Are you planning to retire someday? Unless you are already retired the answer is almost certainly “Yes.” It’s the American Dream! Of course, there’s nothing magical about age 65. Some people end their careers earlier and busy themselves in different ways. Others enjoy their w

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Wall Street is obsessed with interest rates. Many consumers are, too, especially anyone who wants to buy a home or car. There’s a good reason for this: Debt — or you might call it “leverage” — is the lubricant that keeps the financial markets moving. Imagine a car without oil &

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If you’ve been reading my Money and Markets columns for any length of time, you know I’m a big proponent of exchange-traded funds (ETFs). And I think they’re one of the most exciting investment innovations in decades. However, one consequence of innovation is that eventually the la

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In my Money and Markets columns I usually tell you about opportunities I see in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and how you can grab them. Today I want to do something a little different: List some ETFs I think you should absolutely NOT buy! In fact, if you own any of the ETFs mentioned below, you shou

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Whether you’re investing in stock exchange traded funds (ETFs), bond ETFs, commodity ETFs, currency ETFs, international ETFs, or even inverse ETFs, you’re stuck with one big problem: Any way you look at it, you are making a one-sided bet on the future direction of a specific market segme

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Energy is big business here in Texas. Just about everyone in the state knows someone in the industry, if they aren’t employed in it themselves. In fact, energy is big business everywhere! Crude oil, natural gas, gasoline — our civilization can’t live without them. So it’s no surp

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The old saying says, “Don’t believe everything you read.” While this is good advice, investors today have a bigger problem: News that is accurate but irrelevant. I see this all the time as I track the ETF industry. Just about every week — and sometimes several times a week — I

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Today I’d like to tell you about a sector that is deeply intertwined with economic recovery. I’m talking about transportation. We live in a mobile society, even if we are in the internet age. Not only do we move ourselves around, we also depend on quick, efficient transport to sustain ou

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You might think the wild markets of the last year would have made ETF sponsors slow down a bit, but they kept on cranking out new products — some great, some not. By my count, a total of 136 new exchange-traded products (ETFs, exchange-traded notes, and assorted hybrids) came on the market in 2009

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Everyone is making 2010 forecasts. So today I’ll jump on the bandwagon and share one of mine with you: In 2010 you’ll hear a lot more about the “Next 11.” The Next 11 (N-11) is a list of fast-growing countries identified by Goldman Sachs as potentially good investments in the

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