This post is from staff writer Richard Barrington.
I almost sprained my neck last week from shaking my head while reading stories about wild fluctuations in the value of the Bitcoin, an electronic currency.
Bitcoins began 2013 with an exchange value of less than $20. Their value started to climb, and that climb accelerated until they reached a [...]

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This post is from staff writer Richard Barrington.
I was recently invited to review an investment technique called “automated tax-loss harvesting.” It reminded me of the never-ending struggle for primacy between investment managers and accountants when it comes to portfolio management.
By way of disclosure, I should note that I have never been an accountant, while I [...]

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This guest post is from William Cowie, who has contributed to Get Rich Slowly and other personal finance blogs. He also blogs about investing and offers a free Investing Basics course on Bite the Bullet Investing.
Like little ants, we moved and hustled all day, nine years ago, settling into our new house. We didn’t notice [...]

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This post is from staff writer Richard Barrington.
Co-workers tend to look at me as someone who dives head-first into projects and generally meets deadlines ahead of schedule, so they don’t realize my hidden secret.
I’m a recovering procrastinator.
When I was a student, I did everything at the last minute. I suppose the blessing was that it [...]

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Time for another Lending Club update… Our balance is now down below $500 and we should be completely cashed out within the next few months.
Last month our portfolio looked like this:

110 loans were current
295 loans had been paid off
1 loans were currently 16-30 days late
6 loans were currently 30-120 days late
40 loans had defaulted and/or [...]

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With Tax Day fast approaching – and a soul-crushing week in my rearview mirror – I’m pleased to report that our taxes are done. We once again ended up owing and we did the old overpay to get I-Bonds trick.
So now… We wait.
As a reminder, the Treasury (mostly) eliminated paper savings bonds a couple of years [...]

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I was having the “how much does it take” conversation with someone the other day. That’s always a tough one, but perhaps tougher than ever these days.
The “how much does it take” conversation concerns how much money one needs to be financially secure. It’s always a tough call because of all the variables involved, but [...]

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Two years ago, a survey asked a sampling of Americans whether, if they had a choice, they would prefer more money or a better boss. Since most of us are a bit cash-hungry, one might think the answer would be the former. But instead, the survey found a sizable majority (65%) would actually pick a [...]

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One of the most disturbing long-term trends in personal finance is the steep decline in savings rates over the years. There is a distinct difference in how Americans save today and how they saved in past generations.
This raises a couple key questions about the present and the future:

Are savings habits a product of the different [...]

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Not quite four years ago — on March 9, 2009 — the stock market bottomed out. The Dow Jones Industrial average hit 6507.04, the S&P 500 hit 676.53, and the NASDAQ hit 1268.64. At that point, all three indices had fallen by more than 50% since their pre-bear peaks in October 2007.
And yet, here we [...]

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