January 2008

Focus, don’t Diversify

January 31, 2008

Hi All, Most of you probably know what diversification is, thats when you spread your investments across various asset classes, across various industries and types of stocks. The main idea behind diversification is that large scale statistical processes allow you to efficiently maximize your return while limiting your risk (1). Ignore diversification. Its great if [...]

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Merits of Hotel Points

January 30, 2008

I’d argue that if you travel often, for work or pleasure, it pays to find a hotel chain you like and stay there whenever possible. Even if you don’t travel often that it is likely to get you some freebies eventually. Here are some of the perks you should consider: Earn points just for staying; [...]

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Best EBooks in Personal Finance

January 30, 2008

Hi All, It’s a bit of fast moving day here with the DINKs, so I wanted to make you aware of a great posting over at the Consumerist. They’ve done the hard work and assembled a list of the best 30 free personal finance ebooks. Check it out. – Perhaps they have resources that might [...]

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How We Are Paying Off Debt

January 29, 2008

Hi All, So now that my exams are over, I find I’m focusing more on our financial goals. The main goal that we DINKs are working on is paying off our second mortgage. Its currently at $17,329.48 and we’re hoping to have it paid off by this September. It might be challenging to get there, [...]

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Back from the Ivory Tower

January 28, 2008

Hello All, One thing you learn about being a graduate student is that the isolated culture of academia is alive and well in America’s universities. After several weeks of study, I took my first set of comprehensive examinations a day ago. The results aren’t in yet, but comprehensive exams are a rite of passage that [...]

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Money, money, money

January 28, 2008

One of the great things about traveling is checking out all of the currencies around the globe. It certainly takes some added mathematics to sort everything out when landing in a new country, but it is always an experience to see what money is worth in other countries. Right now my wallet is bulging with [...]

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Petronas Towers

January 25, 2008

Just a quick note before my time is out here. I’m currently in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and enjoyed a day at the Petronas Towers. This is the tallest building in the world, 88 floors. The sky bridge is at the 41 first floor. The interesting thing about the building is that it was built by [...]

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200% Tax

January 25, 2008

Wow! Another interesting fact about Singapore. The government can’t prevent people from buying cars, but they can make it hurt. To cut down on traffic in Singapore they have a 200% tax on car purchases. Everything else in the country is duty free. Crazy. Another comment about the payment for driving that I mentioned in [...]

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Interesting Tidbits about Singapore

January 23, 2008

It might be a random topic, but I thought might enjoy a few finance related tidbits about Singapore. First I’d like to say that Singapore is a truly lush and fabulous city, certainly one of the most beautiful and well run in the world. Home ownership is big in Singapore. In fact, 95% of the [...]

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Money can’t Buy

January 22, 2008

Hi Folks, I just wanted to respond to a number of comments that I’ve received over the past months since I’ve been in Afghanistan. Many of our readers seem to feel that I’m in Afghanistan only for the money and that my values are focused only on the bottom line. While it is true that [...]

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