What is a Stock?
Buying a stock means taking an ownership position in a publicly traded company. Once you purchase a stock, you become a shareholder. A company has two ways of acquiring capital needed for growth: borrowing it (often in the form of issuing bonds), or selling shares of their company's equity, which is known as stock. In other words, when you buy shares of a company’s stock, you are buying a claim to the company's profit margin, because you are technically a part-owner in the company. Those who hold shares of Common Stock, the most typical form of stock, have voting rights in the election of the company’s board members. Continue reading...
Where Should I Open an IRA?
IRAs can be held at many kinds of institutions, even those that you only see online. It is completely your choice! IRAs can be opened at almost any large bank or brokerage firm, giving you plenty of options. Many online services make it possible to open an IRA from your phone or computer. Be sure to compare them because there are some distinctions, such as fee structures and the investments available within the account. Some institutions will only offer their proprietary funds, while others will let you access almost any investment on the market that is allowable inside of an IRA. Continue reading...
What is FICA?
FICA (Federal Insurance Contributions Act) taxes are handled by the Social Security Administration, as they are payroll withholdings that go toward Social Security and Medicare funds. Most people will have half of their FICA paid by their employer, but self-employed people must pay it all on their own, which is called the “Self-Employment Tax.” FICA is a tax on employees and employers that funds the Social Security and Medicare programs of the United States. Continue reading...
What are the Projections for Social Security Benefits?
It looks like the Social Security Trust Funds may be depleted by 2037. The system can most likely continue while paying reduced benefits that come directly from the current social security taxes to the workforce. Estimates are that the Social Security Administration could pay about 70% of its obligations at that point. There is enough money to pay Social Security benefits at the current rate until about 2037. Continue reading...
How Do You Make a Paper Bitcoin Wallet?
Because bitcoin wallets and balances are little more than a few lines of code, it is often desired to move the wallet offline into paper form. Generally speaking, it is not a difficult process. The way bitcoin transactions work, funds are sent to a specific address that signifies the wallet of the payee. People can possess multiple wallet addresses, which can be quickly generated at no cost, and this is often preferential for security and privacy reasons. Services such as bitaddress.org allow users to generate new wallet addresses and then help users encrypt and print paper versions of the necessary information to keep their bitcoin balances offline for cold storage in physical form. Extensive tutorials on how to do this exist online in forums and videos. Some people like this option because it removes any chance of their wallet being hacked. Continue reading...
What is Bankruptcy?
When a person or company is no longer able to pay the amount of debt they owe, they can file bankruptcy and be given options for relief. There are different types of bankruptcy filings available (found here — debt would have to have accumulated to a point where there is no mathematically feasible way to repay it all. There may be a way to repay some of it, however. It may mean that a business is able to continue to keep its doors open, with payment plans to service some of the outstanding debt, but this is likely after some assets have been liquidated to settle some of the creditors' claims. Continue reading...
Who is a Bond Trustee?
A bond trustee is an institution which has the fiduciary responsibility of administering and enforcing the terms of the bond indenture. A bond indenture is the contract between the bond issuer and the bondholder. A trustee has the resources to manage the distribution of the funds to the bondholders, to keep up with and distribute the required bookkeeping and statement information to the interested parties as well as regulators like the SEC. If there is a violation of the contract, the trustee must report it and act in the best interest of the wronged party. Continue reading...
What Websites and Apps Can Help Me With Personal Budgeting?
There is a thriving industry committed to helping people plan and maintain a personal budget through online tools and apps. Perhaps the most-used personal budgeting tool as of this writing is Mint, which allows a user to link their bank accounts into the budgeting software, and then sends the information right into a tax filing after the new year. A list such as this is almost definitely going to be outdated by the time you read it; your favorite search engine or app store may turn up more relevant results than this. Continue reading...
What is the October Effect?
The October Effect, also known as the Mark Twain Effect, is an anecdotally-founded fear that markets are vulnerable to catastrophe in the month of October. Several Octobers have appeared to be the origin of problems in the market: in 1929 at the onset of the Great Depression, the 1987 crash, and in 2008 at the start of the Great Recession. Perhaps superstitiously, many people expect October to be the worse month of the year for the market, supposing that if something bad were going to happen, it would happen in October. Statistically, there isn't much support for this idea. Continue reading...
What are Fibonacci Channels?
Price movement often occurs in a range-bound way, even when an uptrend or downtrend is in effect. Fibonacci channels estimate support and resistance numbers using Fibonacci numbers, which are found throughout the natural world, in order to define possible places where reversals will occur. Fibonacci numbers are related to the study of chaos theory, which seeks to find order in complex systems. Since the markets have so many variables, but no lack of data, they are an excellent place to search for Fibonacci patterns. Continue reading...