What you’ll pay for a life insurance policy can vary dramatically; men pay higher premiums than women, older policyholders pay more than younger ones and smokers pay more than non-smokers.

But just how much does your age, gender or smoking habit cost you? InsuranceQuotes.com evaluated life insurance premiums for the top 25 carriers in the nation to find out.

Men pay an average of 38% more than women for the same coverage.

Here’s one area where women have a financial edge. Men are at a greater risk of cardiovascular disease, various cancers and accidental injuries and that makes them more risky to insurers. The average life expectancy of an American man is also five years younger than a woman’s, meaning an insurer is more likely to pay out on a man’s policy than a woman’s.

Smokers pay more than three times as much as non-smokers for the same policy.

Insurers can charge smokers three times as much as non-smokers, insuranceQuotes.com found.

Related: Stressful jobs that pay badly

A non-smoking 45-year-old woman, for example, pays $45 a month for a $500,000 term life policy. If she smokes, however, the premium shoots up to $167 a month. That’s $1,462 more a year.

If you can kick the habit, however, you can save big. Tell your insurer that you’ve been smoke-free for two years and they will usually lower your premium to the rate for non-smokers, said Laura Adams, an analyst for insuranceQuotes.com.

“That’s pretty generous,” said Adams. “It’s almost like you never smoked.”

Related: Why you don’t need to buy extra rental car insurance

But don’t tell your insurer that if it’s not true. If you do die of a smoking-related cause and your insurer finds out you never quit, they can deny the benefit entirely.

Get coverage young and save — but only if you need it

Most people don’t feel the need to buy life insurance until they have a child. And in general, that’s a pretty good rule of thumb.

If you have children in your 20s or early 30s you could save significantly on premiums by opening a policy while you’re young.

Premiums for 35 year olds cost about 27% more than those for a 25 year old.

“Term life [policies are] popular because they’re relatively inexpensive and people don’t need policies for their entire life,” said Adams. Many parents buy 20-year term policies to see their children through their college years.

CNNMoney (New York) First published July 24, 2014: 7:58 PM ET

Joining a growing number of luxury auto makers, Audi unveiled a new all-electric SUV. Called the E-Tron, the SUV will be available in Europe later this year and in the United States next spring.

Audi said it is taking refundable $1,000 deposits for the E-Tron starting now. Prices will start at about $75,000 or $86,700 for well-equipped “First Edition” models.

It’s the first of three new electric vehicles Audi will introduce over the next few years. The German luxury automaker, which is part of the Volkswagen Group (VLKPF), also announced it is partnering with Amazon to handle installation of home charging stations for E-Tron buyers.

The E-Tron was revealed at an event on the San Francisco waterfront. Hundreds of drones formed Audi’s four ring logo over a former Ford factory turned event space.

The SUV was unveiled here because the E-Tron was designed with the US market especially on mind, Audi executives said.

While it might not generate the excitement of a Tesla unveiling — that company received hundreds of thousands of dollars in deposits for its Model 3 within hours of that car’s debut — the E-Tron increases the competitive pressure.

The E-Tron follows Jaguar’s I-Pace electric SUV. Mercedes and BMW also recently unveiled electric SUVs that will go on sale within the next couple of years.

These offerings are all SUVs mostly because the market, in general, has shifted heavily in that direction.

“We wanted to be in the SUV space because we saw the growth and we wanted to be in the sweet spot of the market,” said Filip Brabec, Audi’s vice president for product development.

Car shoppers considering an electric car today are no longer interested in their vehicle looking radically different from anything else on the road, said Brabec.

The E-Tron looks, quite clearly, like an Audi SUV. It even has Audi’s famous trapezoidal grill, a key branding feature, despite not needing a radiator. The grill allows air to pass through under the battery to provide some additional cooling.

There are some unique attributes, though. The E-Tron stands a little wider than Audi’s other SUVs. Slats running across the rear bumper draw attention to the car’s lack of tailpipes, while there are lights in the front that are designed to look like the bars of a charge status indicator.

In Europe, the E-Tron won’t have traditional side mirrors. Instead, it will have a camera on each side where mirrors would ordinarily be. The views from those cameras will be displayed on screens inside the vehicle.

That system will not be available in the United States because safety regulations here don’t allow for it. Audi executives said they are working with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to bring this feature to the American market.

With two electric motors, the all-wheel-drive SUV can accelerate from zero to 60 miles an hour in 5.5 seconds and it has a top speed of 124 miles an hour. It will be able to tow as much as 4,000 pounds. Audi has not yet announced what its driving range will be on a full charge.

When the E-Tron is cruising, rather than accelerating, it is driven mostly by the rear motor. Engineers put a heavy emphasis on recuperating as much energy as possible while driving. That’s generally done as a vehicle brakes or slows by allowing the wheels to push the electric motors, which then act as generators.

In the E-Tron, the driver will be able to select how aggressively the car uses this system, allowing for “one pedal” driving in which taking pressure off the accelerator pedal will slow the car to a full stop using only the motors.

As with other Audi vehicles, the driver will also be able to select different driving modes, from comfortable to sporty, that will alter suspension stiffness, steering responsiveness and how aggressively the SUV accelerates. The SUVs ground clearance is also adjustable by as much as three inches.

Buyers will be able to purchase a home charging system and have it installed by Amazon Home Services. The installation can be ordered online. Pricing will vary depending on each homeowner’s needs.

Audi plans to release two more electric vehicles in the next two years and a total of 12 by 2025.

CNNMoney (San Francisco) First published September 18, 2018: 12:08 AM ET

A prominent short seller who is suing Tesla and Elon Musk for manipulating its stock price says the company would be better off without Musk as the CEO.

Andrew Left, the founder of Citron Research, told CNN’s Julia Chatterley on “First Move” Tuesday morning that it might make sense for Musk to have a more strategic or visionary role at Tesla (TSLA). He said the company could bring in someone else to run the day to day operations.

Left said it would have seemed like “death to the company” a few months ago to think Tesla might need someone else to run it. But Musk has courted controversy as of late. Recently Musk has smoked marijuana during a video interview and accused a caver in the Thai rescue of a stranded soccer team of being a pedophile.

Last week, Left filed a class action lawsuit that accuses Musk of securities fraud after he tweeted in August that he had “funding secured” for a plan to take Tesla private at $420 a share. Musk has since abandoned the plan.

Left argued that the tweet was an attempt to “burn” short sellers who are betting against the company.

“Musk has a long-standing public feud with short-sellers and often uses his personal Twitter account to taunt and confront skeptics of his company,” Left noted in the lawsuit.

On Tuesday, Left conceded that his short position on Tesla has been wrong so far. The stock, despite recent volatility, has soared over the past few years.

“Rumors of their death have been greatly exaggerated and talked about many times,” Left said,

But Left told Chatterley he thinks that at the end of the day, Tesla is going to need more cash and it will probably have to sell more stock to raise funding.

That would be bad news for existing shareholders. Shares fell 2% Tuesday and are now down more than 20% in the past month.

CNNMoney (New York) First published September 11, 2018: 11:54 AM ET

On the surface, annuities may seem like an incredibly enticing “investment” to consider as part of your retirement plan. Insurance companies dangle promises of market-like returns on the upside with no risk of loss during your accumulation years and guaranteed income during your distribution years to get you to sign up for them.

When you dig beneath that surface, you often find that the promises offered by annuities in their marketing wind up severely limited by things like caps, participation rates, and internal fund costs.

Over time, those limits mean that you’ll very likely wind up better off investing directly in the market via index funds than investing via an annuity. As a result, while you’re accumulating money for retirement, annuities generally don’t belong in your retirement plan.

Still, despite the fact that annuities usually make lousy investing vehicles, they can provide reasonable insurance benefits in the form of guaranteed income during retirement. Simple, straightforward single premium immediate annuities from strong insurance companies can provide people with the peace of mind of knowing they won’t run out of money in retirement.

Simple annuities like that can work out for retirees who aren’t comfortable managing their own money. After all, the risks of a poor withdrawal strategy from an investment portfolio could leave a retiree without income at a time when that retiree has no realistic way of earning a living through work.

Still, even the best of annuities have drawbacks that you should recognize before you commit to using them at all.

First, any annuity is only as good as the financial strength of its issuer. If the insurance company offering your annuity were to declare bankruptcy, you would be dependent on the limits and funding sufficiency of your state’s insurance backstop program to provide you any income.

In addition, any option offered by the annuity company beyond the basics of a simple income stream for either a guaranteed time period or for your life will likely come at a substantial cost. Want inflation protection? That will cost you. Want to assure your heirs will get something after you pass? You’re likely better off leaving that something outside your annuity than asking the insurance company to handle it for you.

In addition, if you work in the United States, chances are that you already have access to a retirement plan that acts very much like an annuity that offers you an inflation-protected income for life. It’s called Social Security, and even in the worst case scenario where nothing gets done to shore up the program, it’s expected to cover around three-quarters of its promised benefits for retirees.

The typical retiree or retired couple receives enough from Social Security to keep out of abject poverty. While Social Security alone won’t let you live a lifestyle of the rich and famous, it’s fair to ask how much guaranteed income you really need above Social Security. Other than health-related costs, most retirees find that their expenses actually go down when they’re retired. If you don’t need additional guaranteed income, you might be better off with the greater flexibility that you get outside of annuities.

Remember, too, that even Social Security’s promises are expensive to provide. The combined employee and employer tax rate is 12.4% of your income up to $128,400 of income, and it takes 35 years of those taxes on your earnings to qualify for your full expected benefit. Guarantees, are not cheap, no matter whether they come from the government or from an insurance company. The typical recipient of those guarantees will ultimately be the one paying for that guarantee.

If you consider them only for the portion of your finances that really needs the guaranteed income they promise, annuities may make some sense as part of your retirement plan. Just be sure to treat them as the insurance plans that they are, and understand that just like with life insurance, the act of mixing investing and insurance in the same annuity plan is rarely a good idea for you.

Related links:

• Motley Fool Issues Rare Triple-Buy Alert

• This Stock Could Be Like Buying Amazon in 1997

• 7 of 8 People Are Clueless About This Trillion-Dollar Market

With those limits and those constraints, simple single premium immediate annuities can play a role in providing you guaranteed income for life as part of your retirement plan. Remember that the more complicated the annuity, the more costly it will be for the benefits you get from it, and you’ll improve your chances of finding a truly reasonable annuity to consider.

CNNMoney (New York) First published May 17, 2018: 10:17 AM ET

An investing earthquake is underway and it’s threatening to end traditional money management as we know it.

Investors are pouring their money into so-called passive index funds that blindly track market indexes using computers.

It’s a shift that is coming at the expense of funds that are run by mere mortals, aka invesment managers, who try to pick stocks that will outperform the market.

The trend is especially pronounced in the United States, where 28% of the industry’s $17 trillion in assets are currently invested in passive funds, up from just 13% in 2008, according to data from market research firm Morningstar.

American investors have plowed a total of $671 billion into passive funds since the start of 2015, while pulling $257 billion out of so-called active funds run by managers over the same period.

Prominent BlackRock (BLK) CEO Larry Fink predicted this week that regulatory changes in the industry will encourage even more money to flow into these funds.

“We are likely to see a historical shift on how assets are being managed,” he said. “[Investors] will use [passive funds] more and more at the center of their portfolios.”

BlackRock’s (BLK) popular iShares business, which offers investors passive exchange-traded funds (aka ETFs), saw $51 billion in net inflows over the past quarter while the firm’s active funds brought in less than one-tenth that amount.

While it’s tempting to invest with top investment managers who promise to outperform the market, research has shown that this strategy often results in smaller returns.

“Actively managed funds have generally underperformed their passive counterparts, especially over longer time horizons,” said Morningstar researchers in a recent paper.

The reason for the lackluster performance of active funds typically comes back to investment fees — which are much higher at active funds. (Computer algorithms don’t have kids to feed back at home!)

Related: How should I invest a $250,000 windfall?

But some market strategists warn that passive investing is becoming a crowded trade, with too many people hopping onto the bandwagon.

“Indexing and ETFs offer tremendous value as part of the market, but they should not become the market. If this is an investor’s singular approach to the markets, it represents a pursuit of mediocrity,” said Mike O’Rourke, chief market strategist at JonesTrading.

CNNMoney (London) First published October 20, 2016: 6:36 AM ET

While many Americans are falling short on savings, millennials are most at risk of being unable to afford essential retirement expenses — such as food, shelter and medical care, according to a Fidelity Investments survey released Wednesday.

Fidelity found that about 55% of people surveyed are at risk of being unable to cover these expenses.

Typical baby boomers (born 1946 to 1964) are on track to reach 81% of their retirement income needs, according to the survey. Generation X-ers (born 1965 to 1977) are expected to reach only 71%, and Generation Y or millennials (born 1978-1988) have the largest projected income gap at 62%.

The retirement provider asked over 2,000 Americans a range of questions, from their health to retirement saving habits. It analyzed a variety of factors, including current income, savings rates, home equity and projected Social Security and pension benefits to predict how much money people will need in retirement and whether they are on track to meet that goal.

Related: How to be a 401(k) millionaire

Across generations, many people simply aren’t saving enough, Fidelity found, with 40% of those surveyed saving less than 6% of their salaries — far below the 10 to 15% recommended by financial planners. For millennials, that percentage jumps to 51%.

Also driving the disparity: Boomers are more likely to have some sort of pension benefit and plan to work longer, according to John Sweeney, Fidelity’s executive vice president of retirement and investing strategies.

Boomers had a median desired retirement age of 66, whereas millennials wanted to retire two years earlier than that. Yet today’s young people could live well into their 90s and will have to wait until they are 67 in order to claim full Social Security benefits.

“Some of the older folks had more realistic expectations,” he said.

Many young people are also playing it too safe with investments, he said. Of millennials surveyed, 50% said they had less than half of their investments in stocks. In contrast, common rules of thumb recommend that 30-year-olds should have up to 90% of their portfolio in stocks since they have decades of savings ahead of them.

Related: Will you have enough to retire?

It’s not all bad news though. Sweeney noted that while they have the farthest to go, millennials also have the most time to catch up. Here are some key ways savers of all ages can boost their savings;

Up your savings rate: For young people especially, the most effective move is to sock away more money each month, since money saved when young enjoys decades of compound returns.

Review your asset mix: While you can’t control the markets, you can make sure your investment strategy is age appropriate. Fixing a portfolio that is either too risky or too conservative could significantly help retirement readiness, Fidelity found.

Related: More retirement tips

Retire later: Working longer gives you more time to save, boosts your Social Security benefits and lets you use your retirement savings over a shorter time period.

More than 2,200 households earning at least $20,000 annually took part in the online survey, which used a nationally-representative panel of respondents.

CNNMoney (New York) First published December 4, 2013: 12:29 AM ET

Chinese funds just experienced the biggest exodus of money ever.

Investors abruptly pulled out nearly $7 billion from Chinese funds and ETFs over the past week, according to financial data firm EPFR.

The withdrawal comes after index provider MSCI surprised investors by announcing that it wouldn’t include shares traded in Shanghai and Shenzhen in its widely-tracked global benchmarks due to concerns over China’s market restrictions.

MSCI benchmarks help investors access a wide variety of global markets and direct billions of dollars into stock exchanges when they get the official nod of approval.

When MSCI didn’t grant its coveted approval on Wednesday, investors fled, causing the largest pull out ever in a one-week period.

Related: China stocks are still not ready for primetime

Foreign investment is still largely restricted in China, and institutional investors can only buy into the domestic stock market once licensed and approved, and are assigned specific investment quota.

Many outside investors try to access Chinese markets by investing in exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which track the performance of the wider market.

China has been working to open up its markets, introducing a pilot program last year that connects the Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges to allow for cross-border trading. But critics say it’s still not enough.

Related: Chinese stocks have surged by over 100%

In total, EPFR data shows investors withdrew nearly $9.3 billion from emerging market funds in the past week, which ran from June 4 to June 10. That’s the most money to flow out of emerging markets since January 2008.

The vast majority of the money was withdrawn from Chinese ETFs.

“I wouldn’t say investors are turning cold on emerging markets. This is a one-off China event,” explained Ian Wilson, managing director of fund data at EPFR.

Related: Chinese billionaire cracked joke as his stock crashed

Stock markets in mainland China have posted some remarkable performance over the past few months as domestic investors bid shares higher.

The China Shenzhen A Share index has shot up by 122% since the start of the year, making it the best performing stock market in the world

The Shanghai Composite has gained 60% over the same period.

CNNMoney (London) First published June 12, 2015: 12:11 PM ET

Quick! Name the chief operating officer of Tesla.

You can’t. Because that was a trick question. Tesla (TSLA) has no COO. And some financial experts think that’s a big problem, especially since there are so many questions about the company’s future.

Tesla may or may not be going private. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has forced the issue on his board because he tweeted, perhaps impulsively, that he had “funding secured” for a deal.

The stock surged at first but has since fallen back to around the level it was at before the now infamous tweet. But would Musk have written it in the first place if he had a COO to rein him in? Perhaps not.

Tesla lists only a chief technical officer and chief financial officer, along with Musk, as its top executives. Musk is also the company’s product architect.

“I look at Tesla and I see a genius in Elon Musk. But who’s the general?” said Mariann Montagne, senior portfolio manager at Gradient Investments.

Having another high-profile leader that Wall Street respects, like Sheryl Sandberg at Facebook (FB) for example, could give Musk the freedom to innovate and take risks. Meanwhile, the COO could run the company’s operations, letting investors breathe easy.

Another senior leader may be needed now that Tesla is worth about $60 billion– more than GM (GM) and Ford (F) and making Tesla the most valuable US auto company.

“A strong COO for Tesla would probably be a positive step since, as in CEO Elon Musk’s own words, it is finally ‘a real car company,'” said Craig Birk, chief investment officer of Personal Capital.

Tesla did not respond to requests for comment about why it does not have a COO.

Others also wondered why Musk didn’t have a COO or other prominent executive to help him out.

“Does every company need a COO specifically? Not necessarily. But they need to have someone to tell the CEO when they are messing up,” said John Wilson, head of research and corporate governance at Cornerstone Capital Group.

“Is there any check on the CEO? Musk’s behavior demonstrates that there doesn’t appear to be,” Wilson added.

The lack of a COO is even more concerning to some since Musk is, to put it mildly, a very busy guy.

“Musk has a lot of different irons in the fire,” said Tom Plumb, CEO of Plumb Funds, referring to the two other companies he runs — SpaceX and The Boring Company — and the many other things on his plate.

Having a COO also can reassure investors that there is a succession plan in place in case Musk decides to step down to focus more on these other initiatives.

Other successful founder-led companies have cultivated deep management benches. Google, now known as Alphabet, brought in tech veteran Eric Schmidt to be CEO before its IPO, for example. Microsoft’s Bill Gates had Steve Ballmer and then Satya Nadella take over.

Having a trusted COO also could be helpful in case Musk ever runs into health problems.

Apple (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook had been COO for several years under Steve Jobs. That meant that there was a clear succession plan once Jobs, who passed away in 2011, was no longer able to serve as CEO.

What’s more, Jobs had been CEO of animated studio Pixar until it was bought by Disney (DIS) while also serving as CEO of Apple. If Jobs did not have Cook at his side, Wall Street might have been more concerned about a leadership void at Apple.

Kind of like how Tesla investors are now worried that Musk may be spreading himself too thin and that there’s nobody else to step in and lead the company.

CNNMoney (New York) First published August 16, 2018: 1:25 PM ET

Wall Street banks prefer clients with millions — if not billions — to invest. Soldiers, nurses and construction workers typically aren’t anywhere near that wealthy.

That’s why a growing number of average Joes are turning to an app called Stash instead. On Stash, you can start investing with just $5. The company’s motto is “investing for real people.”

“Lots of our users start investing with less than $100. For us, that’s great because they’ve taken that first step. They’re learning,” says Brandon Krieg, co-founder and CEO of Stash.

Stash launched last fall. It already has over 150,000 users. About 10% of those are active-duty military, says Krieg. It’s a high percentage considering less than half a percent of the U.S. population overall currently serves in the armed forces.

“Stash is the solution for millions of Americans traditionally ignored or taken advantage of by big investing firms,” says Krieg. “Almost all of our customers are first-time investors.”

Related: 10 best investing apps

In addition to military personnel, the app is also popular with people who are self-employed, including Uber drivers.

Stash makes investing incredibly simple. There are only 33 investment options, which is much easier than navigating the universe of thousands of stocks and funds.

The app helps steer you in the right direction, but you still get to make the final decision. That’s different than the so-called “roboadvisor” apps like Wealthfront and Betterment, where a computer decides how to invest your money.

The co-founders of Stash wanted people to learn how to invest, not just hand over their money.

“Financial literacy in this country is a huge problem,” Krieg told CNNMoney. The Stash app is about to unveil a new feature called “learn” to help educate users even more.

Related: My job nearly drove me to commit suicide

To get going, the Stash app asks a few basic questions to determine if someone is comfortable with low, medium or high-risk investing. As you might expect, most people fall in the middle.

Stash encourages most people to put at least some of their money into the “Moderate Mix” fund. Think of it like vanilla ice cream: A very solid option that still satisfies a person’s desire to grow their money for retirement or sending a kid to college.

Users can also choose from other funds like “Internet Titans,” “Defending America,” and “Clean & Green.” These are stock funds, but the names have been translated from Wall Street jargon into normal people speak.

Stash gets high marks from users for making investing easy and accessible, but pay attention to the fees. Stash charges $1 a month. That doesn’t sound like a lot, but a user really needs to invest at least $250 or more for that level of fees to not eat up returns.

Expect even more new features and growth from Stash this fall. This week the company announced $9.25 million in a Series A funding round led by Goodwater Capital.

CNNMoney (New York) First published August 19, 2016: 1:31 PM ET