New Year, New You: Happy New Year!

Now on sale: Napkin Finance, the book!

We are proud to announce that Napkin Finance, Build Your Wealth in 30 Seconds or Less, is now available wherever books are sold!

It’s a quick and easy explainer on everything personal finance—but it’s also a beautiful work of design, and good for more than a few laughs!

It’s not like any other financial book you’ve seen before, and we think you’re going to love it. (We sure do!)

Your financial New Year’s resolutions

Need help getting your financial priorities in line for the new year? We’ve got you covered. Our experts recommend that you put taking control of your debt, building an emergency fund, and improving your financial literacy at the top of your list.

If those items are already on your list of resolutions then you’re not alone. Saving more and paying down debt are Americans’ top financial resolutions. (In fact, given the choice of saving $5,000 or losing 5 pounds, most Americans would take the money.)

Although 80% of New Year’s resolutions will probably be abandoned by February, you can give your financial resolutions a helping hand by putting many of them on autopilot—say, by setting up automatic withdrawals to go to your emergency fund.

Or, try another approach with micro-resolutions—like committing to a new habit for just one month, or by breaking a big resolution down into a few small, achievable steps (like tackling your debt by paying off your smallest balances, first).

The winners and the big winners

A-listers: Apple was the best-performing big-name stock of the year, returning about 84%. Advanced Micro Devices (it makes chips) was the best stock out of S&P 500 companies, gaining some 150%.

Happy returns: And 2019 turned out to be a great year all around for the market (despite those jitters over trade wars and volatility) with the S&P hammering out a 30% return for the year. It was a podium finish for a stellar decade: A $10,000 investment in the S&P at the start of the teens would be worth some $35,000 today.

Binge on this: The best stock of the decade? Netflix, with a more than 4,000% return. Put another way—if you’d invested that $10,000 in Netflix stock at the start of the teens, you’d have about $418,000 today.

Looking ahead: With such strong recent gains under the belt of US stocks, some market experts are starting to warn that no party ever lasts forever.