These are truly days of wine and roses for stock market investors.#-ad_banner-# After being knocked down in the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s and again during the financial crisis of 2008, long-term investors are being rewarded for their persistence and dedication as stocks surge higher, breaking record after record. In fact, this bull market turned 4 years old in March and is showing no signs of letting up. Historically, the average bull market… Read More

These are truly days of wine and roses for stock market investors.#-ad_banner-# After being knocked down in the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s and again during the financial crisis of 2008, long-term investors are being rewarded for their persistence and dedication as stocks surge higher, breaking record after record. In fact, this bull market turned 4 years old in March and is showing no signs of letting up. Historically, the average bull market has lasted 4 1/2 years. In and of itself, this means little; for instance, the 1990s bull market lasted nearly seven years without a major correction. But according to my research, there are three distinct signs that make me think this bull market may be ending soon. Here’s what you need to know. 1. Irrational Exuberance This term is best known for its use by former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan during… Read More

For the first time since 2004, shares of one of the world’s largest gold and copper mining companies were recently selling below $20. But since the end of April, the stock has appeared to carve out a bottom and is in an uptrend, shooting up 7% in the past week alone. Looking at the technical picture, the situation appears ripe for a sustained turnaround. I think this stock still has an… Read More

For the first time since 2004, shares of one of the world’s largest gold and copper mining companies were recently selling below $20. But since the end of April, the stock has appeared to carve out a bottom and is in an uptrend, shooting up 7% in the past week alone. Looking at the technical picture, the situation appears ripe for a sustained turnaround. I think this stock still has an upside potential of more than 100% from today’s prices. Since 2012, the company has increased its dividend 33% to a yield of 4%, helping tide over investors while they wait. I’m talking about Barrick Gold Corp. (NYSE: ABX). But first, let’s take a look at the reasons behind the recent price drop. To begin with, the price of gold has taken a nosedive since November: A mining company like Barrick makes its… Read More

The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) recently released its 2013 Retirement Confidence Survey, and it looks like a lot of baby boomers are going to flunk “Retirement Planning 101.” In a nutshell, the survey concluded: — Americans are living longer. — Americans don’t have nearly enough saved for retirement. — Americans are realizing they will have to work longer, and many will never retire. First, let’s take a look at how confident workers are about whether they… Read More

The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) recently released its 2013 Retirement Confidence Survey, and it looks like a lot of baby boomers are going to flunk “Retirement Planning 101.” In a nutshell, the survey concluded: — Americans are living longer. — Americans don’t have nearly enough saved for retirement. — Americans are realizing they will have to work longer, and many will never retire. First, let’s take a look at how confident workers are about whether they have enough money for retirement: What about those who have already retired? Their confidence also appears shaky… While in 2007, 41% were “Very Confident,” the number in that category has dropped to just 18%. For some additional clarity on the changes, we made a table comparing 2002 and 2013 levels of confidence and included our corresponding grades for each level: Although it’s safe to assume those who gave themselves A’s or B’s think they will be OK, their numbers have dropped significantly. Meanwhile, there seems… Read More

The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) recently released its 2013 Retirement Confidence Survey, and it looks like a lot of baby boomers are going to flunk “Retirement Planning 101.” In a nutshell, the survey concluded: — Americans are living longer. — Americans don’t have nearly enough saved for retirement. — Americans are realizing they will have to work longer, and many will never retire. First, let’s take a look at how confident workers are about whether they have enough money for retirement: [chart 1] What about those who have already retired? Their confidence also appears shaky…… Read More

The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) recently released its 2013 Retirement Confidence Survey, and it looks like a lot of baby boomers are going to flunk “Retirement Planning 101.” In a nutshell, the survey concluded: — Americans are living longer. — Americans don’t have nearly enough saved for retirement. — Americans are realizing they will have to work longer, and many will never retire. First, let’s take a look at how confident workers are about whether they have enough money for retirement: [chart 1] What about those who have already retired? Their confidence also appears shaky… [chart 2] While in 2007, 41% were “Very Confident,” the number in that category has dropped to just 18%. For some additional clarity on the changes, we made a table comparing 2002 and 2013 levels of confidence and included our corresponding grades for each level: [table] Although it’s safe to assume those who gave themselves A’s or B’s think they will be OK, their numbers have dropped significantly. Meanwhile, there seems to be a growing gap between public-sector and private-sector employees. The percentage of U.S. workers with defined-benefit retirement plans is down to 3% as of 2011. That means that… Read More

Many people have a false impression about the wealthy.#-ad_banner-# It’s often believed that the rich are somehow different than the rest of us. The media places them on a pedestal as fortunate people who don’t have any worries and spend their days in a fantasy world of luxury and pampering. But nothing could be further from the truth. Often, the greater the wealth, the larger the problems, worries and stress levels. The only thing that is different is the scale of the… Read More

Many people have a false impression about the wealthy.#-ad_banner-# It’s often believed that the rich are somehow different than the rest of us. The media places them on a pedestal as fortunate people who don’t have any worries and spend their days in a fantasy world of luxury and pampering. But nothing could be further from the truth. Often, the greater the wealth, the larger the problems, worries and stress levels. The only thing that is different is the scale of the issues; otherwise the rich are the same as everyone else. So just what is different about those with self-made wealth and those without? This subject fascinates me, so I decided to discover what characteristics and habits are common factors among the wealthy. Here are seven secrets of self-made wealth. 1. The Ability To Delay Gratification This is truly a key to wealth. The wealthy are able to concentrate on the future along with their everyday tasks. The ability to understand how actions today will affect the future… Read More

The bear market in gold may not be over, but one precious metal is a buy now. Before getting to that buy, I want to talk about Japan. Two weeks ago, I explained how trading once every two weeks can increase returns. Last week’s market crash in Japan immediately put that theory to the test. With detailed testing, I have found that trading as little possible with a relative strength (RS) system… Read More

The bear market in gold may not be over, but one precious metal is a buy now. Before getting to that buy, I want to talk about Japan. Two weeks ago, I explained how trading once every two weeks can increase returns. Last week’s market crash in Japan immediately put that theory to the test. With detailed testing, I have found that trading as little possible with a relative strength (RS) system can generally increase returns. In a RS strategy, the idea is to hold winning trades as long as possible.#-ad_banner-# This often means holding even when the market pulls back or suffers a sharp decline. In hindsight, many of these pullbacks will turn out to be buying opportunities in a long-term uptrend. Sometimes, the decline is the start of a bear market and the RS system will confirm that with a sell signal within a few weeks of the top. In testing, I found that holding after a sharp drop in price is almost… Read More

When I first started writing about investing in the 1990s, the whole notion of “e-commerce” was just getting going. Analysts then thought this emerging form of retail would continually take away market share from traditional brick-and-mortar stores. They might not have expected that e-commerce would still be growing at a fast clip nearly two decades later.#-ad_banner-# Last year, U.S. e-commerce sales rose 15.6% to $71 billion, triple the growth… Read More

When I first started writing about investing in the 1990s, the whole notion of “e-commerce” was just getting going. Analysts then thought this emerging form of retail would continually take away market share from traditional brick-and-mortar stores. They might not have expected that e-commerce would still be growing at a fast clip nearly two decades later.#-ad_banner-# Last year, U.S. e-commerce sales rose 15.6% to $71 billion, triple the growth rate of traditional retail sales. However, considering that e-commerce sales still account for less than 6% of all sales, there’s no reason to expect this niche to slow down anytime soon. In fact, revenues of the major players could double in size over the next five years and still reach just 10% penetration (assuming that traditional store-based sales also rise a modest amount). Of course, much of that growth will be picked up by Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN), which had more than $60 billion in sales… Read More

Being a StreetAuthority subscriber has privileges. That includes learning firsthand about our biggest breakthroughs. I want to let you know about one such discovery. It’s likely to be one of the most groundbreaking finds in our company’s history and could completely change the way you invest. We’re still finalizing the research, but the results are promising. It’s a new method that has produced average annual gains of 21.4% during the past decade, compared with the S&P’s 7.1% a year. I’ll tell you more in just a moment,… Read More

Being a StreetAuthority subscriber has privileges. That includes learning firsthand about our biggest breakthroughs. I want to let you know about one such discovery. It’s likely to be one of the most groundbreaking finds in our company’s history and could completely change the way you invest. We’re still finalizing the research, but the results are promising. It’s a new method that has produced average annual gains of 21.4% during the past decade, compared with the S&P’s 7.1% a year. I’ll tell you more in just a moment, but first I want to reintroduce you to the man behind this research — Michael J. Carr. You may have heard from Mike recently in this article. Mike is one of our brightest experts here at StreetAuthority. He also has one of the most interesting backgrounds of any analyst on our staff. Mike holds a degree in chemistry and an MBA. He retired as a Lieutenant Colonel in the Air Force. His service included stints in Spain, Germany, Japan, Korea, Iceland and Guam. And he’s a former investment… Read More

In his book “Telecosm,” author George Gilder called this financial titan “the key source of organizational changes that have impelled economic growth over the last 20 years.” He earned more than a billion dollars over a four-year period as an employee of Drexel Burnham Lambert in the late 1980s — at the time, the record for employee compensation in the United States.#-ad_banner-# His success was attributed to an incredible trading record of only four losing months out of 17 years — as well as the rise in public awareness of a financial product popularly known as junk bonds. Although like… Read More

In his book “Telecosm,” author George Gilder called this financial titan “the key source of organizational changes that have impelled economic growth over the last 20 years.” He earned more than a billion dollars over a four-year period as an employee of Drexel Burnham Lambert in the late 1980s — at the time, the record for employee compensation in the United States.#-ad_banner-# His success was attributed to an incredible trading record of only four losing months out of 17 years — as well as the rise in public awareness of a financial product popularly known as junk bonds. Although like most public figures he is not without his critics, over the years this financier has also been praised by Fortune magazine and other media outlets for his decades-long work as a philanthropist and innovator in medical research. If you haven’t already guessed it, I am talking about Michael Milken. Milken is credited with helping expand the market for junk bonds, which have transformed the way companies raise capital. Junk bonds are high-yielding bonds that are below investment grade, which means they have a higher risk of default than traditional investment-grade bonds. Therefore, junk bonds need to pay out a higher… Read More

When I first started writing about investing in the 1990s, the whole notion of “e-commerce” was just getting going. Analysts then thought this emerging form of retail would continually take away market share from traditional brick-and-mortar stores. They might not have expected that e-commerce would still be growing at a fast clip nearly two decades later.#-ad_banner-# Last year, U.S. e-commerce sales rose 15.6% to $71 billion, triple the growth… Read More

When I first started writing about investing in the 1990s, the whole notion of “e-commerce” was just getting going. Analysts then thought this emerging form of retail would continually take away market share from traditional brick-and-mortar stores. They might not have expected that e-commerce would still be growing at a fast clip nearly two decades later.#-ad_banner-# Last year, U.S. e-commerce sales rose 15.6% to $71 billion, triple the growth rate of traditional retail sales. However, considering that e-commerce sales still account for less than 6% of all sales, there’s no reason to expect this niche to slow down anytime soon. In fact, revenues of the major players could double in size over the next five years and still reach just 10% penetration (assuming that traditional store-based sales also rise a modest amount). Of course, much of that growth will be picked up by Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN), which had more than $60 billion in sales… Read More