During my former days as a financial advisor, I’d occasionally get a call or email from someone in our “Alternative Investments” department trying to drum up business. Invariably, they wanted me to deposit my clients’ assets into a specialized hedge fund utilizing one esoteric strategy or another. Quite… Read More

When the stock market is on the upswing, private companies get in line to sell their shares and become members of the new crop of initial public offerings (IPOs). Bankers like to know that investors are in a buying mood when taking these companies… Read More

You can’t blame investors for bagging profits on big winners. Many investors that bought into... Read More

You can’t blame investors for bagging profits on big winners. Many investors that bought into Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) back when shares traded for the price of a Big Mac have been exiting the... Read More

As the Obama administration gets set to spell out the restrictions placed on offshore drilling, one... Read More

As the Obama administration gets set to spell out the restrictions placed on offshore drilling, one thing is clear: The domestic supply of oil and natural gas is bound to be cut — at least in... Read More

How many times has this happened to you lately? You carefully research and buy a stock. The company announces unexpectedly good financial results. But the stock’s price plummets, caught up in one of the market’s now-frequent downdrafts. You curse high-frequency traders. Your sleep suffers as the market… Read More

Investors tend to buy stocks when the market is on the upswing and avoid them when the market is flashing red. But if you focus simply on value, then you should be buying at lows. And right now, a whole host of stocks are trading at lows for the year,… Read More

On April 26, the Dow hit a 52-week high of 11,258.01. It lost -11.0% through June 2 and has since... Read More

On April 26, the Dow hit a 52-week high of 11,258.01. It lost -11.0% through June 2 and has since clawed back some ground but remains -8.5% below its late-April high point. We lived through some big... Read More

After plunging steadily in recent weeks, share prices in the oil and gas exploration appear to have finally found a floor. Some stocks such as Halliburton (NYSE: HAL) and Schlumberger (NYSE: SLB) sharply rose on Wednesday after falling close to their 52-week lows, while other stocks such as Diamond Offshore… Read More

For most investors, the health of the U.S. economy should be the most important item to track. How the economy fares will directly correlate with how the Nasdaq, NYSE and S&P 500 perform — over the long-term. But right now, attention is focused on… Read More

Earlier this month, gold prices hit an all-time high, as the yellow metal fetched more than $1,240 an ounce. Yet gold bugs still think the price can hit even higher highs, back to the nearly $2,000 per ounce figure hit in the 1980s, on an inflation-adjusted basis. That could spell… Read More