If you’re like many people, you may pay a lot of attention to the day-to-day price movements of your investments. But to create and maintain an effective investment strategy, you also need to look at the “big picture” — specifically, the economic and market forces that can affect your investments’ performance. And one of those factors is inflation.
Of course, inflation has been fairly tame lately. In fact, some consumer prices fell through much of 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Will the mild inflation environment continue?

You may not have the pictures, suntan or souvenirs to show for it, but if you’re at least 70-1/2, you’ve just finished a “vacation.”  And that means you’ll have to do some work — on determining how much to take out of your retirement plans this year.
Typically, when you reach 70-1/2, you must start taking withdrawals (“required minimum distributions,” or RMDs) from your traditional IRA or your employer-sponsored retirement plan, such as a 401(k), 403(b) and 457(b). However, the sharp decline in the financial markets in 2008 led Congress to give you a one-year vacation from taking RMDs in 2009 so that you wouldn’t have to cash out assets whose value had fallen significantly.

Most investors pay a great deal of attention to the price of their investments —  yesterday’s price, today’s price, tomorrow’s price, next year’s price and so on. And that’s understandable, because we always want the prices of our investments to rise. Yet, if you focus too much on prices, you could end up making some costly mistakes.
Why? Because price-driven behavior is emotional behavior — and as an investor, you’re much better off making decisions with your head, not your heart. Suppose, for example, that you’ve seen a steep decline in the price of one of your investments. After a while, you may feel that you just can’t take it anymore and you decide to “cut your losses” by selling the investment.  Conversely, you may have an investment that has gone up and up — and to grab even bigger gains, you buy more shares.

Valentine’s Day is fast approaching, so you’d better get going with the flowers and chocolates for your sweetie. But this year, why not go beyond the traditional gifts and give a present that can make a difference in your loved one’s life for years to come? Specifically, why not give a financial gift?
Of course, you could always put some cash or a check in a card, but with a little creativity, you can make a financial gift that has a longer-lasting and more profound impact.