In this Ask KT & Suze Anything episode, Suze answers your questions about fraud at TreasuryDirect.gov, investing in the company you work for, when it’s time to get a financial advisor and so much more.
Listen to Podcast Episode:
Podcast Transcript:
Suze: February 12, 2026. Welcome everybody to what KT to what?
KT: The Women in Money podcast and everyone’s smart enough to listen.
Suze: And what are we doing today? It’s the Ask what?
KT: Ask KT to ask Suze anything.
Suze: So here we go, everybody. Here’s what you need to know if you have a question. Just send it in to asksuzepodcast@gmail.com. And if KT chooses it, oh, we will ask and answer it on the podcast. However, as many of you know, I do go through those emails, and if I feel like it because it strikes a chord in my heart, I will answer it.
KT: Wait, you gotta tell everybody about Super Bowl. For those of you that missed Super Bowl Sunday podcast, go back and listen to it. It was one of the very best and one of my favorite that Suze’s ever done.
Suze: Why did you like it?
KT: It was really, really educational. It was informative. You were calm. You were great.
Suze: You were great. Wait, are you saying that I’m not calm?
KT: It was Super Bowl Sunday, and I was worried that she was gonna give all of you like this really big ra ra ra podcast, but it was unbelievably wonderful. I listened to it twice.
Suze: Come on…
KT: I did. I did. You did. I did, and so did my sister. We really loved it. It was one of your best.
Suze: But I have to tell you. I love the thing about patience versus impatience.
KT: Don’t, don’t give it away. Those of you that didn’t listen, go listen.
Suze: I can give anything away. I want to give away.
KT: Let’s tell him that I won. KT was for Seahawks, baby, and they did a great job.
Suze: I have to tell you. I couldn’t have been more disappointed.
KT: I know Suze was a little depressed with her Patriots.
Suze: I wasn’t depressed. It was, I have a strange feeling that the quarterback who had had an injured shoulder still did, but anyway, the Seahawks so deserved to win. So congratulations, KT. Tell everybody what a party animal I’ve turned into.
KT: Oh my God, ever since we left the island. Suze has looked at me, she said, I’m making up for lost time. I said, we were not stranded for 14 years. It’s not like, you know, we were on an island without being able to leave. I said we chose to be there, but she came back to Florida and she has booked every theatrical event, every concert. Every performance, all kinds of live. She hasn’t gone to live events in years, so we have a calendar that is just like a social animal. Unbelievable, especially she’s not a butterfly. She’s a social animal.
Suze: Especially from somebody who very seldom even left the house, right? KT for all those years.
KT: If I had a house like that, I wouldn’t leave.
Suze: You used to, you don’t know, but you wanna know what’s great, everybody, we went from a seriously sprawling estate that we had built in the Bahamas to really a tiny condo…
KT: We have a little, little, little condo here on the beach, which is great.
Suze: But tell everybody how much we’re loving it.
KT: We love it. We’ve told them this before. Suze has such joy knowing where I am all the time and in this little condo, but she can hear me, she can see me, she can say KT, she doesn’t have to call me or ring bells.
Suze: But, more than finding KT, egotistical woman over there, no, but seriously, more than finding her, I just want to tell all of you who maybe are afraid to downsize, you’re used to all the space around you, and you like that you get used and start to love what you do have around you, and we couldn’t be happier really if we tried.
KT: You know what also really did it for me is that we obviously sold our estate turnkey so we left everything but we did take personal belongings, photographs, art, anything that was special for us. As soon as I brought those back into this little space, I felt surrounded by my love and comfort buttons, and it made it all very easy to make the transition. So think about that, it makes it, you can make it really easy if you just do what feels natural.
Suze: And what do I enjoy more than anything? Not having to pay all that money to live on a private island anyway, that’s besides the point. But tell everybody where you’re going tonight.
KT: Oh, the social calendar. OK, we’re doing something that I’m really very excited about. I love this is so…
Suze: This is her early Valentine’s Day, everybody.
KT: We both love Andrea Bocelli, especially since I’m an Italian girl and he’s one of my most favorite Italian artists. I can’t wait to hear him sing, and Suze got us great seats right up front, and I’m very, very, I’m looking forward to it. I said he can’t see me, but he’ll feel me. He’ll feel me, Suze.
Suze: Right, I love that. Let’s begin now. We’re gonna start with an email that I’m asking KT to read, and this is a very serious problem if you ask me that is happening with Treasury Direct. So I want you to listen to this email closely because don’t think it can’t happen to you. Go on.
KT: Are we ready? I did not edit this, people, so listen up. This is from a woman by the name of Cheryl, and Cheryl said, Suze, I purchased a US savings bond from Treasury Direct in 2022. In July of 2025, my account was fraudulently accessed. My bank information was changed and my money liquidated all without my authorization. They did not notify me until October when they reported fraudulent activity on my account. The money was long gone.
I immediately called and they refused to connect me with a fraud investigator. They have refused to provide any information, blaming me for not protecting my information. However, my loss of funds was not unique. I’ve discovered 16 other people who lost their money in the same manner and almost at the same time frame.
When we attempted to access our accounts, we received hundreds of spam emails, had our bank information changed, our accounts were liquidated without any authorization. Our accounts were locked, preventing us from seeing what happened. When we were finally allowed access to our accounts months later, our money was long gone. All accounts had their money transferred to Pathward NA into an account named checking.
Suze: What’s Pathward?
KT: Another company, OK.
Suze: It’s a financial that people are using to do this.
KT: The money was then transferred to Broxel and a prepaid Visa card. All money is lost. We have received no help whatsoever from Treasury Direct and Pathward. We have asked our Congress people, the OIG, the FBI, the CFPB, and others for assistance. Thus far, Treasury Direct is stonewalling everyone. We have also filed complaints with the SD Department of Consumer Affairs seeking redress from Pathward, all to no avail.
And to add salt to an open wound, listen up everybody, you won’t believe it. Treasury Direct mailed us a 1099 form requiring us to pay taxes on the money that was lost. When I called TD, they told me to call the IRS. The IRS told me to call TD. You can’t make this stuff up.
Suze: So, everybody listen up. The reason that I wanted KT to read that is I have been going back and forth with Cheryl about this, giving her exact things, do this, do that, do this, do that, and it breaks my heart that Cheryl and others that she knows of now, they’re having to go through this, but there’s something I need you all to understand.
Treasury Direct is run by the government. It is not a commercial bank or a credit union with 24/7 fraud teams and instant reversals. So if ACH instructions are changed and the money is moved, I’m telling you investigations can take time.
ACH stands for automated clearing house, and it’s an electronic network that moves money between bank accounts in the US. That’s how money usually moves. That’s bureaucracy, everybody, not conspiracy, but here’s what matters to you.
If you have a Treasury Direct account, I want you to use a password you use nowhere else, nowhere. You are to never click a treasury link from an email. That’s how this happens. You get an email, and you think it’s from the treasury, and you click on the link, gone. You need to type the website directly into your browser when you are going to contact Treasury Direct.
I know it’s a pain, but I want you to secure your email with two-factor authentication. You just gotta do this. You gotta check your linked bank account settings regularly. If you don’t, something can happen and you don’t even know that it’s happened. You have to get that cybercrime today is so sophisticated, and if someone gets into your email they can reset everything.
Your financial security is not just about where your money is. It’s about how well you protect access to it. We can’t control everything, but we can control our digital discipline. I need you to be smart, be proactive, be powerful, because nobody should lose $11,000 or any amount of money due to a preventable cyber crime.
KT: So this is from Fred and Dorothy. Dear Suze, when you say not to invest in the stock market with money you will need in five years, do you mean from the time you start investing or until the time you feel you might actually need it?
There’s about $750,000 in retirement accounts plus $200,000 in CDs. Our house is paid off and we have no debt. Our Social Security combined will be over $6,000 per month and currently we spend about $5,000 per month. Thank you for clarifying.
Suze: Dear Fred and Dorothy, it’s five years from when you think you might actually need it, not from when you start investing, but from when you think you will actually need it. Just that simple.
KT: This is from Victoria. My husband wants to buy shares of stock in his employer’s company. It’s a fintech company that is not publicly traded. The company’s been around for six years. We have already loaned his company $50,000 at 8% interest, which I am told is now being converted to stock. He wants to invest $100,000 more. The company is still in the red. Suze, I think this is a bad idea, but I don’t know anything about this sort of thing. Please help.
Suze: Most fintech companies operate at a loss for years and years. Many never go public. Many raise repeated funding rounds, and when they do, it dilutes the equity of the shareholders. Employees often overestimate the value of their stock. There’s also an ego thing involved.
The company is six years old. It’s in the red. They’ve already converted a $50,000 loan into stock. Now he wants to invest another $100,000. This is called double concentration risk.
Her husband has a salary from this company. His career is in this company. Their health insurance is from this company. His bonus. And now there would be $150,000 of their capital at risk in the same company. If this company goes under, they lose his job, his stock, everything. That’s how families get obliterated.
I wouldn’t do this if I were you. Trust me on that one.
KT: This is from Stacy. After purchasing the must-have docs on January 15, 2021, finally printing them out only a few months ago, on January twenty-eighth we gathered our witnesses, went to the bank, had everything notarized. It is done. Better late than never. I’m honestly so relieved and proud.
Suze: Just do it, everybody. It’s so easy. An hour, maybe two at the most. The must-have docs are a living revocable trust, a will, an advanced directive, a durable power of attorney for health care, and a financial power of attorney.
They are $99 for over $2,500 worth of state of the art documents that you can share with as many family members as you want by giving them the activation code. You get them by going to musthavedocs.com.
KT: This is from Joy. I’m 48 years old with cerebral palsy, and I lost my dad in June. Now he is gone and I realize how I didn’t prepare. I am not where I need to be in retirement, but thanks to you, I am now maxing out on my employer match.
I need your help convincing my mom how important it is to have a trust and a will. She thinks it’s not necessary because she has my name on all of her accounts. Mom is 75. We’re caring for my 97-year-old grandmother. My mom trusts what you say, Suze. Please help me to get her to do a will and a trust.
Suze: If all Mom has is bank accounts held in both of your names, not you as beneficiary but joint owners, and no real estate, technically no big deal. As long as you can sign, write checks, and pay bills, OK.
However, if Mom has real estate and it’s in both of your names as joint tenancy with right of survivorship and she becomes incapacitated, she can’t sign. It takes both signatures to sell or refinance. You may need a conservatorship, which can cost thousands.
A revocable living trust with an incapacity clause avoids all that. Also, having a child’s name on property can expose it to that child’s legal risks. And what if you die before Mom? Then what?
It’s $99. There’s nothing wrong with double protection. Do the trust. Do the advanced directive. Do the powers of attorney. Protect yourself.
KT: An Alliant customer asks: My monthly expenses are $10,000 a month, so I keep about $120,000 in an emergency fund in the ultimate opportunity savings account. Can I change that to the jumbo savings?
Suze: Yes. The jumbo savings is liquid, paying 3.35% APY. Keep $100,000 average daily balance for 12 months and you get a $250 bonus, which brings it to about 3.6% if rates stay the same. You must do it before March 31st and go through myalliant.com to qualify for the bonus.
KT: She also inherited $45,000 and will need it for a down payment in about seven months. Should she put that in jumbo savings?
Suze: I would put the $120,000 in jumbo savings. The $45,000, since you’ll need it in seven months, put it in the 6-month certificate at 3.9% APY. That gives you a higher rate and aligns with your timeline.
KT: Last question from Mary. Should we get a financial advisor? We’re retired with nearly $2 million. My husband was diagnosed with Parkinson’s. I think we should hand off the money for 1% so we can focus on his health.
Suze: Your husband is still capable. Don’t take away something he loves before he can’t do it. The advisor will always be there.
Also, don’t think you can’t learn this. Sit down with him. Have him teach you. Know which stocks to keep forever. One percent of $2 million is $20,000 a year. That’s a lot.
Maybe someday you hand over part of it, but first bet on yourself. Use this time to learn and be empowered.
KT: I love that. Bet on yourself.
Suze: All right, everybody. Until Sunday when Fitzy joins me, send in your questions today. And remember, there’s only one thing we want you to remember.
KT: People first, then money, then things. Now you stay safe.
Suze: See you Sunday. Bye-bye.
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