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Behavioral Finance: New Year; New Habits

Lose Weight ... Work Out More ... Cut Back on Spending ... Get a Financial Plan – Sound familiar?

We all start with strong resolve and we are determined to crack the nut this time. But then what happens?

The Willpower Trap

Funny that this runs contra to everything we’ve previously been told: If we just have enough willpower we’ll be able to make that change … almost overnight. And yet that’s not the typical result.

Are we really that weak in our resolve? Behavioral science says “No”.  

Willpower alone is not the key ingredient, and our thinking that it should be often creates a new dilemma, instead of getting us to our goal.  So best to avoid that trap.

Women In The Bulls Eye: The Good, The Bad, and The ...?

The Good:The Age of Women Is Now Fully Recognized

Well, finally, some 40 years after Gloria Steinem and other feministas did those unthinkable things to bring on the revolution, they are noticing. "They" being everyone from Madison Avenue marketers to Wall Street ... and even more recently from the heights of the president of the World Bank. The demographics - and actuarial tables - are finally indisputable.

Meanwhile women are rockin' it, and "They" know we're going to bring it.

The big questions are: Do we know? ... Are we prepared? ... and, as importantly ... Have we stepped up to full ownership?

New Neuroscience Study Says Women Make Better Investors

Neuroscience Says Women Make Better Investors, But Why?

"Women are better wired than men to avoid emotionally driven investing mistakes." Women's more highly developed emotional processing capabilities make it possible says the latest from neuroscience research. Neuroscience Tells Us So While our general tendency of "risk-aversion" continues to leave too many women at impasse regarding investing, those who have taken the plunge seem to actually have an advantage over men according to the findings of Richard L. Peterson, psychiatrist and author of Inside the Investor's Brain (Wiley Trading, 2007) and co-author of MarketPsych: How to Manage Fear and Build Your Investor Identity (Wiley Finance, 2010).  Peterson points to women's higher levels of oxytocin and a thicker corpus callosum (fibers connecting the two halves of the brain) as likely reasons for the differential between the sexes and the basis for his survey results showing women as:

Warning: Is Your Financial Adviser An Authentic Women’s Specialist?

It’s a tough economic environment and that means shrinking revenues for all manner of financial advisers as well as the rest of us.  Searching for new clients is increasingly difficult.

By now it’s well-documented through academic studies that women as a buying group have the majority of the clout and that they control the majority of financial assets in this country.  They are also known within the financial services industry to be largely inexperienced and, to some with predatory instincts, this makes them a highly desirable target.  More so, it’s understood that women especially in divorce are highly vulnerable, impressionable, and since significant dollars are changing ownership, they can be ripe for the picking.

Why Are My C.D. Rates So Low?

Yes, there's no denying it: Interest rates are abysmally low right now. Understanding "why" and the impact on your bottom line, can make a big difference in how you use C.D.'s in the future.

What are interest rates anyway?

Simply put, interest rates can be defined as the “Cost of Capital”, which to put in regular language just means the 'cost of doing business'. Let's take a look:

Why Signing On the Dotted Line Needs Careful Consideration

With tax returns neatly filed and over with until next year, it seems like the perfect time to talk about what your signature means, both on your tax return and other documents as well.  A signature by definition binds the individual signing the document [i.e. contract, agreement, form, etc.] by the provisions contained in the document, which means simply:  You are legally obligated to whatever is contained within them.  And in circumstances where you are married and signing as one of the parties to the contract—or tax return—you share in the legal responsibility, as well as in any legal consequences, that may arise.