{"id":669,"date":"2008-09-20T20:23:14","date_gmt":"2008-09-21T00:23:14","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/?p=669"},"modified":"2008-09-20T20:23:14","modified_gmt":"2008-09-21T00:23:14","slug":"madness-and-mayhem-and-bailouts-oh-my","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/madness-and-mayhem-and-bailouts-oh-my\/","title":{"rendered":"Madness and Mayhem and Bailouts, Oh My!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This week has been a real ride financially. I thought it might be fun to take a &#8220;wide angle&#8221; look at how the personal finance community is reacting to the current market turmoil.<\/p>\n<p>As for myself (and I&#8217;m no economist believe me!) I cut an unfortunate loss (*cough* Lehman *cough*) but didn&#8217;t take much of a hit. Mostly I am enjoying the discounts, ing what I can afford, and wishing I had even more money to invest. I &#8220;called&#8221; the market bottom in August, and I was incorrect. It&#8217;s taken a little longer, and it&#8217;s a bit rougher than I figured it&#8217;d be. All in all I expect that it will eventually come out in the wash. There will be spectacular losses, spectacular gains, and we will go on. So, there&#8217;s my uneducated two cents, for what it&#8217;s worth. <\/p>\n<p>Now, let&#8217;s take a look at how everyone else is doing!<\/p>\n<p><font color=\"brown\"><strong>No Big Deal?<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Mrs Micah&#8217;s<\/strong> advice? <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mrsmicah.com\/2008\/09\/19\/sell-stocks-bad-market\/\">Diversify properly and leave your stocks alone<\/a>. Selling at the bottom of a drop makes no sense.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Gen X Finance<\/strong> has a really good article on <a href=\"http:\/\/genxfinance.com\/2008\/07\/15\/from-the-front-lines-changing-your-risk-tolerance-based-on-a-bear-market\/\">Changing Your Risk Tolerance Based on a Bear Market<\/a>. It&#8217;s accurate commentary I believe. We&#8217;re all al little braver when the market is doing well! His advice? Stick to your guns. Understand asset allocation, and take on the same amount of risk in an up market as you do in a down market. Whatever your risk tolerance is, be consistent.<\/li>\n<li>Cheers to Trent at <strong>The Simple Dollar<\/strong> who just maxed out his IRA contribution for the year, and I quote, &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.thesimpledollar.com\/2008\/09\/18\/using-treasurydirect-for-conservative-investing\/\">First of all, the down market doesn\u2019t concern me all that much.<\/a>&#8221; He&#8217;s getting the same stock he&#8217;s been ing all along at a 25% discount. Nice to hear a positive approach.<\/li>\n<li>Ben at <a href=\"http:\/\/moneysmartlife.com\/aig-bailout-stock-market-drop-bank-closures-federal-reserve-news-no-big-deal\/\">Money Smart Life<\/a> isn&#8217;t too worried either. He;s taking a new approach by watching the &#8220;most searched&#8221; terms on Google. So far Entertainment, the Election and Football are beating out AIG, Lehman, and Merril Lynch.<\/li>\n<li>Jim at <strong>Blueprint for Financial Prosperity<\/strong> is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bargaineering.com\/articles\/i-just-day-traded-aig-its-dangerous-addicting.html\">day-trading shares of AIG.<\/a> Hehe. \ud83d\ude42 I have to admit I did the same with Freddie Mac just before the bailout. I made a bit of money too, but Jim is right when he says that day trading is both dangerous and addictive. It&#8217;s one thing to do it for fun, another to do it with your life savings. Find a balance, and that&#8217;s the best road.<\/li>\n<li> <strong>The Digerati Life<\/strong> is worried about all the Chicken Littles, and the negative press. She&#8217;s taking the high road and giving out great advice in her article: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thedigeratilife.com\/blog\/index.php\/2008\/09\/19\/best-places-to-put-your-money-when-the-stock-market-tanks\/\">Best Places For Your Money When The Stock Market Tanks<\/a> Kudos for her for actually having the guts to suggest safer investment alternatives instead of just running scared and adding to the negative media.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><font color=\"brown\"><strong>I&#8217;m Undecided:<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thehappyrock.com\/2008\/09\/18\/state-of-the-us-economy-scary-stuff-or-nothing-to-worry-about\/\">The Happy Rock<\/a> isn&#8217;t losing any sleep over the issue, and he is cautiously optimistic. He does say though, that the situation warrants further discussion and leaves it up to his readers to weigh in with how they feel. <\/li>\n<li><strong>Money Ning<\/strong> Has a really cute post with a &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/moneyning.com\/advice\/sending-my-regards-to-all-moneyning-readers\/\">Get Well Soon&#8221; card<\/a> for our finances. He&#8217;s honest enough to say that he&#8217;s as scared as the rest of us, but he has no doubts at all the we will get through this downturn just like all the other ones.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Free Money Finances<\/strong> wonders <a href=\"http:\/\/www.freemoneyfinance.com\/2008\/09\/the-test-can-yo.html\">if you can handle a troubled economy<\/a> and gives a simple little test to see whether or not you might need to adjust your financial picture.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Free Money<\/strong> Finance has a must read article on the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fivecentnickel.com\/2008\/09\/19\/inside-the-economic-rescue-plan\/\">giant bailout our government is gearing up to implement<\/a>. I shudder at the thought of this, I really do. I wish they&#8217;d leave well enough alone. Apparently though, they believe that a mega-billion dollar bailout will somehow cost taxpayers less than letting things crash and burn. We shall see I suppose&#8230; <\/li>\n<li><strong>Get Rich Slowly<\/strong> got the &#8220;economical dirt&#8221; straight form an educated source: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.getrichslowly.org\/blog\/2008\/09\/19\/thoughts-on-the-financial-crisis-from-an-actual-economist\/\">Economist Stephen Popick<\/a>. Popick rightfully pointed out that the current situation started years ago, through bad lending practices. He also spends a second or so talking about the slicing and dicing of loans that&#8217;s led to companies and people not really even knowing which part of what debt they even own. Definitely worth a read. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><font color=\"brown\"><strong>Editor&#8217;s Choice:<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<p>My favorite article of the week is a two way tie!<\/p>\n<li><strong>20&#8217;s Money<\/strong> has a worthwhile rant on &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/20smoney.com\/2008\/09\/19\/america-the-land-where-it-doesnt-pay-to-be-financially-responsible\/\">America: The Land Where It Doesn\u2019t Pay To Be Financially Responsible<\/a>&#8221; Hear hear! It certainly seems that way lately.<\/li>\n<li>I also loved <strong>Squawk Fox&#8217;s<\/strong> article:  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.squawkfox.com\/2008\/09\/16\/reasons-to-build-and-love-an-emergency-fund\/\">Reasons to Build and Love an Emergency Fund.<\/a> It cannot be stressed enough that if you don&#8217;t have this fund in place, you shouldn&#8217;t be investing anyway. As fox points out, starting an emergency fund is &#8220;neither rocket science nor \u201cknee injury\u201d painful.&#8221; It&#8217;s a basic necessity that can start with a small amount of money and grow larger with time.\n<p><strong>Editor&#8217;s Choice Honorable Mention:<\/strong> NCN at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ncnblog.com\/2008\/09\/17\/worried-that-you-might-loose-your-savings-deposits\/\">No Credit Needed<\/a> did a short post on how to check and see if the funds in your bank are FDIC insured. If you&#8217;re worried about losing the money you have in the bank, check this link out &#8211; you&#8217;ll sleep better tonight.<\/p>\n<p><font color=\"brown\"><strong><br \/>\nCarnivals, Festivals and Celebrations:<\/strong><\/font><br \/>\nThanks to these carnivals for featuring our articles this week!<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Finance Fiesta No. 16: Devote Your Life to Money! Edition<\/strong> @ <a href=\"http:\/\/ourfourpenceworth.com\/finance-fiesta-no-16-devote-your-life-to-money-edition\/1221\">Our Fourpence Worth<\/a><\/li>\n<li><strong>The Blog Carnival: Business Books<\/strong> &#8211; September 17, 2008 at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.brianoates.com\/2008\/09\/17\/blog-carnival-business-books-september-17-2008\/\">Brian Oates<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Money Hacks Carnival #30~Fall is in the Air Edition @ <a href=\"http:\/\/questtobedebtfree.com\/money-hacks-carnival-fall-is-in-the-air-edition\/\">On a Quest to Be Debt Free<\/a><\/li>\n<li><strong>Welcome to a mid-September Carnival of Debt Reduction<\/strong> at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mightybargainhunter.com\/2008\/09\/15\/welcome-to-a-mid-september-carnival-of-debt-reduction\/\">Mighty Bargain Hunter<\/a><\/li>\n<li><strong>Carnival of Personal Finance #170 \u2013 Famous Last Sentences Edition <\/strong>@ <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thepersonalfinancier.com\/2008\/09\/carnival-of-personal-finance-170-famous.html\">The Personal Financier<\/a><\/li>\n<li><strong>Retired at 47<\/strong> highlighted our article &#8220;<a href=\"\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/credit-cards-are-excellent-financial-tools\/\">Credit Cards Are Excellent Financial Tools<\/a>&#8221; as one of his <a href=\"http:\/\/retiredat47.com\/2008\/09\/this-weeks-top-finance-and-frugality-picks\/\">top picks for the week<\/a>, thank you!<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thedigeratilife.com\/blog\/index.php\/2008\/09\/17\/tax-management-home-for-sale\/\">The Digerati Life<\/a> also highlighted one of our articles in her weekly roundup. Thanks!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That&#8217;s it for this roundup. Wishing you a stable bank, and a large return on your investments very soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This week has been a real ride financially. I thought it might be fun to take a &#8220;wide angle&#8221; look at how the personal finance community is reacting to the current market turmoil. As for myself (and I&#8217;m no economist believe me!) I cut an unfortunate loss (*cough* Lehman *cough*) but didn&#8217;t take much of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[169],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.10 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Madness and Mayhem and Bailouts, Oh My!<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/madness-and-mayhem-and-bailouts-oh-my\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Madness and Mayhem and Bailouts, Oh My!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This week has been a real ride financially. I thought it might be fun to take a &#8220;wide angle&#8221; look at how the personal finance community is reacting to the current market turmoil. As for myself (and I&#8217;m no economist believe me!) 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