Last year was a bad one for pension plans worldwide, with the global financial crisis vacuuming an aggregate $5 trillion from companyoperated retirement plans in such key markets as the United States, Japan the United Kingdom and The Netherlands.
The plunge in stock prices knocked worldwide pension assets down from $25 trillion to $20 trillion, an excruciating decline of 19%, Reuters reported.
If you're an emerging-markets investor, and you happened to peruse the study that the Institute for International Finance released this week, you must've experienced alarm – if not panic. The IIF expects the inflow of private funds into these markets to plunge to only $165 billion this year – an amount that's just 18% of the $929 billion that flowed into these very same markets in 2007.
For investors, the message is clear: We'd better concentrate on those emerging markets whose inhabitants have hefty piggybanks of their own.
Oil prices have fallen 70% since hitting a record $147.27 a barrel in July, which means in just five months, crude has given up all the price gains it made in the past four years.
After such a wrenching plunge, many analysts believe the outlook for the "black gold" remains bleak – and in the short term it certainly is. In the long run, however, dwindling supplies, resurgent demand, and a lack of investment will cause crude oil to double, triple, or even quintuple in price over the next few years.
Two companies are dwarfing "big oil" in profit margins and reserves. They're about to hand investors a double in the short run…
No one knows if the price of oil will continue breaking records – but one thing is certain:
The biggest oil companies are hardly the best oil investments.
With stock markets in a downward spin, gold has emerged as one of the safest and most profitable investments. This FREE report contains the key steps to profiting in gold – including the five best "profit machines" to buy right away.
By Shah Gilani, Chief Investment Strategist, Money Morning • @ShahGilani_TW - • Print | Email
When the banking-system bailout plan – formally referred to as the "Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008" – was originally unveiled, the financial-crisis firefighters at the U.S. Treasury Department were essentially reprising the Florida firefighting strategy. And U.S. taxpayers can anticipate an outcome a lot like the one that afflicted the Coral Gables apartment dwellers.
Unfortunately for the U.S. taxpayer, there's no Biltmore in which to seek temporary shelter. There's only one U.S. economy, and we have to stay in it, whether it's been condemned or not.
By Keith Fitz-Gerald, Chief Investment Strategist, Money Map Report - • Print | Email
"Have we seen the worst from the financial sector?"
The question – a very good one – came from an audience member following my global investing presentation at the Agora Wealth Symposium in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Since Ben Bernanke touted the dollar's muscle in 2002, the greenback has fallen 40% against world currencies. This free report reveals what's next for the greenback andfour ways you can profit.
By Keith Fitz-Gerald, Chief Investment Strategist, Money Map Report - • Print | Email
I don't know about you, but I could only pick my mouth up off the floor when I watched the Big Three's CEOs beg for a taxpayer-funded bailout this week. Never mind the fact that they're now asking for $34 billion (up 36% from $25 billion two weeks ago), or that they drove to DC in a caravan of new hybrids that would make the Keystone Cops proud.
Emerging Markets: The Future of the Gaming Industry
The Middle East, China, India, Africa, and South America all have extreme pirating problems where video games are concerned. Thus, most companies have trouble expanding into these markets.
