D espite my best intentions to improve my money-saving habits this past year, I have yet to become a committed coupon clipper. I do closely scan supermarket flyers for specials, but finding and using coupons still seems like a lot of work and I’m not convinced of the payback. So I was interested to see Brett Arends, a personal finance writer for The Wall Street Journal, recently do the math on coupons and conclude that they are, in fact, worth our time . The average savings per coupon is $1.44 (U.S.), according to a report by Inmar, a U.S.-based coupon-processing agent. M r. Arends estimates that it takes one minute to clip and use a coupon. Based on that assumption, your work for 10 minutes of coupon-cutting is worth $14.40. That translates into an impressive hourly rate of $86.40. Then, he points out, this…

B renda MacDonald , 55 Occupation: Independent financial counsellor Portfolio: Holdings include Russel Metals Inc., Brookfield Asset Management Inc., Power Corporation of Canada, Royal Bank of Canada, National Bank of Canada, Goldcorp Inc., Toromont Industries Ltd., TransCanada Corp., Enbridge Inc. No fan of mutual funds Ms. MacDonald doesn’t like mutual funds, not just because of the hefty fees, but because she figures you can get the best of what they offer for free. “You can go to the globefund website, look at the Top 10 holdings of all the big-blue chip funds, and then rather than pay fees, just buy the companies yourself.” What’s wrong with owning the funds themselves? The big funds often hold well over a hundred companies, and that inevitably includes many dogs, she reasons. Her Approach For those that have the time and inclination, Ms. MacDonald advises following her approach. Look at the best…

W atching the Olympics, the notion of risk is very clear. Athletes need to push it to the limit in order get to that top spot on the podium. But to obtain the advantage, they risk missing a gate, catching an edge or taking an untimely penalty. They may risk injury or even death, as we found out tragically on Feb. 12. And, when they are going all-out for gold, they may jeopardize a trip to the medal ceremonies for a chance to win. Like elite athletes, investors need to take chances to succeed. Risk is the fuel that drives long-term returns. But as opposed to the clarity of sport, it’s a more muddled concept when it comes to investing. Consider the following three examples where there is often confusion around the risks. Gold Appropriately, the first is gold. Is the shiny metal a high- or low-risk investment?…

Cashing out a 401K before you reach retirement age has a much heavier penalty than you may think. This will stop most people from deciding to withdraw early, but if you decide you have no other option, there is still more you need to know, for instance, you can’t actually do this any time you want to, you can only withdraw at certain points in your life. First of all, you can of course withdraw from your plan without any problems or penalties once you reach 59 years and 6 months of age. Until then things are a lot more complicated. Before you reach retirement age the only other time you have the choice to cash out is immediately after you have left an employer. Actually, when you leave a job you have four options of what to do with your retirement account. You can switch to your new employers plan, rollover…

Day trading futures is being more and more common due to the low cost of entry. To start day trading the highly liquid and highly profitable E-mini S&P 500 Futures, you can start with a small recommended account size of at least a minimum of at least $5000.00 to $10,000.00. Compare this to day trading stocks, where you would need at least $25,000.00 to start day trading. I have day traded both the E-mini Dow Futures and the E-Mini S&P Futures. Both are similar and both track each other as far as daily chart performance/movements/price action. But the key to day trading is getting into a program that teaches you how to day trade. The best are systems that allow a 1/3 down payment and monthly payments that can be paid with monthly profits; these also offer you the ability to log-in to a trading training…

Forex trades or what we call Foreign Currency Exchange is now one of the suitable home businesses you can ever venture and invest nowadays. You can trade foreign currencies thru the internet in a 24/7 mode. This indicates that the foreign currency exchange is a much easy way to gather higher profitable income. When we say forex trades it means that you buy a currency and you sell it with another concurrently. These currencies are often traded in pairs of forex for example the US Dollars and Euro Dollars (USD/EURO). The Forex trades are considered as over the counter or inter-bank as trades are done between the lines of two counterparts via telephone connection or electronic network. Forex trades are different from stock trades for the reason that market has no centralized location for its trades. Learn forex trades is the best way to answer your queries on why…