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Nearly every man who develops an idea works it up to the point where it looks impossible, and then he gets discouraged. That's not the place to become discouraged.
Thomas Edison Categories
Monthly Archives: February 2010
Vote for the Weekly Cartoon
Images used under Creative Commons licenses 3.0 & 2.5 (Dylan Horrocks, Greg Williams, and Nina Paley) Read More
Your Career: What to do when your boss gives up
Your boss shows up late, sneaks out early, ignores e-mails and winces at work-related questions.
Sound familiar? Many managers are burned out from trying to get more work done with fewer staffers and resources. Some have even stopped caring.
That can frustrate employees who can’t get questions answered, are waiting in vain for decisions to be made and feel like the workplace is in limbo.
Here are some tips for those trying to cope with a boss who’s given up . . . read more Read More
Consumer confidence falls sharply
A monthly poll showed consumers’ confidence took a surprisingly sharp fall in February amid rising job worries. The decline ends three straight months of improvement and raises concerns about the economic recovery.
The Conference Board said February 23 its Consumer Confidence Index fell almost 11 points to 46 in February, down from a revised 56.5 in January. Analysts were expecting only a slight decrease to 55 . . . read more Read More
Editor’s Choice
Cartoon used under comics.com and/or dilbert.com terms of use, copyright United Feature Syndicate. The inclusion of this cartoon does not imply that United Media, comics.com, and/or dilbert.com endorses or sponsors think.zionsdirect.com and/or affiliate organizations and product(s), nor does it imply that the authors/illustrators of the comics/works appearing on comics.com and/or dilbert.com endorses or sponsors think.zionsdirect.com and/or affiliate organizations and product(s). Read More
Interest rates mixed after Fed official talks
Short-term interest rates inched lower in the bond market Monday after a Federal Reserve official reiterated that record-low interest rates are still needed to help the economy.
Rates rose and bond prices fell as Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco president Janet Yellen became the latest Fed official to stress that the central bank isn’t in any rush to boost borrowing costs for millions of Americans. The remarks come after the Fed took a surprise step Thursday and bumped up the discount rate, the interest banks pay for emergency loans. . . . read more Read More
Low inflation gives Fed room to keep rates down
The Federal Reserve seems likely to keep interest rates at record lows for several more months after news Friday that consumer prices excluding food and energy fell in January.
It was the first time such prices have fallen in any month since 1982.
The benign report on consumer inflation sent a positive signal to investors and borrowers. It suggested that short-term rates can remain low to strengthen the economic recovery without triggering inflation . . . read more Read More
What you need to know about credit card reform
The new credit card law is finally here. Starting Monday, banks will need to abide by new regulations on terms and disclosures. The idea behind the landmark law was to prevent banks from using practices that often dug borrowers deeper into debt.
A look at how the credit card law affects key aspects of your account.
INTEREST RATES
THEN: Banks could raise the interest rate on an account at any time, including the rate on an existing balances, even if you weren’t late on payments.
Drop in jobless rate points to modest improvement
The job market is lurching toward improvement. It just has a long way to go.
The outlook for jobs became a bit less bleak Friday the 5th when the government released January’s unemployment rate . . . read more Read More
Vote for the Weekly Cartoon
Images used under Creative Commons licenses 3.0 & 2.5 (Dylan Horrocks, Greg Williams, and Nina Paley) Read More
Formula shows why it’s so hard to cut jobless rate
The economy’s 5.7 percent growth last quarter — the fastest pace since 2003 — was a step toward shrinking the nation’s 10 percent unemployment rate.
There’s just one problem: Growth would have to equal 5 percent for all of 2010 just to lower . . . read more Read More
New report: Consumers spent modestly in January
Americans backed off from their holiday spending pace in January, but retail sales rose for a third month in a row compared with a year earlier, largely because of . . . read more Read More
Editor’s Choice
Cartoon used under comics.com and/or dilbert.com terms of use, copyright United Feature Syndicate. The inclusion of this cartoon does not imply that United Media, comics.com, and/or dilbert.com endorses or sponsors think.zionsdirect.com and/or affiliate organizations and product(s), nor does it imply that the authors/illustrators of the comics/works appearing on comics.com and/or dilbert.com endorses or sponsors think.zionsdirect.com and/or affiliate organizations and product(s). Read More
Parents, students on edge over soaring tuition
As students around the country anxiously wait for college acceptance letters, their parents are sweating the looming tuition bills at public universities.
Florida college students could face yearly 15 percent tuition increases for years, and University of Illinois students will pay at least 9 percent more. The University of Washington will charge 14 percent more . . . read more Read More
Reporting change increases investor transparency
Due to a change in securities regulation, Zions Direct Auctions is now requiring bidders, with the exception of participants in FDIC-insured Certificate of Deposit auctions, to have a Zions Direct account connected to their auction account prior to bidding. This change is necessitated by a consumer-focused shift in reporting requirements to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s (FINRA) Trade Reporting and Compliance Engine (TRACE).
TRACE was introduced in 2002 to give increased visibility to investors about publicly traded “TRACE -eligible” debt securities. In addition, the reporting system aggregates and recaps market data in an effort to help individuals understand how the fixed-income market is functioning. The data is free and open to the public . . . read more Read More
