Friday, April 9, 2010

Money Market Rates 4/10

Here are the latest money market interest rates of the banks that I've been tracking on my blog. Note that these rates are sorted by APY, and represent institutions that I have accounts at, or have otherwise mentioned in my blog:

1.35% Discover Bank Online Savings
1.29% Ally Bank Online Savings
1.10% HSBCAdvance Online Savings
1.10% ING Direct Orange Savings
1.07% Shorebank Direct Online Savings
0.90% Citibank Ultimate Savings
0.65% Western FCU Money Market
0.50% Chase Premier Savings
0.40% E*TRADE Complete Savings
0.06% PayPal Money Market*

NOTES: *The PayPal Money Market fund is NOT FDIC insured.
Rates are believed to be accurate as of 4/8/10. I did not include banks that had special, or introductory rates in the list because they are not ongoing interest rates. I am also not including non-liquid accounts such as CD's in the list.

This month, I have added Discover Bank Online Savings to the list, which currently has the highest interest rate of the banks that I'm tracking. The latest bank casualty in my list of banks is Umbrellabank, which was a division of New South Federal Savings Bank. New South was closed by the FDIC in December, and the assets were transferred to Beal Bank. I will stop tracking the Pot O' Gold Money Market here.

So, there is the latest list. Please let me know if you know of any higher interest rates.

DC

Monday, April 5, 2010

Two Week Free Trial of MarketClub

I hesitate to recommend a product on PFStock unless I feel that it is really worthwhile. MarketClub from INO.com, which I've mentioned before in my post MarketClub Pays for Itself, is one of those exceptional products. Now for a limited time, MarketClub is offering a 2-week free trial. This is a risk-free way to try out the powerful technical analysis tools at MarketClub -- which have earned my personal recommendation.

I don't know how long they will have this free trial offer available, but MarketClub is regularly priced at $449.00 per year. INO.com (pronounced "I know") normally offers a 30-day risk-free period, but they would ordinarily ask for your credit card number upfront. But, if you Click Here you can sign up for the free trial without giving them your credit card information. Even at full price, I feel that MarketClub is worthwhile because I've made much more than the cost of a subscription using their tools.

Anyway, there are 4 powerful trading tools available to MarketClub members that you, as a free trial member, will have access to: Smart Scan, Trade School, Chart Analysis, and Data Central. You also will have access to numerous videos from Adam Hewison, the creator of MarketClub. One other major bonus about this trial is that their, customer support team will be providing unlimited support! You can call or email MarketClub for an instant response to any question, comment or concern.

DC

Thursday, April 1, 2010

Should You Invest in Gold?

On this blog, I haven't talked much about investing in gold or in precious metals. With the upward trend of gold prices in the last few years, I have started to consider gold as an investment. But, I've been afraid that I might be a little bit late to the party. To give me more to think about, the folks at INO.com (pronounced "I know") recently sent me an Email with a link to their video about the future of gold prices. I thought that it would be useful to re-post their message here.

Note: The views expressed are those of the original author, and do not necessarily reflect those of PFStock.


Why gold will not make new highs or lows this year
by Adam Hewison, INO.com President

Gold has had some dramatic moves in the last eighteen months and we expect it will have some equally dramatic moves in the future, but not right now.

Click Here to see Adam's 4-minute video about gold.

While I recognize that gold is one of the few commodity markets that people are really passionate about; the purpose of this article is not to take sides either with the gold bugs or those who reject the argument that gold is forever. Rather, I want to discuss my interpretation of the markets cycle.

After spot gold made an all-time high against the dollar on December 2 at $1,226.37, gold has been in retreat mode. For the for the past several months gold has been in a broad trading range, seemingly unable to move one way or another. This process has created frustration from bulls and bears alike.

Here is the dirty little secret about the gold market. It can be a horrible investment and here's why:

Gold first started trading in the 80s while I was on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in Chicago as a member of the International Monetary Market, (IMM) which was at that time a division of the CME now the CME Group. When gold opened up the public clamored to buy into the gold futures market and guess who sold it to them? That's right it was the pros- the guys who made their living trading. As a result, gold hit an all-time high of around $850 an ounce back then and it took almost 25 years for gold to move over that level, at least in dollar terms. I don't know what your timeline is, but 25 to 30 years is an awful long time to get even again.

So what is really happening in this market?

Everyone is aware of the problems in Europe with Greece, Portugal and a host of yet to be named countries. We all know that the huge amount of money being printed, coupled with the bank failures abroad contribute to the dollars declining value. These events, in conjunction with the American governments actions, also contribute to the devaluation of the dollar. The government claims that this is beneficial to exports, but the bottom line is that the purchasing power of the American dollar continues to erode in world markets.

Based on the declining value of world currency against gold you might ask- why isn't gold trading at $2,000 or even $3,000 an ounce? What is wrong with this market? This is because a great deal of what goes into the gold market is psychological and reacts to cyclic trends driven by both psychological and economic factors.

So what does all this have to do with the price of gold now? It has everything to do with gold and nothing to do with gold.

Here is what I've been able to observe in the last several years in gold and seems to be holding true. It is something that you should pay attention to if you're interested in the next big move in the gold market.

Before gold can move higher it needs to create what I call an "energy field". The most recent energy fields in gold were between May 12, 2006 and September 20, 2007. This 17 month energy field saw gold prices oscillate between a broad trading range bound by $730.08 (upside) and $541.80 (downside). That energy field produced enough power to propel gold to the new high of $1,012.40 on March 17, 2008. This marked the first time gold exceeded, in dollar terms, the highs set in the early 80s mentioned earlier.

The energy fields I have observed for gold are taking somewhere between 17 and 18 months to complete. If the energy field holds, then the December 3rd 2009 high of $1,226.37 should remain in place for quite some time. If the same cycle remains true then the recent lows that we witnessed, at $1,050, should also remain intact as they represent the 15 to 16 month cycle low.

With the lows in place the next question becomes when is the next cyclical high in gold? Based on the existing cycle, we can expect the next major gold high in 2011.

To summarize: I expect gold to be locked in a broad trading range for the next 12 months bounded by the December 09 highs of 1,226.37 and the lows of $1,050.00. If the gold cycle holds true, we expect that gold tops the $1,226.37 marker by April or May of 2011.

On the upside we will also be looking for gold to make a nature cyclic high in October or November of 2011. It's impossible to predict the future with any degree of accuracy; however when we look at the cycles in gold this reads as a pretty good bet.

No matter what happens we expect gold will offer some great trading opportunities that investors and traders should be able to take advantage of.

Listen to Adam's technical analysis of the gold chart.

As I always discuss- in trading one should approach gold or any other market with a game plan and proper money management stops. The key to success in this decade will be an investors willingness to move in and out of asset classes such as gold and be well diversified into more than one asset class. That way you wont be left holding the bag for the next 25 years. Our World Commodity Portfolio is a good example of this approach and one I believe will serve investors well in the coming years.

--
Adam Hewison is the Co-creator of MarketClub. For a limited time, MarketClub is offering a 2-week free trial. This is a risk-free way to try out the powerful technical analysis tools at MarketClub -- which have earned my personal recommendation. For more information, see my post MarketClub Pays for Itself.

DC