Money and Financial Business

Account Totals
Banking	$49,705.62
Credit Cards	$0.00
Investment	$32,676.82
Total Value	$82,382.44

Got 2500 from 401k matching.

The fact that there are so few investment books written with a Canadian focus of the caliber of The Investment Zoo is in no small part a fair reflection of the fact that there are correspondingly few Canadian investor-authors that compare not only to Jarislowsky’s financial success but also his emphasis on corporate ethics, shareholder interest and responsible philanthropy. Sadly, I have found

 

Good News!

Debt is "in." Finally, no more shame, guilt or anxiety. 

I'm not saying that you can feel good about being in the hole, but the fact is, debt is not your dirty little secret -- anymore. With Bankrate reporting consumer debt at nearly $2.2 trillion (and fast approaching the government's $8 trillion I.O.U.), who doesn't have debt?

So we're all in the same club, but togetherness won't make us wealthy -- or -- happy. Maybe it's time to change the status quo? (The government can't afford to bale us out.)

To learn more about our "in" crowd? Read or "post" on:

· Bankrate's Special on Debt
· The Next Generation Begins in Debt (blog)
· Student Debt Is the Norm

For advice on improving your financial situation, think of the best-case scenario for your situation. (Except the big lotto dream) A new job? Learning a little discipline? What's the one change you could go for that would have the biggest impact on your current situation.

For me, one best-case scenario is winning a free money makeover from an expert. To learn who's giving these away, come back for the next posting.

Next Blog: Free Money Makeovers from the Experts
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 Debt, Dollars & Sense Blog: Empty Pockets Welcome

If you're looking to get rid of debt and accumulate more dollars -- then this is the blog for you. I'm not going to tell you how to change your money situation, but I can help you find the answers to your questions. Just ask them.

It's that simple, I swear.

Too bashful? Sign up for e-mail alerts so you don't miss a topic that speaks to your situation.

You can expect to learn insider information such as the sneaky moves of credit card companies and how the experts bank online. 

But the first several entries focus on getting out of debt. If you're just now getting tackling this endeavor, please find them in the archives. You'll find great free or low cost resources, including free money makeovers.

You can get a bang for you debt buck!

 

 

 

 

There press release...

We are glad to tell you good news. Sam Colins, our CEO, has just returned from a business trip dedicated to making new contacts on investments into research and development of new medicines, especially those preventing birds flue virus.

goes on to say...

Our business partners are willing to continue co-operation and, for that reason, we want to allow non-VIP investors in this investment opportunity. We would like to learn your opinions on a short-term (approximately 60 business days) placement of your funds. The daily rate will be almost twice as high as the current one, but it will not exceed 6% daily. This is a very high-yield and short-term offer, we have already made substantial investments in this field and have signed several contracts that would allow us to continue our work this and next year.

For more on the program details click here
please note: I have an account with this group and am very happy with the results.

Lawsuits can help victims receive compensation for pain and suffering caused by negligent acts. But cases can drag on for years, making it difficult for plaintiffs to survive financially until they receive their settlement. That's where lawsuit loans can help.

But after all the noise, and almost 1.7 million shares changing hands (4x normal), we ended the day more or less where we started. The small gain of $0.03 was random; had the session ended a minute earlier, it could have meant no gain, or a slight loss.

As for the earnings release itself, and the following call, there were no great surprises. The company hit the earnings expectations for the last quarter right on the head, both for top-line and bottom-line. Guidance for the coming quarter and year is up for revenue, because of the acquisition, and down for EPS, again because of increased acquisition-related expenses. Current EPS guidance is for $0.27 - $0.30 for the year, excluding executive stock options expenses, and a onetime write-off of in process R&D assets from the Compex acquisition. The guidance does, however, reflect all merger-related cash expenses, as well as regular goodwill amortization, and synergies. This base case further assumes that there will be no divestitures of any Compex businesses. This last assumption could easily be violated, as Encore have retained consultants to assist in the evaluation of strategic alternatives regarding certain parts of Compex. To the extent that this would allow the company to convert goodwill back into cash, which might be used to reduce borrowings, it might bring EPS closer to current consensus estimates of $0.32 for the year.

Using the same assumptions as before, the company guided to 2006 revenue of $415million - $425 million, gross margin of 61.5% - 62%,and operating margin of 14.5% to 15% of revenue. All of this is consistent with my investment premise. The fact that inventory only increased marginally, despite an intentional build-up of inventory for new product introductions makes me think that sales are pretty well humming along. During the call, the company also confirmed that initial demand for their new product introductions at least met their expectations.

So, I am in no hurry to sell. The current quarter should bring some more clarity on possible divestitures and sales trends. There is upside potential in both. I remain confident that this company is well-managed, and on an excellent track.

Baby On a Budget is on hiatus... hopefully to be back soon!

The process is complete and I am now earning 4.75% on $6,500 thanks to Citi Bank. I received my Citi Bank credit card a week and a half ago and immediately requested a check from their website. The check arrived a few days later and now has been transferred to my savings account with ING. The process went smoother than I expected, so I am going to try this arbitrage thing once more. This time my wife will be applying for the card. I will post once everything is set up with that account.

Investments I want...

1. Making Money: Think money doesn't grow on trees? It used to. From the third century B.C. up until the 19th century A.D, the Chinese cast their coins in tree-shaped molds. After the coins were removed, the stem was melted and reused.
2. Filthy Lucre: Studies have found up to 93 strands of bacteria--including the very nasty food-poisoning bugs E. coli and S. aureus--living on the surface of the cash we pass. Some Hitachi ATMs in Japan actually disinfect money before they dispense it, passing the bills through very hot rollers.
3. So Corny: Several thousand new Wisconsin quarters were stuck in 1994 with an extra leaf on an ear of corn that appears on the flip-side image. The coins are being offered for sale for as much as $1,500 apiece.
4. Lucky Charm: George Dixon, a soldier in the Confederate army during America’s Civil War, credited a $20 gold coin with deflecting a bullet and saving his life at the bloody battle of Shiloh. He had the coin engraved and carried it in his pocket. The coin’s luck ran out when Dixon, the commander of one of the first submarines ever built, drowned when the sub sank Feb. 17, 1864. In 1995, the wreck was discovered, and Dixon’s coin, found near his remains, helped to conclusively identify the lost commander.

Subscribe today to save 77% on Forbes! 

Wow, I haven't posted in 3 weeks. Unemployment is hard work! Jokes apart, the last few weeks flew by in a flurry of last minute transition lists, replacement training, sign offs and so on and so forth. And now I have joined the glamorous ranks of the jobless. Since I am no longer slave to the 7 am alarm call and J had some vacation time (we patched things up if anyone is keeping track. He is

I have been away for the weekend and I will be in training all next week so I'll have less time to post. But in the same vein as "Stop buying stuff you cannot afford", I bring you this parody of debt consolidation services in the meantime...enjoy!

I sent NCN an update on thursday before I left on how much debt I have paid off and I was suprised just in my payments last week I paid down 1%…thats not bad in one week. If you haven’t already, check out the No Credit Needed Network it is a great way to get support from those with common goals and its a great way to be inspiration to someone who might be in the same shoes you are. What do you have to lose ? Go ahead and check it out.

I am currently at the SANS 2006 Conference in Orlando and after two days I think my brain is already mush. I am in the SANS +S Trainning Program for the CISSP Certification Exam track. Each day our classes run from 8 in the morning till 7 at night…talk about needing to relax afterwards…I can’t even enjoy what disney world has to offer…so if my posts seem worse than normal. I apolgize…

Many company which have a fairly large volume of business (ie. $100,000 per month) with other companies that have good Dunn & Bradstreet ratings, can qualify for an Asset-Based Line of Credit (ABL). Even if they have been turned-down by their bank for some reasons, they very well may qualify for an Asset-Based Credit Line with a very competetive rate!

Very often Letters of Credit are used as collateral for Large Project financing.  The main concern is that the clients have the ability to pay for the instrument, and to protect it with an acceptable third party Bank or Insurance Company commitment to take out the LC before its maturity, with payoff or permanent financing.  This is NOT a loan program. We only provide the instrument upon which Developers and/or Projects can borrow.

From Forbes:

The newest crop of business-themed board and card games caters to hard-core capitalists--the greedier the better. Some square players against each other in the pits of the stock market. Others demand strategic thinking to build vast real estate empires. Want to smuggle controlled substances during Prohibition? You can do that, too.

Steve Martin was the guest host of Saturday Night Live last week, and did a fantastic skit on personal finance — click on the arrow to watch it here.

This post might actually be a surprise/shock for readers outside India. Having given the disclaimer, let me begin this post.

I used to have a guy clean my car every morning. This is fairly common in most parts of India. I live in a gated residential complex (what is called a society). There are 3-4 guys who clean the cars inside the whole complex - about 50 cars every day. These guys start work really early - around dawn - so that the cars are all done by around 8am, when people start leaving for work. The guy in our complex used to charge me Rs. 200 per month - which is the rate for daily wash of the car, and on sundays, I give him the keys, and he dusts the inside and also cleans the mats inside the car.

I decided today that I will discontinue his services. This decision was based on two decisions - (1) I could use the 200 bucks for something else - this is approximately half the cost of a good dinner for the two of us ; (2) the guy has not been doing a good job the last month or so. He has been absconding from work, atleast 2-3 days a week ; and when he does clean the car, it is not a good job done.

I decided to just purchase myself a good duster, a good wash cloth and a promise to myself that I will do a thorough cleaning every weekend. I feel good. Lets see how this progresses.

Update on our budgetting: The wife and I started doing budgetting for our household this month beginning. I am proud to report that, we have written down every single expense that incurred. It was rather a pain sometimes, but we went through it resiliently. Today, with 2 more days for the month to end, we collated the expenditure list into categories. We now have a handle on some of the money slurpers.

After much procrastination and tweaking, I have finally developed a budget that I am hoping my wife and I can adhere to. We will begin tracking each and every expense starting March 1st. I will post the results after the first month. We will see how it goes and how accurate my projections are.

Kris Frieswick of The Boston Globe Magazine published an analysis of Fidelity Investments on February 19. There are a couple of angles Frieswick explores -- ranging from Fidelity's migration of offices and employees to other parts of the country (its headquarters is in Boston) to the history of the Johnson ...

Read more news like this from PFBlog Network, the personal finance bloggers' network..

by Sue Stevens

It's easy to neglect setting up a retirement plan when you own your own business. With so many existing administrative tasks--payroll taxes, insurance benefits, bookkeeping--adding one more benefit may seem overwhelming.

But retirement creeps up on you much faster than you'd expect. Setting up a retirement plan is essential--and the sooner you do it, the better.

I'm at a point quite reminiscent of childhood, where I'm rushing (if only mentally) to the mailbox everyday on the way home from work, eagerly turning the key, and peering inside the dark metal bin (we are using a super box) . After years of mail = bills or junk, and a shift to more electronic communication, once again I find myself much more interested in(snail) mail than I have been for some

The Toronto Star reported that consumer gas rates are indeed, likely to fall this spring, according to Enbridge. While great news for the vast majority of consumers, those that signed fixed-price contracts under 'the sky is falling' pretences (um, myself included) will, at least for a while, have to pay more as the promise of higher rates and a mathematical savings remains elusive, at least for

Well I haven’t done a great job of getting other site to link to me, but I just found out that I have been linked up at PFBlogs.org, which is a really neat blog aggregator for personal finance blogs, best of all they don’t spam you with ads to view the content. Anyway thanks to [...]

To read more stop by my website at JacksCash.Com

Summer is coming. It is slowly becoming hot. I had postponed this for quite some time, but today I went and got my window glasses tinted in my car. I had it tinted to the right level - allowed by law. There is a limit in India about the degree of transparency (or opaqueness, whichever way you see it) that you need to ensure. This is to ensure that, if a cop pulls you over, he needs to be able to peep in. Most people do not follow this rule, but this is the easiest excuse for a cop to pull me over, and I do not want this. Feels good - kinda feels shady inside the car now.

This podcast is about how to make money through multiple streams of income without actually having a job. This is a high-level overview of the general process and mindset involved in generating passive income streams. It would take a lot more than a 15-20 minute podcast to share all the exact implementation details. But with the right mindset, you’ll be able to figure out the details over time.

Enjoy the podcast…

Pavlina-006-How-to-Make-Money-Without-a-Job.mp3
(Time = 16:34, Size = 7.6MB)

It’s been a short week, with the markets closed for Presidents Day on Monday. The only purchase of the week came today with Komag. We haven’t sold anything yet, and I suspect that we won’t for some time.

So this is what the portfolio looks like, today:

Company	Ticker	Date Bought	Cost Basis	Last Closing Price	Return %
Autoliv	ALV	1/24/2006	$49.05	$53.20	8.46%
Encore Medical	ENMC	2/3/2006	$5.41	$6.01	10.85%
Knoll, Inc.	KNL	2/14/2006	$19.15	$19.65	2.61%
Komag Inc.	KOMG	2/24/2006	$46.95	$46.88	-0.15%

The portfolio is up 5.7%, compared to the S&P being up 2.16%. A couple of notes about that:

• First, the S&P 500 is not dividend adjusted. So, over time, the index appreciation understates the total return one would realize by owning the index components at the appropriate weights. S&P adjust for that, by publishing a dividend adjustment on a monthly basis (It’s in cell C66, “Monthly Dividend for S&P 500 Composite” of this spreadsheet). Over the past 3 years, the S&P 500’s total monthly return was higher thant the index appreciation by about 1.7 index points (last month it was 1.261 points). I make an appropriate adjustment to the daily return.
• Comparing a tiny 4 issue portfolio to a market index over a 1-month period is pure nonsense. But fun!

The modified Dietz return for the portfolio is 10.7%.

Finally, astute readers may have noticed two things: First, so far I seem to have bought the stocks in perfect alphabetical order. Secondly, I slid back a bit compared to last week. To both of those, I shrug my shoulders.

I just bought 1,000 shares @ $46.95.

Volume is down quite a bit, compared to the past two days. I suppose that whichever big holders were selling, got done with it.

Cash flow shortages can happen to almost any business, but invoice factoring can provide a quick, easy solution. Invoice factoring involves the selling of your account receivables or invoices to secure immediate working capital.

One of the many stock screens I keep tinkering with is focused on income momentum. This is a screen that has excellent backtesting results, and one that has proved very effective for me over time. Recently, it dredged up a number of companies in the storage devices segment.

It’s been a decades-old trend for storage capacity per drive to roughly double every year, while cost per megabyte (…gigabyte,…terabyte) keeps going down, leaving the price per drive approximately where it was. Lately, demand has gotten an added boost from portable media players, digital video cameras, DVRs (TiVo, and the like), game consoles, and even cell phones. At the same time, demand for ever-higher capacity, especially in computer hard drives, has outrun the improvements in areal density. Consequently, higher-capacity hard drives are increasingly featuring 2, 3, or 4 disk platters. Between an increasing number of drives per PC and a growing number of disks per drive, the total number of disks per PC has grown from about 2 in 2002 to 2.8, today. All of this is excellent news for Komag (KOMG), who make these platters for many of the largest drive manufacturers.

In essence, blank aluminum disks (the “substrate”) are plated with Nickel alloy and polished, before applying several exremely thin layers of magnetic and non-magnetic material, which hold the data. In the end the disks get carbon sealed and lubricated, before being shipped off to the drive manufacturer. Modern disk platters deliver data at areal densities of up to 100GB/square inch. This tightly packed information has to be picked up by the read head “gliding” at a distance of 0.2 millionth of an inch over a disk that spins at up to 15,000 rpm. It’s obvious that the slightest surface imperfections would render the disk unusable. What all this means is that disk platters are not a commodity item that just any manufacturer could churn out wth some modest investment. In fact, most of the major hard disk manufacturers in the world are Komag’s clients: Seagate, Hitachi, Western Digital, and Maxtor (to be bought by Seagate).

So, what’s the outlook for Komag? Well, there should be plenty of gas left in the tank: A recent NY Times article pegged the current penetration of DVRs at 7.2% of U.S. households; other industrialized nations presumably trail that figure. The same article puts the number of U.S. households with TVs at 110 million, compared with only 70 million households that have a PC (as of 2003, per U.S. Census). Clearly, if DVRs become ubiquitous, the benefit for the storage industry will be enormous. Microsoft’s recently introduced Xbox 360 ships with a hard drive (the stripped down Xbox 360 Core System has none), and there are reports that Sony’s next gaming console, the Playstation 3, will also have a built-in hard drive. What kind of volume would that be? We don’t know, but Sony sold over 100 million of the predecessor PS2 consoles in just 5 years. Add to that the demand for high capacity iPods, and their likes, and it’s easy to imagine that the storage business should be good for some continuing growth in the coming years. As for Komag, the company has been running at flat-out 100% of capacity in both of the most recent quarters. In order to take advantage of expected demand growth, Komag are embarking on a substantial capacity development program. The total capacity is expected to grow from currently 31 million platters per quarter to over 40 million platters per quarter by the end of 2006. But even with added supply, a recent Komag investor presentation projects a cumulative supply shortfall of 21 million to 117 million platters for 2006; under the base scenario, the supply shortage would amount to over 9% of total production. Not surprisingly, Western Digital have alrady preordered (and prepaid!) incremental supply from the factory expansion.

From a financial standpoint, Komag is as healthy as ever. In 2001 the company got in trouble, when the last tech boom ended. All production in the U. S. was shut down to bring costs and capacity in line with demand that was 20% below that of 2000. Despite the effort, the compay had to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in August of 2001. Less than a year later, the company emerged with its liabilities reduced by 2/3. Proceeds from a secondary stock offering in 2004 were used to further cut the long-term debt load to its current level of $80.5 million. At this point, the company has a comfortable 16% debt-to-capital ratio, and 86x interest coverage.

As mentioned in the beginning, I really like the fact that Komag have been able to dramatically increase their profitability over the past year. 5Q2005 gross margin was 28%, compared to 23% during 4Q2004. Net margin improved from 12% to 18% over the same period. Revenue has been up for 6 consecutive quarters, and with the capacity increases expected to come online over the balance of this year, that string is looking to continue. Komag currently trades at a trailing P/E excl. extraordinary items of 13.75, a sales multiple of 2.13 and a cash flow multiple of just under 14. With that, they sit between the disk manufacturing equipment makers, such as Intevac, or the Swiss firm Unaxis, which have the most exposure to the cyclicality of the storage market (Intevac currently trades at a P/E of just under 29, and multiples of 3.2x sales and 28x cash flow), and the drive manufacturers, who are somewhat less volatile and currently trade at generally lower multiples (WDC: P/E 17.9, 1.3x sales, 11.8x c/f; STX: P/E 12.55, 1.5x sales, 8.45x c/f). It’s hard to compare Komag to any peers, since there really aren’t any. Komag is the only independent thin-film media manufacturer in Northamerica. A number of Asian competitors exist: Fuji Electric, Hoya, and Showa Denko. Comparing Japanese valuations to American ones is tricky, since accounting standards differ, as do returns on competing (non-equity) investment opportunities. Making matters worse, all three Japanese competitors are fairly diversified conglomerates, for whom the disks and disk substrates are only a small portion of the business. For what it’s worth, Hoya trades at 5.9x sales and a P/E of 26, and Showa Denko is changing hands at 0.69x sales and a P/E of almost 36.

If there’s a fly in the ointment, it would be the fact that Komag will soon derive 45% of its revenue from a single customer (Seagate, incl. Maxtor), and 95% of their sales come from the top 3 customers (adding Hitachi and Western Digital). This will no doubt limit Komag’s negotiating leverage during times of oversupply. This is doubly true, since most drive manufacturers (WDC are the exception) have their own thin-film media production, from which they derive roughly half of their total disk supply. Only the demand that cannot be met by internal sources is contracted out to “independent” disk manufacturers such as Komag. At the first indication that oversupply conditions may emerge, it would be time to sell KOMG stock. The stock price develoment of real estate builders over the past few months demonstrates Wall Street’s disregard for current performance, if it is not matched by a strong outlook.

But for now, given Komag’s excellent financial situation, and the healthy anticipated demand for storage, this one looks like a winner. If you prefer the drive manufacturers, take a look at Seagate (STX); they have recently been eclipsed by Western Digital, whose Raptor drives have been the performance leaders for the past couple of years. But Seagate is a rock-solid company, with strong research and strong products. If they can manage the integration of Maxtor, they should be golden.

On a tactical note, the entire storage sector got into a funk on Tuesday: STX is down 6.5% since Monday’s close, WDC is off 6.7%, and KOMG dropped 7.2%. No obvious reason has emerged so far, except that possibly the tepid guidance issued by Dell, last Thursday, is working itself through the system. At this point I see this weakness as temporary, and a buying opportunity. Still, take a careful look at the market before jumping in. Clarification should come no later than March 7th, when KOMG will hold their Analyst & Investor Day in Santa Clara. Unfortunately, it’s not open for retail investors, but it’ll at least be webcast.

Since we are on the "budget plan" my gas company reevaluates my usage every four months and fiddles with my monthly charge (some budget, huh?)

In October our gas bill went from around $130 to our new rate of $151. We tried to keep our heat off for all of October (almost made it) and we kept the thermostat lower than ever before.

Our efforts have paid off since our new amount, as of March, will be $103! I know that natural gas prices have decreased a bit, but we decreased our usage majorly this year. And we have the hat-head to prove it.

This will be a $48 savings per month for four months, but I will keep an eye on it. Now that we have some savings built up I'm not so sure I'm loving the "budget" plan since it really is never a set monthly amount for a full year. If the balance keeps tipping in our favor I will probably switch back to just paying what we owe each month. Or move to California.

I found this via It's Your Money and really I just wanted to play with YouTube and give you all that multimedia experience!





It really *is* that simple even though it never feels like it ;)

[UPDATE: It seems that SNL skit was taken off YouTube.com for copyright violations. It's understandable, but given that it is an obvious, but important message, delivered with humor...I'd hoped it would still be available there for a long while. Like zillions of other SNL skits. oh well. Maybe it's still available via Salon]

Costs

Air ticket = Free + $10 processing fee (Thank you, frequent flyer miles)
Four day car rental with AAA discount = $ 129.00
Three nights stay at various budget stays = $110.00
Food = $20
Gas= ~$30
Various buys (posters, prints, books, etc, mainly about Mesa Verde National Park) = $80

Getting severely sick on first day of vacation, being rushed to the emergency room, and then IV dripped for three of the four days of "getaway" in a lonely hospital room in a remote New Mexio town..................

Priceless

We read a lot. A LOT. I've become pretty good about using the library more than Barnes and Noble to get books to read but we still have quite the plethora of books around here. So today, I rounded up boxfulls of them and started listing them on Half.com. I have 20 books listed as of now and if they all sell, that will be about $200 in my pocket.


Works for me.


I haven't started to list all of the kids' books that I've weeded out. That's a whole 'nother box.




I also have more stuff to put up on eBay - mostly toys but also some jewelry and household items that need to go. This wasn't a good month in terms of sticking to the plan of not spending and throwing every last cent at the credit cards. But we're working on it.




Every little bit counts.

Well I just got a confirmation email today telling me that I have received my $50 bonus for signing up with Sharebuilder. That’s a lot of free money for a little guy like me!!

To read more stop by my website at JacksCash.Com

It is fairly easy for Jonathan, a 5-year-old kid taking his tennis lessons every weekend to improve than it is for Roger Federer. I think the reason lies in the transition of thought process associated with the game from System 2 to System 1, a concept well explained by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky.

Two System Thinking:
They use this term to distinguish intuition from reasoning, where

Intuition (System 1):
Intuitive operations are basically fast, automatic, effortless, associative, and difficult to control (or) modify. Think of Pete Sampras’ serve.

Reasoning (System 2):
These operations are basically slower, effortful, and deliberately controlled. The other two defining characteristics of this process are: they are rule governed and flexible. That is why a kid who is most flexible (or quick learner) and a great teacher (say a guy who knows what works) will make a great combination (think Warren Buffett and Benjamin Graham.)

System 1 (Intuition) & Status Quo Bias:
Status quo bias is a consequence of system 1 (Intuitive) mode of thinking. I also think that status quo bias is a big drag on unleashing human potential to its best possible level. But we don’t realize it because what’s forgone can only be measured in opportunity cost whereas the advantages associated with it are ‘psychological and real.’ I will try and discuss the psychological (dis) advantages in the next section.

Human Beings Hate Uncertainty:
“Willingness to change is a strength, even if it means plunging part of the company into total confusion for a while”—Jack Welch.

This can be cited as very uncommon behavior because associated with the confusion is the whole lot of uncertainties. It is under such conditions of uncertainty that we are most susceptible to all the biases, as explained by Dr. Cialdini,

“When we are unsure of ourselves, when the situation is unclear or ambiguous, when uncertainty reigns, we are most likely to accept the actions of others as correct”

Thus I think we tend to stick to what is consistent with the current setting when all we forgo for doing so is measured in opportunity cost, which nobody cares to address when they don’t have any incentives to do so.

Grandma’s Rule:
It says “You have to eat the carrot before you get the dessert.”

While thinking about how to overcome status quo bias, I realized that it is not the lack of insights that hold us form seeking change, but the lack of enterprise or incentives to carry out the change. For example, we often hear our inner voice claim that from now on we have got to change this and that, but many a times that tomorrow never comes. To make sure that we accomplish what we think we should, we can set incentives for ourselves. I remember reading somewhere that Warren Buffett decided that he would not invest unless he reads “Intelligent Investor” eleven times. I don’t bet on the authenticity of this but I surely think that this is a good example as to how to set incentives for ourselves. After all, Incentives are super-powers.

Conclusion:
“Practice makes permanent—not perfect”—Warren Buffett.

As an investor, it is only natural to work hard to try and make security analysis as effective as possible. It is also natural that as we practice harder, it will tend to become less effortful. But at the end of the day, security analysis is not an exact science but an art where it pays to stick to certain well-grounded principles and also be flexible.

To be flexible, we need to be receptive to the feedback we receive from the system (ie) success or failure of an idea, as the case may be, and try and incorporate the learning in our collective thought process.

“One mended fault is always better than two found faults”—Ben Franklin.

Investor's Business Daily is providing 3 days of free access to the "IBD 100 List of Top Rated Stocks" [thanks, mom!]

First let me say thanks to everyone for "partying" with me yesterday, next time I should totally bring cupcakes!

Some invoices got paid recently so LaLa was able to make another contribution to our emergency fund bringing us to about 78% of our goal. It's pretty exciting to see the end of the goal clearly in reach and the deposit slip for $2200 was downright sexy! I am anxious to meet this goal asap so we can get back to saving for retirement (after our brief hiatus).

The flip side of all this is that our cash flow is crazy tight until mid-March. With all this aggressive saving and a few unexpected expenses we've had to keep a very close eye on the bank account, but the temporary pinch seems worth it to meet our other savings goals. We've gone out to eat only once in the last 5-6 weeks (for a social occasion) and last night was the first night we got any sort of takeout in about the same time period (Ok, I'll fess up...we used a BK coupon and fed both of us for $5.33 not too bad a deal if you're already on the slippery slope of a fast food evening LOL). Anyway the cash flow management should be interesting over the next 3 weeks.

I was visited by a salesperson from Universal Power yesterday looking to have me sign a long-term (5-year) agreement for fixed price electricity. I'm not terribly impressed by the scare-tactic approach, widely used in selling electricity and natural gas (ok, so it worked on me when I bought my gas plan ...). I realize our electricity rates are artificially regulated in Ontario, but I'm really

There will be a lot of Chiquita headlines about slipping on banana peels, tomorrow. And, boy, am I glad I pulled out of the buy recommendation on this stock.

Unfavorable currency translations, hurricane damage, a big acquisition of a low-to-no-margin business, and the ever-entertaining EU tariff regime: It all conspired to make Chiquita’s quarter a bad one. Revenue was 5% below expectation (and below last year’s, after adjusting for the Fresh Express acquisition), and the net loss was ($0.45), instead of the expected ($0.01). About the only good news was that European pricing has held up better than expected. Unfortunately, that came at the expense of lower volume, as the substantial incremental advertising spending during the 4th quarter apparently didn’t pay off.

Once the supply situation normalizes, after the replanting of Latin American bananas following last year’s hurricane devastation is complete, whatever price advantage currently exists will be gone. In the meantime, currency effects will weigh on future comparisons, and the cost of the higher EU import tariffs is going to hit the company head-on. Higher than normal expenses for fuel and ship charters are also only partially hedged.

Clearly, management is trying to focus on the improvements in the Fresh Express segment, where volume and prices are going in the right direction. Operating loss of the segment was ($5 million), mostly due to restructuring expenses for two plant closures in the Midwest. That should not affect next year’s costs. But there’s a bunch of debt on the balance sheet that was raised to pay for the acquisition, and most of that is priced at a spread over LIBOR. If interest rates keep going up, it’s going to be a long time, before this acquisition pays off.

Right now, CQB is down 5% in after-hours trading. I don’t see it dropping very much more, since the company is not in immediate distress. But with all the issues facing the stock, I still see no reason to buy.

A common challenge to most start-up entrepreneurs is complying with the Internal Revenue Service and ever changing regulations. Fortunately, the I.R.S. has an Internet based Tax Center which contains a great deal of information that will assist you. You can learn about operating a business with employees, business deductions and tax credits, filing and paying taxes, recordkeeping and choosing an accounting method. You can also secure business income tax forms for all of the types of businesses.

As a logical conclusion to my review of banking options, I followed through on my assessment and opened a new President's Choice Financial account for my everyday banking. I do want to thank everyone that provided feedback on this - I'm glad it was pointed out, for example, that CIBC really doesn't service PC Financial for in-bank services. As suggested, I will keep my existing TD Canada Trust

This week's festival is hosted by Retire at 30 . I particularly liked the post by Jim from Blueprint for Financial Prospectity featuring an actual cost analysis of compact florescent bulbs vs. standard incandescants. Perhaps a minor point, but the value for me was the effort spent to move beyond the anecdotal and measure a real-life savings.

Does anyone else feel it, or is it only me ? I feel that time just flies past like crazy. Really really fast. Whoa, today morning I realized that it is already wednesday, well mid week. And before I realized it, I was staring at my calendar, shaking my head in disbelief that it is 22nd of Feb. The month is almost over ! Wow.

Two items of interest today. One, we are going good and strong on our frugal living. I have visited the ATM only twice this month - and taken out smaller amounts. Feels good. The other is, today is our second week of liquid diet. We read somewhere that it is very good for our body, if we do a liquid diet day once a week. Well, we cheat a little bit, because we fast the whole day, but we do have a meal in the night. But, it usually is a very thin and light meal. So let us see who this goes today.

A year ago today I made my first post (2005...The Year of Finances) so I guess that means this is my bloggiversary or blog birthday or some such thing. I haven't accomplished everything I set out to last year (still closing in on that emergency fund and I haven't checked my credit report yet) but I've made some decent progress since I had my "Aha!" moment at the very beginning of 2005.

I started blogging because I wanted a more emotional record of what I was attempting than Quicken could give me. I thought that by making my intentions somewhat public that I'd hold myself more accountable (it works for me). And I also wanted to break the silence that many women seem to have when it comes to talk about money.

A brief look back on the year...

Aha! (A prequel)
It was a few days into 2005 when my 2004 bonus check arrived with my paystub. As I looked at the after tax amount my heart sunk because it was nowhere near enough to pay off the $14,000 in credit card debt that we had incurred. I'll spare you the gory details but what really sunk in was that I alone had the power to make sure I never received a windfall like that again...and felt disappointed. Things were gonna change and change fast.

Credit Card Debt
When I started "The Year of Finances" we had $14k in credit card debt. Shortly thereafter I started blogging and it was down to $11k. I had the credit cards paid off by March, but used a card to borrow money to fully fund my 2004 Roth and that took another few months to pay off. It's been $0 since then because we pay the credit card off every month.

Savings
A year ago I had no non-retirement savings. Our emergency fund is now at $7800 (as of today) and we have about $700 set aside already earmarked for vacations, big ticket house items, and gifts. We are regularly saving tax-deferred retirement, tax-free retirement and regular taxable amounts and we continually strive to save a larger portion of our income.

Roth IRA
I had opened a Roth IRA with $2000 several years ago and had not contributed since because I was favoring the tax deductions of maximizing my 401(k) contribution. Last year I got "Roth Religion" in time and I was able to max out both the 2004 and (just recently) the 2005 investing $7000 total in my Roth over the last year.


I'm not out here blogging as some paragon of financial stability. I'm attempting to use this blog to share successes as well as missteps in a search for community. I want to learn from others, cheer on the struggles of those in debt, make some friends, and I hope that I have a few useful things to share now and then.

I still have a long road to travel to get where I want to be...I have far too much junk in the nether regions of my house, I have a backlog of posts that seems endless, and I still struggle with the feeling of "enough".

But it's still been a great year and I thank every one of you that drops by. And yes, I get like this on MY birthday too ;)

[Coincidentally I seem to have picked an auspicious date to begin since this also happens to be Consumerism Commentary's bloggiversary...the 6th to be exact! Congratulations, Flexo!]