stock market decline

Recent economic mess and stock market decline left many people wondering if they’ll have enough money for their retirement. Many will just have to adopt a more frugal lifestyle, but some people are lucky enough to have the option of delaying their retirement. If you are in this latter group of people, here are several [...]

As a new parent, I am sure you’re painfully aware of how expensive college is, and will be.  You may wonder how in the world are you going to save that huge sum needed for your child’s college education. This article is design to help you walk through each step — e.g., getting your finances [...]

Before I begin my net worth review, I would like to point out that Larry Swedroe recently published The Only Guide to Alternative Investments You’ll Ever Need.  The book got several great reviews on Amazon.com and my copy is on order.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to share some insight from the book with you soon. [...]

The recent stock market decline probably makes more than a few people realize that it’s wise to have a balance of growth and income investments as part of any portfolio.  One of these income investments is Certificates of Deposit.  It’s widely accessible and relatively simple in a sense that more people are familiar with CDs [...]

With the current economic crisis in full swing, it’s easy for us to fall into the recency bias trap.  In psychology, the recency effect is the tendency to remember more recent events or observations more vividly and give recent information more weight than historical information. Unfortunately, this recency bias could cause you to abandon your [...]

A friend of mine is hit hard by the 40% plus drop in his 401(k) and the daily gyration haven’t made it any easier.  He was seriously considering cashing out of his 401k and stop contributing altogether.  After a long conversation with him, I was able to explain to him why this was a bad [...]

First, let me start off by saying that there are several advantages of investing in mutual funds and I do use mutual funds in my portfolios.  However, there are several disadvantages of investing in mutual funds that may not be obvious to new investors.  In this article, I’ll review some of the problems with mutual [...]

You probably heard the news that the SEC halted short selling on 799 financial stocks last week. The SEC did this in order to reduce downward pressure on financial stocks, and hopefully, restore price stability and investor confidence. Here’s an excerpt from the SEC web site:
Under normal market conditions, short selling contributes to price efficiency [...]

Last week was incredible in many ways.  Most notable were Lehman Brothers failure, Merrill Lynch sale, and AIG bailout.  The wild swings over the last five trading days definitely woke up a few people.  It’s times like these that we learn more about ourselves and help us understand if we really have our ducks in [...]

With enormous markets emerging across the world and the dollar continuing its decline, the suggestion that investors should increase their international exposure in order to have a balanced portfolio is worth looking at more closely. After all, investing in international equities helps diversify a portfolio by broadening currency risk and exposing the portfolio to new [...]