3 Jun

Outrunning the bear market

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

By Alexandra Twin, senior writerWednesday, June 2, 2010 Provided by CNN Money After the Dow’s worst May in 70 years, the threat of the stock correction becoming a full-blown bear market has intensified. But this isn’t new territory for long-term investors. They’ve faced this precipice 29 times since World War II, according to Standard & […]

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27 May

Home foreclosures don’t add up

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

Lack of ability to do the math, it turns out, is the cause of many consumer insolvencies. Why do people default on mortgage and other loans? It turns out that it’s not so much the amounts they owe, but that they are unable to do the math that tells them exactly what their financial situation […]

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26 May

Loonie’s plunge signals long-term risk for Canadian and global economies

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

OTTAWA – The Canadian dollar plunged to its lowest level in eight months before recovering Tuesday, sending a clear signal that Europe’s debt crisis has the potential to reach across the Atlantic and impact Canada’s mending economy. The loonie has lost about eight per cent of its value over the last month in reaction to […]

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25 May

Private sellers shaking up real estate industry

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

Gordon Ives is the sort of customer who keeps real estate agents awake at night: a former customer. Last year, after several years of trying to sell his Charlottetown home through an agent, the retired banker decided to change tack and find a buyer on his own. He calculated how much a conventional sale would […]

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25 May

DAY OF DECLINE

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

In a worrying replay of the crisis of 2008 and 2009, lending rates in Canadian credit markets continued to react to the growing turmoil over European debt, with key overnight bank lending spreads doubling since February. “We are starting to see interbank lending rates back up again and that’s an unfortunate development,” said Doug Porter, […]

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25 May

New rules cuff some mortgages to banks

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

  A headlock would be the wrestling term to describe the hold Canadian banks will have on some consumers because of new, more strict mortgage rules. We are already seeing the impact of the changes that came into effect on April 19, but were put in place well in advance by Canadian financial institutions. Consumers […]

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18 May

Feds want tighter rules to ground fly-by-night movers

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

The federal government is putting the moves on movers. Industry Canada wants to tighten the rules for moving companies after a deluge of complaints from consumers who say they’ve been ripped off by crooked operators. Armed with a cellphone and a Kijiji or Craigslist ad on the Internet, scam artists are preying on Canadians looking […]

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18 May

Even recession didn’t slow down Canadian’s spending, report finds

General

Posted by: Steven Brouwer

Neither recession, global uncertainty nor growing joblessness appears to have stayed Canadians’ appetite for spending money they don’t have. A new report by the Certified General Accountants Association of Canada shows that household debt in the country kept rising through the recession and peaked in December at $1.41 trillion. That’s $41,740 on average per Canadian, […]

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