Personal Finance, Financial Planning, and Investment Management tidbits
Posted in Investing, Retirement Planning on Jun 8th, 2010
What does the term “get your ducks in a row” mean? According to the wiseGEEK, when a person is fully prepared for any eventuality and has every element in place, he or she can indeed be said to have his or her ducks in a row. Jim Blankenship, CFP®, EA Getting Your Financial Ducks In [...]
Posted in Investing on Feb 19th, 2010
Review of the 2009 Callan Periodic Table of Investment Returns, including the BlackRock Asset Class Returns Table
Posted in Investing, Retirement Planning on Sep 29th, 2009
Intel employees are now eligible to exchange their current underwater stock options for new options at a lower strike price. Employees should carefully consider the assumptions and trade-offs to make an informed decision.
Posted in Investing on Aug 25th, 2009
Standard & Poors recently released the Midyear 2009 results for the Standard & Poor’s Indices Versus Active Funds Scorecard (SPVIA). The report is now published semi-annually, and the key findings are summarized below. The prior report was published for year end 2008 data, and reviewed on this blog post. You can read the full report [...]
Posted in In the news, Retirement Planning on Aug 24th, 2009
Brent Hunsberger, the personal finance columnist for The Oregonian, tackled the often complex topic of annuities in his Sunday column. My take: immediate annuities have a role in retirement income planning. However, it’s important to understand the embedded costs and “apples to apples” cash-equivalent yield of a variable annuity with a Guaranteed Lifetime Income Benefit [...]
The Illinois State Treasurer’s office has reached a tentative agreement with Oppenheimer Funds to recover $77 million of the $85 million that plan participants lost in the Oppenheimer Core Bond Fund. Details at this link.
Negotiations with Oppenheimer Funds include Oregon, but there hasn’t been any official communication yet from the Oregon 529 College Savings Plan.
This [...]
Posted in In the news, Investing on Jun 6th, 2009
June 2009: Tim is quoted at Kiplinger.com in an article entitled “7 Ways Your Money Will Never Be the Same” An article about the changing investment landscape.
Read the full article
Update: Jeffery Kosnett, Senior Editor, discusses his article on ABC news
7 Ways your money will never be the same
Posted in 529 Plans on Jun 3rd, 2009
update: clarifications and examples in italics, total tax savings amount changed.
According to a recent national survey of parents from Sallie Mae and Gallup, only 33% of parents are saving for college through a 529 plan. The same study found that 62% of parents of college-bound children are saving for education.
Parents that aren’t using a 529 [...]
Posted in Retirement Planning on May 22nd, 2009
A recent analysis by Charles Schwab found that 43% of the 401(k) assets held by workers who left their jobs in the first quarter of 2008 still remains in the old plans. Leaving your assets on autopilot in your old employer’s plan may not be the smart thing to do.
Assets left in an [...]
Posted in 529 Plans, In the news on May 14th, 2009
The Oregon 529 College Savings Plan is selecting a new manager, and we have an opportunity to become “best in class”.