B premiums through income-related surcharges.
“In 2026, the standard monthly Medicare Part B premium is $202.90, but if your AGI exceeds certain thresholds, you could end up paying much more than that,” wrote AARP. “People with modified adjusted gross incomes over $109,000 for an individual taxpayer or $218,000 for a married couple filing jointly will pay anywhere from $284.10 to $689.90 a month.”
“In most cases, the high-income surcharge is based on your tax return from two years ago,” AARP continued. “For example, the 2026 surcharge will be based on your AGI for 2024, so the notice that you’ll have to pay a higher premium may come as an unpleasant surprise.”
Vanguard explains 401(k)-to-IRA rollover benefits
It is also important to remember that rolling over a 401(k) into an IRA offers key advantages that grant people greater authority over their overall financial strategy, according to investment management firm Vanguard.
“Rolling over your 401(k) to an IRA often opens access to a broader range of investment options, including stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), supporting better diversification and growth potential,” Vanguard wrote.
“If you have several 401(k) accounts or IRAs, consolidating your retirement savings into one account makes it easier to monitor and manage your long-term goals,” Vanguard added.
“A rollover helps you avoid taxes, penalties, and unwanted withdrawals from your retirement funds when you leave a job.”
AARP is cautioning retirement savers about the potential pitfalls of shifting funds between 401(k)s and Roth IRAs.Shutterstock
AARP explains Roth IRA conversion Social Security implications
A Roth conversion’s boost to adjusted gross income also elevates the risk that a retiree will owe taxes on a larger portion of their Social Security benefits.
To calculate whether an individual’s Social Security benefits are subject to taxation, I always emphasize the fact that the IRS evaluates “provisional income,” which combines their adjusted gross income, non-taxable interest, and 50% of their annual Social Security payments.
If that figure is between $25,000 and $34,000 for an individual or between $32,000 and $44,000 for a couple, up to 50 percent of Social Security is taxable,” wrote AARP.
“If your provisional income exceeds $34,000 (single) or $44,000 (couple), up to 85 percent of your benefits may be taxable,” AARP added. “401(k) withdrawals you make as part of a Roth conversion count toward those thresholds.”
This article is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as individualized tax or investment advice.
Related: Dave Ramsey warns 401(k), IRA savers on IRS 5-year rule
4 in 10 FSA holders lose hundreds to one year-end rule
Open enrollment season is underway, and millions of workers are making benefit elections that will affect their health care spending for the full year ahead.
Among the most consequential choices is the flexible spending account (FSA), a pretax tool with a use-it-or-lose-it rule that forfeits unspent balances at year-end.
New research from the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) studied more than 3.3 million accounts and found forfeitures continued through 2024 despite year-over-year declines.
The dollar amounts that workers leave behind remain large enough to erase much of the tax advantage these accounts provide.
Also Read: Vanguard reveals health account best for retirement
EBRI finds average flexible spending account forfeitures fell to a record low in 2024
Only 4 in 10 FSA holders surrendered unused funds in 2024, and those who lost money returned an average of $404 to their employers, EBRI reported. That average is down from $436 in 2023, the lowest inflation-adjusted figure since the institute began tracking these accounts in 2019.
Most participants tapped their accounts during the year, with 89% taking at least one distribution averaging $1,503, the report found. Average annual contributions rose modestly to $1,431 from $1,413 the year before, though inflation-adjusted contributions edged slightly lower, the data indicated.
Jake Spiegel, Senior Research Associate, Health and Wealth at the Employee Benefit Research Institute, said declining losses are encouraging, but gaps in participant awareness remain.
<strong>The decline in average forfeitures is encouraging. Still, the findings point to opportunities for employers to help workers better understand eligible expenses, plan deadlines and the features available to manage unused balances</strong>
A previous Money analysis pegged the 2023 nationwide total amount surrendered at roughly $4.5 billion, underscoring the scale of unspent balances across the market.
Younger FSA participants contributed less and forfeited more often
The EBRI data revealed a sharp generational divide, with age emerging as the strongest predictor of whether pretax health dollars go unused. Workers younger than 25 contributed an average of just $623, compared with $1,639 among those aged 45 to 54.
Two-thirds of account holders under 25 surrendered unused funds in 2024, the highest forfeiture rate of any age group. The data confirmed that only 36% of those aged 65 and older forfeited money, though they tended to lose larger dollar amounts when they did.
More Personal Finance:
Pay raises trail inflation so Ramit Sethi says, “Ask for $5,000”
Your home insurance deductible could be $20,000. Would you be ready?
Why your next car purchase will be an affordability nightmare
The report found that accounts with a carryover, a grace period, or both showed relatively small differences in average contribution levels.
Contributions ranged from $1,365 for accounts without a grace period to $1,489 for accounts with a grace period.
EBRI data shows younger workers contribute less to flexible spending accounts but forfeit unused funds more often, risking lost healthcare savings.Curly_photo / Getty Images
The IRS raised the 2026 health FSA limit to $3,400
The financial stakes of misjudging an FSA election are set to grow under new federal limits announced for 2026 plan years. The IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32 increased the maximum annual employee pretax contribution to $3,400, up from $3,300 the prior year.
The IRS formalized the increase under the inflation index tied to the Affordable Care Act (ACA). For employers that permit unused balances to carry forward, the maximum carryover amount also increased to $680 from $660.
Employers that offer rollovers may set their threshold below the IRS cap, and neither a carryover nor a grace period is required. A worker who contributes the full $3,400 and leaves the balance unspent at the 2024 average rate would lose more than $400 in pretax dollars, as shown in IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32.
Those forfeited pretax dollars could have covered copays, prescriptions, dental work and other eligible medical expenses under the participant’s plan.
Married couples with two FSA-eligible plans can each contribute up to $3,400, for a combined household limit of $6,800, under the IRS limit in Revenue Procedure 2025-32.
How to keep more of your FSA dollars during the next plan year
The EBRI report concluded that greater awareness of plan features and spending requirements could help workers use FSAs more effectively. Rollover and grace period provisions offer workers additional time to manage year-end FSA spending.
Leaving a small balance unspent does not necessarily erase the benefit of participating, because pretax savings can outweigh the lost amount.
Spiegel pointed to opportunities for employers to help workers better understand eligible expenses, plan deadlines, and features available to manage unused balances.
Spiegel said understanding how FSAs work is essential to maximizing their value. The report also identified website filters for FSA-eligible products as one emerging tool that could help reduce unused balances before plan-year deadlines close.
Related: The six-figure retirement health care myth: Why lifetime estimates distort your real budget
How to Fix Damaged Gutters in Your Home
Gutters protect your home from water damage. When they work properly, they carry rainwater away from your roof and foundation, keeping everything dry. However, over time, gutters can be damaged by wear and tear, weather changes, or clogs. A small issue can become a bigger problem if you don’t fix it. That’s why you need to check your gutters regularly and know how to repair them when needed.
You might be surprised at how easy it is to fix gutter problems yourself. With the right tools and a bit of knowledge, you can save money on costly repairs later. Let’s look at how you can fix damaged gutters at home.
Spotting damage
The first step in repairing gutters is to identify any damage. Look for clear signs like sagging, rust, or leaks. If you see water pooling around your foundation or on your roof, your gutters may not be working correctly. Sometimes, a close look can show cracks or holes that aren’t easy to spot at first.
Check the seams where different sections of the gutters connect. These joints can often be weak, especially if they haven’t been sealed well. Also, look for sections that bend or pull away from the house. Finding these problems early can help you fix them before they get worse.
Tools needed
To repair your Delta gutters, you’ll need a few tools. Start with a sturdy ladder to safely reach high places. A trowel will help you clean out debris and clogs. You’ll also want drip-edge shingles or small rubber gaskets for seal repairs. Sealant or gutter repair tape can help fix leaks.
Wear gloves to protect your hands from sharp edges or debris. If your gutters have rust, a wire brush or sandpaper can smooth those areas before applying sealant. Having these tools ready will make your repair process easier.
Removing debris
Cleaning your gutters is essential for keeping them working well. Leaves, dirt, and other debris can build up and cause clogs. To start, climb your ladder and carefully scoop out any gunk blocking the water flow. Be ready for a messy job, as the debris can be compact and stubborn!
Remove as much debris as possible so you can see any damage underneath. Use a bucket or tarp at the base of your ladder to catch anything you drop. After cleaning out the gutters, take a moment to rinse them with a hose. This helps clear out any leftover sludge and shows whether water flows freely.
Scheduling Routine Cleanings
Cleaning your gutters is not a one-time job. It needs regular attention. Aim to clean them seasonally, especially in the fall when leaves are everywhere. Depending on your location, you might want to schedule cleanings twice a year. Keeping a routine helps you spot problems before they get worse.
If you’re not comfortable climbing ladders, consider hiring a professional service. They can do the heavy lifting and keep your gutters well maintained. Regular cleanings keep your gutters working well and can help them last longer, ultimately saving you money.
Finding leaks
After you clean your gutters, check them for leaks. Look for holes or gaps where water might escape. If you notice water spilling out instead of flowing smoothly, you might leak.
Most leaks can be fixed easily. Start by checking the seams; cracks often appear there. Run your fingers along the ends and joints to feel for moisture or see any visible damage. A quick visual inspection is usually enough to find where you need repairs.
Applying sealant
For small holes or cracks, use gutter sealant. Clean the area around the leak and make sure it’s dry. Apply plenty of sealant to the crack or hole, then smooth it out with your finger for a secure seal. If the damage is larger, consider using gutter repair tape.
For bigger repairs, you might need to replace a section of the gutter. Most hardware stores sell gutter sections you can install yourself. Match the size and type of your existing gutters to keep everything consistent.
Gravity’s role
Over time, gutters can sag or get misaligned, affecting how they handle water. The gutter angle matters for directing water to the downspouts. If they aren’t sloped correctly, water can pool instead of flowing away.
Check your gutters from different perspectives to see if they are aligned properly. Ideally, gutters should slope toward the downspouts at about a quarter inch for every ten feet. This setup allows water to flow smoothly.
Making adjustments
To fix sagging gutters, examine the brackets that hold them up. Tightening loose screws or replacing brackets can help with alignment. If needed, adjust the gutter pitch by loosening the brackets, changing their height, and then re-tightening everything to create the right slope.
Take your time with this adjustment. If the gutters aren’t aligned, gravity won’t work properly, and you could face various water damage problems later. Pay attention to the details. Maintaining your gutters is very important. Small repairs can prevent bigger issues. Keep an eye on your gutters, and you’ll enjoy a well-kept and damage-free home!
The post How to Fix Damaged Gutters in Your Home appeared first on Addicted 2 Success.
Why Your Team’s “8 Hours” Is a Lie (And What That Costs You)
A guy I know runs a 14 person warehouse supply shop outside Columbus. He paid his crew for 38,400 hours last year. When he finally sat down with actual clock data instead of gut feel, the number he could defend was closer to 34,000. That’s a whole employee he was paying for who never showed up. Not theft, not fraud. Just a decade of rounding, of “close enough,” of a supervisor who liked his team too much to say anything.
Most owners I talk to assume their payroll is roughly accurate. It isn’t, and the gap rarely comes from the person you suspect. It lives in the spaces nobody watches. The 7 minutes between clock-in and the first task. The shift that runs 22 minutes long because nobody wanted to be the one to interrupt. The break that stretches. Multiply one careless minute across a crew and a year and it stops being a rounding error and starts being a real line item you’d notice on your P&L.
Here’s what I’d tell that shop owner if he asked me today: stop treating hours as a feeling and start treating them as data. That’s the whole job of time and attendance software, and if you’re still running this on paper or a spreadsheet, you’re the last person in the room who trusts a guess over a record.
The Payroll Gap Map: Where Your Money Actually Leaks
I built a simple model for tracking this a few years back, and I call it the Payroll Gap Map. It splits every hour you pay for into three buckets. The first is productive time, the work you hired someone to do. The second is ghost time, paid minutes that produce nothing measurable, lunch runovers, late starts, and the slow drift at end of shift. The third is unpaid effort, the overtime nobody logged, the early login from the parking lot, the “I’ll fix it later” that never gets reimbursed.
Ghost time and unpaid effort are both expensive, but they pull in opposite directions. Ghost time inflates your payroll. Unpaid effort erodes trust, and it’s the quiet reason your best people eventually leave. Most managers only see one of them because their system only records one of them.
When I first started mapping this, I assumed ghost time was a discipline problem. I was wrong. It’s an information problem. If your crew doesn’t know their exact hours are visible to them, they treat a few minutes as a rounding courtesy. The moment they can see their own clock data, the behavior shifts on its own. You don’t have to chase it.
What a Real Time Record Looks Like
A legitimate time record isn’t a punch-in number. It’s a story about a day. You want the raw clock event, the break markers, the project or job code attached, and the approval trail showing who signed off and when. That’s four layers, and paper gives you roughly one and a half of them.
Digital records also create something a spreadsheet can’t: a trail you can audit. Labour law across most of the developed world sets baseline employee protections around working time, rest breaks and record keeping, and employers are expected to keep accurate records of hours worked.
The European Union publishes its working time directives as an example of how formal these expectations have become. Your own jurisdiction will differ, but the pattern is universal: the burden of proof sits with the employer, not the employee. When a dispute lands on your desk, “I’m pretty sure he was here” is not a defense. A timestamp is.
Why Your Best Employees Hate Your Current System Most
This is the part that surprised me when I ran my first paid pilot with a crew of 22.
The hourly staff whose hours were always recorded correctly were the least bothered by paper timesheets. They clocked in on the minute, clocked out on the minute, no friction. The people who hated it were the ones who actually carried the extra weight. The shift lead who covered a gap and forgot to write it down. The administrator who did 40 minutes of catch-up on a Sunday because she cared. They were being quietly punished by a system too blunt to see them.
So if you’re weighing whether to move off paper, here’s the test I’d run before you buy anything. Take one full work week. Ask each team member to log their own hours twice a day, once at midday and once at end of shift, in a shared sheet. Compare that to the official record. Three things will surface. Who consistently under-reports. Which departments drift most. And whether the drift tracks a real workload problem or just loose supervision. That single week will tell you more about your business than a quarter of reports.
Only then should you pick software. The tool has to fit your reality, not the other way around. A restaurant with a rotating roster needs schedule-driven tracking. A construction company working at multiple sites needs location-aware clocking. A distributed office needs flexible-hour logic. If your team runs on annualised hours or a Bradford-style absence model, your tool has to speak that language natively or you’ll spend the first year fighting it. That’s the kind of thing you should confirm before you sign a contract, not after.
What the Research Actually Says About Presence
The instinct is to assume paid hours and productive hours track one to one. They don’t. We’ve had decades of evidence on the gap between time at work and time actually working, and the pattern holds across industries and countries. SHRM is a solid starting point if you want a neutral clearinghouse on workforce time, engagement and productivity research. The consistent finding is that manager oversight quality matters more than the number of hours scheduled.
Which is the case for the software in the first place. A time system doesn’t manage people. It removes the ambiguity that lets people manage themselves badly, and it removes the blind spot that lets good people go uncredited. Your supervisors still do the human part.
The Tuesday Afternoon Test
If you want a one-minute diagnostic right now, run this. Pull last Tuesday’s records for any single department. Look at the five minute block after every scheduled start time and the five minute block before every scheduled end time. Count how many entries cluster in those windows. If more than two-thirds do, your people are clocking around the edges of what you asked for. That’s your gap. It doesn’t need a consultant to explain it, just a shift in how you measure.
None of this requires you to become a surveillance boss. That’s the move I’d warn against most. Treating your crew like suspects burns trust faster than ghost time ever costs you. The right posture is transparency in both directions: they see their hours, you see the patterns, and the conversation is about workload, not guilt. Half the “problems” I’ve helped owners untangle were just people trying to do a good job inside a system that never gave them the information to do it cleanly.
Stop paying for the hours you think you got. Pay for the ones you can prove. Start with last Tuesday. What does your five-minute window tell you about your own team?
The post Why Your Team’s “8 Hours” Is a Lie (And What That Costs You) appeared first on Addicted 2 Success.
What To Watch This Week: The Best New Shows And Movies On Netflix, HBO Max, Prime Video And More
Looking for something new to stream this week? Here’s every major new movie and show hitting Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Apple TV and more.
US Navy’s Oldest Commissioned Warship Has Its 79th Commanding Officer
The USS Constitution was commissioned in 1797 as one of the original “six frigates” of the U.S. Navy. It is preserved as a museum ship but remains a commissioned warship
New Study Shows Which U.S. States Have Most Credit Card Debt
Have you ever wondered what the average credit card balance is and how that varies from state to state?
Team Clark touts the responsible use of credit cards as a way to earn rewards on your everyday spending while enjoying superior consumer protections.
But there is a downside to rewards credit cards if not used properly.
If you spend more than you can afford and can’t pay your balance in full, interest charges can regularly exceed 20%. And, unfortunately, that interest can add up quickly if you make only minimum payments each month.
The average credit card balance among American consumers is approximately $6,659, according to 2026 data provided by Experian.
At the state level, Iowa has the lowest average credit card balance ($5,187), while Alaska has the highest ($7,760).
10 U.S. States with Highest Average Credit Card Balances
It’s reasonable to expect that the cost of living could affect the credit card balances people carry. So, with that in mind, perhaps it is not a surprise to see the two non-contiguous states (Hawaii and Alaska) atop this list.
Washington, D.C. residents are also carrying an average balance that would rank near the top of this list ($7,740).
10 U.S. States with Lowest Average Credit Card Balances
The Midwest is a prominent fixture on this list. Iowa and Wisconsin have the lowest average credit card balances.
Wisconsin ranks second in the nation for both highest average credit scores and lowest average credit card balance. That means Badger State residents are doing a good job of both avoiding credit card debt and keeping their FICO scores up.
Interestingly enough, this list also includes some of the states (Mississippi, West Virginia, Arkansas) with the lowest average credit scores. That could indicate that access to lines of credit could have an impact on the average credit card balance totals.
Average Credit Card Balance by U.S. State
Didn’t see your state on either list? Don’t worry, Experian has provided the data for all 50 states and Washington, D.C.
Here’s an alphabetical list of the 2026 data, including how much the state averages have increased or declined from the 2025 debt numbers:
StateAverage Credit Card BalancePercentage Change from 2025 to 2026
Alabama$5,932-1.20%
Alaska$7,760-0.10%
Arizona$6,8501.00%
Arkansas$5,624-1.10%
California$7,1291.50%
Colorado$7,1891.10%
Connecticut$7,4941.20%
Delaware$6,7420.40%
District of Columbia$7,7402.10%
Florida$7,4441.10%
Georgia$7,145-0.60%
Hawaii$7,6541.50%
Idaho$6,0601.00%
Illinois$6,5450.40%
Indiana$5,467-0.40%
Iowa$5,1870.10%
Kansas$5,9150.00%
Kentucky$5,279-0.30%
Louisiana$6,170-1.70%
Maine$5,8781.80%
Maryland$7,3580.80%
Massachusetts$6,8012.00%
Michigan$5,791-0.20%
Minnesota$5,9891.00%
Mississippi$5,327-3.00%
Missouri$5,879-0.70%
Montana$6,0641.10%
Nebraska$5,8130.10%
Nevada$7,2931.10%
New Hampshire$6,7352.20%
New Jersey$7,4641.00%
New Mexico$5,9250.50%
New York$6,9010.60%
North Carolina$6,3981.00%
North Dakota$5,8490.50%
Ohio$5,706-0.40%
Oklahoma$6,072-0.90%
Oregon$6,1490.80%
Pennsylvania$6,1000.20%
Rhode Island$6,6410.90%
South Carolina$6,5050.60%
South Dakota$5,5871.40%
Tennessee$6,2571.20%
Texas$7,3830.00%
Utah$6,4591.80%
Vermont$5,8761.20%
Virginia$7,1221.20%
Washington$6,8671.10%
West Virginia$5,287-0.30%
Wisconsin$5,2640.80%
Wyoming$6,2360.00%
How does your state rank? Were you surprised by the results? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the Clark.com community.
The post New Study Shows Which U.S. States Have Most Credit Card Debt appeared first on Clark Howard.
Morgan Stanley just made a bold call on Amazon stock
Amazon stock jumped to lead the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Oct. 19, the same day Morgan Stanley named it the firm’s top pick and set a price target that would push AWS’ total revenue to $1 trillion for the first time, according to Investopedia. Analyst Brian Nowak set a new target of $350, up from $335, representing roughly 40% upside from the stock’s Oct. 16 close.
The upgrade lands at an unusual moment. Amazon’s cloud business is expanding at a pace Wall Street did not expect. Its AI infrastructure bet is producing visible returns, and one of the company’s biggest competitors just ran into a public fight with Amazon over how AI agents shop online. The stars, in Nowak’s view, are lining up.
The “Rule of 90” case for buying Amazon now
Nowak’s note centers on what he calls the “Rule of 90” for Amazon Web Services. The idea is that when revenue growth plus operating margin crosses 90%, a cloud business earns a premium multiple, Motley Fool reported.
AWS is not there yet, but Nowak thinks it will get there. He projects AWS growth of 47% in 2027 and 42% in 2028, with operating margins of 42% and 44%, respectively.
Also read: JPMorgan’s CEO sends a stern warning to corporate America
Put those numbers together and you get an AWS business that nearly triples its revenue between 2025 and 2028. At those margins, AWS would clear the Rule of 90 threshold and, in Nowak’s model, justify a higher valuation for the entire company. He sees Amazon earning around $16.50 a share in 2028, roughly 7% above the Wall Street consensus.
The projection rests on Amazon’s position inside the cloud arms race. AWS grew 37% to $42.2 billion in revenue during the second quarter of 2026, its fastest pace in 18 quarters, and is now running at a $169 billion annualized rate. Amazon also raised its 2026 capital expenditure to $220 billion. CEO Andy Jassy cited falling memory prices as one reason to accelerate the spending.
AWS is betting on Bedrock and Nvidia to pull ahead
Nowak’s optimism on margins ties directly to Amazon’s AI platform strategy. Bedrock, AWS’s managed AI service, gives enterprise customers access to at least 10 fully managed third-party models, according to Amazon’s SEC filing. Nowak expects Bedrock to become a growing source of high-margin revenue as more companies run their AI workloads on AWS rather than building their own infrastructure.
The hardware picture adds to that argument. AWS and Nvidia announced in August that they would deploy an additional 2 million Nvidia GPUs over roughly the next two years, a commitment that would give AWS one of the largest GPU fleets in the world. That kind of scale matters because the biggest enterprise AI workloads require consistent, massive compute that only a handful of providers can guarantee.
KeyBanc Capital Markets also has a $350 target on Amazon, projecting 38% AWS growth versus a 37% street consensus, as TheStreet reported. Both firms see AWS’s trajectory as underappreciated by the broader market.
Amazon stock jumped to lead the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Oct. 19.Global Visual Network / Getty Images
Meta’s Muse just handed Amazon an unexpected edge
One of the more unusual factors in Amazon’s favor right now is a fight it did not start. Meta launched Muse, an AI shopping assistant, and integrated it with retailers including Walmart and Best Buy. The plan was for Muse to help users browse, compare and buy products across the web, with Meta collecting a transaction fee on each purchase, according to TheStreet.
More Amazon:
Amazon is coming for your quick Walmart run
Amazon’s Alexa shopping tool faces its first big October test
Amazon pulls a best-selling pain reliever again, and customers need to check their medicine cabinets
Amazon blocked Muse from its store on Sept. 20, after Meta declined its request to remove the bot. Amazon bars outside companies from using automated tools to shop on its site, and its spokesperson said third-party agents like Muse have the same obligations as other apps.
Amazon blocked Muse for a reason. Every AI purchase routed through a Meta checkout is a transaction Amazon loses. Blocking the bot kept that money in-house.
What the $350 target means for investors
Morgan Stanley’s Overweight rating and $350 price target are not a guarantee. Amazon traded near $250 around Oct. 16, meaning the stock would need to climb about 40% to reach that level. That kind of move rarely happens in a straight line, and a lot has to go right on AWS growth for Nowak’s 2028 earnings estimate to hold.
Rate risk is the one to watch. Amazon has $220 billion earmarked for AI infrastructure, and that bet only pays off if enterprise demand stays strong. A pullback leaves a lot of empty rack space.
AWS is growing faster than any major cloud rival. Bedrock is signing enterprise customers. Amazon shut Muse out rather than share the checkout. Nowak’s argument is that none of this is fully priced in yet, and that AWS hits the Rule of 90 before the street expects it to.
Related: Amazon shutting down a key grocery service in multiple countries
American Airlines leaves empty seats while charging flyers more
Traveling by plane has become so much more than getting from A to B in the quickest and safest way possible, without much turbulence.
Passengers want legroom, a nice view, and delicious meals, while others want to be able to work smoothly on their laptops while flying.
These demands have fueled fierce competition in the industry, and airlines also need to turn a profit. Amid rising fuel prices, airlines are adjusting their strategies to stay afloat.
American Airlines reported third-quarter earnings results on Oct. 22, revealing 19.3% year-over-year revenue growth, topping the high end of the previously announced guidance range.
In addition to revenue records, the carrier also revealed an important shift in its strategy.
American Airlines says it is prioritizing higher fares over fuller planes
During the third-quarter earnings call, American reported record quarterly revenue of $16.3 billion. Demand was strong across domestic and international markets, and premium travel and corporate bookings performed particularly well.
However, higher ticket revenue did not translate into a profit because of high fuel costs.
“Higher fuel added $1.9 billion to our costs in the third quarter. Nearly 70% more than we paid during the same period last year,” said CEO Robert Isom Jr. during the call.
American also reported an adjusted loss of $0.28 per share, and management projected fuel costs to remain high through the end of the year. It also provided a full-year 2026 adjusted-loss guidance of $1.00 to $1.60 per diluted share.
The carrier also confirmed it has been focusing on higher fares rather than maximum seat occupancy. In airline terms, that means prioritizing “yield” (revenue earned per passenger mile) over “load factor” (the share of seats that are filled).
Its plan is to improve revenue through premium products, pricing, and its loyalty program.
“We were deliberate in how we managed revenue during the quarter. We prioritized yield over load factor, proactively securing meaningfully higher yields in exchange for slightly lower loads,” said Chief Commercial Officer Nathaniel Pieper.
American Airlines says it is prioritizing higher fares over fuller planes.PATRICK T. FALLON / Getty Images
What American Airlines’ focus on higher fares means for travelers
For travelers, the shift is already showing up in ticket prices. U.S. airfares rose an average of nearly 23% year over year in the seven months through September, according to Labor Department data cited by Reuters.
Southwest, for example, said its average passenger fare rose 26.9% to $231.69 in the third quarter, not including fees.
Holiday trips are also impacted. Hopper’s 2026 Holiday Travel Index puts the average domestic round-trip fare at $402 for Thanksgiving, up 31% from last year, and $452 for Christmas, up 23%. Economist Hayley Berg attributes the 10-year highs in part to months of elevated jet fuel costs tied to the conflict in Iran.
Travelers shouldn’t count on relief if fuel prices ease. American Airlines CFO Devon May told the Financial Times on Oct. 22 that if fuel prices drop, fares will probably stay largely where they are.
Flexibility is still the best way to save. In September, Hopper wrote that departing on Monday, Nov. 23, is the cheapest option for Thanksgiving, at about $370 round trip. It also advised avoiding Sunday, Nov. 29, for the return, when fares average as high as $604.
Here’s some of my other recent travel news coverage:
Delta CEO has firm message for travelers worried about flight safety
Low-cost airline Wizz Air exits 2 major markets until March 2027
Marriott finally fixes major pain point for key travelers
Fare strategy shows results on revenue, but has limitations and risks
American’s decision to prioritize yield over load factor reflects a broader shift in the U.S. airline industry, as several carriers are increasingly willing to leave some seats empty rather than discount tickets to fill them.
Five major U.S. airlines generated nearly $8.8 billion more in passenger revenue in the third quarter, an increase of 18%, while passenger traffic grew by less than 1%, Reuters reported on Oct. 23.
So even as higher fares drive much of the industry’s revenue growth, they have not been enough to protect profits from surging fuel costs.
“If fuel stays elevated, we have to continue to push yield up so that we can make a bit of money,” May told Reuters.
This approach also has limits. Higher prices could eventually discourage demand, while flying with fewer passengers can increase operating costs per occupied seat.
Can airlines sustain higher fares?
Today’s pricing strategy could also become harder to maintain in 2027.
Six major U.S. airlines plan to increase domestic capacity by 3.8% in the first quarter of 2027, compared with a 0.2% increase in the third quarter of 2026, according to Airlines for America, citing Cirium data, Reuters highlighted.
If more seats enter the market, competition could intensify and pressure airfares. At the same time, consumers have already faced substantial price increases, raising the possibility that some will cut back on travel.
If capacity grows faster than demand, airlines may have to choose between accepting lower load factors and reducing prices to attract passengers.
Nonetheless, American Airlines’ CFO believes the airline’s “yield gains are very sustainable.”
Related: United’s CEO defends charging travelers extra for a better seat