General Knowledge Articles
This section is full of things that I found interesting, and I thought that you might too. The Iraqi stock exchange. How to stay up all night. You never know, there might be a few nuggets of gold in this section that just might interest you.
It's OK To Fire Your Stock Broker
The holiday season gives me the opportunity to talk to people that I normally wouldn't have the opportunity to have a conversation with. Whether it's the festive season or the spiked eggnog, people ju...
Tunisia Was The Best Performing Stock Market in 2008
2008 was an absolutely horrific year for the global markets, and it should come as no surprise that the vast majority of major market indexes were down in 2008.
In fact, of all of the stock markets...
You Don't Need a Stock Guru
The "stock guru" industry is big business. Millions of dollars are made every year through the sale of instructional DVDs, books, newsletters and chat room memberships.
About ten years ago, I ran a...
Holiday Retail Sales Numbers Are Horribly, Unbelievably Bad
SpendingPulse has released preliminary retail sales data for the 2008 holiday season, and it ain't pretty.
According to their report, they expect total retail sales to be down between 5.5 - 8% from...
Why Would Someone Buy a T-Bill With a Zero Percent Yield?
In case you missed it, earlier this week the annualized yields on three-month Treasury bills dropped to 0% (and actually hit -0.01%) before rising to 0.01%.
The last time that short-term Treasury y...
The Recession Explained: What Is a Recession?
Over the past few months, you have undoubtedly (unless you've been living under a rock or out in the wilderness somewhere) heard the term "recession" mentioned on television. You've probably heard tha...
What is a TFSA (Tax Free Savings Account) and What Are the Benefits?
This article is for all of my Canadian friends out there.
Early in 2008, the Canadian government announced that TFSA accounts would become available starting January 1st, 2009. TFSA stands for Tax...
What Is the Definition of a Short Squeeze?
The term "short squeeze" has been bandied about quite a bit in the media as of late, especially when referring to the current situation involving Porsche and Volkswagen.
Volkswagen's shares explode...
Looking For a Safe Place to Park Your Money? Try a 24 Month Online CD at WaMu at 4.00% APY
The current market turmoil has left people scrambling to find safe places to put their money. The Dow Jones Industrial Average has just completed one of the worst years in its history, and many people...
What Now for the Financial Markets?
It's Friday evening. The $700 billion dollar bailout (actually, it's more than that, but whatever) has now been passed by both the Senate and the House of Representatives and signed into law by Presid...
United States National Debt Tops Ten Trillion Dollars for the First Time
According to Treasury Direct (a United States Government website, link below), the total public debt outstanding for the United States of America topped ten trillion dollars for the first time as of ...
Home Equity Withdrawals Drop to $24 Billion From $700 Billion Dollars in 2005
The rapidly increasing housing market from 2001 to 2006 enabled many Americans to spend more than they were making.
Most Americans who purchased their home anytime before 2005 saw the valu...
Proposed Federal Bailout Numbers: Nearly $2 Trillion Dollars and Counting
We are living in extraordinary times right now. College students will be studying the events from 2008 in economics classes 20-30 years from now. Some people don't understand the sheer magnitude of wh...
Entreprise Value - What is It?
A number that you may have come across during your investment research is "Enterprise Value". "Enterprise Value" is usually on the line below "Market Cap" on most online financial information sites. <...
Nasdaq Delistings Way Up in 2008
The major stock exchanges (such as the Nasdaq and NYSE) are encountering weakness from all sides in 2008. Not only has the IPO market slowed considerably (many companies are sagely waiting until the m...
Hedge Fund Fees: A Primer
Most hedge funds usually have the same type of fee structure. First you have the "management fee", and then you have the "performance fee."
The management fee is taken regardless of the per...
14% of Americans Believe That the Country is Moving in the Right Direction
According to a recent ABC News/Washington Post poll, only 14% of Americans surveyed believe that the country is headed in the right direction. This doesn't refer to just the economy...
A Brutal Cardio Routine For You
If you really want to torture yourself at the gym one day, try out this cardio routine. If you can complete it from start to finish without dying, then I would say that you are probably in pretty good...
How The Internet Bubble Was Similar to the Housing Bubble
There are actually quite a few similarities between the Internet bubble (last half of the 90's until mid 2000) and the most recent housing bubble in the United States. By drawing si...
Knowing the Difference Between a 10-K, 10-Q and an 8-K
If you want to become a serious investor, then you need to start reading SEC filings religiously. You should have a pile of 8-K's, 10-Q's and 8-K's sitting on your bedside table. Yo...
Bottom in the California Real Estate Market?
To say that the real estate market in many parts of California has taken a beating would be an extreme understatement.
The market has been completely taken apart in the ...
Don't Get Married to a Stock
The most valuable piece of advice that I ever received when it came to trading was this: "Don't get married to a stock".
This advice doesn't just apply to trading - it a...
A Bottom in the Housing Market? 10 Signs That Will Help You Identify a Bottom
Trying to time the bottom in the housing market can be risky business. You may be waiting to put your money to work. You might think that a $300,000 home which used to be $500,000 i...
Some Older Google Penalties Expiring?
I've noticed this weekend that a number of our LONG penalized sites have suddenly re-appeared in Google's search index.
We're not talking about penalties of a month or t...
The Ten Worst (Projected) Real Estate Markets in the United States
There is no such thing as a general "real estate market" - rather, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of smaller real estate markets that can perform completely independently of ...
What is the "Problem Bank List", and Is My Bank On It?
The FDIC (or The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) reported that 90 banks, or a full 1.1% of the banks that fall under its watchful eye, landed on their "problem bank list" in ...
Short-Selling is Not the Problem
Short-selling has been in the news quite a bit over the past week. Just now, as I am viewing my Google News page, a story on short-selling is the main story at the top of the page.
Just re...
Blog About Topics That You Are Passionate and Knowledgeable About
One of the biggest mistakes that I see people make is that they choose blogging topics based on how much money they can make. This is an almost surefire way for your blog to die a slow and painful dea...
What Exactly is a "Bear Market"?
If you have been watching the news over the past few weeks, then you have likely heard that the stock market is currently in a "bear market". What does this mean exactly?
Many people have m...
The Logistics Behind an Email "Pump and Dump"
If you have an email address, then there is a good chance that you've received at least one email recommending you to purchase a specific stock.
If you happened to look up the stock in Yah...
Adsense Arbitrage - What is It, and Why Doesn't Google Like It?
First off, what is "arbitrage"?
According to Wikipedia, arbitrage is "the practice of taking advantage of a price differential between two or more markets". It's the act of buying something...
Google Cracking Down on Non-Compliant Adsense Sites?
Jennifer Slegg at Jensense.com commented in a June 24th post that it seems as though Google is starting to aggressively target sites which utilize Adsense that a...
Seven Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers
The world of "blogging" has always been fascinating to me.
People tucked away in all corners of the world developing huge followings (and massive income streams) by blogging about their da...
ScribeFire is Awesome
Normally we don't do product reviews or product endorsements on this blog, but what the hell, this product is great.
I believe that ScribeFire used to originally be known as Performancing ...
Tips For Hiring Translators Online
Hiring translators online can be a much more complex (and dangerous) task then you might think. There are very good translators out there, but the industry is fraught with fraudsters trying to make a ...
What is a "PEG Ratio"?
If you have been using a site such as Yahoo! Finance or Google Finance to check up on your favorite stock, then you may have run across something called the "PEG Ratio".
If you are involved in the stock market (and most importantly, initial public offerings), then you may have come across the term "Dutch Auction".
The "Dutch Auction" m...
Traffic Before Monetization, Not the Other Way Around
I see this happen all the time in the "blogosphere". People launch their own "Make Money Online" blogs, and immediately they want to jump into monetizing their sites. Paid reviews. 1...
Arjun Murti - The Man Behind the "Super Spike"
Arjun N. Murti has made a number of headlines over the past few years after making a couple of bold predictions regarding the price of oil.
He first made headlines ba...
Champion Air Goes Out of Business Just In Time for the NBA Finals
Big deal right? Yet another airline goes under.
If you are a sports fan, and most importantly a fan of the NBA, then it is a big deal.
How Long Will It Take the Real Estate Market in the United States to Recover? Some Perspective from the Past 30 Years
Over the past thirty years, the overall real estate market in the United States has fluctuated wildly due to varying reasons. You had the crippling recession in the early 1980s. You had the stock mark...
Did A Stock That You Own Get Halted? What Happens Now?
There is nothing scarier than waking up in the morning and hearing that a major stock in your portfolio has been halted. You scour different websites for possible news but can't find anything. You soo...
Vallejo (A City) Is Planning on Filing for Bankruptcy
Vallejo is not a person. Vallejo is not a publicly traded company. Vallejo is a city located in the northern half of California. And Vallejo, located in the western part of Solano County, is planning ...
National Association of Realtors: "Home Sales Should Start Improving by the Summer"
The National Association of Realtors put out a press release today titled "Soft Existing-Home Sales Expected Near-Term But to Rise Midsummer".
The National Associatio...
Six Things that Most Wealthy People Understand That you Should Too
Some people think that the only way to become "wealthy" is to inherit millions of dollars from your parents or win the lottery. This is completely untrue - right now there are literally hundreds of th...
Five Signs That We May Be Near a Bottom in the US Housing Market
You may watch television or read your newspaper on a daily basis and come to the conclusion that the US housing market will never recover. The industry housing industry seems to be cloaked in doom and...
So You Want to be a Contrarian Investor?
You've probably heard it many times before.
"The real money is made by contrarian investors".
The real money was made by people who bo...
Be Wary Of Companies Who Launch Anti Short-Selling Campaigns
From time to time you will find companies who will issue press releases, imploring their shareholders to "take a stand" against unsavory short-sellers. They will threaten lawsuits against these un-nam...
Steps That You Can Take To Avoid a Foreclosure on Your Home
Foreclosures are a growing problem in the United States and other parts of the world.
A foreclosure, in simple terms, is typically when an owner of a property violate...
What is a "Margin Call"?
First off to receive a margin call, you must have a margin account.
A margin account, as compared to a cash account, is an account in which you are able to buy stocks on "margin". This means that y...
What is a "Bear Raid"?
If you have been watching the financial news as of late (which is likely considering the recent fall in Bear Stearns and the ensuing panic that followed) then you have probably heard the term "bear ra...
The Greater Fool Theory
The "Greater Fool Theory" can be applied to any form of investing, whether it be investing in the real estate market, stock market or otherwise.
The "Greater Fool Theory" is when a person buys an a...
United States No Longer the Biggest Economy in the World
So after a week that saw the Fed rush to inject cash into the system, several high profile hedge fund failures and the near collapse of Bear Stearns, Americans now have to deal with the fact that they...
Why Doesn't Berkshire Hathaway Split Its Stock?
This is quite a common question. With Berkshire Hathaway's "A" stock currently trading at $129,360 (that's right - one hundred and twenty-nine thousand, three hundred and sixty dollars), why don't the...
What is a Reverse Stock Split? And Why Is It Usually a Bad Thing For the Stock?
If you are currently holding shares of a company and they have just recently announced plans to institute a reverse split of their stock, then you probably want to seriously evaluate whether or not yo...
The Top Seven Reasons Why 90% of Daytraders Fail
First off, I have no idea whether or not the "90% of daytraders don't make it" is even true or valid - however, most people that I talk to assume it to be true, so let's go with it.
90% of restaura...
Why is it So Hard for Me to Get Shares of an IPO?
Let's say that there is a hot Initial Public Offering hitting the market soon. You know that the offering is going to be a strong one, and you know that the stock is going to trade much higher from it...
JP Morgan Tops List of Biggest US Hedge Fund Managers in 2007
Credit crunch? What credit crunch?
Even though three of the top ten largest hedge funds in the US lost an estimated $24 billion in assets last year, the overall assets of the top US hedge funds act...
Calculating EPS (Earnings Per Share) and P/E Ratios (Price to Earnings) and Why They are Important
If you are new to the stock market, you may have come across a couple of unfamiliar terms when you were trolling through Yahoo Finance or Google Finance. EPS (Earnings Per Share) and P/E or P/E ratio ...
New Version of Yahoo Buzz to Compete with Digg?
According to Techcrunch, Yahoo will be launching their Yahoo Buzz service sometime on Monday. Techcrunch have said that they will be making an announcement at 9 pm on Monday, which leads me to believe...
Linking Out to Other Sites is Not Only Good Karma - It's Smart Business
I can understand the mindset that some people might have.
"I am never going to link out to other sites," they will say, "I am going to keep all of my Google link juice to myself."
I must admit t...
Getting Started With Your First Web Site - What You'll Need
So you have decided to take the plunge and start your very first web site. You have the basic theme of the site and a great deal of content mapped out in your head. You have decided that you are going...
What Exactly is a "Poison Pill" and How Does it Apply to the Stock Market?
You may have been watching CNBC one day and heard the term "poison pill" being discussed. You have probably figured out that it somehow involves one company taking over another, but you aren't sure as...
Tips on How to Create Interesting Content for Your Readers
When it comes to building a website on the cheap, content is king. Quality content is the great equalizer when it comes to competing with other web sites in your niche. Even if they have more employee...
Don't Ever Sell Your Content If You Can Help It
Let's say that you are a fairly good writer.
You have been writing for years, and a friend of yours told you that you can make some pretty decent money doing content creation for web sites.
Most...
HotorNot.com Sells for $20 Million to Avid Life Media
The recent sale of Hotornot.com to a Canadian investor group called "Avid Life Media" recently just goes to show you a couple of things:
1. Sometimes the best web sites are the simplest ones.
2....
When Creating a Personal Blog, a Little Originality Goes a Long Ways
I had finished my work early last night and was surfing around, looking for nothing in particular, when I noticed a steady and undeniable trend.
There are literally DOZENS of sites that have the sa...
Why Do Companies Announce Stock Splits or Reverse Stock Splits?
Let's cover the topic of regular "stock splits" first.
Why would a company want to split their stock?
Let's look at a fictional example. Let's take a company that is called XYZ. XYZ has had a gr...
Cruises.co.uk Sells To Cruise.co.uk In Largest .co.uk Domain Sale Ever
Dnjournal is reporting that Cruise.co.uk, based out of the UK, has purchased Cruises.co.uk in the single largest *.co.uk transaction ever for 560k euros (1.1 million US). This was apparently a private...
What is a Stock's "Float" And Why is it Important?
What exactly does it mean when people refer to a company's "float", and why might the size of a company's float have a direct impact on how the stock trades?
First off, what exactly is a "float"?
...
What is an IPO (Initial Public Offering) and How Do I Buy Into One?
First off, what exactly is an IPO? An IPO is an "Initial Public Offering" in which a company will sell shares to the public in order to raise capital.
Let's say that you have a private company, XYZ...
Stock Dividends - How Exactly Do They Work? Ex-Dividend Dates, Dividend Yields and More Explained
Before we get into the explanation of how dividends work, we need to understand exactly what they are.
A dividend is a payment that is made to a shareholder by a company. Dividends are usually made...
Will a Three Percent Fed Funds Rate Help to Revive the Housing Market in the United States?
With the housing market plummeting and many Americans watching their net worths evaporating before their eyes, the Federal Reserve has undertaken an aggressive campaign to lower interest rates. First,...
What is a "Whisper Number" And Why is it Important?
You may have heard this term being used on television or on an online financial news site and wondered what exactly it meant.
Well, let's take a company that will soon be reporting earnings. This c...
Buying Small-Cap Growth Stocks: Your Six Point Checklist
Including some small capitalization, more speculative growth stocks in your portfolio should always be part of your long-term investment plan. Small-cap companies require a little more research in ord...
More Stock Market Terms Explained: Limit Orders, Market Orders and Stop Losses
If you are fairly new to trading, then you may be a little uncertain as to what these three terms mean. Here's a quick explanation for each term:
1. Limit Order - Let's say that yo...
Buying Penny Stocks: The "Dos" and "Don'ts" of Penny Stock Speculation
So you are interested in speculating in the world of penny stocks? It's dangerous territory out there, however here are some tips that I have come up with to ensure that you give yourself at least a f...
Panicking During A Market Meltdown Probably Means That Your Portfolio Diversification Strategy is Out of Whack
I don't care how old you are. I don't care if you are 20 years old or 55 years old.
If word of a market meltdown has you sitting up at night, sweating profusely and worrying about your portfolio, t...
Options Beginners Lesson: Strike Prices, Time Decay and Premiums
If you are new to the world of trading options, then you are likely somewhat confused by some of the new terms that you are hearing about. Options volatility? Time decay? Premiums? What does it all me...
"Domain Tasting" and "Domain Kiting" - What Are They Exactly?
"Domain tasting" and "domain kiting". Two practices that are very well-known to most domain name purchasers, but unknown to most of the general public.
With ICANN-regulated domain names, all domain...
2007 Worst Year for US Housing Market Since Great Depression
On Thursday there were a couple of datapoints that were released that spelled out exactly how bad the US housing market was in 2007.
First off, sales of existing single-family homes dropped 13% in ...
Front-End Load, Back-End Load, "Level Load" And No-Load - Breaking Down Mutual Fund Fees
If you are planning on buying a mutual fund, your head may be spinning after reading the fund's prospectus.
You thought that it would be as easy as simply buying a fund and paying a small commissio...
Averaging Down or "Doubling Down" Can Be Financial Suicide If You Don't Have a Plan in Place
If you invest in the stock market, then I am sure that you have faced this situation:
You love a company. LOVE it. You've done all of your research and read all of the company's financial reports. ...
How to Become a Daytrader | Becoming a Daytrader
Before I get into this article, let me dispel a couple of myths associated with daytrading.
"Daytrading is easy." If you think that daytrading is going to be a piece of cake and "easy money" then p...
Lower Valuations + Weak American Dollar + Desperation = Foreign Buying Bonanza of American Companies
I remember back to the late 1990's when the US dollar was a pillar of strength. I remember hearing about the speculations and conspiracy theories that the US government was keeping their dollar strong...
High Negative Investor Sentiment Usually Signals That the Time to Buy Stocks Is Near
This is one of the ideas that many investors can simply not wrap their heads around, but is a very important principle to understand if you plan on making some above-average gains in the stock market....
Ten of the Top Performing Hedge Funds of 2007
In 2007, news of poorly performing hedge funds seemed to dominate the financial headlines. There was the Global Alpha fund, which dropped 38%; there was the Global Equity Opportunities Fund, which dro...
Using Arbitrage To Make Money in the Stock Market is Not As Easy as It Sounds
On the surface, "merger arbitrage" or "risk arbitrage" would seem like easy money. One company has announced that it will be buying another company for $11 per share, and the company that is being acq...
Is the Credit Card Industry Next to Feel the Pinch?
A few years ago, there were plenty of easy ways to raise money to support your lifestyle, especially if you were a homeowner.
You could buy a house and then flip it a year later for a nice big prof...
Daytrading (Daytrader) Stock Chatrooms - How To Find the Best Rooms and Avoid the Worst
Daytrading chat rooms run the full spectrum from either really, really bad to really insightful and helpful (and profitable). There are chat rooms out there that are nothing but rip-offs, specifically...
Where is the Real Estate Market Going in the United States?
There is a rule of thumb that is used in the stock market that can easily be applied to the real estate market as well. When everyone is buying, you should be looking to sell. And when everyone is sel...
The Worst Trade of My Life
Every trader has a trade that sticks with them for a very long time. A trade that they will always remember every vivid detail of, a trade that will haunt them for a lifetime. This particular trade le...
How To Successfully Stay Up All Night (aka "Pulling An All-Nighter")
I speak on this issue as a certified expert on the matter. I have stayed up all-night more times than I can count in my life.
There are easy ways to stay up all-night and then there are the harder ...
The Effects of a Falling US Dollar on the Economy of the United States
Many people tend to shrug off news reports that talk about the plunging US dollar. "A rising or falling dollar doesn't really effect me, so why should I care?" The fact of the matter is that a droppin...
"Detox" - Detoxifying Your Body
Earlier this year, I went through my first official "detoxification."
After years and years of consuming way too much sugar, caffeine and fast food, I decided to just cut it out of my diet.
We a...
What Is a "Dead Cat Bounce?"
If you follow the stock market, then you have probably heard the term "Dead Cat Bounce" at one time or another. If you hear this time and wonder what exactly it means, then this article is for you.
...
UFC / MMA Are a Huge Business and You Need to Get Involved
Mixed Martial Arts fighting, especially the UFC, is a very big but still rapidly expanding business that you need to get some exposure to if you are involved in Internet marketing.
We just recently...
Naked Short Selling: What Is It Exactly?
Naked short selling is probably one of the most misunderstood concepts in the stock market. You ask some people and they will tell you that naked short selling is everything that is wrong with the sto...
Who Are the Best Investor and Best Trader of all Time?
When it comes to the stock market, there are two people that I admire more than anyone else. Sure, there are quite a number of famous investors and famous traders who have netted billions of dollars f...
Why Short-Selling Is Necessary in the Stock Market
Many people slam short-sellers.
"They are wrongly profiting at the expense of hard-working investors all over the world."
"They engage in deception and the spreading of false rumors to make thei...
What is Meant by "Short Interest" and "Short Ratio"?
In the last article we touched a bit on short-selling. Basically, short-selling is when you bet that the price of a share will fall. So instead of buying a stock, you sell it without owning it. So let...
Bids, Asks and Spreads - A Primer on Stock Trading
I get asked the same questions all the time. What is a bid? What is an ask? Why are there two different stock prices when I log in and check the current quote on my favorite stocks?
For those peopl...
The Top Ten Fastest Ways to Lose Money in the Stock Market
10. Trading options or forex if you don't know what you are doing. Forget the get-rich books that claim you can easily make millions trading options or forex. This is simply not true,...
The Top Ten Most Outrageous Stock Market Scams of all Time
Scams occur in the stock market every day. Stock market scandals are woven into the fabric of our culture.
However, these are the TRULY outrageous stock market scams. The scams that when you hear a...
Digg.com On the Block for $300 Million?
Techcrunch and Venturebeat are both reporting that Digg.com is cu...
The Top Twelve Stock Market Scams of the Last Twelve Years
The title is self-explanatory. Here are the top 12 scams since 1995:
12. The Emulex Press Release Hoax. In the summer of 2000, Mark Jakob, a former employee of Internet Wire, sent ...
Traders at Goldman Sachs Banked Big Profits Betting on Mortgage Meltdown
Have you been wondering why Goldman Sachs have been avoiding the punishment that is being meted out to other big brokerages this year? Wonder why Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers have a...
Google Releases 2007 Year-End Zeitgeist
Google have released their 2007 Year-End Zeitgeist, which is basically a summary of their quickest rising and fastest falling...
Does Privacy Matter to You When You Are Using a Search Engine?
Ask.com is announcing the release of a new product on Tuesday that will be called "AskEraser."
This product, if you have it enabled while you are searching on Ask.com, will scrub all of your search...
A Low Share Price Doesn't Necessarily Make a Stock "Cheap"
Here is one of the biggest problems that novice (and even some advanced) investors in the stock market will encounter during their investing career. They will mistakenly assess a stock as being "cheap...
The Five Stages in the Life of a Successful Young Webmaster
Most people that I know who are fairly young and have had at least a moderate amount of success owning their own web sites have gone through the four stages that I am just about to talk about, myself ...
Legitimate Reader Interest Is Your Most Valuable Capital When Running a Blog - Don't Squander It
Let's say that you are running a blog, and over the last number of months, you have built up a fairly respectable readership. You've gone from just a couple of hundred unique visitors a day to over 15...
Don't Be Afraid to Experiment With Affiliate Sales and Direct Ad Sales
Google Adsense is a wonderful tool, but there is more to life than just Adsense and many people find that they are able to multiply their revenues when they remove Adsense from their sites.
The big...
AGLOCO Bites the Dust?
From the looks of it, AGLOCO seems to have gone out of business.
Their web site has been down for days (the site is currently done, and according to the most recent cache that Google has of their i...
Be a Contrarian, Not a Sheep
One of the biggest tips that I could ever give to anyone that is learning how to trade and/or invest is: be a contrarian. Take action, don't just react. Analyze trends and try to get in on the bottom ...
How the Market Tends to Perform After Interest Rate Cuts
Everyone is always curious as to how the stock market tends to perform after there have been sizable cuts to interest rates. Interest rate increases are done to slow down an economy and prevent inflat...
Five Tips For Surviving Your First Front-Page Digg
The goal of many webmasters and website owners is to be on the front page of Digg.com.
Not only do you receive a MASSIVE amount of traffic over a short period of time, but you will also pick up an ...
Countrywide Financial Currently Has Over 14,000 Homes Offered for Sale on their Website
Not to be a harbinger of doom here, but this is a number that clearly illustrates: a) the overall problems with the United States housing market and b) the overall problems that Countrywide Financial ...
Paid The Cost to be the Boss
Most people out there who are involved in affiliate marketing know what I am talking about.
You tell someone what you do for a living and they look at you and say "Wow, you are so lucky to be doing...
Kenneth Heebner Cashes In Big on Countrywide, Sears Short Sales
For every person that is losing money in equities such as Countrywide and Sears, there is someone on the other side, raking in the cash.
One is those people is Kenneth Heebner, manager of the CGM F...
How to Deal With Shady Affiliate Programs
If you have been in the affiliate marketing business for any period of time, then there is a good chance that you have run into a shady affiliate program or two. You know, the companies that promise e...
Almost 64% of Facebook is Female
I came across some Facebook users stats today on Techcrunch that quite surprised me to be honest. As the title of this article states, almost 64% (63.88% to be exact) of all Facebook users are female....
October Search Engine Market Share: Google Continues to Dominate
It's Google's world, and we are all just living in it.
Google continues to dominate the search engine market, increasing their market share by 3% from over a year ago. As an RBC analyst remarked, "...
Be Your Own Guru
"Gurus" are a dime a dozen when it comes to making money on the Internet.
Everyone has an ebook that they want to sell you. Everyone has all of the secrets that you would ever need to make millions...
Why Is it That Stocks Sometimes Go Up on Bad News?
It's an interesting phenomenon.
A stock will come out with worse than expected earnings and actually end up going higher on the news. What gives? Why would a stock do that?
The answer is that us...
College? Who Needs College?
One of the biggest myths perpetuated on the general public is that you somehow need a degree from college to be successful in life. Obviously there are some areas that you MUST have a degree in order ...
Google Is Worth Every Cent of its $741.79 Share Price
$231.54 Billion dollars? $741.79 per share?
Most people look at those numbers and their gut reaction is to pan Google and call the stock overpriced, with absolutely no basis for their valuation. "I...
SEO? Just Build a Site that People Like
Many people when they are starting out a blog or web site are completely frozen by the "SEO" aspects of their site. Which words should I have in the title? What kind of keyword density should I have o...
The Way That Some People Are Spinning This Google Pagerank Situation is Ridiculous
It's pretty funny to me how people in the blogosphere are spinning their Pagerank situation with Google.
In case you didn't know, Google recently punished a large number of blogs for a variety of d...
Radiohead Has Single-Handedly Changed the Music Business Model
When Radiohead announced that they were going to be offering their new album online in exchange for whatever amount of money that a buyer saw fit to donate, many people laughed. "Most people will just...
The Digg Effect
Well after being in this Internet game for years, my partner and I had our first full-fledged Digg.com explosion of traffic. I thought it would be interesting to look at how this took place, and what ...
Stop Chasing Links, Start Adding Value
The amount of link requests that we get each day for sites across our network is mind-boggling.
Most link requests just automatically get deleted, but occasionally I'll open a link request email ju...
Credibility Is The Most Valuable Currency Online
It can be tempting sometimes.
The easiest way to get traffic to your web site is to make something ridiculous up and post it online.
Word will get out and people will flock to your site. You'll ...
Yahoo Search Marketing Finally Announces Site Exclusions
I never thought that there would be a day when I actually thought that I would use Yahoo Search Marketing again.
My biggest gripe with them was always that they didn't allow the advertiser to exclu...
Guest Blogging - A Great Way to Drive Traffic to Your Blog
One of the best ways to get your blog noticed in its early days is to volunteer your services to write a guest blog on a blog that receives a fair amount of traffic.
Meaning, if you were new to the...
Without Traffic, There is No Money
Whenever you start up a blog or similar site, you need to ask yourself one very important question:
How am I planning on driving traffic to this site?
Or even more importantly, how am I planning...
The Proper Way to Write Online Content
Your biggest asset for your blog will be the users that return on a daily basis.
To ensure that these loyal "customers" continue to read your blog on a daily basis, you need to ensure that you are ...
How to Pick Your Online Business Niche
The most common question that I get is:
Which online business niche should I target?
There are many factors that you should consider when you are choosing the niche that you will target with you...
The US Dollar vs. The Canadian Dollar: A Tear Falls from my Eye
As someone who lives in Canada but makes most of his money in American dollars, the frantic rise of the Canadian dollar vs. the American dollar has been particularly painful. Rewind to about 1999, and...
How to Effectively Use Google's Content Network to Your Advantage
When we first started out doing PPC, everyone that I talked to said: don't use the content network when using Google Adwords, just use the search network. You will have a much higher ROI on investment...
Split-Testing is a Valuable Tool When It Comes to Enhancing the Profitability of Your PPC Campaigns
What exactly is split testing?
Split testing is when you test more than one ad for a keyword or group of keywords that you are targeting.
Meaning, let's say that you are running an adgroup on Go...
Early Iphone Owners Are Pissed Off at Apple
People who bought the Iphone when it first came out are livid with Apple.
Steve Jobs, when unveiling the revamped line of Ipods that will soon be hitting the streets, announced that that the 8 giga...
Breaking Down the Payout Structures of Most Hedge Funds
If you were ever wondering how hedge funds make money, then this article is for you.
If you were ever wondering what "2 and 20" or "3 and 50" meant when it came to hedge fund compensation, then you...
Blogging Tip: Write About Something that Actually Interests You
Nothing derails a blog faster than trying to write about something that you have absolutely no interest in.
Sure, you may be able to research new topics for a while, but eventually writing these ty...
Why Can't I Invest in Hedge Funds?
For years, the SEC has had a rule in place blocking the "Average Joe" from investing in a hedge fund. In order to invest in a hedge fund, the SEC says, you must have at least $1 million dol...
Tips to Staying Productive: Check Your Email and Stats Just Twice Per Day
One of the biggest pitfalls of running a blog is that it is so easy to fall into the trap of checking your emails and stats (such as Google Adsense, etc.) every couple of minutes. Everyone ...
Consistency is the Key - Blogging Your Way to a Small Fortune
There is no real secret to developing a large readership for your blog. Imagine a popular television show, like Friends for example. The key to their success is that there is continuity. Yo...
Davemanuel.com Blogging Stats for August 2007
Month #2 for Davemanuel.com is now in the books. We are looking forward to the fall and winter, which is generally a bonanza if you operate any kind of advertising supported website. More people are s...
Should the US Government Bail out Homeowners?
The answer to this question is a bit more complicated than you might think.
I bet that the average person read the title of this article and had an immediate reaction to the question. The problem i...
The Curious Story of the Most Expensive Art Purchase in History that Never Happened - "Le Reve"
Steven Cohen is a very successful hedge fund trader. His knowledge of the stock markets have grossed him billions of dollars, and made him one of the richest men in America.
Steven Cohen has a pass...
Want to Buy a Piece of Steven Cohen's SAC Capital? Here's Your Chance
When you talk about successful traders, and I mean, really successful traders, Steven Cohen is one of the first traders that should pop in your mind. Cohen is a spectacularly successf...
What To Look For When Selecting a Stock Market Newsletter to Subscribe To
Who better to write this article than someone who operated a stock market newsletter for almost four years?
The stock market can be a lot to digest. There are many reasons for signing up to a stock...
Stock Options Lesson: The Straddle
About a month ago, we detailed an options strategy called the "strangle." Today, we are going to explain what is meant by an "options straddle", and when you would utilize such a strategy.
A "stran...
Secured Loans as a Means of Consolidating Credit Card Debt - It Does Make Sense
You may recoil at the thought of taking out a second mortgage on your home. The simple fact of the matter is though that if you are upside down in credit card debt and are not making any progress in p...
Liar Loans, Teaser Loans and Stretch Loans: What Exactly Are They?
Liar loans. Teaser loans. Stretch loans. With all of the recent turmoil in the mortgage markets in the United States, you have probably heard one or all of these terms talked about on the nightly news...
The Iraq Stock Exchange: Slowly Coming to Life
Considering the problems that Iraq currently has (terrorism, civil unrest, destroyed infrastructure, political turmoil), you may be surprised to find out that Iraq actually has its own stock exchange,...
Twenty Things That I Have Learned During My Time as a Stock Trader
Here is my list:
1. If you are wrong about a stock, you need to get out, no matter how strongly you feel about a position. Getting married or attached to a stock can kill you.
2. Stop losses are...
Research Home Equity Loan Companies Carefully Before Taking out a Loan
If you have bought a home in the United States (or pretty much anywhere for that matter) over the past few years, chances are that your home is worth quite a bit more than what you paid for it. Your f...
Hitting a Brick Wall: What to Do When Your Trades Stop Working
Everyone has gone through it before. No matter how good of a trader you are, you have without a doubt had a rough stretch where none of your trades have worked, and you start doubting whether or not y...
Window Dressing: What Exactly Does It Mean?
You have probably heard the term at one time or another when you have been watching CNBC or reading your favorite financial magazine. "XYZ was up in late day trading, and traders are speculating that ...
What Happens If a Stock That I am Short Goes Bankrupt?
This is a common question that I often here from people that short-sell. What happens if a stock that I am short gets halted and announces their bankruptcy?
First off, as a short-seller, this is yo...
What is the Pattern Daytrader Rule?
When the Internet bubble popped in mid 2000, the NYSE and NASD moved quickly to introduce something called the "Pattern Daytrader Rule" to the SEC. On February 27th, 2001, the SEC approved this rule c...
What's the Point of This Blog?
Along with my partner, I own and run about 20-25 web sites. Some of the web sites are very active and pay a good chunk of my bills; other sites are frequented only by a random search engine bot, comin...
Real-Time News Services: Do They Matter to a Serious Trader?
There are two sets of traders out there it seems.
The first set of traders don't worry at all about the news of the day. They are interested only in graphs and charts and technical analysis, and if...
Another Stock Market Trading Tactic for You All To Know About
About a month ago, I outlined one of the strategies that I use to trade on the stock market; trading secondary offerings for major profit. I have received a few emails in the last little while, asking...
Bloggers Need to Understand SEC Disclosure Rules
Blogs are an amazing tool for amassing personal wealth if you have a substantial amount of traffic. You can make money from Adsense, Chitika, Text Link Ads and literally hundreds of other affiliate / ...
SEO Marketing vs. PPC Marketing: Which one is Better?
Both types of marketing have their distinct advantages and distinct disadvantages. Both are well worth your while, and I would recommend using both to tackle an industry. Here are the pros of both SEO...
Stop Losses and Profit Stops - Two Extremely Powerful Weapons in Any Traders Arsenal
What is a stop loss? What is a profit stop?
Let's say that you buy 1000 shares of MSFT at $50 even. Well when you buy the stock, you can enter in a "stop loss" into your trading software. You can e...
Why Do Stocks Get Halted?
It is probably one of the worst feelings in the world. You own 1000 shares of a stock, and you hear that the stock has been halted. The absolute worst case scenarios race through your mind; you are ce...
Starting up a Hedge Fund: What are the Costs Involved?
To be sure, running a hedge fund sure sounds like an appealing job. The money, the power, the prestige; there is a reason why many highly educated people choose to work at a hedge fund. Sure the stres...
How to Sell Your Web Site: Some Practical Tips
So let's say that you have a fairly successful web site that spins off a decent amount of revenues every month. Even better, the site makes you a nice bit of cash that allows you to make your mortgage...
Paralysis By Analysis: Sometimes You Have to Just Do It
There are plenty of people interested in making money on the Internet. In their minds, it's an easy, low-risk way of making money. They always ask me how I got started, and how they should get started...
The Pros and Cons of Running a Business Online
I have been making my living from the Internet since November 23rd, 1998. That is the very day that I started my online stock newsletter, and it basically took off from its inception. Since then, I ha...
Ten Things That You Need to Know About the Stock Market
You thinking of investing some of your hard earned money into the stock market? There are some things that you need to know, universal truths that I have come to realize after nearly ten years of inve...
The Best Real Estate Investment: Domain Names
You may be reading this and saying to yourself, this guy is crazy. I need a piece of land and a house or apartment in order to consider something a "real estate" investment. It is exactly that kind of...
Purchasing a Domain Name Privately? Five Things You Need to Know First
Domain names are like real estate on speed. The rate of returns on really good domain names are unbelievable. A domain name worth $5k one week can be monetized and flipped for $20k the next week.
B...
Commission Junction is Incredibly Frustrating to Work With
We signed up to Commission Junction about a week ago, looking to do some PPC marketing for a few specific US-based financial services companies. We have a great deal of experience with financial landi...
Direct Access Trading: What You Need in a Broker
When it comes to direct access trading solutions, there is plenty of competition out there. Different companies have different selling features in order to get people through the virtual door to open ...
Trading Forex: It Can Be Lucrative, But Understand The Risks
Forex trading can be a pretty lucrative business.
You have probably heard about some people making millions from trading forex. Because there is such high leverage involved, if a trade goes right, ...
Stock Market Gurus: Are They Necessary For You to Become a Better Trader?
Here's a little secret. I used to be a "stock market guru." From the end of 1998 until the end of 2001, I ran a stock market newsletter that was pretty successful. I had hundreds upon hundreds of peop...
Level II (2) Quotes: Are they Necessary for You?
Level II quotes are a big selling point for most online stock brokerages out there. You will find that cut-rate costs for Level II quotes are a big selling feature for many online. But before you make...
Stock Options Lesson: The Strangle
The strangle is probably one of my favorite options plays. I enjoy this play because if I am unsure as to whether or not a stock will go up or down, but I am sure that it will make a big move one way ...
Parasitic Blogging: What Do You Think of It?
Now before I start this entry, I just wanted to say that I'm not picking on any one person in particular. I picked the example that I did because this person is a high-profile blogger. I guess I was a...
Forget Optimizing Your Homepage; The Real Money is in your Subpages
Sometimes I really can't believe how much people agonize over optimizing their home page just the right amount.
I need to have the perfect % of keywords that I am targeting on the main page.
I n...
How to Choose the Right Online Stock Trading Broker for You
I've been trading stocks online since 1998. I've been through a bunch of online stock brokers.
I started with TD Canada Trust, which treated me to "bargain-basement" commissions of $39.95 per trade...
The Proper Way to Approach Someone for a Link Exchange
Now, I'm not a big proponent of doing link swaps. I prefer just to create unique content, and eventually the one way links pointing to my site (the best kind) will pile up and my sit...
Trading Secondary Stock Offerings for Profit
Becoming a successful trader is all about finding edges. Once you find an edge, you need to exploit it over and over and over until it doesn't work anymore. You don't need to re-invent the wheel every...
How to Write a Great Eulogy, Even if you are Pressed for Time
Has someone close to you passed on, and you have been asked to read the eulogy. Are you pressed for time and don't really know where to start? Follow the steps laid out in this article and you will be...
How John Chow Overoptimized Himself Right out of Google
I am sure that you have all heard of John Chow.
He runs the extremely successful blog John Chow.com. The site has gone from making a couple h...
The Best Linking Strategy For Your Blog
Linking strategies are like opinions. Everyone who runs a blog has one. Some people will read this article and say, no way, that's not the way to do it. That's fine. There are many...
Beware of Web Sites with Fake Pagerank
If you are in the market to purchase a domain name or website, then you need to be aware of how easy it is to fake a page rank for a site, and how to figure out whether or not a site...
Five Tips for Generating Unique Content for your Blog
Writing content for your blog can be tough. Usually you'll have a good 10-15 ideas for articles when you launch your blog, and then after that, the well will run dry and your blog wi...
Adsense Tips: Blending Your Ads
One of the biggest mistakes that I see some websites make is that they don't blend their Adsense ads in with the rest of their page. For instance, their web site will have a light gr...
Too Many Paid Reviews can Ruin a Blog
When you run a blog and start monetizing it, there is a fine line between generating as many dollars as you can from the blog and then overexploiting it. By building up traffic and r...
The Text Link Ads Experiment is Over
Just about a week after we put Text Link Ads up on some of our major sites, we took them down. While I am sure that some people are doing very well with Text Link Ads on their sites, we just didn't fe...
My Experiences with Adbrite
Adbrite. According to their website, they serve over 614 million impressions per day across almost 30k sites. They boost a pretty impressive list of clients that they work with: Alexa, Break.com and E...
10 Business Lessons that You Can Learn from a Hooker
Prostitution. The world's oldest profession. You may not think that you could learn anything about business from prostitutes and pimps, but they are in fact some of the shrewdest businesspeople out th...
Short-Selling Should be a Major Part of Your Market Strategy
Alright, since this site is all about making money online, I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about online trading, and how you can extract large sums from the stock market.
Trading is how I got my sta...
Blogging as a Job? Be Prepared to Put in the Time
One of the questions that is most often asked of me is: can I make a living online? Can I make a career out of blogging? The answer is always, of course, if you are willing to put in the time.
Why Web Sites Are Oftentimes Incredibly Undervalued And What We Plan on Doing About It
These days, there are literally hundreds of ways to make money with a web site. More and more companies are finding that the Internet is a cost-effective way to spend their advertising dollars. It can...
Play Poker for a Living? No Thanks
Someone asked me the other day: how would you feel if you made your living playing poker? The reaction I had to their question was immediately negative. Play poker for a living, I thought to...
John Chow Gets Nailed by Auctionads
John Chow is obviously a smart guy. He runs The Tech Zone, which is a popular technology website that I am sure he does very well with. He is probably more well-known for running his namesake websi...
The Top Ten Hardest to Fill Jobs in the US
Did you ever wonder what the top ten hardest jobs to fill are in the US? 1. Sales representative
2. Teacher
3. Mechanic
4. Technician
5. Management/executive
6. Truck driver
Not Impressed with Yahoo Free Search
Is there a worse search engine out there than Yahoo? Can a search engine that actually manually places sites into the top 3 of many major keywords actually be taken seriously? (some of our s...
SEO vs. PPC - Sure, SEO Is Free, but PPC Is Scalable
I often here people debating this subject: should I focus on SEO or PPC? Well, I would say, do both, but if you had to choose one.. I would go with PPC. Why? Those who s...
300 Will Continue to Change the Way that Movies Are Marketed
300 basically came out of nowhere and rocked the movie theaters last weekend for a total North American take of over $70 million dollars. The movie didn't feature any big name actors. The story was...
Is There Such a Thing as an Overly Commercialized Blog?
I make no bones about it. I visit a number of different blogs on a daily basis. These blogs all have the same theme; they are all run by one-man shows who have made a living off of the Internet, an...
Shoemoney Gets Banned from MyBlogLog
I've been following MyBlogLog for a while now. As soon as they were bought by Yahoo for $10 million dollars, they hit my radar screen. To be honest, it takes me a long time to utilize some new popu...
My Letter to Overture UK
Hi there, I realize that there is an ongoing investigation in regards to "partner site" traffic on my account, but I wanted to just provide you of further evidence of clear fraudulent behavior ...
Some Adsense Placement Tips For All You Aspiring Content Publishers Out There
After testing, re-testing, and double re-testing, I have figured out the best way to incorporate Adsense ads into your page. Well, this is what has worked best for me, but I think that most Adsense...
The Adsense Experiment: Making a Hundred Dollars Per Day with Adsense
Making money with Adsense is hard work. It involves creating a great deal of unique content, like I have illustra...
Running a Newsletter: Seven Things You Can Do to Increase Your Audience
From November of 1998 until the end of 2001, I ran a pretty popular online stock market newsletter. Back then, I had no clue about SEO and PPC; I didn't spend a dime on marketing costs. I grew the ...
Beginner's Guide to Jogging: How to Get Started and How to Avoid Injury
So you have decided that you want to start jogging. This is great, as jogging has many, many benefits for both your health and emotional well-being. I find that when I am jogging ...
Five Things that You Can Do to Get More Productive Right Now
You ever have one of those days where you seem to get so much stuff done, that you wonder where you would be if every day was like that? Taking care of business is all about momentum; getting start...
The US Government Deals Yet Another Blow to the Online Gambling Industry; Neteller Blows Up
Well, Neteller didn't actually blow up. But if you were using your Neteller account to fund your online poker account and you are living in the US, then you are now out of luck and MUST find anothe...
Overture - Massive Click Fraud?
Let me give you some background. My partner and I have been advertising with Overture UK for a long while now. As a programmer and math guy, I love looking at our site stats. I am the type of person t...
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