Posts Tagged cash

Be Wary the Rush to Gold

Posted by Tetyana Matychak in Banks on May 27th, 2010

Most of us have seen advertisements to buy gold or offering cash for gold. With the economy still unsettled and gold prices steadily rising, you may be tempted. But not all gold investments are safe.

On Tuesday, Representative Anthony D. Weiner, a Democrat from New York, attacked one company that is a gold and precious metals dealer, Goldline International Inc. He accused the company of “shady practices,” alleging that it overcharges for collector coins and provides misleading financial advice to consumers. “They’re exploiting the economy that we’re in,” he said.

Mr. Weiner also spoke of the company’s “unholy alliance” with television and radio personalities like Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas and Republican presidential candidate; and Fred Thompson, a former Senator from Tennessee and TV actor. But he particularly singled out Glenn Beck, the conservative talk show host.

“It’s debatable whether gold is a good investment,” Mr. Weiner said at a news conference in front of the Mercantile Exchange building in lower Manhattan. “There’s a confluence between a declining economy and the ignorance many consumers have about how the marketplace works.” Read the rest of this entry »

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What If Your Tax Refund is Wrong?

Posted by Tetyana Matychak in Budget, Favourites on May 12th, 2010

Most of us get refund checks at tax time. And most of the time, those refunds are just what we had been eagerly awaiting. But occasionally, the amount on an IRS check is not what we expected. In some cases, it’s less than we figured on our 1040s. Every now and then, it’s more.

Regardless of whether the refund discrepancy goes against you or favors you, some steps can be taken to resolve the matter. That way, even if you and the tax collector aren’t necessarily satisfied with the eventual amount, you’ll at least understand the mathematical misinterpretation.

Explanation en route

First, don’t panic. There’s usually a logical explanation for why you and the Internal Revenue Service came up with different numbers.

The IRS will send you a written explanation for the unexpected amount. The only problem is that the explanation doesn’t always accompany the check. Such coordination of cash and comment is particularly difficult with directly deposited refunds, which are likely to show up unexplained in your account first.

Why your refund might be an unexpected amount: Read the rest of this entry »

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How to be an emotionless investor

Posted by Tetyana Matychak in Investing on October 30th, 2009

It’s one of the truths of mutual fund investing: You buy the manager as much as the prospectus. So it pays to have someone you trust.

Neil Hennessy, who runs the Hennessy Focus 30 fund (HFTFX), might be someone investors trust for what he does as much as what he doesn’t do. Since its September 2003 launch, the Focus 30 has returned 6.76% annually, beating the S&P 500 by an average of 4.8% a year by following a simple, quantitative strategy. Hennessy only reshuffles the fund’s 30 stocks once a year, usually in the fall. That means two things: He can’t time the market and he can’t let feelings get in the way.

After writing about his flagship fund back in February, we recently checked in with Hennessy. He had just finished rebalancing the Focus 30 in September, which meant screening 10,000 companies to find mid-cap U.S. securities that pass his requirements for price-to-sales ratio, increased annual earnings, and recent rallies. If a company makes it to the top 30, it’s given equal weight: Each stock makes up 3.33% of the fund.

Last year consumer discretionary stocks composed a third of the portfolio. That led to a paltry 0.7% gain for the portfolio in the past year, but it still beats the S&P 500’s (SPX) 5% drop. Read the rest of this entry »

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