Random Thoughts: Bye Bye Bernie

With the financial world showing glimmers of hope this past week we also see that Bernie Madoff plead guilty to 11 charges including fraud. They had a bunch of his “victims” on TV the night before talking about how he had ruined their lives, so I suspect Bernie is not going to be getting much leniency and may be in the slammer for an extended period of time. Remember if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Could that kind of fraud happen in Canada? Maybe not on the scale that was seen, but I am sure there are “get rich quick” schemes or Ponzi schemes going on right now, so be vigilant in your research of any investment scheme.

My March Thoughts

• Random Thoughts, spring Ahead for a time change.
• The Eaton’s Catalog and The Sweater a great story for the Winter.
• Down to the Wire with Taxes don’t put the pro in procrastination.
• Is Canada in a Good Place? I hope so.

Random Financial Thoughts

This week more news to cause investors to be more nervous, and Warren Buffett telling us the U.S. economy fell off a cliff (gee thanks Mr. B., that must have added a lot of confidence to the whole mess).

• The N.C.F.B.A. met again this week and as usual much discussion of useful financial ideas and Preet from Where Does All My Money Go finally met Larry MacDonald, I urge you to read the blogs that are under the N.C.F.B.A. title in my right hand column, they are excellent sources of personal finance and investing ideas.
• Larry MacDonald asks, Is Now a Good Time to Buy Berkshire Hathaway? It is very cheap right now, however, there are many bargains on the Stock Market right now. Better still what happens if Mr. Buffett falls off a cliff?
• The Canadian Capitalist mentioned to me about the importance of rebalancing even in tough times, and he had an update for the Sleepy Portfolio (that I actually use in one of my RRSP accounts). The re-balancing spreadsheet is very useful.
• Preet at Where Does All My Money Go has some interesting projects on the go, and he discussed with us The Psychology of money and how he may be using this in a future TV project.
• Thicken My Wallet has some excellent pointers on How NOT to Get a job (a good read for us unemployed folks).
• Michael James resurrects one of my favorite why it was bad to invest in Nortel stories with Nortel vs. Beer , this one when I first read I didn’t laugh, because at the time I’d just lost a lot of money and didn’t buy beer. Mmmm… beer…

CIS Hoops This Weekend

Hope all of you will be watching the Canadian version of March Madness with the CIS Championships for Men’s Basketball going on this weekend (SFU won on the Women’s side last weekend). Great home grown basketball to watch and enjoy. University of Waterloo is not there this year, but I can still cheer for the local Ottawa teams.