Introduction – Learn How to Get and Stay Out of Debt

American culture is founded on consuming. Let’s face it, we all buy things. Sometimes we have no choice (medical bills, education, housing, etc.) and sometimes purchases are for things that we enjoy (vacations, dinners, movies, etc.) Both expense groups are important and necessary. As long as you live in American society, you will always need to spend money and may need to get help with debt consolidation.

A Household Budget and You

A household budget can be the foundation to a strong financial game-plan. This personal financial strategy will be based on your personal and financial goals, and can help you get free of liabilities, accumulate assets, and enable you to use your positive cash flow and assets to build a positive net worth… ultimately letting you meet your goals. A household budget is also the best way to break the cycle of debt that so many Americans are struggling with.

Establishing a Personal Household Budget

One of the first steps toward financial freedom is understanding how money is coming in and how much is going out of your bank account every month. The following Free Personal Household Budget guide will help you manage your money and cash flows. Use it to help you meet your personal financial goals.

Organize: To start, you’ll need to get organized. First, label manila folders or envelopes as follows:

• ONGOING BILLS (Fixed Expenses)
• MUST BUYS (Variable Expenses)
• EXTRA CASH
• SAVINGS

ONGOING BILLS: These are bills that come in regularly every month – rent, cable, telephone, electricity, and water are examples of ongoing bills. These are also called “fixed expenses” because the amount is fixed and does not significantly vary month to month.

MUST BUYS: “Must Buys” are necessities that vary in cost from month-to-month. These include purchases such as food, gasoline, medicine, and entertainment expenses. To reiterate, they are “variable expenses” because they can fluctuate from month to month.

EXTRA CASH: This money is whatever cash is leftover from your paycheck after paying your ONGOING BILLS and MUST BUYS. Many people have no extra cash (or worse, negative extra cash). If your extra cash position is negative, you should seek immediate help in lowering your expenses, raising your income, and getting out of debt. Bills.com can help you get out of debt fast.

SAVINGS: This folder is specifically intended for short-term savings. This slush fund is particularly helpful when an unexpected repair or medical bill occurs. The cash saved may also be used for the niceties of life such as going to the movies, eating out, etc. This is how you will begin saving for a new outfit, the latest gadget, vacation, etc. Keep in mind that it is important to keep yourself happy with vacations and nice things – just be sure to plan for these expenses within your personal household budget.

Source: http://www.bills.com/guide/

justin narin
http://www.articlesbase.com/personal-finance-articles/budgeting-guide-for-managing-debt-715319.html

SONGS IN THIS CLIP: SHE, ATTITUDE, HYBRID MOMENTS, HORROR BUSINESS and ANGELFUCK

Duration : 0:9:35

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Duration : 0:9:36

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Duration : 0:5:35

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In the biggest Insider Trader scandal in two decades, members of four prominent firms were implicated in the developing scandal. The firms included Bank of America (BAC.N), Morgan Stanley (MS.N), UBS (UBS.N), and Bear Stearns (BSC.N). To begin with, a little history is in order. Insider trading in this country is illegal; this is not the case in certain other countries. In some countries principally England, such trading is legal. Prior to the inauguration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt as President of the United States in 1933, insider trading was legal in this country also.

In order to restore financial confidence in the American economic system after the massive impact of the Depression hit the country in the late 1920’s, the newly elected President Roosevelt mandated the creation of the Securities Exchange Commission, part of the Commission’s duties were now to reign in, and put an end to insider trading. Who did FDR appoint as the first SEC Commissioner – Joseph Kennedy? Old Joe Kennedy was one of the notorious insider traders that took advantage of any and all information that came his way.

In the same league as Jesse Livermore, Jacob Fisk, and Bernard Baruch, Joe Kennedy knew where the bones were buried. He quickly moved to create a series of laws, rules, and regulations that would outlaw the very practices that in past decades had enabled him, Kennedy to become one of the four wealthiest individuals in America. The practice of lawful insider trading had come to an end legally. To show you how effective these policies have been, whenever a real case of such trading comes to public light, it makes nationwide headlines. This is because of the relative rarity of such scandalous behavior being brought to public light.

During the 1980’s, the biggest insider trading scandal which became public knowledge was Ivan Boesky, probably the premiere arbitrage player of his generation when he was accused of insider trading. Boesky was caught via tape recordings taking advantage of such information. His primary source was Dennis Levine, an affable investment banker working for Drexel Burnham Lambert; a now defunct banking firm whose primary asset was Michael Milken’s junk bond capital raising unit.

The Latest Scandal

It looks like this current scandal followed two separate tracks occurring simultaneously. The profits generated amounted to $15 million dollars over a period of five years. Insiders were used at Morgan Stanley and UBS Securities. These individuals including Mitchel Guttenberg, who as an institutional client manager at UBS would be aware of research upgrades and downgrades taking place on a daily basis. He was given hundreds of thousands of dollars for his knowledge of non-public information. The men purchasing the information were David Tavdy, and Erik Franklin. Using the non-public information available to them, they were each able to amass $4 million in trading profits.

In a separate scheme running a parallel track, Randi Collotta a lawyer, was an employee of Morgan Stanley in their compliance department. Her husband Christopher Collotta was an attorney in private practice. Randi would come up with information on mergers and acquisitions that Morgan Stanley was involved with, and pass the tips to her husband Christopher. The husband would then sell the information on Wall Street for money that amounted to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

During the course of the schemes, information was sold to Erick Franklin who was a Bear Stearns Hedge Fund client. People like Franklin are use to doing 50 to 100 different trades per day, each day. Such individuals are able to bury their results in the sheer mass of trading that is done on a daily basis.

Although caught, the conspirators were sophisticated enough to use facilities outside the immediate firms that they each worked for. Meetings were held in the famous Oyster Bar in Grand Central Station. Disposable cell phones were utilized. Secret Codes were invented. Text messages on cell phones were employed. E-mail was OUT. Telephone calls with HOT TIPS were OUT. Nobody exchanged checks. CASH was the rule of the day, every day.

As of today, 13 people have been arrested with 11 of them facing SEC charges. Three Hedge funds have been charged with criminal behavior. Four of the 13 arrested have already pleaded guilty. The hedge funds are tough group to supervise because they don’t have the degree of compliance that is present in a brokerage firm. They are also probably much harder to detect as to insider trading involvement. It will not be a surprise if many more people are arrested and charged, than the group currently mentioned.

The demand for performance among hedge funds where a tenth of a percentage point in performance can mean the difference of millions of dollars of additional compensation is already well known. Depending upon performance, hedge funds live and die by performance. There are 9000 basically unregulated hedge funds in operation today, managing $1.4 trillion dollars, plus 6 to 1 leverage. About a thousand of these same hedge funds go out of business every year, with a 1000 new start-ups coming on stream.

It is not beyond the realm of possibility, to see how a person under water with any kind of questionable character can succumb to the allure of insider trading if in fact; such trading will dramatically alter the performance of the fund he or she is managing. It is becoming apparent that hedge fund trading is unsupervised. This case is not going to be the last case involving insider trading.

Hedge funds are also becoming more heavily involved in the financing of Presidential elections in an attempt to curry favor with Presidential candidates. To what extent will the amount of money floating around among hedge funds lead to a lack of supervisory action by elected officials caught in ethical conflicts.

In this, the latest insider trading scandals, the government was able to pick up irregular profitable trading patterns in the merger and acquisition of two publicly traded companies. They were Adobe Systems, and its acquisition of Macromedia in 2005, and ProLogis, and its acquisition of Catellus Development.

Once the SEC saw the irregular trading, it was only a question of time and effort before the patterns revealed a conspiracy, and the conspiracy revealed insider trading. Now it’s up to the court system to figure out the rest, but first, expect more arrests.

Goodbye and Good Luck

Richard Stoyeck
http://www.stocksatbottom.com

Richard Stoyeck
http://www.articlesbase.com/finance-articles/stock-investing-bank-of-america-morgan-stanley-ubs-and-bear-stearns-swept-up-in-latest-insider-trading-scandal-115543.html

Obama raises a quick $1 million — and some L.A. commuter ire
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama-la-20100817,0,6969841.story?page=2
After visiting the plant, Obama told a Milwaukee fundraiser that the heart of his economic strategy in the months ahead “will be three powerful words: ‘Made in America.’ ”

But analysts warn that federal efforts to encourage clean-energy manufacturing could shrivel without steps to mandate its use.

The administration so far has failed to convince Congress to pass sweeping energy legislation that would boost clean technologies by requiring renewable sources for electricity and raising the price of fossil fuels through a “carbon price” — in effect a tax on fossil fuels.

Obama visit causes traffic nightmare in Los Angeles
http://www.wtam.com/cc-common/news/sections/newsarticle.html?feed=104668&article=7488600
(KFI – Los Angeles) Traffic on the west side of Los Angeles is expected to be snarled on Tuesday morning as President Obama’s motorcade returns to LAX.

Obama’s heading to Seattle after attending a fundraiser in Hancock Park Monday night. He reminded donors about his successes in the midst of criticism from both ends of the political spectrum.

Obama traffic nightmare leaves residents with lingering road rage
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/08/obama-traffic-nightmare-leaves-residents-with-lingering-road-rage.html
President Obama’s fundraising mission in Los Angeles may have been a whirlwind trip for him, but it was a tedious slog for thousands of people who found themselves in traffic gridlock from the Westside to Hancock Park.

A two-mile drive on the Westside took 45 minutes. Frustrated drivers vented on the Los Angeles Times’ website, among others. No matter their politics, Los Angeles residents were united.

A two-mile drive on the Westside took 45 minutes. Frustrated drivers vented on the Los Angeles Times’ website, among others. No matter their politics, Los Angeles residents were united.

Let me show you the arrogance of this president. He is our employee! Now our King

He came to LA to raise 1 million dollars?
How much money did that security detail cost? How much does 5 military helicoptors cost?

This guy isn’t in reality!

They shut down the city! How many blocks did they shut down?

John Wells, ER & West Wing Why?

Why a residential neighborhood?

Mothers were stranded with children with no bathrooms

Nurses couldn’t get to their patients in hospitals

we are talking 4-6 hours of COMPLETE shut down.

It was so bad, people got out of there cars!!! While OBAMA had drinks with Hollywood BIgwigs? LOLOLOLOLOLOL And you guys put up with this Amazzing!

Duration : 0:3:1

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Duration : 0:15:0

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When I was talking to my daughter, who was seven years old at the time, about adopting a panda, I neglected to explain the concept properly. She asked me if our house was big enough for a panda and what would we feed it on! Much as I would really like a pet panda, I don’t think I’d cope very well. I remember that episode of The Simpsons when Bart won an elephant. Animals for Adoption, as far as wild animals are concerned, is not so hands on.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), have an adoption scheme that works very well. The idea is to choose an animal from their Animals for Adoption program and commit to paying an amount of money each month. The money goes towards the conservation of that animal in it’s natural surroundings. The WWF doesn’t operate zoos but is committed to preserving endangered species in their natural habitat.

The choice of animals that the WWF offers is the Giant Panda, Orangutan, Bottlenose Dolphin, Bengal Tiger, Asian Elephant and Black Rhino. The Animals for Adoption scheme enables you to feel part of the excellent work that the WWF does. On joining the scheme and choosing your individual animal, you receive a certificate, a photograph of the animal and a soft toy. You also get a fact sheet about the species and information on how to be environmentally aware.

Each species is on the endangered list for one reason or another and would be in an even worse state if not for the public support of the WWF and similar organizations.
Animals for adoption plays an important part in conservation and raising awareness.

The Giant Panda is greatly affected by forest clearing for timber and agriculture. There is also the problem of overgrazing. Habitat destruction is also a problem for the Orangutan, as land is cleared for agriculture and commercial logging. The Borneo and Sumatra islands are now the only places left on Earth where wild Orangutans can be found.

Bottlenose Dolphins have their own problems at the hand of humans. The oceans are increasingly polluted and dolphins are frequently caught up in fishing tackle. As the shipping lanes become busier, they are in danger of colliding with ships. The Animals for Adoption scheme is vital for the depleted numbers of Bengal Tiger in Nepal, who are in constant danger from poachers. It’s hoped that the patrols that have been put in place can help the situation.

The demand for the horn of the Black Rhino has made this species very rare. The powder derived from the horn has long been a favored ingredient for traditional Chinese medicine. Again, habitat clearance for agriculture and logging is putting the Asian Elephant under threat. Animals for Adoption is one way to show you care about all these endangered animals.

John Pawlett
http://www.articlesbase.com/pets-articles/animals-for-adoption-99213.html