Unbiased financial information

Now, an unbiased source of financial information
Unfortunately, there are few unbiased sources of information about building wealth. Most people give up 1-2% of earnings per year—$500,000 over a lifetime—to salespeople for poor advice. Instead of building assets for a secure future, most people are at the mercy of salespeople who are building THEIR own secure future. An industry joke is Where Are the Customers' Yachts?Members of the Unbiased Advisors Network work in the financial industry but are unhappy with our industry’s role in NOT helping to educate their fellow citizens. We are unhappy that there is no basic financial education (beyond balancing your checkbook) in our schools. Now you can learn how to buy the best without paying commissions, fees and charges.Show More Show Less amazon.com/Unbiased-Advisors-Network-helps-tax-FREE/

Consumer Reports top car brands: Subaru No 1
The Consumer Reports top three auto brands: 1. Subaru 2. Mazda 3. Toyota Consumer Reports bottom three: 11) Mercedes-Benz 12) General Motors 13) Chrysler Honda fell farthest in the ratings due to lack of car to details, according to CR. Coincidentally, Honda and Acura are recalling 9,000 SUV for faulty gas tank vent. Oh.

Soon we may have more information on our broker/advisor
The regulators are considering making the information about complaints and discipline actions available to the public in more useable forms. Financial salespeople have been lucky up to now since the data is hard to decipher for most customers. Most of us just assume that if their salesperson is working for a national firm, they must be ethical. Regulators want to give the info to vendors who will use it to simplify it. http://www.investmentnews.com/article/20120301/FREE/120309986/-1/INDaily01&dailycount=1&issuedate=20120301

Is your advisor taking you for granted?
Advisors are instinctively sales people. They must enlarge their client list or be demoted or fired. In order to serve more people, they must make certain assumptions about keeping your business. Advisors think they are the professional you will always seek for advice. They want you to contact them when you have money to invest/spend. They can’t afford to hold your hand every day unless you have a large account. Things are changing. Advisors naively believe in their clients’ loyalty, vastly underestimating the number of their clients who have direct accounts. Advisors reported that only 20% of their clients maintain direct accounts, which is at odds with what clients reported to Cerulli in a survey. More than three in four clients surveyed (76%) said they owned direct accounts. There are many reasons to have an account you control yourself. 1. Easy access 2. Low cost 3. Investing experiment thrill 4. Multiple account safety. Members have learned the hard way that advisors can take $500,000 or more of their account value in fees over time. amazon.com/Wealth-Without-Wall-Street-Commissions/dp/1442168137

Advisor-chosen stocks lag passive index investing in most markets
In most markets, owning a fund that matched the market average return beat stock pickers’ fund returns. Even when active management beat the index fund, it was impossible to buy the correct fund that beat the index since not all won. Since the winners change every year, you would never own the winners consistently over time. SPIVA:http://www.standardandpoors.com/servlet/BlobServer?blobheadername3=MDT-Type&blobcol=urldata&blobtable=MungoBlobs&blobheadervalue2=inline%3B+filename%3DSPIVA_US_YearEnd_2010_FINAL_0311.pdf&blobheadername2=Content-Disposition&blobheadervalue1=application%2Fpdf&blobkey=id&blobheadername1=content-type&blobwhere=1243867401012&blobheadervalue3=UTF-8

Smart investors pick Roth IRA
Smart investors choose Roth IRAs over traditional IRAs, according to a recent study by Texas TechUniversity. The researchers determined that people with high IQs were the most likely to own a Roth IRA, even after controlling for education, income, and net worth. 12,686 young adults participated in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth beginning between ages 14 and 22 and who were between 43 and 51 in 2008. Some 14.3 percent of people in the highest IQ quintile owned a Roth IRA by 2008, compared with 3.8 percent of all the study participants and just 0.9 percent of people with the lowest IQs. Members pick Roth because withdrawals are FREE: amazon.com/Create-Your-Tax-FREE-Financial-System/

Chase and Bank America only want customers with over $100,000
The largest U.S. banks said about 70 percent of customers with less than $100,000 in deposits and investments will be unprofitable following regulations that cap lenders’fees.Banks want to sell more products to those with more assets and will target their offerings appropriately. Major banks tried the $5 monthly fee but customers baulked. Customers with less than $100,000 may find services curtailed. The defection rate for large, regional and midsize banks averaged between 10% and 11.3% of customers last year, according to a J.D. Power and Associates' survey of more than 5,000 customers who shopped for a new bank or account over the past 12 months. Perhaps it is time to shop for a better deal. Members find other alternatives with better rates: . amazon.com/Insiders-Guides-Discount-Financial-Services/dp

ME denies Anthem increases
State regulators were justified last May in denying a planned rate hike by Anthem Health Plans of Maine, the state's highest court ruled.

Tax credits that increase your refund
There are credits that give you cash even when you owe no taxes—refundable credits. They have restrictions but you may qualify. 1. The Earned Income Tax Credit is for people earning less than $49,078 from wages, 2. Child and Dependent Care Credit is for expenses paid for the care of your qualifying children under age 13, or for a disabled spouse or dependent, 3. Child Tax Credit is for people who have a qualifying child. The maximum credit is $1,000 for each qualifying child. 4. Retirement Savings Contributions Credit, also known as the Saver’s Credit, is designed to help low-to-moderate income workers save for retirement. Read how to claim: http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=255095,00.html

Do you have money coming from the IRS?
There are $ billions waiting to be refunded. For more information: http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=254725,00.html

Employers dropping health insurance—more deaths expected
The number of Americans getting health insurance from their employers continues to drop, hitting a record low of 44.6% in 2011. Not surprisingly, the percentage of Americans who are uninsured has increased, rising to 17.1% this year. Preventive care like colonoscopy is reduced.

SCAMS
NY tells insurers to pay full death benefitNew York regulators told insurance companies they must pay out fully when members of the military are killed in action as the standard practice, rather than automatically establishing a kind of checking account that provides interest to the companies.Families can often get a better return on interest if they invest the bulk payment, rather than draw down from "retained assets accounts" that are now commonly set up by insurance companies. Under the accounts, the families receive some of the return on interest and the company gets the rest. Shame! http://online.wsj.com/article/AP8f5183695b76429cbdaa4b39e2442490.html

We taxpayers are still paying big agrato grow or not AND bribes
Just ten percent of America's largest and richest farms collect almost three-fourths of federal farm subsidies – cash payments that too often promote harmful environmental practices. We pay for their crop insurance too. We are sending $147 million to the Brazil Cotton Institute under an agreement that was forged to get around a ruling by the World Trade Organization (WTO) that subsidies to American cotton farmers violate international trade rules. This is bribe money pure and simple. We pay the subsidies AND the bribe to keep others from complaining. Shouldn’t the largest farm corporations pay for the bribe? http://www.ewg.org/farmsubsidies

Speculators blocking rule that prevents traders speculating on gas prices
Wall Street is pushing to stop a new rule that would crack down on speculation in the energy markets, which many blame for contributing to the spike in gas prices.The new rule -- part of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act to reform Wall Street -- would set limits on how much traders can buy, preventing firms from grabbing large chunks of the energy market. But those limits may not be set anytime soon. Nearly two years after the new law, the rule has yet to be fully implemented. And on Monday, two Wall Street trade groups asked a federal judge in Washingtonto delay or block the rule.

Who owns your account now?
AutoOne and AutoOne Select Insurance Companies from OneBeacon Insurance Group to Interboro Holdings.

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