• The Trials and Tribulations of Measuring and Comparing Investment Performance
    03/01/2006 - 09:00

    Measuring and comparing investment performance is not an easy task. Consider, for instance, something as simple as the daily comings and going of the stock market. One month the Dow Jones industrial average (DJIA) is up and the next month it's down. But do those changes really tell the whole story?

  • Taking Time to Understand the 2006 Tax Changes
    02/01/2006 - 09:00

    The Internal Revenue Code is not ordinarily thought of as a gift that keeps on giving, but, with 2005 having given way to 2006, it does contain several sections which provide for keeping more of what you will be earning and saving more for your retirement-on a tax-sheltered basis-out of what you keep.

    They also provide, in some cases, for siphoning slightly more of what you earn-as your income increase with inflation-but these cases are far less numerous.

  • Figuring Out the Financial Aid Formula
    02/01/2006 - 09:00

    Few areas of financial planning are more complicated for parents than ensuring that their children will have enough money to pay for tuition, room, board, books, transportation and other related expenses. But the payoff-the likelihood that a good college education will expand their children's opportunities to enjoy gratifying careers and higher lifetime incomes-is worth planning for.

  • Changes in Store for Medicare and Medicaid
    02/01/2006 - 09:00

    President Bush signed into law in February the Deficit Reduction Act, otherwise known as the fiscal year 2006 budget reconciliation bill. That law, which contained more than $39 billion in cuts, including $6.4 billion from Medicare and $4.8 billion from Medicaid, has plenty of changes in store for seniors.

  • Caring for Elderly Loved Ones from Afar
    01/01/2006 - 09:00

    There was a time when family members - grandparents, parents and children alike - lived in close proximity to each other, often in the same house. But that was then and this is now. And now, it's becoming increasingly common for family members to live in different parts of the country. That trend is fast colliding with care-giving for the elderly.

  • Evaluating the Need for Insurance in Retirement
    01/01/2006 - 09:00

    Of all the changes that come in retirement, few are likely to give you more concern than dealing with money. Your concern is, of course, understandable and widely shared because so much of what will happen is unpredictable. That's especially true of how long and how well you may live-whether you live long enough to have to lower your standard of living so that you can stretch your nest egg to avoid the horror of outliving your money.

  • Navigating the Federal and State Estate Tax Maze
    01/01/2006 - 09:00

    To taxpayers, the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 may have meant income tax cuts resulting in more current after-tax income, but to financial planners it has meant more work for clients to develop strategies to minimize both federal and state estate taxes, a less widely-publicized section of the 114-page law.

    Why? For starters, it has changed the basic provisions of federal estate tax law, culminating in their expiration in 2010, which planners have had to factor into existing and new estate plans:

  • Equity-Indexed Annuities Demystified
    12/01/2005 - 09:00

    There is perhaps no financial product more confusing today than equity-index annuities or EIAs. On the surface, EIAs are somewhat simple. Like most annuities, EIAs are nothing more than a contract between you and an insurance company in which the company promises to make periodic payments or a lump-sum payment to you, starting immediately or at some future time, according to the NASD.

  • Financial Planning for Life
    12/01/2005 - 09:00

    If the term “financial planners” evokes visions of equities and equity mutual funds—selected to implement financial plans they developed for clients in accordance with their investment goals and tolerance for investment risk—it should not be surprising.

    Equity Ownership in America, 2005, a study recently released by the Investment Company Institute and the Securities Industry Association, found that more than 75 percent of the millions who own equities and equity funds outside employer plans bought them through financial planners and other professional financial advisers.

  • Making and Keeping New Year's Financial Planning Resolutions
    12/01/2005 - 09:00

    Even if you aren’t among those who normally make New Year’s resolutions—and keep them—this may be a time when you will want to make and keep them in the year to come.

    With the Standard & Poor’s 500 Stock Index up 1.05 percent through October and the average U.S. taxable investment grade bond returning an almost identical 1.12 percent, as indicated by the Citigroup Broad Investment-Grade Bond Index, barring a year-end rally, 2005 could wind up as a flat year in both stock and bond markets.

Market Snapshot

SymbolLastChange
^DJI
10,340.70
-107.24
^GSPC
1,098.87
7.03
^IXIC
2,228.87
19.98
TYX-X.W
0.00
0.00