“The Fed’s failure to expand the set of institutions it deals with reflects failure to adapt to the new world of financial intermediation. Previously, lending was dominated by banks, which meant the Fed could address liquidity shortages threatening the supply of credit by providing liquidity directly to banks. Today, lending is increasingly separated from banks. First, banks sell many of the loans they originate so that the ultimate lender is not a bank. Second, many originating lenders are non-bank firms. That means the credit supply is vulnerable to disruptions among these other lenders.” Preventing a Financial Crash

The columnists in the AsiaTimes are an unending source of analysis and most often criticism of the American financial system. Sometimes you can’t help get the impression that it’s a wonder our polity has managed to survive without the guidance of these ever so prescient journalists.

Hopefully, the Fed, and other Central Bankers when needed, will keep liquidity at the top of the priority list. Inflation and a battered dollar will no doubt result but those evils as bad as they can be are not fatal.

The Federal Reserve’s rate cut is dominating the news, as did recent Fed injections into the market. And the media continues to hold its collective breath each time Bernanke meets or prepares for an announcement.

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Can I rely on the Fed?
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Inflation, but what about deflation?
What can I do to protect myself?
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(ARA) – As children, many baby boomers went through a familiar right of passage — the IQ test their parents forced on them to learn just how intelligent they were. Today, many of those baby boomers are increasingly concerned about their “retirement IQ,” or where the stand on the path to a successful retirement. According to Thrivent Financial for Lutherans research, 71 percent of boomers say the lack of money is the single most important issue preventing them from accomplishing the things they wish to do in retirement.

The struggle they and many others face is getting a clear picture of where they are and what they need to do to reach their retirement dreams. “People want help seeing the big picture of retirement,” says Pam Moret, Thrivent Financial executive vice president of marketing and products. “Because everyone’s situation is unique, getting a good assessment and some immediate recommendations on what to do can be critical in creating financial security for your golden years.”

So where does one go to get their retirement IQ? ThriveQ (www.ThriveQ.com) is an online tool that gives users a scare-free assessment — a ThriveQ score — that ranks each individual on their retirement path without generating a shocking multimillion dollar savings total that leads many people to despair.

“Seventy-one percent of boomers wish they had begun saving for retirement upon landing their first job, and 86 percent advised Generation X to start saving as soon as possible,” says Moret of the survey findings. “They know something needs to be done, but they need an easy, non-intimidating way to get into a better position for tomorrow.”

ThriveQ is based on seven key principles for retirement. First, have a vision. Focusing on the things that inspire you will keep you motivated to do what’s needed to be better prepared for retirement. Second, plan ahead because it’s never too late or too early to start preparing for retirement.

Controlling spending, the third principle, is another important step toward retirement success. “Your values are your best guide to determining your spending,” says Moret. “By spending only for those things that are important to you and your family, you can keep debt to a minimum.”

Fourth, once you control your spending, it’s time to save and invest. Saving too much is always better than saving too little. Simple steps, like incorporating automatic savings programs, can make saving and investing as painless as possible.

In realizing retirement dreams, rethink work. This fifth principle centers on thinking of working past the minimum retirement age, or cycling in and out of work for several years. It may be the opportunity to follow your passion, a way to stay connected or a chance to be your own boss.

Sixth, protect your future through insurance and other means to ensure you can withstand any financial surprises. Finally, think about giving back and making a positive impact on others in retirement. By seeking activities that enrich your life and the lives of others — via helping others through gifts of time, talents and treasures — you actually are preparing yourself for a happier retirement.

Created by Thrivent Financial in cooperation with author and gerontologist Ken Dychtwald, Ph.D., a world leader on the effects of an aging population on the marketplace and retirement, ThriveQ helps individuals find their unique retirement vision and measures progress toward that vision, while encouraging actions that will help them achieve their goals.

The questionnaire takes about 10 minutes to complete, with each user receiving their ThriveQ — a score ranging from 1 to 1,000. Based on their score, participants will also be assigned to one of five groups according to their retirement readiness: Survivor, Provider, Striver, Thriver and Thriver +.

After a user receives a ThriveQ score, they also see their score as compared to other ThriveQ users and are given three customized recommended actions based on their answers. Participants can also save their score and track their progress as they accomplish the recommended actions, thus improving their score over time. The site also offers real-life examples of people taking steps to achieve their definition of retirement success.

Learn more about how to achieve your goals for retirement by visiting ThriveQ.com.

Courtesy of ARAcontent

It’s a newspaper, it’s a Web site–it’s all of the information that comes rolled up in every edition of The Wall Street Journal and much more, available online. Anyone who wants to stay on top of U.S. and international news, especially economic and technology-oriented stories, will find {tag]The Wall Street Journal Online[/tag] to be a valuable asset. Forbes has called it “simply the best business news site on the Web.”

The interactive Journal delivers stock quotes on demand, continually updated news, a customized news- and portfolio-tracking service, access to extensive archives, and “briefing books” for 22,000 companies and more than 7,000 U.S. mutual funds.

Profiting with Forex introduces investors to all the advantages of the global foreign exchange market and shows them how to capitalize on it. Readers will learn why forex is the perfect supplement to stock and bond investing; why it is unrivaled in terms of protection, profit potential, and ease of use; and how it can generate profits, whether the other markets are up or down.

Written by two leading forex experts, this complete investing resource uses basic economic principles, solid technical analysis, and lots of common sense to develop an arsenal of tools and techniques that will lead to winning results in the lucrative foreign exchange marketplace. Profiting with Forex includes everything that investors need to know about the foreing currency markets.

“If you are looking for a book to get you started in the forex market like I was this is a great book. It give you an excellent feel for many of the factors that affect the market. I would strongly recommend this book for any beginner.”

Trading software and hardware.

Are you prepared for the future? Far too many individuals and families adopt the naive belief that they are ready for anything tomorrow may bring. However, the sad truth is that they’re not. I say this because they lack any proper long term care insurance providers. When it comes to insurance, we simply can’t be to sure. There is basically no way of knowing what tomorrow or the distant future may bring. Life can definitely throw you a curve ball at any given time. Are you prepared for that? Well, this is where quality and respectable long term care insurance providers come into the picture. We need their services to be secure and have piece of mind. You can never prepare for the future too early. The better jump-start you get, the better off you are.

What are your concerns regarding insurance? Do you have the basic medical and dental plan offered by your place of employment? The key is knowing what all and who all is covered. Obviously you’ll want your spouse and children to be covered to the fullest as well. I will be the first to say that when it comes to finding decent long term care insurance providers, it’s no simple task. Far too many of these so-called insurance companies now days have no respect for their clients. The minute you need their help, they’re gone like the wind. Although you’ve been forking out the cash to them for years, they want no part of your problems. Isn’t that sad? That’s why so many individuals hate long term care insurance providers and insurance companies altogether. No one wants to suddenly have health issues, and then have their insurance provider tell them to go take a hike. That’s a horrible thought. What will you do then? How will you afford the medical bills?

Have you found the good long term care insurance providers yet? They are out there amongst the many. You just have to do your research in order to find them. This can be a challenge. I am not going to lie to you. One benefit to finding long term care insurance providers these days is the knowledge that can be acquired online. You can easily do a search to the top long term care insurance providers on Google and receive some good feedback. This should help you with your search and decision.

Foreign currency rates refer to the amount of currency you receive when you buy one currency with another currency. That is, suppose you are traveling to England. If you live in the United States, you carry dollars. You need to change these dollars for British Pounds. You would check the foreign currency rates to see how many US dollars it would take to buy one British Pound. The same thing would apply to every other country you might visit. Importers and exporters of goods are also concerned about foreign currency rates.

They need foreign currency to make their business transactions. A buyer in England of United States goods watches the foreign currency rates to try to get a better price for the United States dollars they need to buy the United States goods.

Most foreign currency rates change all the time. Foreign currency rates that do change on a daily or even hourly basis are called floating currencies. That means that the price is determined by market forces. If more dollars are being bought and more British Pounds are being sold, the United States dollar increases in value.

Some currencies do not fluctuate at all. They are subject to fixed foreign currency rates that are usually set by the central bank of a country. For example, the Hong Kong dollar is fixed and does not change unless the central bank changes the rate.

Other currencies fall under the category of being a partially floated currency. Here, the foreign currency rates for that currency are allowed to change within the limits set by the government. They do this so that the foreign currency rates of their currency move less and are more stable.

The introduction of the Euro created a single European currency for most of the European countries and eliminated all foreign currency rates in those countries. A hamburger may cost a different price in Spain and Germany, but they are both paid for in Euros.

If a country is experiencing political or economic problems, you may see their foreign currency rates change very frequently as buyers and sellers try to adjust to the changing conditions.

Some people make money trade the changes in the foreign currency rates. They buy one currency with their dollars, hoping that the foreign currency rates will move in their favor so that later when they buy back their dollars, they will get more dollars than they originally started with.

Foreign currency rates are a fact of business life in the modern world. They determine the price of all our important goods and the cost of our overseas vacations. Foreign currency rates also have a bearing on the price we pay for gasoline and other basic commodities.

Existing-home sales will fall 8.1% this year while new-home sales will drop 7.1%, Fannie Mae says. The declines are largely due to investors pulling out of the housing market, the mortgage-finance company says.

ADMIN: If you are asking questions about refinancing your mortgage you will get more cash out while home prices are higher than lower.

As many as 60% of homes are assessed for too much and about 33% of property-tax appeals succeed. We offer tips on how to lower your load. Plus, whether an IRA can be used to pay off a mortgage.

ADMIN: A reverse mortgage is another way to live mortgage payment free. If you or your spouse are 62 or older you should learn about reverse mortgages.

The Profit Magic of Stock Transaction Timing by J.M. Hurst was published in 1970. Many hundreds, perhaps thousands, of investment or trading related books have been written since then. Few, however, no matter how recently published, can match Hurst’s work for its clarity and completeness.

Hurst was a physicist and worked as an aeronautical engineer for more than 25 years. He was careful to provide the mathematical references for his work although few readers would have the academic training or perhaps even the inclination to pursue the theoretical basis underlying his trading technique. Happily, J.M. Hurst focused his book on the application of the principles and no such rigorous training or mathematical background is required to understand and apply the stock trading method which Hurst laid out in Stock Transaction Timing.

Since, as the title tells us, Hurst set out to create a trading method based on timing the market, or more accurately timing the buy and sell of individual stocks, he first established the reasons that stocks move up and down in price over time. His reasons are the product of nine years of research and 30,000 hours of computer analysis, and he expresses them in the book with a sense of scientific certainty that would probably create some discomfort in investors new to the art of technical analysis. How many times have we heard that you cannot time the market so don’t even try?

Hurst defined the process of stock price fluctuations as a price-motion model. He determined that 75% of all stock price movement is due to relatively foreseeable fundamental factors pertaining to the stock market as a whole, to sectors and industries within the market, and to individual stocks within the industry groups.

As you can see Hurst’s price-motion model, although it is a timing system, is not a repudiation of the adage about market timing, but more of a confirmation of it. 75% is a very large influence. And because the secular trend of the US markets at least has been up for more than 200 years a Buy & Hold strategy makes eminently good sense over the long haul. Hurst’s price-motion model also maintains the integrity of fundamental analysis as a worthwhile exercise of stock market investing.

Perhaps most surprisingly Hurst determined that macro random events, like news shocks, which in his time would have been epitomized by the assassination of President Kennedy, and global events such as war, even when combined with micro random events, like an individual liquidating a stock portfolio to buy a summer house, account for only 2% of stock price movement in the price-motion model. Hurst readily acknowledged that the short term affect of purely random events on stock prices could be large but that the movement would still be only temporary.

The remaining 23% of stock price movement in Hurst’s price-motion model was determined to be the result of semi-predictable oscillations. These oscillations are caused by the aggregate sum of several (non-ideal) periodic fluctuations, better referred to as cycles. The nominal stock market cycles identified by Hurst are consistent with the periodicity of cycles determined by researchers subsequent to the publication of Stock Transaction Timing.

In the next part we will discuss how to take advantage of the 23% cyclic contribution and why that is so important for achieving superior investment returns.