Smart401k Blog

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If I could change one aspect of the financial industry it would be the media’s attention surrounding financial news. While it’s great that so much news is readily available for investors, far too often I see individual looking at financial journalists as if they are investment advisers and analysts. While some may have the adviser credential or background, their news coverage isn’t based on your individual situation.

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Photo Credit renaissancechambara

December 2,2011, marked the ten-year anniversary of Enron declaring bankruptcy.

Enron, you might remember, was a Houston based energy company that had a historic fall from grace. There are many lessons to be learned from the Enron collapse, but one important lesson is the importance of diversification.

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In the headlines

A look at some of the market movers from the week:

• With the Eurozone crisis deepening, global central banks stepped in to lower dollar funding costs  for banks
• Eurozone countries may seek to amend the European Union treaty to help them deal with the debt crisis
• Shoppers came out in droves for Black Friday and boosted sales versus last year
• Shopping continued on Cyber Monday as online shoppers spent a record $1.25 billion

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We follow lots of really good blogs – mostly related to personal finance and economics. The Blog Round-Up allows us to point you in the direction of some great content from the blogging world. Posts* included in today’s round-up are our favorites from the month of November.

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Despite a year filled with mixed economic news and Washington stalemates, the holiday shopping season kicked off with a bang.

The National Retail Federation reported an increase in total spending of 16% compared with last year, indicating American consumers plan to finish the year strong and take advantage of historic deals on 2011’s hottest items.

One of the hardest things to do this time of year is set a strict spending limit and stick to it. With discounts all over the place, it’s tempting to raid all your accounts to find extra spending money. Credit card debt gets plenty of media attention during the holidays, but alternative loan sources like your 401(k) account deserve some discussion too. And here it is.

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In the headlines

A look at some of the market movers from the week:

• The Congressional “super committee” admitted failure in coming to agreements on deficit reduction
• U.S. third-quarter GDP was revised down
• A poor German bond auction stoked concerns over the Eurozone
• Italy joined with a lackluster auction of its own

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Back in the fall of 1621, as the Pilgrims prepared for a multiple day feast to celebrate their plentiful harvest, I don’t think they were too concerned about making cultural impacts or creating holidays. I assume they were just happy to celebrate the fact they had more than enough food to get them through a bitter winter. But the Pilgrims started something far bigger than they could have imagined.

Since those days nearly 400 years ago, Thanksgiving, and everything associated with it, has grown to massive proportions. To truly understand just how big Thanksgiving has become, let’s take a look some numbers related to Turkey Day.

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Photo Credit Vinni123

Are you ready to hit the ground running on January 1, 2012? Before the holidays are in full swing and year-end commitments become overwhelming, it’s is a good time to look back at 2011 and establish resolutions for 2012.

There are a few goal-setting suggestions that could help you adhere to your 2012 financial New Year’s resolutions:

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As part of the agreement this past August to increase the debt ceiling, a congressional “super committee” was formed with the task of finding at least $1.2 trillion to cut from federal spending. If the committee could not come to an agreement about these cuts by November 23^rd, a series of automatic cuts would go into effect in 2013. These cuts will be roughly split between defense and non-defense spending. As of the writing of this post, it is expected that the super committee will soon be announcing their failure to reach a compromise on budget cuts.

Like most instances of political uncertainty and instability, it would not be uncommon for a failure by the super committee to cause a spike in volatility in the short-term. We saw a significant market downturn in the weeks after the budget and debt debates this summer, but a substantial portion of those losses were quickly recovered when stocks bounced back up. It is possible that we will see a return to this higher volatility over the next few weeks, but we do not recommend altering your investment strategy in light of these issues.

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In the headlines

A look at some of the market movers from the week:

• Congress approved a measure to avoid a government shutdown even as the “super committee” continues to be deadlocked
• Markets continued to warily eye Italian bond yields
• Fitch Ratings warned that U.S. banks could face significant risk from the Eurozone debt problems
• The report on leading economic indicators was better than expected