Articles written by James Brumley
Showing 54 Articles
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Checklist of Pre-Retirement Steps to Take
Retiring isn't a one-step process done because an eligible employee decides to stop working. Specific steps should be worked through to ensure maximum retirement income.
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The Web's Best Free Retirement Calculators
Simply guessing about retirement income needs is a plan for disaster. Investors who want to save enough for their golden years should use a few powerful but simple tools.
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Planning Social Security, Pension, & IRA Income
As Social Security and pension payouts shrink, workers will rely more on individual retirement accounts, or IRAs. Here's where retirement income will come from.
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Retirement Plans for the Self-Employed
Standard individual retirement accounts or Roth IRAs are not self-employed business owners' only options. Qualified, tax-friendly plans offer higher contribution limits.
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Investor Interpretation of Economic Indicators
Unemployment, capacity utilization, the Fed Funds rate, and the inflation rate are the most accurate economic indicators investors can use to spot a recession.
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Chart Analysis Using Fibonacci Retracement Lines
Science, nature, and investing overlap when a key pattern of Fibonacci numbers are applied to stock charts to make technical price forecasts.
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Mutual Funds Versus ETFs
Though mutual funds have failed to lure investors now that so many exchange-traded funds (or ETFs) are available, mutual funds are still the smarter choice in many cases.
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Picking the Right Forex Training Course
Forex trading courses that promise riches are easy to find. However, finding a quality currency trading class should actually be a challenge.
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Free Online Stock Charting Software
Sophisticated stock trading tools don't have to be costly. In fact, three web-based charting platforms are totally free... TrixyChart, FreeStockChart, and StockCharts.
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Commodity Future Margin Rates
Trading commodities can be risky, but the potential rewards can be great for traders who understand and use leverage. Here's the type of leverage that can be tapped.
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Getting Started in Commodity Futures Trading
Commodity futures trading offers huge reward potential, and in many ways is less complicated than trading stocks. Here's an overview of how to get started.
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What You Need to Know About Mortgage Lenders
Finding a mortgage lender is easy; finding a good one can be more difficult. Here's some background on the home loan business that will help a borrower choose wisely.
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What is a Covered Call Option Trade?
Though there's no such thing as risk-free investing, investors can tip the risk-versus-reward scale in their favor by writing covered calls on stocks they already own.
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Forex Trading Tips and Tricks
Forex trading's biggest earners are successful usually just because they stick to a simple set of rules. Here are the highlights of their forex trading tips.
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How To Choose the Right Forex Broker
Choosing a forex trading broker boils down to asking a few simple questions regarding price, speed, tools, and support. Here are some tips to help select the right one.
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Tips for Completing a Mortgage Application
The trickiest part of buying a home can be properly and effectively completing the home loan application. Here are some simple steps to make a mortgage loan a snap.
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How to Place Forex and Currency Trades
The idea of speculatively trading foreign currencies- often called forex trading- can be intimidating. This example illustrates how simple it can be.
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Forex Trading Basics: Getting Started
The foreign currency exchange market - or 'forex' - is one of the simplest yet most dangerous ways to trade for income. Here are the basics all traders need to know.
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What Is An Investment Bank?
Investment banking is the process of raising funds for companies by connecting those corporations with investors. There's more to it than just that, however.
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How to Sell Your House Fast and Profitably
While marketing a house or land has always been challenging, the real estate crisis of 2008 has forced sellers to do adhere to all the major rules of selling real estate.
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Candlestick Chart Patterns – Harami, Engulfing
Major stock trends start and stop with common high, low, opening, and closing price patterns shaped over a short time. Here are four patterns traders must recognize.
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Review of TradeKing's Stock Trading Platform
A wide variety of stock screeners, option calculators, market research, and technical analysis tools await investors with online brokerage firm TradeKing.
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Review of Zecco's Trading Platform and Community
Online brokerage firm Zecco offers a wide array of tools for traders: screeners, research, and account management features. A detailed look at them is well-invested time.
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Using Williams 'Percent R' To Trade Stocks
Spotting overbought and oversold stocks is made simple with Larry Williams %R Indicator. Plus, the tool can be easily incorporated into a trading system.
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Basic Technical Analysis Candlestick Patterns
There's more to stock trading than simply spotting momentum or following the trend. The open, high, low, and close from one day to the next can be vital clues.
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Technical Analysis' Stochastic Oscillator
Traders love momentum, whether it's bullish or bearish. However, how's a trader to know when a trend is likely to stall?
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Understanding Technical Analysis' MACD Indicator
One of the first tools a new technical analyst is apt to learn is the moving average convergence divergence indicator, or MACD. The cons are as numerous as the pros.
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Review of Schwab's StreetSmartPro Software
For traders seeking a stock charting and market data platform that directly integrates with a trading interface, schwab.com's StreetSmartPro deserves a closer look.
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Strange ETFs Investors Need in Their Portfolio
Exchange-traded funds are a great way to capitalize on styles and sectors without committing to an individual stock. But, popular ETFs may not always be profitable ETFs
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Investing in Wind Energy Gearbox Advancements
The use of wind energy is fast approaching parity with coal and gas energy. However, the gearbox technology needed to get past that hurdle may also be a worthy investment
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Investing in Wind Energy Growth Trends
Some investors may feel wind energy is a mere fad that will never really produce investment gains. These investors need to look at the facts, and the projected growth.
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The World's Most Attractive Wind Energy Stocks
Though capital expenditure spending cuts affected many industries, wind energy has managed to continue drawing a crowd. As such, wind turbine stocks remain attractive.
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Valentine's Day Gift Ideas For Women
Finding the right Valentine's Day gift for the woman in your life is all about thought and understanding. Most women just want to know they're considered to be special.
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Valentine's Day Gift Ideas for Men
Finding a great Valentine's Day gift for a man is a matter of fun and creativity. Here are a few ideas to get Valentine's Day shoppers started.
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ETF Fundamental Valuations for 2009
Though fundamental analysis is typically reserved for individual stocks, the strategy is still helpful when evaluating exchange-traded funds.
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Suggested Industry Allocation for Early 2009
Get more out of the stock market by finding the hottest industries, and avoiding the coldest ones. Here are a few industry suggestions to get investors started.
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Suggested Portfolio Allocation for Early 2009
One key to successful investing is picking the right sectors and avoiding the wrong ones. This suggested allocation for 2009 may help investors build an ideal portfolio.
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Components of a Good Stock Trading System
While there's no such thing as a consistently successful "black box" in trading, a true automated-signal system can certainly remove a trader's misleading biases.
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Using ETFs as Part of a Sector Rotation Strategy
Too often, investors own stocks moving against the grain. A portfolio is easier to manage, and considerably more profitable, when the wind is at an investor's back.
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The Web's Best Free Option Trading Calculators
Don't just guess about option price projections based on Greeks like delta and theta. Proper use of these free calculators can help you maximize your trading profits.
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Using the Greek 'Theta' in Option Trading
Not only do option traders have to predict a stock's direction, they have to beat the clock too. Wise traders learn how to minimize this time-decay known as 'theta'.
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Using the Greek 'Delta' in Option Trading
Not all stock options behave the same. Delta is a measure of how much (or how little) a particular option changes relative to the price of the underlying stock or index.
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Spot Market Reversals with the VIX
If you want to become a master of predicting the market's direction, you must first understand investors' opinions....and then trade in the other direction.
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Option Greeks for Beginners
New equity option traders should familiarize themselves with 'the greeks' - like theta and delta - to maximize their potential trading gains.
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Beginner's Fundamental Stock Analysis
Price to earnings ratios, return on equity, operating margins ... what does it all mean? Getting started with stocks doesn't have to be as complicated as it seems.
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How to Evaluate Solar Power Stocks
Solar power stocks aren't new, but only recently - thanks to record breaking oil prices - has the industry gotten investors' attention. Finding the right ones is the key.
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Beginners Technical Stock Analysis
Fundamental analysis assumes a stock will always trade at an appropriate value. Technical analysis will highlight periods when it's not.
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Common Investing Mistakes to Avoid
Though the list of tripwires an investor faces is virtually endless, there are five that seem to constantly resurface.
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Influences on a Stock Option's Value
As with anything related to capital markets, sometimes a stock option is priced at what it's worth, and sometimes not. Some basic math can show a trader their true cost.
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How to Start Trading Stock Options
Trading stock options may be intimidating for newcomers, but getting started may be easier than they expect. As with all new things, the key is learning the basics first.
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Investing in Alternative Energy ETFs
Between global warming and skyrocketing oil prices, investing in alternative energy has become more than a fad. ETFs are the simple way to add it to your portfolio.
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The Benefits of Exchange Traded Funds
Exchange-traded funds are attractive to investors for several reasons, such as being cost effective, less volatile than stocks, or more flexible than mutual funds.
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Top Alternative Energy Investments
Oil stocks have reaped the reward of record oil prices, but demand for other solutions has grown. Alternative energy companies are now a big investment opportunity.
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Portfolio Allocation - Late 2008
Stocks that led the way over the last six months - mainly materials and energy - aren't primed to repeat. A new allocation for your investments may be in order.
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