Signals vs. Noise put up an interesting short Blog asking readers to guess which company this is based on 5 financial stats. Without peeking at the answer, see if you can guess!
767 employees, P/E of 182, operating margin 6.5%, market cap $4.4B, short shares % of float: 12%.
Times’ up! Did you guess yet? Hint: How many companies have a P/E of 182? Did you guess correctly? Head over to Signals vs. Noise for the answer!

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I would like to get a series started about all the different RSP ads that are popping up for the season. What are the sales tactics of these mutual fund companies to get you to contribute to your retirement savings plans? How can we filter the truth from the marketing?
I’ll give you an example borrowed from Mark Cuban. Mark Cuban said that the smartest marketing that shampoo companies ingrained into the population was the slogan of “Rinse & Repeat”. It’s a genius way to get people to quickly use up …

Now that The Conservatives are elected to form a minority Canadian government. I’m looking forward to Steven Harper’s commitment to reduce GST from 7% to 5%
A 5% GST will mean
$2 more in savings in your pocket for every $100 GST eligible purchase.
that it’ll be easier to calculate taxes using your head if only GST is involved.
that it’ll be much harder to calculate taxes using your head if GST and PST (Ontario) is involved. [Quick! What is 13% of $77.99?]

Today’s last installment of the Canadian Election Watch analyzes the New Democratic Party’s (NDP) political promises about Canada’s financial prosperity. For those who joined us late, you can browse through previous articles about The Conservatives and The Liberals here and here respectively! Enjoy and as always, your comments are welcomed!
Increasing the GST tax credit
This NDP declaration is in direct response to the other two party’s tactics to reduce personal taxation.

In today’s part 2 of the Canadian Election Watch, I will be examining the Liberal Party’s tax goodies. You can check out yesterday’s first part focusing on the Conservative’s tax cut promises.
Increasing The Personal Tax Exemption
The basic personal amount of income exempted from taxation is $8,648 in 2005. Paul Martin and The Liberals promise to increase this amount to $10,000 over the next four years. Henry Choo Chong (CGA) states that this translates into approximately $500 of savings in an individual’s pocket, but does not elaborate on whether this …

I was riding the subway today and picked up a copy of The Metro for some light reading. The Money Matters column by Henry Choo Chong (CGA), caught my eye as he answered a reader question about the different tax promises that each party is bringing on their platform for the Canadian election.
Henry was definitely correct to point out that simply voting for a particular party because of their tax policies is really not the right way to base a decision. Nevertheless, he analyzed 3 major points from the 3 …

I recently saw in a company’s (un-named to protect anonymity) newsletter, this announcement about their group plan insurance. Take a look at this censored excerpt:
Each year our insurer reviews the cost of our LTD coverage and makes adjustments to the premium based on the claims incurred during the year. Our incidence of disability claims has increased this past year, and as a result of the insurer’s review the premium for your coverage will increase by 10% beginning with the first pay in January.
For example, if you earn $xx,xxxx annually, your …

One of the more interesting Blogs regarding financial matter I’ve encountered was “Hello Dollar”. However, the articles I saw while I was there were a lot of recycled materials from other books and publication medias that I’ve already seen. I did not subscribe to a feed because I have too many feeds to read a day as it is. Nevertheless, I’ve occasionally check back to see if there will be more interesting posts.
On my last visit, to my surprise “Hello Dollar” has dissappeared. In its place remains a parking page …