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The S&P 500 is near post-financial-crisis highs. The 10-year yield on U.S. Treasury's is near post-crisis lows. The former points to confidence and growth potential. The latter points to extreme risk aversion. The question is: who are you going to trust? The preponderance of the evidence, I believe,...

In yesterday's D&C business section there was an article that compared the current state of student debt to the mortgage crisis before that bubble burst. The long and short of that crisis was that consumers took on too much mortgage debt on inflated home prices. The subsequent decline in investment...

It's a good idea to periodically have your life, disability and long term care insurance policies reviewed by an insurance professional. An analysis may determine that your policies are just fine and that they fit your financial goals. In some cases, though, a review uncovers internal problems with...

Several years ago, when my daughter was a high school senior, my wife bought a softcover book with a page on each of hundreds of different schools (I think it was this book). It wasn't an important reference for us because she had pretty much already decided to attend Sarah Lawrence College. I had...

In an interesting twist to the current Freddie Mac situation (which I blogged about here), President Obama has decided to elaborate on his New Housing Proposal that he briefly mentioned in his State of the Union Speech last Tuesday. Obama's plan to expand the Home Affordable Refinance Program HARP w...

Did you know that the direction of the stock market in any given year is determined by the outcome of the Super Bowl? Well, not really, but there is a fun statistic that has been dubbed The Super Bowl Indicator (SBI). According to the Super Bowl Indicator, if the winning team is from the old Amer...

One of my favorite lines from the Lord of the Rings trilogy is when the wizard, Gandalf, speaking to Frodo about feelings of regret at having to witness difficult times, says, "So do all [people] that come to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do wi...

Yesterday, I was contacted by a client who asked me about the effect on SIP funds that had undergone the change from the Fixed Income Fund to the Short-Term Bond Fund (Here is T. Rowe Price's notice about the change and new fund). For those that don't know, The Fixed Income Fund, which used to be...

Since the Eastman Kodak bankruptcy announcement we have been getting many questions regarding the income tax impact of losses on Kodak stock. In general, if your capital losses exceed your capital gains, the excess can be deducted on your tax return and used to reduce other income, such as wages,...

I'm not sure why the quarterly earnings reports from Hershey are more blogworthy than others. Maybe it's because I like chocolate, so the very name Hershey always makes me smile. But Hershey shareholders have plenty to smile about today, too. That's because the company reported higher earnings today...