Stock picking was all the rage because everyone was convinced that stocks were where you should be because the performance was so great. Stock picking gave individual investors the idea that they could generate even larger returns therefore they ate it up. Hot stock tips spread via newsletters and word of mouth like wild fire. The reality is that these tips could work if someone read the fundamentals right. Unfortunately all of this ended in 2008.

For approximately 5 months I have been managing my “mutual fund” via Youtualfunds.com – which is a very cool platform. My performance over the last 5 months has been very good. While the performance is encouraging, I’ll be the first to admit that a 5 month time frame is very short. You can follow my performance by…

Essentially countries want lower currencies priced against other currencies in order to stimulate exports. Of course if your exports are cheaper for other countries, then stuff is also more expensive for your own people, but that’s irrelevant, right? Well, what happens when EVERYONE is devaluing against eachother trying to all stimulate exports? Well, you have all currencies losing value.

A rundown of commentaries on current events such as Occupy Wall Street, the idea of income disparity, what is happening in Europe and Netflix!

Stock markets continue to be volatile with weak jobs/economic data and especially fears over the Europe situation. The European debt crisis will have to come to a head at some point, so it probably makes sense to hold out until it does. What will that look like? A Greek restructuring of debt at a minimum.

The price of gold corrected 10% over the last few days. Here are the reasons why the run is not over.
1. First, a correction like we just got is actually very healthy. I would be more concerned if we didn’t have a correction and continued going up higher and higher. Corrections are needed to shake out weak hands and leverage and help to create a sustained bull run over longer than mere days and weeks.
2. The fundamentals that have supported this run are firmly in place. In fact, they are …

Fear has re-entered the markets and the economy as Americans are overwhelmingly responding to polls that they fear the economy is getting worse and possibly headed back into a recession. Meanwhile we have record long-term unemployed which speaks to the structural nature of our economic woes (versus cyclical). Yes, it’s by no means easy to get ahead in today’s economy, but we’re here to deliver the financial survival guide for those of you in your 20s (or 30s for that matter). Let’s jump in…
Income
Nothing at this stage is more important …

Markets are getting pretty volatile and many are expecting the Fed to step in. Of course, quantitative easing will do nothing but spike inflation so it’s a lose / lose. I’d hate to be Bernanke right now. How out of control does the price of gold get if they announce QE3? We could get to $2,000 / oz rapidly if so. Uncharted territory indeed.