Now may be an ideal time for you to pay a visit to your friendly local banker.
Not to open an account…but to pry loose some of their toxic defaulted real estate.
Actually, the banking industry is no longer on life support. 
They are enjoying their day in the sun, profiting from spread lending, now that their […]

A riddle for our times.
Normally, banks make money by gathering in deposits — paying little or no interest to account holders — then re-lending the money to borrowers at a substantial markup.
Also known as “spread-lending”.  And if the banks make loans to borrowers who pay back the money, life is easy and the bonus money […]

Personal finance would not be so confusing if the investment community junked most of its technical jargon.
Let’s take a look at a term that is very much in the news today:
The Yield Curve
It sounds formidable and exotic, but the reality is something much more prosaic.
The yield curve is simply the plotting of two linked measurements […]

Please indulge me for a brief wallow in personal nostalgia…
My first career job in finance began at Bank of America in 1969, after I finished my MBA at Berkeley.
Starting pay was $11,000 per year (par for the era).  Two years (and three raises) later, it had rocketed up to $15,000.  That’s when I quit to […]

Solid proof that consumers have been scared witless by the crushing recession…
Debit cards are overtaking Credit cards as the plastic of choice.
See the Wall Street Journal article, “Debit-Card Use Overtakes Credit,” by Robin Sidel (4/30/09, page C1).
And who can blame them?  Instead of racking up unpaid balances that accrue double digit interest and late payment […]

Have you checked out your recent returns on your brokerage money market fund?
You are in for a shock.  So called “prime” money market funds…those that have traditionally had the fattest yield, clock in at well under a half percent.  Treasury money market funds pay practically nothing…and many have closed their doors to new money.
Mutual fund […]

Subscriber Mikell Lawrence asked if I would offer my views on the mark-to-market controversy.
This is a timely request, as there is now consensus momentum toward modification of this self-inflicted wound, and its close cousin, the up-tick rule on short selling.
The Tick-Tocks of the Up-Tick
The up-tick rule, in place before the SEC succumbed to terminal stupidity, […]

Time was, I enjoyed starting the day with freshly brewed coffee and the morning newspaper.
That was when there was a balanced mix of good and bad news. Nowadays, the mix is bad….and worse.
Which brings us to the dreary little item that caught my eye the other morning, by AP reporter Christopher Leonard “Bank Fees […]