CAPSULE COMMENTS

January 25, 2007

Financial Reading

With the financial instability forecast for the Social Security system and the coming mass retirement of many of the Baby-boomer generation, this January may be an excellent time to take a closer look at the financial health of you and your family. Just as we look to physicians and professional literature to understand and assess our physical health, professional financial advisors can help us to understand our financial world and to create long-term plans to meet the eventual needs of our futures.

Ed Slott is a nationally respected IRA (Individual Retirement Account) expert who, in his new book, Your Complete Retirement Planning Road Map: The Leave-Nothing-to-Chance, Worry-Free, All-Systems-Go Guide, offers clear, step-by-step directions through the maze of IRAs, 401(k)s, 403(b)s and other major retirement accounts. The author guides you through an assessment of every retirement account that you currently own and teaches you how to properly fill out beneficiary forms, advises as to what to do when you inherit so as not to lose the tax benefits that the benefactor may have already had in place, and explains how to handle sticky situations such as divorce, unmarried partners, or decisions about trusts. His information on the Pension Protection Act of 2006 and other new retirement incentives will enable you, the investor, to take advantage of the most up-to-date tax laws.

If you recognize the name, James Cramer, you probably know him as the host of the syndicated radio program Real Money and/or the television program Mad Money. In his new book, Jim Cramer’s Mad Money: Watch TV, Get Rich, the zany money guru tells his readers how to take the advice given on his television program and put it to work in the real world of the middle-class. He teaches how to evaluate your investment risk levels, how to research and purchase stock options and how to sell the "right way." Cramer also shares some of his best investment calls… and some of his worst, and the ten lessons that can be learned from each. Throw in the behind the scenes explanations for some of the antics on his show and you have a thoroughly entertaining yet extremely informative book on investing.

After co-founding the Quantum Fund, Jim Rogers retired at the age of thirty-seven. Now, the author of best selling books Adventure Capitalist and Investment Biker has finally written a book of practical investment advice. In Hot commodities: How Anyone Can Invest Profitably in the World’s Best Market, Jim Rogers suggests that "the next bull market is here" and it is in the commodities market. By investing in the basic needs of domestic life, i.e. sugar, corn, copper, or aluminum, one can reduce the risks sometimes associated with stocks and the sluggishness that is so often characteristic of bond markets. Rogers believes that commodities are among the simplest of investments and offers straightforward strategies for putting money into investment products that the average person understands.