Retirement allocation - Down the ages
You’ve probably read umpteen articles on retirement planning an so on so forth. So another one probably will have nothing new to add. No this is not so. Retirement portfolios have to be made with different perspectives depending upon the age of the investor.

Your Asset Allocation reflects you!
As an individual you go through different circumstances and situations in your life. How you react to different situations and the decisions you take, will give shape to your future. As an investor, the most important decision you take, concerns the overall structure of your portfolio—how will the portfolio be divided among the major investment categories.

Who wants to be a millionaire?
No, this is not a sequel to the US soap opera, "Who wants to be a millionaire". We are talking about the real world. It's a case of Money.. Money.. and Money. The only thing that everybody would love to have in excess is Money.

The Secret of becoming Rich - II
The only barrier between you and anything you desire is one simple fact: Your life today is the way it is because of how you think’- this is a conventional wisdom much spelled in the West. In the last write-up, we have shown you some very significant day-to-day savings tips. Now, here, we will show you how best you can maximize your returns over a period of time without taking any risk or compromising with your style of living.

Start them early - Kids and Money
In today’s world it's better to start off kids early on money management. Habits learned early on, will form the basis for a lifetime of responsible finances. With ample credit facilities and enough of glittering objects to spend the money on, the sooner kids learn about how to correctly use money, the better it is.

Selling home ... The checkout list
There is a lot of advise given on buying a house, but when it comes to selling the advise is few and far between. But selling an asset is as important as buying one and should be done after careful preparation and consideration. In fact preparation and timing can help you get the best price.

Negotiating a winning pay package
Like tech stocks that could no longer defy gravity, over-the-top compensation packages popularized by now grounded start-ups have mostly deflated and floated back to earth. The days of taking a 30% pay cut to work on the next cool Web site are over. And forget about the sports car, the Caribbean vacation and the concierge service.

Do some smart borrowing
Sometimes it makes sense to borrow. In fact, avoiding debt at any expense could actually prove quite costly if it means you have no cash reserves for an emergency. After all, no one can say, "Our kids will always be healthy; I won't lose my job. The hot water heater? Nah, that will never break." There's always an unexpected expense waiting around the corner.

The Secret of becoming Rich
"There are three ways to make money. You can inherit it. You can marry it. You can steal it." You can marry the rupaiah to distinguish yourself from a poor man and the secret is a secret indeed, that rich people will never tell you. Follow these five lessons and we bet, you can implement them in your personal life to become rich.

Foolproof investment strategies
Remember, no one has ever lost big, over the long run, when they bought quality companies after significant crashes. That's why fund managers love big downturns, because they can load up on their favorite stocks at bargain prices. Investors should think exactly the same way.

A new approach to retirement planning
Achieving a comfortable retirement in the 21st century requires a new approach to retirement planning. It's not like your father's retirement in which at age 58 or so we went from working to not working, collected a fat corporate pension and retired to our family homes

Designing your family budget
Creating a budget is definitely a painful task but one has to start somewhere. Basically a budget has three steps-1) identify how your money is spent today (2) evaluate that spending and set goals that take into account your financial objectives, and 3) monitor your ongoing spending

Media keeps you entertained
There are a number of media stocks in the market like Balaji Telefilms, Mukta Arts, Crest Communication etc. Investors can concentrate on the leaders like Balaji Telefilms and Mukta Arts in which most growth mutual funds also have huge exposure

Qualitative analysis for you
Successful investing is all about picking the right stocks at the right time. Analysis however calls for crunching beyond numbers and ratios. In fact, most long-term, successful investors select stocks based on the business quality, management strength, integrity and vision

Learn the value lessons, fast
If you don't know what's going to happen in the market, then diversify. Sound advice, but also boring stuff to many people in the 1990s, when one chunk of the portfolio could double in weeks and the rest would just plod along or shrink in value. But these lessons are critical nevertheless

Does greater risk mean greater return
Do not mistake low stock prices for "value". When a stock sells at a discount, there is often a good reason, and the investor should be wary. Value investing pinpoints where the discount is unwarranted. Cheap is not valuable. After all cheap crap is crap anyway

How to be a smart Online Investor
Investor protection - at its most basic and effective level - starts with the investor. In this day and age, there simply is no substitute for a person's awareness and wariness. So investors will do better in this fast moving environment if they have done their homework before clicking away

ABC of Financial Planning
Wouldn’t you like to be in a situation where you can accumulate enough wealth to support the lifestyle you desire for yourself and your loved ones now and on into the future? Wouldn’t you also like to reach the point where you didn't have to work unless it was by choice? Sure you would. Everyone does. But not everyone succeeds.

Look Before You Invest
The mutual funds industry in India has also finally come of age. An indication of this is the number and variety of funds offered by the issuers, as well as the depth of the market in terms of the secondary trading. So today one doesn’t need Rs 100,000 minimum to start investing in shares of sensex pivotals. One can invest in them for as little as Rs 1000.

Manage Your Cash Flow to Riches
You know the secret of successful financial planning-cash flow management. Whether your home or your office, you will never fail in your financial planning goals if you manage your cash flow like a CEO. You may not run a company, but you are the chief executive of your personal finances.

Size Matters
Investing is not about avoiding risk but avoiding it. To that end, an investor should always be reluctant to commit too much capital to a single position. Not because you don't believe in your flair for stock picking, but because sometimes the best way to manage risk is not to take it in the first place.

Buffettology
The basic tenents of Buffettology rest on knowing what to buy and then waiting to buy it at the right price. This forms the basic premise of investing only with a business perspective. Buffet based this business perspective on the predictability of future earnings of a company.

Join the Future Millionaires Club
Who doesn’t want to be a millionaire? We are using the term millionaire not in number terms, rather in terms of what the word conveys- an aspiration to be a successful wealthy person, whose only money worry is how to manage it better. Whether you are the CEO of a company or a self employed, whether you are a high income or a low income earner, the financial goal can be generalized as wanting to be financially secure and to retire comfortably.

Life Beyond the PE Ratio
What drives up a price of a share? Any investor worth his or her salt will quote ratios like EPS-earning per share, or the PE-the price earning ratio-and possibly they will be right. After all, earnings are the bottom line and how much profit a company earns, is what separates the winners from the losers. It all comes down to earnings.

Personal Loans - Differentiating the Clutter
It is still a million-dollar question as to what matters most - financial branding or unconscious biased nature that may decide one’s preference to HDFC over ICICI for a financial product that comes at the same cost. It is indeed amazing how little there is to differentiate

How to Choose your Online Broker
Selection of an online broker depends on his physical infrastructure and research backing apart from the regular requirements. So remember as in every service – customer is king and you have the right to choose the service which suits you the best. And drive a hard bargain

Is a Monkey Portfolio better ?
A buy and hold is definitely good as long it is a long run play and the investor has researched the fundamental strengths of the stock. However, mutual funds provide a medium for uninformed investors to participate indirectly in short term profits. But don't fall into the monkey portfolio trap

Magic Mantras for Smart Investing
The secret of making money at the stock markets doesn’t lie in buying low and selling high, but more on identification of what to buy and what to sell (where many investors go wrong) and then buying or selling the same smartly, i.e. at the right time and price!

Investment Strategies that Work for you
Many large successful investors and mutual funds are known by their investment strategy and perhaps it is not a bad idea to sit with your portfolio and just see why you had invested in those stocks. It will definitely throw light on your investment strategy as well as tell you which one worked best for you

Hidden Costs in Mutual Funds
For funds with higher turnovers, transaction costs can have a major impact on the cost of doing business. While this invisible cost is automatically reflected in the fund's performance results, that is no reason to ignore it. A look at the investment style will give you an idea of its portfolio reshuffle policy

Personal Loans - Fixed or Floating rates ?
Once one finance company advertised "we can loan you enough money to get you completely out of debt" but be cautious before you take a final decision. Better to create the wealth with discipline than to create at the cost of uncertainty. Read between the lines of debt

How to select your Portfolio Manager
Selecting a portfolio manager is an art because more often than not we tend to get carried away by promises. Remember, it is always safer to trust a portfolio manager who educates you on the downsides of investing rather than one who promises you the moon

Pension Plans for India - 401K Style
While India's total population is expected to rise by 49 per cent by 2016, the number of senior citizens aged 60 and above is expected to soar by 107 per cent to 113 million. A majority of them will need retirement security. Pension funds such as the 401(K) have immense potential in India

MF NAVigation beyond NAVs
While selecting an MF investment performance of the fund/scheme in question over the past year would be a point in order. In a nutshell, a fund’s investment philosophy, consistency, levels of diversification, returns over market cycles is sine qua non of any mutual Fund investment

Mera Bharat Mahaan !!
A recent study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) on the 250 biggest corporations in the US found that they paid an average of just 20.1% taxes on their profits from 1996-98, nearly half of the rate of 35% required by federal law. Is India better off then?

How much Diversification is good ?
Diversification needs to be done across asset classes, sectors and styles. Firstly, an investor needs to hold different classes of assets like stocks, bonds, real estate and gold in his portfolio so that the cyclicality of returns is minimized. Secondly, stocks should be spread across unrelated sectors and styles

Are Sector Funds really Risky ?
Considering that the portfolios of most equity and balanced funds are not very different in terms of diversification from sector funds, the risk profile of these funds do not differ much. Hence though sector funds are believed to be for the risk takers, in reality all growth funds are just as risky

Go get a Tech Fund
Almost all technology funds today have huge exposures to technology majors in India who have seen substantial erosion in their values since their peaks in early 2000. What it effectively means is that downside risk for these tech funds from these points is extremely limited and upside phenomenal

Risk Management - Get the Duration Edge
Duration can be a useful risk management tool if you have a clearly defined time horizon. A rule of thumb is to match your investing time horizon with the duration of your bond investment. By that technique you can save on a lot of mismatch risks which we all face as investors

Pay more Tax and Earn More Interest
If excess tax is deducted from your salary there is no reason to worry instead you should be happy that you would be earning interest on the tax refunds. More the refund of tax the more you earn. Unbelievable…. isn't it ? And the yield is more than on bank FDs and debt funds

Benchmarking your Mutual Fund
You can't tell how well a mutual fund has performed by studying its historical returns alone. Instead, you should compare those returns with the returns over the same period of an appropriate benchmark, or measuring stick. How to arrive at the appropriate benchmark is the tricky issue

When to sell your Mutual Funds
Like equities, the key in a mutual fund is also when to exit. Most investors tend to panic and exit when the NAV is falling. Actually, falling NAVs provide a delicious opportunity as long the fundamental portfolio of the MF is sound. Learn how to how the cardinal blunders

Strategy to Time the Market
The stock market is not an anxious game of Las Vegas roulette. In roulette, the longer they stay in, the greater their chance of experiencing a big loss. With stocks, history shows the opposite to be true. The easiest way to improve gain is to hang on to your portfolio

Price to Sales ratio : Better than P/E
With investors increasingly getting disillusioned with the P/E ratio, the trend is more towards the usage of Price/Sales ratio. Apart from being a cycle-neutral ratio, the P/S ratio is more eminently suited to the unique requirements of the dotcom business. Find out why it is better than P/E

Bond Investing - Myth versus Reality
Surely you too have been a victim of bond investment myths, haven't you. Classic myths pertaining to default risk, interest rate risk, credit rating, risk free gilts are just a few examples. Investors need to increasingly understand the dynamics of bond investments to make wise decisions

Is it time to invest now ?
Is it time to enter the market, remains the million dollar question today? Seems to be on top of every investor’s mind. Has the market bottomed out? Which sectors will do well? If we do want to enter then which route should we adopt to enter-direct or through mutual funds?

Trading Days are here Again
In investing, intuition also plays an important role. Good intuition derives from experience and good psychological habits. Losing money can be very upsetting, but you need to be consistent and not quit the game easily. Learn to use a loss as a lesson, just as professional traders do

Investment Rules for Everybody
Every one likes to read a success story – especially if it is by the richie richs of the financial world. Normally after one goes through what the gurus of Gyan have to say, it all seems like common sense. But do not forget!!. Common sense to an uncommon degree is what the world calls wisdom

ESOPs - Employees know your Kitty
ESOPs have emerged as a powerful technique of rewarding employees and buying loyalty. But still there continues to be a lot of grey areas in terms of ESOP valuation and taxation treatment. Employees need to explicitly understand and appreciate how much their ESOP kitty is worth

How to Select Co-branded Credit Cards
Co-branding, apart from the reward schemes and redemption options, also allows for discounts at specific outlets when using the card, free merchandise, frequent buyer program similar to frequent flyer points. But beware of the fine print and the dicey insurance cover

How much is your Future worth Today !
Money has different values at different points of time. It loses its value as time passes. It deteriorates every day, every hour, every second....Most of the people are aware of the concept of Time Value of Money but unclear about the concept. Learn more about it

Avoid tax - Get SWP Smart
Tax outflow under an MF MIP can be 20 times the tax outflow under the Systematic Withdrawal Plan. Of course this advantage will diminish as time passes but it provides a good avenue for investors with a medium perspective to save on tax. So go ahead and get smart with SWPs

Index Funds - Who cares for slumps
The secret of index funds is to stay invested. If you want to weather the market's inevitable down cycles, index funds offer a simple way to share in the stock market's long-term growth potential. Index funds can give you that extra edge, an idea whose time has finally come

It is time for Value Investing now
In the current market value investing seems to be the investing magic wand. Sectors like infotech, pharma, telecom, cables, paints and may be even cement merit an investment and remember the saying that when the shoe shine boy starts giving you tips, its time to get out of the stock

Understanding Mutual Fund Accounting
Investors can take an intelligent decision about mutual fund investing by understanding and reading between the lines of a mutual fund annual report. How to interpret NAVs and portfolio changes and more importantly how to judge the health of a MF scheme

Interpreting Company Annual Reports
The annual report of a company is more than just a routine feature. It contains valuable information on the health and cash flow position of the company. How can an investor interpret income statements and balance sheets to get a bird's eye view of company financials

How Risky are your Investments
They say that no investment is without any risk. Money brings the evil of risk with it. If you keep in cash it gets eroded through inflation, if you keep in a fixed deposit, you are exposing yourself to the risk of a bank default, a la BCCI. Need we say about equity? Get to grips with your risks

Investment Strategy to beat Inflation
A penny saved is a penny earned, right? Not necessarily. Thanks to inflation, over time that penny could be worth less than when it was first dropped into the piggy bank. That's why if you're investing - especially for long term goals don't ignore the effect of inflation

Power of Compounding
Did anyone tell you that it is not how much money you EARN NOW that will determine your future prosperity but it is how much you SAVE that will decide your future prosperity. Sounds funny-no? after all your saving rate will depend on your earnings. Read on about the power of compounding

PC - Your new money manager
Today your internet connected PC is beyond a mere word processor or a spreadsheet calculator. It has become your personalized money manager. With a host of online calculators and facilities to maintain all your transactions online we are entering a new era of replacing your financial advisor ..........more

Buy your dream car
It is the dream of every yuppie and would be yuppie to own a car. Bargains are plenty and the price range is wide and interesting. But all investors need to be aware of the variety on offer and understand how to get the best deal for cars. Importantly, do not miss the minor issues ..........more

Getting Savvy with Debt Funds
The recent study by Crisil points out emphatically that debt funds have returned more than equities index over the past three years. Also among mutual funds, balanced funds have done better than equity funds in the last three years. Why investors need to get more savvy with debt funds at this point of time ..........more

Investors beware : Conman around
If you ever thought that you had struck gold in a lease or hire purchase deal, think again. Finance savvy sellers can make you pay a lot more that you would ever anticipate. Small things like advance payment, upfront fees, deposit money and processing charges can make your effective cost much higher..........more

Why to make a will
Ironically most wise investors ignore the making of a will. Tedious as it may sound it saves a lot of trouble after a person's death and reduces substantially the haggling over inherited property.  Take a few minutes off to make your will. You can save a lot of heartburns later on..........more

Retirement Planning : Your reality today
Retirement planning is serious business today. Increasingly, investors need to get out of old paradigms and take a fresh look at retirement planning. As life expectancy increases and corporate burnouts are on the rise, the face of retirement planning is being redefined like never before ..........more

FD Mania - Back to Square One
It seems that corporate fixed deposits are back with a bang. If the recent trends are any indication investor interest is shifting out of equities and back into FDs. But this time around the investors are being more selective and discerning in their choice of FD issuers...........more

Choosing your Mutual Fund
When financial markets are in a state of flux, how does one make a choice of his ideal mutual fund. Balanced funds are the flavor of the day. But investors need to be careful while selecting balanced funds since the characteristics of the debt and equity holdings matter. Some simple rules.........more

Riding the bond market
The recent hike in the CRR rates has led to bond prices in India plummeting. What is the causal link between these two. What are the basic things that a bond investor needs to remember while investing in bonds? What strategies should bond investors follow under fluctuating interest rates.........more

Tips on Mutual Fund investing
While investing in mutual funds, most investors commit the cardinal sin of assuming it to be a risk free investment avenue. But that is far from the truth. Investors need to follow a set of simple rules to understand, evaluate and adapt mutual funds to their risk-return requirements.........more

US64 - Risky yet preferred
Despite the US-64 fiasco of 1998 the flagship fund of UTI seems to continue to command investor interest and faith. Has the US-64 acted in accordance with the Deepak Parekh committee recommendations? Is US-64 as safe and secure as investors believe it to be..........more

Smart Investing in You
Investing is all about common sense, but unfortunately common sense is the most uncommon commodity. What are the essential rules that an investor needs to remember while taking an investment/divestment decision? The answers to these questions are as simple as they are profound..........more

Arbitrage - Safety with Smartness
The introduction of index futures ushers in the possibility of riskless arbitrage between stocks and futures. An investor can perfectly hedge his position as also the investor can profit from pricing anomalies by going long or short on index futures. How can an investor actually benefit...........more

Choosing your Investment Mix
In a market scenario marked by volatility how does an investor choose his right investment mix. Should an investor be overweight on equities, mutual funds or bonds. Remember the golden rule of not putting all your eggs in one investment basket still holds good in a volatile market..........more

Index Futures at Work
The introduction of index futures on the BSE and the NSE provides a world of an opportunity to investors in India to effectively hedge their market risks. But how does an investor benefit from these futures and what is the process by which these futures hedge your investment risk..........more

IDBI's Death Call
The recent decision of IDBI to call back its flexibond series deep discount bond issued in 1996 spells a death knell to the lakhpati dreams of millions of Indian investors. Where did the Indian investor go wrong in his judgement and why an investor needs to read the fine print more carefully..........more

Value Investing
Having paid a heavy price for short term trading in markets, Indian investors are slowly going back to the time tested value investing. How is value investing different from momentum investing? Is it sufficient insurance in bearish markets? Is value investing as a strategy still relevant in an era of volatile markets.........more

Old Economy Again
There seems to be of late a revival of interest in the old economy stocks. Does it mean that the interest in the TMT and ICE stocks are history? What are lessons that investors can learn from the revival of old economy stocks? What are the interesting bargains available in the market at attractive valuations ........more

Profiting from Index
Traditionally the BSE Sensex and the NSE Nifty have moved in tandem since they both represent the largest chunk of the trading population. But even in this positive relationship there are minor aberrations which tend to repeat with surprising regularity. How should an investor interpret these trends and profit from it .........more

Mutual Strategy
IT funds which were the darling of investors a few months ago have suddenly fallen out of favor. Investors do not need to be at a loss for options. Cheap valuations for commodity stocks offer the investors a golden opportunity to reduce their risk and improve yields by opting for balanced funds ........ more

Foolish Investors.com
Most of you who are reading this article might be investors – some small and some big, some risk takers and some risk averse. But there is something definitely common among all of you in the way you invest. It’s sad though that the point of commonality is the mistakes you make...... more

Investment myopia
Investment. The very word sometimes sends shivers down your spine, especially if you are a student trying to select a subject of specialization. For the brokers and commission agents – this word merely has a bread and butter connotation. For the real hard-core professionals, Finance is life. And for the rest, it doesn’t matter at all. And that is exactly where Investment myopia sets in....... more

ICE ICE Baby
The ICE revolution in the Indian markets has drawn a clear line of demarcation between the old economy sectors like cement, steel, aluminum and banking and the new economy ICE sectors. Stars of yesteryears like ACC, Tisco, Reliance, Telco and SBI have given way to the likes of Wipro, Infosys, Satyam and Zee Telefilms..... more

Evaluating EVA
Open any equity research report by a leading broker or foreign institutional investor and the latest fad is to justify investment recommendations is through Economic Value Added (EVA) analysis. EVA is the excess of what the company earns over its cost of capital, but the downsides of this measure are ignored by most investors ...more