Forex Yellow Pages

The dollar has fallen for much of this decade, and lately the decline is picking up speed. Already down more than 15% against the euro since March, the buck is expected to sink another 10% by the first quarter. Usually, when a once-strong asset falls this far out of favor, the correct long-term strategy is clear: Be a contrarian and buy.

But the dollar isn’t an asset — it’s a vehicle through which investments are made. And the fact that investors around the world are buying more and more non-U.S. assets suggests that the dollar will keep falling. Read more…

SAN DIEGO (ETFguide.com) – Warren Buffett is finally spending some of Berkshire Hathaway’s cash hoard. And he’s buying a railroad company. As the greatest investor of our generation, does his latest acquisition signal a market bottom?

Dissecting the Deal

Buffett’s firm, Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-A – News), agreed to buy Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. (NYSE: BNI – News) for $100 a share valuing the deal at $44 billion.

Over the past year, Burlington’s stock price has lagged the performance of its peer benchmark, the Dow Jones Transportation Average (NYSEArca: IYT – News). Read more…

The U.S. economy got to play “trick or treat” early and ahead of the Halloween festivities with several economic indicators.  New home sales and consumer confidence clearly were tricks with numbers being very disappointing. But equity investors got a treat on Thursday as real GDP posted a stronger-than-expected 3.5 percent annualized gain for the quarter.  The relatively strong number sent the “equities-are-in-correction” traders scurrying for cover—or rather short covering for the day.  Nonetheless, the question remains—how strong is the recovery and is there reason to believe equities are a little ahead of where economic growth is really headed? Read more…

If you’re like most Americans, you don’t have a secret bank account in Switzerland where you stash money to keep it out of IRS hands.

Being out of the foreign tax-shelter loop isn’t such a bad thing. Uncle Sam recently signed a new tax treaty with that Alpine nation that should help U.S. collectors crack down on tax-evading owners of a foreign bank accounts.

But there still are plenty of  legal tax havens for law-abiding taxpayers. Even better, most regular Joe and Jane taxpayers can easily take advantage of them. Read more…

It is only a number — the stock market equivalent of an appliance chain’s millionth customer, or the gazillionth hamburger served at McDonald’s.

Still, the Dow, which closed up 124.17 points, at 9,789.36, on Monday, is within reach of 10,000. Who would have thought?

At the depths of Wall Street’s crisis, when traders were despairing and shares of Citigroup were trading for just over a dollar, Dow 5,000 seemed a likelier prospect than this.

But now, one of the most-watched measures of the financial world is on the cusp of jumping back to five-digit territory.

That does not mean the economy’s problems are over, or that 401(k)’s are going to be made whole anytime soon. In fact, this milestone could even stall the rally if enough investors use it as an opportunity to cash in their gains, analysts say. Read more…

Aside from the standard meat-and-potatoes equity and fixed-income investments that should make up the portfolios of most people, several alternative asset classes are available to individual investors.

Alternative assets are a good diversification tool because they’re generally not correlated to the stock market. This means when the market goes down, alternative assets may go up or stay the same and vice versa.

Large investors such as pension and endowment funds have been attracted to hedge funds because of their reputation for producing high returns. But it’s difficult to tell how successful hedge funds are because the historical data leaves much to be desired. Read more…

If there’s one question that investors have asked themselves over the past year and a half, it’s that one. If only I had acted differently, they say. If only, if only, if only.

Yet here’s the problem: While we know that we made investment mistakes, and vow not to repeat them, most people have only the vaguest sense of what those mistakes were, or, more important, why they made them. Why did we think and feel and behave as we did? Why did we act in a way that today, in hindsight, seems so obviously stupid? Only by understanding the answer to these questions can we begin to improve our financial future.

This is where behavioral finance comes in. Most investors are intelligent people, neither irrational nor insane. But behavioral finance tells us we are also normal, with brains that are often full and emotions that are often overflowing. And that means we are normal smart at times, and normal stupid at others. Read more…

The forex market, unlike other exchange driven markets, has a unique feature that many market makers use to entice traders to trade. They promise no exchange fees or regulatory fees, no data fees and, best of all, no commissions. To the new trader just wanting to break into the trading business, this sounds too good to be true. Trading without transaction costs is clearly an advantage. However, what might sound like a bargain to inexperienced traders may not be the best deal available – or even a deal at all. Here we’ll show you how to evaluate forex broker fee/commission structures and find the one that will work best for you. Read more…

It’s unclear whether the economy has hit bottom or not. Investment markets are moving up. Jobless rates didn’t get any worse. “Cash for clunkers” has given the auto industry a real boost. And stimulus funds are slowly making their way into the real world. So, at the risk of tempting fate, it’s probably safe to venture outdoors once more. The sky will not be falling. Life as we know it will not be ending. There will be a World Series in the fall, and college stadiums will be jammed with fans. Read more…

In the good old days, farmers knew better than to yoke a bull and an ass together to plow the field. The yoke would be uneven and no good would come from it. How about a bull and a bear, would those two harmonize?

We shall find out soon. Unknowingly, investors have been watching a bull and bear work together simultaneously. We have a stock market bull and an economy bear. How so? Read more…