With technology advancement, almost any can now start earning – or losing – through forex trading. If you need one, there are thousands of forex trading tips given by experts on blogs, internet, television news, and newspapers daily. This shows the popularity and craving of forex trading among world population. In short, a privilege once enjoyed by bankers and high net worth individuals is not accessible to everyone. However, are you among those who are still searching a reason to start forex trading? Okay, may be something kept you away from it. However, here are few reasons that are more than enough for any one to start foreign exchange or Forex or FX trading. You will be a part of world’s biggest financial market FX is nothing but trading in currency. A person X, for instance, will buy some dollars by paying some pounds. However, unlike stock markets, FX market is not limited  [...]

People all over the country, in fact, all over the globe are expecting the financial crises to conclude. Investors are picking up favorite stocks as they are being as optimistic as the news channels. Truly, one cannot a pessimist after hearing few good news like big banks paying back TARP money, stabilization of unemployment rate, and correction in major economies around the world. If the US economy stabilizes anytime soon, people would start spending more on everyday products, which means the brands producing daily items will see a decent hike in their stock price. So which are the companies that will benefit from the rise in spending of mass population? Almost every company, I can say. However, the major benefit would be to companies like Coca Cola – KO McDonald’s – MCD Wal-Mart – WMT Procter & Gamble – PG And Johnson & Johnson – JNJ Why? Coca  [...]

Over 168-story tall, Burj Khalifa is now open for business since 4th January, 2010. It is taller than the former world’s tallest structures known as pyramids in Egypt. This is the first time that a tall (world’s tallest) structure has been erected in one of the Middle East countries. Along with the foundation of Burj Khalifa, Dubai hopes to strengthen its economic balance and expects international customers to invest in the edifice. This once strong economic foundation was shaken considerably, when Dubai announced in November that it might not able to repay the debt of $60 billion. With the introduction of Burj Khalifa, it intends to regain the lost prestige of being known as top-notch financial center. The giant structure was initially known as Burj Dubai. However, it was transformed to be Burj Khalifa to respect the president of Abu Dhabi, who helped the vicinity to be bailed  [...]

Master Limited Partnerships (MLPs) Another financial instrument which is getting popular when it comes to saving taxes in the current low interest rate regime is master limited partnerships (MLPs). These instruments have also become popular because of the higher yield in comparison to other instruments like treasury bonds, bank CDs, or money-market accounts. MLP’s can operate at a loss particularly in the first few years particularly in industries like developing oil and gas pipelines due to high depreciation and hence reduced net earnings.  However after the initial phase MLP’s will in probability generate free cash flow in excess of earnings on which taxes are not levied until the owner sells the unit as it is treated as a return on capital. Approximately 80% of MLP distributions are labelled as return on capital. High yields on MLP’s is another factor that makes this an important  [...]

The times are definitely hard and in these hard times taxes can be a big drain on one’s pocket. One easy and very effective way to save on taxes is by investing in tax saving instruments. But is it so simple. Not all investments will get you the same tax benefit. In fact I would like to modify my earlier statement and say that the best way to save on taxes is to invest judiciously.  For instance one way of reducing tax liability is to hold on to investments for longer period of time. You will in all probability be taxed higher if you sell off your investments earlier than its total life. However holding all investment assets for a long time will not help in saving taxes. It is important to understand which assets should be held for a longer period to get maximum tax benefits. In short investors need to understand the methods of financial planning that will help them reduce their tax  [...]

Green jobs is a phrase which has been made famous by President Obama. As per research done by Pew Charitable Trusts in June approximately 0.5% of the total job market that is around 770,000 jobs were green jobs. Compare this against the number of jobs created in other established industries like telecommunications where 989,000 jobs were created and biotech where 200,000 jobs were created and one clearly gets the idea that green jobs will be the next big thing in the job market. Also this is one segment of the job market that is experiencing fast growth. Green jobs are estimated to grow by 9.1% as against 3.7% growth projected for all jobs. As per placement company Challenger Gray & Christmas, the economy is already generating approximately 1.3 million new green collar jobs every year. American Solar Energy Society estimates that by 2030 there would be 40 million US jobs directly or indirectly  [...]

On Thursday stocks declined sharply mainly as a consequence of increase in the value of dollar which gained on the back of Fed’s comments that economy still continues to be weak. The Dow Jones industrial average declined by 133 points (1.3%) to close at 10,308.26 points with 28 of the 30 Dow components registering a decline. Other indices also declined with the S&P 500 index declining by 13 points (1.2%) to close at 1,096.08 points. The Nasdaq composite also declined by 27 points (1.2%) to close at 2,180.05 points. Sector wise all sectors declined on Thursday with the materials and financials registering the maximum decline of 2.3% and 1.8% respectively. Material stocks were under pressure mainly on account of increase in the value of dollar. Among the financial stocks leading the decline was Citigroup whose stocks were down by 7.5%. American Express stocks declined by 2% while JPMorgan  [...]

Plan for long-term care The biggest retiree medical expense which is the long-term care is normally not covered by Medicare. Just to give an idea of the cost involved let us look at the numbers. As per Genworth Financial survey a room in a private nursing home last year cost an average of $76,460 a year which is $209 per day. Again costs differ in different states and can start from an average of $125 a day in Louisiana to $515 in Alaska. There are other not so expensive options but even they don’t come in retiree budget. Per hour on an average home-health aide cost $19 which by simple compounding amounts to $43,884 per year for 44 hours a week of care. One needs to shell out on an average $36,090 annually for a private one-bedroom unit in an assisted-living facility. Adult day care costs $15,236 per year, on average, for care five days a week as per survey done by Genworth Financial. So  [...]

Postpone retirement till you qualify for Medicare One easy way to take care of your medical bills given that you don’t have health insurance in retirement would be to continue being employed till you are 65 and hence are qualified for Medicare. However the challenge here is to stay employed in a company that provides health care benefits till you are 65 given the current economic scenario. But what if you are fired? Check out then if you are covered under spouse’s health plan and COBRA continuation coverage through your former company which typically covers you for the maximum of 18 months. Employees terminated between Sept. 1, 2008, and Dec. 31, 2009 are eligible for a 65 percent subsidy toward COBRA premiums for up to nine months under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act passed in February. Research shows that if you retire before you are eligible for medicare then you are  [...]

Health care expenses are increasing day by day. Also planning for health care expenses in retirement is one difficult task given that it is very difficult to predict health care expenses in your old age. Many companies earlier used to provide life time coverage but now this is a thing of past for many. Even people who retired with life time coverage are finding that this facility has been scrapped on account of cost cutting pressures. This is what happened to my neighbour and close friend Jack. Jack who retired at the age of 65 after 34 years in General Motors as Sales and marketing manager was considered to be one lucky person. He retired with two of the most sought after retirement benefits- pension and lifetime medical coverage. But then recently General Motors due to cost cutting pressures scrapped his retiree health care facility. He however was not the only one some 100,000 white-collar  [...]