Walk With Money » Mint

Review: The Little Book of Bulletproof Investing

Robert Wilkinson — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 21:20:03 +0000

Every Sunday, The Simple Dollar reviews a personal finance book or other book of interest.

The Little Book of Bulletproof Investing by Ben Stein and Phil DeMuth is the most recent entry in the Wiley Little Books series and probably the most entertaining one, too. The first thing you’ll pick up from the book is a good deal of humor: while they treat the subject seriously, they don’t treat it as Serious Business. This actually makes the book a rather enjoyable read.

The Little Book of Bulletproof Investing focuses, unsurprisingly, on a conservative investment philosophy that doesn’t focus on earning a mint, but does focus on earning a steady return and not facing giant losses when the market dips. They focus heavily on diversification and steady investing with a very long-term focus without any real concern for short term dips and bubbles.

In other words, it’s a philosophy I like.

One | The Nut Behind the Wheel: Behavioral Finance in One Lesson
We trust our emotions so often in day to day life that it seems completely natural that we trust them when it comes to our finances. Yet, when we do rely on our emotions to help us decide what to do with our money, we usually wind up in trouble. We buy when we’re confident (usually a bad time). We sell when we’re afraid (almost always a bad time). The one lesson worth learning is that we need to remove our emotions from our financial decisions and take them entirely based on the numbers.

Two | Wall Street Therapy: For Good and for Evil
The best course of action is to have a plan. Know the reasons why you’re investing. What are you investing for? If you can’t answer that with anything beyond, “To, uh, get rich,” you don’t have a plan. Start with your goals first. If your goals are long term, invest for the long term. If your goals are short term, invest for the short term. Don’t let all of the investment talk out there confuse you, either – much of that talk is directed towards day traders, institutional investors, and all sorts of people who are investing for different reasons and with different levels of acceptable risk than you.

Three | How Not to Invest: Kids, Don’t Try This at Home
Slow, steady, and boring wins the race. You can’t beat the stock market by stock picking. You can’t beat the stock market with timing, either. Instead, your focus should be in diversification, so that you do reasonably well when others are doing well but don’t completely fall apart when a bubble pops (like the tech bubble or the housing bubble).

Four | How to Invest: It’s Not as Fun as It Used to Be
Simplify. Diversify. Minimize expenses. Buy and hold. That’s really what the whole solution to investing for most people boils down to – and it’s not all that glamorous. People often imagine investing as being something like day trading or the movie Wall Street when it’s actually more akin to putting money in a savings account. It’s all about patience.

Five | The Holy Grail of Investing: Having Your Cake and Eating It, Too
The best way to invest over a very long period is to ...

Can Mobile Banking Save Emerging Markets?

Robert Wilkinson — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 09:20:06 +0000

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(futureatlas.com)

Mobile banking has been a blessing to anyone who values quick, painless money management. Here in the United States, the ability to check account balances and transfer money via mobile phone has reduced the need to bank at physical branches (never a fun task), or even sit in front of a computer. However, in emerging economies, mobile banking means something far more profound. While mobile banking is chiefly a matter of convenience in the developed world, for emerging economies it is increasingly the difference between banking or not banking at all. In our previous article on the future of mobile finance, Mint discovered that 36% of the people in India, for instance, “…earn less than Rs 5,000 a month [and] own a mobile phone, but do not have a bank account.”

Similar situations are found in other developing markets. TMCNet predicted in November 2008 that “…will grow at nearly 7 percent annually through 2013 and will exceed $200 billion by that time” and furthermore that “…the growth will be driven by emerging markets in nations such as Brazil, Russia, India and China, and on the continent of Africa.” Indeed, TMCNet continues, “…collectively, emerging markets will compose about 60 percent of the market share in 2013.” Gavin Krugel, director of mobile banking strategy at the GSM Association, goes a step further, claiming that, “…one billion consumers in the world have a mobile phone but no access to a bank account.” What is lacking in these countries are not mobile phones, but – until recently – mobile banking technology tailored to their unique needs and circumstances. Luckily, the mobile banking scene in developing markets is rapidly beginning to take shape.

Today, we’ll take a closer look at what mobile banking (in its advancing state) means for the developed world, both in the short term and down the road.

Helping The Poor

(whiteafrican)

One promising aspects of mobile banking is its potential to help the poor in developing nations. As noted earlier, the impoverished state of many of these nations is such that the average citizen has little or no access to real banking services. India, with its 36% of citizens earning less than Rs 5,000 a month and lacking a bank account, offers one example, but it is hardly the only example. GlobalEnvision.com cites The Consultative Group to Assist the Poor, which estimates that, “…80 percent of people in least developed countries are unbanked.” The Jakarta Globe makes mention of people in, “…rural and remote areas” of Afghanistan, Asia and Africa who can now “…get paid, send remittances or settle their bills” using mobile banking technology.

Thanks to such services, it has never ...

Other People’s Priorities Don’t Have to Be Your Priorities

Robert Wilkinson — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 05:20:25 +0000

Kelly writes in:

In the past three months, I’ve paid off all but $2,000 of my credit card debt. I feel happier about my money than I have in a long time. The only problem is that my social life seems to be falling apart. I don’t have as much interest in the things my friends are spending their money and time on and I find myself doing other things a lot. What do you suggest?

Bear with me for a second as I go down a bit of a strange road.

I’ll admit it. I’m not a good housekeeper, and neither is my wife.

Yes, we keep our house reasonably clean and we make an extra effort to clean when guests come over, but on a day to day basis, housework is lower on our priority list than it seems to be for many other people that we know. Quite often, we do minimal cleanup during the week and wait until Saturday for a real housecleaning – and, even then, we don’t scrub the walls or things like that on a regular basis.

Our priorities are simply different. There’s no wrong or right about it. Some people value housecleaning more than we do. A few of our closest friends spend literally hours each day on housecleaning because keeping their house sparkling is a very high priority for them.

So what’s a high priority for us? Time with our kids and with each other. Learning new things. Finding ways to have fun without spending a mint.

If we were to simply follow the lead of some of the people in our social circle, we would probably spend more than we do. One of my closest friends is becoming a small-scale land baron. Another one buys lots of Leroy Nieman serigraphs and, on occasion, original art. Yet another close friend really, really values his three automobiles.

Our money goes towards financial stability, because that’s what we value.

Placing that value highly, even if it’s not in line with what our friends seem to value, hasn’t damaged our deepest, most important friendships. You don’t have to value exactly what others value – you just have to respect it.

Instead, our friendships ...

Mint.com Wants Limited Power of Attorney

Robert Wilkinson — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 14:20:08 +0000

A reader recently asked me about what I thought about the fact that financial aggregation site Mint requires you to give them limited Power of Attorney when using their website. There was also a recent discussion on Bogleheads about it. You can find it in the Terms of Use Agreement page.

For purposes of this Agreement and solely to provide the Account Information to you as part of the Service, you grant Intuit a limited power of attorney, and appoint Intuit as your attorney-in-fact and agent, to access third party sites, retrieve and use your information with the full power and authority to do and perform each thing necessary in connection with such activities, as you could do in person. YOU ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT WHEN INTUIT IS ACCESSING AND RETRIEVING ACCOUNT INFORMATION FROM THIRD PARTY SITES, INTUIT IS ACTING AS YOUR AGENT, AND NOT AS THE AGENT OF OR ON BEHALF OF THE THIRD PARTY. You understand and agree ...

Mint Map: Housing Sales

Robert Wilkinson — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 21:20:08 +0000

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The government will tell you that we are coming out of recession and economic recovery is right around the corner. Since the mortgage meltdown could be considered the root cause of the economic downturn, it’s helpful to look at the current housing market to get a sense of whether the recovery is hitting close to home. As prices have continued to drop in cities across the nation, the number of home sales has been increasing in many areas. Especially profound was the dramatic percentage increase ...

Mint Map: Where the Jobs Will Be

Robert Wilkinson — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 13:20:06 +0000

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With the current unemployment rate at 10.6 percent and soaring even higher, you might have to seriously consider relocating in order to find work. You know what the say about the grass being greener? Well, our latest map shows that not all cities are faring equally in our current economic climate and in fact some are actually growing. Take a look to find out which cities are projected to have the greatest number of new jobs created, as well as those with the fastest rate of job growth over the next 20 years.

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<br /><a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.mint.com/">Budgeting</a> – Mint.com

The Best iPhone Personal Finance Apps

Robert Wilkinson — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 09:20:06 +0000

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Photo: Steve Rhodes

If your New Year’s resolution included some sort of financial goal, odds are you’ve struggled to keep up with it already. While most people know they should keep some sort of budget, and many genuinely try to, most run into the reality of it all: tracking all those receipts and logging each purchase takes a huge amount of time. Even for those who started with the best intentions, most soon fall behind. That’s why a growing number of people are turning to web- and mobile-based personal finance solutions. Plus, you can access your data from anywhere and it’s easy to keep up with your expenses.

If your main struggle with finances has been forcing yourself to sit down after a long day at work to balance your checkbook, read on for our roundup of a few tools that can turn the tide with the best personal finance apps out there.
you want to:

Manage your accounts with the least work possible

Mint.com: Web, iPhone (free)

Download

Mint is a free web-based application that tracks your spending and your account balances. Mint’s claim to fame is that the site automatically retrieves your financial data from your banks, credit card companies and the like, and tracks your net worth, spending and even divides your purchases into categories for you — so that Amex charge from Taco Bell at 1:43 a.m. on Saturday will automatically get classified as “food.” From here, it’s easy to set budgets for each category and even receive texts or e-mails when you’re low on funds or about to go over your budget in a category.

The downside to all this is that, yes, you’re giving Mint.com all your financial information so they can review your complete financial picture. The information is held on their servers, and they claim to use the same level of security as bank websites do, but you’ll need to head over to Mint.com to see if the security policy is something you’re comfortable with. If you are, mint is a free, powerful and nearly totally automated service to track your finances.

Pros: Free, versatile, automatic, good companion website
Cons: Requires you to share your financial data, not as powerful as more complex tools
you want to:Control what gets tracked and how by hand

Pocket Money: iPhone ($4.99)

Download

If you’re hesitant to hand your finances over to a company like Mint.com to be automated, no need ...

The Future of Mobile Finance

Robert Wilkinson — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 21:20:06 +0000

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(whiteafrican)

One of the most universally dreaded errands throughout American history has been going to the bank. Synonymous with long lines, incompetent employees and bureaucratic nightmares, banking in person is rarely described as anything other than a necessary evil. Of course, face to face banking has become less frequent during the last decade, due to the rise of online banking. The ability to pay bills, examine account balances and transfer funds with the click of a mouse has been nothing short of a godsend for most consumers. In fact, InternetFinancialNews.com stated in February 2009 that online banking has grown even more popular during the current recession, with “…28 percent of consumers saying they are using online banking more then they did a year ago” and another “…63 percent said managing all of their accounts online from one site would help them feel more in control of their finances.” However, even the relatively recent innovations of online banking are quickly being surpassed by the next big thing — mobile banking. While it’s barely been a decade since online banking gained mainstream appeal, it is now possible to do just about everything a bank website offers from a mobile phone. A group of friends searching for an ATM, for instance, need only use MasterCard’s ATM Hunter for the iPhone. Bank of America users can manage every facet of their accounts from their iPhone, Blackberry or Android. And of course, Mint offers an iPhone app for remotely tracking every bank, retirement and investment account you happen to have. But cool and exciting as these innovations are, they are actually just the beginning!

Below, we’ll comment on the future of mobile finance by profiling some of the most significant, new developments, some of which are already assisting consumers in all manner of remote transactions.

Mobile UPC Scanning

(Mu0x)

Perhaps the most intriguing development in mobile finance is how it extends far beyond simply bringing online banking to mobile phones. Indeed, the technology often extends beyond banking completely. One exciting example is mobile bar code scanning. While much remains to be done before mobile phones can scan and inventory bar codes as reliably as dedicated scanning equipment, early scanning programs already exist for the iPhone. One such program is RedLaser 2.0, which enables users to scan bar codes from a grocery store in real time. This has enabled consumers to comparison shop while standing in a store aisle by running scanned bar codes against a database ...

Mint Map: The World’s Most Expensive Cities

Robert Wilkinson — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 15:20:06 +0000

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Which are the world’s most expensive cities? The cities included on this interactive map are from a 2009 study by the UBS, which tracked the ups and downs of various places in the wake of the financial crisis. Many cities have changed ranks, with some cities become more, and others becoming less expensive. Currency devaluations played a a major role in the change of rankings, specifically in regards to emerging market cities. High inflation rates also were a factor, especially in areas such as Caracas, Venezuela (30% per year, for the last three years) When a cursor is placed over each highlighted city, an information window will pop up, showing whether it has become more or less expensive to live in this city than it was last year, as well as last year’s rankings for that city.

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Beyond Budgeting: Pocketsmith Helps You Forecast

Robert Wilkinson — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 23:20:15 +0000

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Walk With Money » Mint

Review: The Little Book of Bulletproof Investing

Related Searches:

Can Mobile Banking Save Emerging Markets?

Helping The Poor

Other People’s Priorities Don’t Have to Be Your Priorities

Related Searches:

Mint.com Wants Limited Power of Attorney

Mint Map: Housing Sales

Mint Map: Where the Jobs Will Be

The Best iPhone Personal Finance Apps

Mint.com: Web, iPhone (free)

Pocket Money: iPhone ($4.99)

The Future of Mobile Finance

Mobile UPC Scanning

Mint Map: The World’s Most Expensive Cities

Beyond Budgeting: Pocketsmith Helps You Forecast

Linked Content materials content articles