Is It Time To Get Back Into Financial Stocks?

Some analysts say a recession is coming and some say it isn’t. What is for certain is that the stock market has grown increasingly volatile since the summer. While this increases the risks for investors it also increases the chance for reward.

Large movements swings have been the norm the last few months depending on whether the daily news was good or bad. If you had idling cash lying around it would open the opportunity for some serious bargain hunting. There are quite a few stocks that are trading below their historical PE or price to earnings ratios.

Now the big question for many bargain hunters is whether it’s time to jump back into financial stocks or not. There are some big names out there that have lost a large chunk of their market values after they started reporting huge writedowns during the month of November.

While some of them do look tempting I believe it’s still too early to jump back in. Another surge in defaults is expected after rates adjust upward this quarter for the many ARMs that weren’t affected by the government’s bailout plan. There is also the fact that we are still in a credit crunch and while we may get it under control sometime soon in this country that may not be the case for the rest of the world.

College in Hawaii

Life on a tropical island and affordable college? I found it difficult to believe.
To get the lowdown, I called Sarah, a friend from high school who attends the University of Oregon, but decided to spend this fall at University of Hawaii at Manoa through an exchange program. Although I interrupted her beach time, she was kind enough to briefly talk finance.
Read more.

How the Mortgage Bailout Hurts Me

The Bush administration intends to reward some borrowers who are in over their heads by cajoling mortgage companies into leaving those borrowers’ artificially low interest rates where they are. Those rates won’t jump, as they were scheduled to do soon. Read the White House’s explanation here.

But what about the folks who have saved diligently, have impeccable credit, earn a decent income and yet still are priced out of many homes because of the stratospheric real-estate prices that were propelled by easy credit? Folks like, oh, say, me for instance? Read more.