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President Obama will head into his second term in January facing a divided Congress that looks a lot like the Congress of the last two years of his first term – with the Democrats controlling the Senate and conservative Republicans solidly controlling the House of Representatives.

While political pundits work overtime to draw profound conclusions from Tuesday’s election results, the implications for the financial markets seem less than momentous. Election night was clearly much better for Democrats than Republicans, but this was a status quo outcome. Until the 2014 mid-term elections, the players will be President Obama, a GOP House of Representatives and a Democratic Senate—the same mix as the last two years. This begs the question, “Will anything be different?”

The world’s largest developed economies continue to experience modest and volatile growth as they work off excess debt accumulated over the previous decades. Global growth is unlikely to come in a straight line, due to the instability caused by excess debt and the inconsistency and cyclicality of governmental policy response. In fact, in the near-term, global economic growth appears to again be waning, creating the third annual growth scare since 2009. This has prompted further monetary action from central banks. Will it be effective?

Incentives, credits, and deductions within the U.S. tax system are currently in the spotlight, and most advisors are aware that unprecedented exemptions for gift and estate taxes are set to expire on December 31, 2012. Less clear, however, is how families can manage their assets to capitalize on the credits before the window closes. This article looks at some of the reasons families have not taken advantage of expiring gifting opportunities.

Advisors should protect their clients who own fine art and other collectibles from financial loss with properly executed tax and estate planning. This article highlights two recent examples of how oversights, such as defective title, create marketability challenges that may result in substantial financial consequences for collectors.

This issue of Eton's Investment Outlook explores the concept of confidence level, using the familiar example of airline travel to illustrate our need for higher confidence levels in certain activities than in others. An investor’s level of confidence, both desired and actual, is a key driver in the Goals-Based Investing framework. This article describe how confidence levels are a function of our priorities, our time horizon, and the amount of portfolio risk we assume when investing.

History shows a number of scenarios could lead to significant losses for bond investors. Based on an examination of fixed-income markets since 1919, researchers found that even the most gradual rate increase scenario models an annualized return expectation of 0 percent for almost six years.

While family businesses are playing an important role in the economy and studies have regularly shown that in the long-term they outperform other businesses, there is the continual challenge of succession to the next generation. An estate is built up over the generations and the family grows larger. This source of diversity is not without its challenges: how do you forge a common identity to which everyone can relate? How do you learn to take decisions together while maintaining family harmony?

Current U.S. fiscal policy, if not modified before year-end, is on track to deliver a $600 billion economic headwind in 2013 (the equivalent of 4 percent of U.S. GDP), while the 2012 presidential and congressional elections add another layer of uncertainty to an already complex and politically challenged situation.

The upcoming election is as much about how we address fiscal issues as it is about the pace of the remedy; at the center is the debate over taxes and the size of government.