ThxPORTAL - My OnlinE InvestmenT ProgresS

When banks give out loans, they do not give out money that they already have. They simply give the loan which is a promise to pay the actual money which they never really have to do. In the economy, 95% of the money is in the form of bank credit. There is no real currency backing it.Whenever we borrow money, the bank creates new money. This process constantly (almost) expands the money supply. This dilutes the value of the existing money....

By Jeff Clark in Casey's Daily Dispatch:Long-term readers know that gold moves inversely to the dollar, meaning if the dollar drops, gold tends to rise (and vice versa). This happens with about 80% regularity. But what many gold writers haven’t acknowledged is the leveraged movement our favorite metal has demonstrated this year to the world’s reserve currency.The U.S. dollar index, a six-currency gauge of the greenback’s value, has dropped 7.1% so far this year. Meanwhile, gold is up 34% year-to-date. In other words, for every...

As we enter the new year investors will be wise to focus on the risks of 2009. Although the crisis appears long behind us it’s important to keep an eye on the bigger picture. Little has changed in terms of the structure of our global economy therefore the risks remain largely the same. Let’s take a moment to highlight some of these risks as we begin to prepare for a new year:1) Those darned analystsIt would be comforting to think that Wall Street’s analysts were in fact doing us all a great big favor with their expert analysis,...

The announcement by the United Nations this week that it will license the minting of silver and gold bullion coins bearing the UN logo may be the button that launches metal prices into orbit.In its wide-ranging report this fall, the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) stated that the system of currencies and international banking practices within today’s economies were inadequate, and responsible for the present economic crisis....

WASHINGTON: Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Tuesday the Obama administration is confident it will prevent a repeat of last year's financial crisis, the worst in seven decades. "We are not going to have a second wave of financial crisis," Geithner said in an interview with National Public Radio. "We cannot afford to let the country live again with a risk that we are going to have another series of events like we had last year. That is not something that is acceptable." Geithner, interviewed on NPR's "All Things Considered"...

In a long-term assessment of employment data released last week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics surveyed the country's jobs landscape and developed a picture of how it's likely to evolve over the next ten years.As the population ages and manufacturing jobs wane, much of the next decade's employment growth is expected to be in service industries -- such as health care services or business services -- which are projected to make up a whopping 96% of the increase in new employment.But if some industries flourish in the new economy,...

“The Gulf monetary union pact has come into effect,” said Kuwait’s finance minister, Mustafa al-Shamali, speaking at a Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) summit in Kuwait. The move will give the hyper-rich club of oil exporters a petro-currency of their own, greatly increasing their influence in the global exchange and capital markets and potentially displacing the US dollar as the pricing currency for oil contracts. Between...

Newsweek. The magazine already has slashed its rate base (circulation guaranteed to advertisers) from 3.1 million to 2.5 million. It has announced further cuts that will take this figure to 1.5 million early next year. The New York Times reported that Newsweek’s advertising fell 29.9% through the first three quarters of 2009. According to the 10-Q for The Washington Post Company (NYSE:WPO), Newsweek ad revenue plunged 47% in the third quarter...

Even central bank critic U.S. Rep. Ron Paul is surprised that both his colleagues and the nation now listen to his calls for an audit of the notoriously untouchable Federal Reserve. Paul has represented Texas for 22 years and, as a Libertarian, he actually believes that the Fed should be abolished, but he will settle for the next best step. Meanwhile, even longer than Ron Paul has campaigned against the Fed, Bob Prechter has steadily built the case that the Fed is powerless to change the trends in the economy. He thinks the...

DUBAI (Zawya Dow Jones)--Dubai said Monday that it has received $10 billion in financing from Abu Dhabi, which will pay part of the debt held by conglomerate Dubai World and its property unit Nakheel.Out of this, $4.1 billion will be used to repay Nakheel's Islamic bond, or sukuk, that matures Monday. The remainder of the funds will be used to finance Dubai World's needs up until the end of April 2010."We are here today to reassure investors, financial and trade creditors, employees, and our citizens that our government will...

KUALA LUMPUR: Permodalan Nasional Berhad (PNB) hari ini mengumumkan agihan pendapatan skim Amanah Saham Berhad (ASB) sebanyak 7.30 sen bagi tahun kewangan berakhir 31 Disember 2009 berbanding 7.00 sen tahun sebelumnya.Demikian diumumkan Pengerusi PNB, Tun Ahmad Sarji, di sini sebentar tadi. Ia membabitkan pembayaran dividen RM4.95 billion kepada pemegang unit, meningkat 19.56 peratus berbanding RM4.14 bilion tahun kewangan sebelumnya.PNB juga mengumumkan pembayaran bonus 1.25 sen, membabitkan nilai RM537.65 juta. "Pembayaran...

Russia's Central Bank will increase its gold holdings by around 5% by buying 30 tonnes of gold from the State repository which had been planning to sell the gold on the open market.Author: Polina Devitt and Robin PaxtonPosted: Saturday , 12 Dec 2009MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia's state repository will sell 30 tonnes of gold worth $1 billion to the central bank next week, a source at the body said on Friday, keeping the metal inside Russia after rethinking a plan to sell it on the market.Central banks worldwide are building up their...

The amount of nonsense I come across misleading readers, or simply providing bad advice, makes me cringe. Sometimes our own site presents such information like discussing penny stocks and technical analysis.In general, I distinguish bad advice, misleading or misguided information from that regarding a stock idea that simply did not pan out, of which I have been guilty too -- all of us have hits and misses. However, a post I read on Seeking Alpha promoting gold, with suggestions of doom by tailoring the data to fit the theory....

1. Cut Your Credit Cards and Set A BudgetEvery family that finds themselves in debt should cut up all their credit cards and live on a cash budget, keeping a log of each and every expenditure made. Use the following formula to set a budget. Keep in mind that the "life" category includes is everything from groceries, to gadgets to entertainment. Housing: 35%, Debt: 15%, Life: 25%, Transportation, 15%, Savings 10%.2. Reduce Your Interest RatesReducing your interest cost is one way to fast track your way out of debt. Some people...

In a report entitled "Worst-case debt scenario", the bank's asset team said state rescue packages over the last year have merely transferred private liabilities onto sagging sovereign shoulders, creating a fresh set of problems. Overall debt is still far too high in almost all rich economies as a share of GDP (350pc in the US), whether public or private. It must be reduced by the hard slog of "deleveraging", for years. "As yet, nobody can say with any certainty whether we have in fact escaped the prospect...

Greece’s debt has just been downgraded, and experts say that if the country goes belly up, the euro could be in big trouble. "The Greek problem will be an acid test for the currency union," a senior German government official told German magazine Der Spiegel. Fitch Ratings cut Greece’s credit rating to BBB+, the third-lowest investment grade. Meanwhile, Standard & Poor's placed Greece's A- rating on watch for a possible downgrade, meaning it could be slashed within 60 days. Greece is the lowest-rated country in the...

The IMF has grown tired of increasing government spending in Ukraine. The agency had agreed to loan the nation $16.8 billion to offset its large national deficits. It is now withholding the latest $3.5 billion installment. The nation desperately needs the capital. According to The New York Times, “The monetary fund has forecast that Ukraine’s economy will contract 15 percent this year, with inflation running above 16 percent.” Ukraine does not have access to other capital. The global debt markets will not fund a sovereign government...

Thursday, December 10, 2009 3:34 PM Mexico has allocated $1.2 billion to an options strategy that will protect it if oil drops below $57 a barrel. Mexico bought put options, giving it the right – but not the obligation – to sell oil at that price next year, the Finance Ministry said in a statement. The $57 level represents a 20 percent decline from current levels. “We want this as an insurance policy,” said Finance Minister Agustin Carstens, according to Bloomberg. “If we don’t collect any resources from this transaction,...

On December 8, Fitch Ratings announced that “Latvia and Lithuania’s ratings are under pressure from the sharp deterioration in public finances.” (Bloomberg) The same agency also just cut its rating on Greek government bonds, and Standard and Poor's shifted its outlook for Spain's debt from "stable" to "negative."All that less than three weeks after Dubai defaulted on its debt through its subsidiary Dubai World.You can see a common theme...

Long since thought of as "the rotting corpse" of the currency markets, the U.S. dollar reawakened to new life this week by rallying to its highest level in more than a month. For many -- namely those affiliated with the financial mainstream -- the dollar's revival came as a huge surprise. Reason being: The two main fundamentals that supposedly drove the dollar to its 2009 "deathbed" were still very much in force. To wit: The Interest Rate Factor: According to the usual pundits, the persistent, easy money policies of the Federal...

Investors of the Amanah Saham Bumiputera (ASB) fund may see better dividend distribution this year, since the country's economy has been showing a positive growth rate.Permodalan Nasional Bhd (PNB) president and group chief executive Tan Sri Hamad Kama Piah Che Othman said the state-owned company has been providing good returns through its various funds to its investors every year."Our past record revealed that despite facing economy slowdowns, PNB continued to offer a promising dividend rate," he told reporters after he paid...

The recent earthshaking announcement from Dubai World indicates that the U.S. is not alone in dealing with an overleveraged economy. In fact, many countries are in more dire straits than the U.S. As with real earthquakes, the financial aftershocks of Dubai World’s semi-default will be felt far and wide, particularly farther to the north in Europe. (Be sure to read our Special Section on Dubai, p. 34.)Some of the weakest European countries have their own acronym, which runs counter to the positive overtone of the BRIC economies...

As you read this, the Chinese government is doing an extraordinary thing... something nearly unheard of in the modern world.It is encouraging citizens to put at least 5% of their savings into precious metals.The Chinese government is telling people gold and silver are good investments that will safeguard their wealth. After last year's meltdown in the stock market, people believe it. After all, Chinese citizens don't receive government...

Jim Chanos, head of investment firm Kynikos Associates and famous for his call to short Enron in 2001, has found his next big target.Chanos and other China bears say the country has overcapacity in just about every sector of its economy, and the government's massive stimulus isn't working. They think China is simply covering things up with faulty statistics.For example, they point to the huge reported increases in car sales in contrast to numbers showing little growth in gasoline consumption, which suggests state-run companies...

When it comes to the 2010 outlook for commodities, who better to ask than commodities whiz Trader Vic? Victor Sperandeo (also known as "Trader Vic") is one of the world's most outspoken commodities traders, with over 40 years of market experience. He has invested independently for the likes of George Soros, Leon Cooperman and BT Alex Brown, and has written a book, "Trader Vic on Commodities." Mr. Sperandeo also created the popular Diversified Trends Indicator, a long/short rules-based trading methodology based on a highly diversified...

Gold fell almost 5% [on Friday] to below $1,160 an ounce on the latest jobs data. Unemployment unexpectedly fell to 10%. Employers only cut 11,000 jobs in November. That's the least since the recession began, and less than the 130,000 expected cuts. This could be the beginning of the gold correction so many are predicting...Economist David Rosenberg says we're in a secular bull market for gold. He says central bank purchases, led by China, will eventually push gold to $2,600. Like Jim Rogers, though, Rosenberg thinks the short...

- Clive MaundWhat was really odd about yesterday was that we saw a big dollar breakout, but Treasuries fell heavily. We are now believed to be on the verge of another massive deflationary downwave, similar to last year, but worse. However, this time it is very possible that while we will see a flight to cash, we will not witness a stampede into Treasuries, or at least not on anywhere near the same scale. So what is going on here? - what...