Investing Blog

This year, CD rates have hit unprecedented lows. What are beleaguered CD investors to do? One avenue, suggests Bill Larkin, fixed-income portfolio manager at Cabot Money Management in Salem, Mass., is to try bonds. Rather than bonds funds, as I’ve written about in a previous post, Larkin suggests some of his clients buy bonds rather

I’ve written about indexed CDs previously but recently a marketing e-mail for a currency-linked CD got me interested in writing about them again. EverBank offers a few currency options in CD form. Their newest CD offering is linked to the Deutsche Bank Currency Returns Index. According to the details, investors can earn all of the

My grandparents bought me savings bonds when I was born. I spent the money the second it was in my grubby little mitts, which was around 16, if I recall correctly. Since then I’ve struggled with my innate tendency to burn through money like water with varying degrees of success. Rather than giving me the

Cue the triumphant fanfare, today President Obama signed the Dodd-Frank Act into law. Whether that signals a new era of consumer protections or a leaden regulatory morass depends on your perspective but hopefully consumers will find themselves being trampled by Wall Street and big banks a little less regularly. In his remarks during the signing

Most people have probably heard of a zero-coupon bond, or a bond that pays interest at maturity rather than accruing annually. But CDs also come in zero-coupon form. Coupon refers to the interest rate on a bond. According to the website, BondClass.com, zero-coupon CDs, or ZCDs, are issued in maturities between three and 30 years and

A recent analysis from Market Rates Insight reported that in the first week after Regulation E took effect on July 1, the national average rate for deposits dropped 0.06 percent. Regulation E mandates that banks may not automatically enroll customers into their standard overdraft plans. Unless consumers opt in to the coverage, neither debit card

Yesterday I asked Herbert Hopwood, CFP and president of Hopwood Financial Services in Great Falls, Va. why investors would buy CDs in an IRA. It’s kind of a silly question but, luckily, Hopwood believes there are no dumb questions, only dumb answers. So he gave me a smart answer. “We consider them like a bond.

Though the FDIC currently insures deposits for up to $250,000 — and will forevermore if the Dodd-Frank Act passes in its current form — some people need more of their cash insured. They can get it by putting funds under separate ownership registrations at one institution or spread their wealth among several banks. Or they

Allen Stanford was not the only person in history to think of scamming people using a CD as bait. Back in 2000 the National Association of Securities Dealers launched accusations of fraud at San Clemente Securities Inc. for selling “zero-coupon” CDs and failing to disclose fees and commissions as well as shady investment strategies and

Let’s be honest, it’s easy to believe we can’t be scammed. But what if the fraudulent instrument is something as benign and unassuming as a CD? In February 2009, the SEC raided the offices of Allen Stanford and charged him with running an $8 billion investment fraud, according to an Associated Press story written at