0% Balance Transfer Credit Card Offers and Alternatives

By MoneyBlueBook

As the economic paddy wagon continues to hee and haw its way through the recessionary mud, once available avenues of emergency funds are steadily drying up. Credit card consumers and account holders across the nation may have noticed that they are receiving fewer credit card junk mail in their mailboxes these days. While this reduction in the volume of paper junk mail received may be counted as a blessing, it's also a sign that the once bountiful availability of lucrative 0% APR credit card offers are slowly coming to an untimely end. Due to the deterioration of the mortgage and credit industries, major credit card issuers such as Citi Card, Chase, Bank of America, American Express, and Discover have significantly pulled back their credit card marketing efforts and drastically reduced the quantity and quality of introductory 0% balance transfers offered.

Currently, the most popular 0% balance transfer card offers that still remain in effect today include the following short list of active promotions. As always, before applying for a balance transfer card, it's important to read the fine print carefully and be fully cognizant of the advertised 0% rate duration, the availability of any balance transfer fees, the regular interest rate after the end of the 0% period, and the availability of any underlying cash back or credit card reward offers.

By MoneyBlueBook

A few days ago, the legendary and super talented pop icon, Michael Jackson, suddenly and inexplicably passed away at the age of 50 due to cardiac arrest. After a long and glorious (but controversial) entertainment career that spanned 40 years and included the world's best selling music album of all time - "Thriller", the self anointed King of Pop was finally laid to rest in peace. Perhaps it was his enormous talent or his seemingly gentle nature, but I have always managed to overlook his eccentricities, the oddness of his perpetually changing skin color, and the lurid details of the tabloid controversies that followed him - particularly the allegations of child molestations and quirky behaviors and activities at his infamous Neverland Ranch. For me, I grew up as an adoring fan - enjoying amazing hits like "Black and White", "Billie Jean", "PYT", "Thriller", and "Jam". I will always remember Michael Jackson for his music, his stunning liquid pop locking dance moves, the ground breaking music videos, the moon walking, and his one of a kind "hee hee" falsetto squeals. Inevitably, artists in the future will continue to pay homage to Jackson by attempting to emulate his moves and his songs, but there will never be another one quite like him ever again.

Unfortunately, the story of Michael Jackson is also one of great tragedy. Aside from the eccentricities of his life and the untimeliness of his death, the man was a text book case on how absolutely not to live one's life. Despite building a massive

By MoneyBlueBook

Free Monthly Lottery Drawing: The American Dream Card From HSBC (info)

Since I was a little kid, I've always dreamed of hitting it big and winning the lottery. I'm not talking about winning the Texas Holdem poker pot at your buddy's house, or lucking out at grandma's Bingo night, but rather about�  landing one of those mega jackpots - the ones you see on TV that feature the screaming people holding the oversized checks - the Powerball's and the Mega Millions lotteries. Alas - I've yet to experience success in any type of sweepstakes or lottery drawing other than that one time I won my elementary school's carnival raffle as a kid (and even then my "prize" was simply a free lunch and movie date of sorts with my school principle). But certainly one can dream right?

For many people, winning a multi million dollar lottery jackpot is truly the ultimate once-in-a-lifetime fantasy. In light of spiking unemployment rates and the ongoing recession, some people now even see lotteries as their best and only chance to ever gain a personal net worth of a million dollars or more. But unfortunately for them and the millions of people who participate in the daily and weekly lottery drawings, the odds are astronomically stacked against them - so much so that their chances of being struck by lightening or even drowning in their own bathtubs are much higher than that of ever winning. Participants of the popular Powerball lottery currently face an unfathomable 1 in

By MoneyBlueBook

Review of SmartMoney Magazine's Top Discount Brokerages Below

While I have written about the best online discount brokers in the past - reviewing what I believe to be the top brokerage companies out there for new stock and fund investors - it's always good to check out what the financial experts have to say on the subject. For almost two decades now, the editors at SmartMoney Magazine have been reviewing and releasing their annual list of the best stock brokerage companies, thoroughly researching and comparing the candidates based on a variety of key competitive factors. For customers and broker firms alike, their award wining list is always a popular read.

In this year's 18th annual broker survey, SmartMoney updated its ranked list of the best and worst brokers after conducting a variety of performance based tests and undercover research as well as reviewing the responses to surveys by the online brokerages themselves. As the folks at Smart Money remarked in this year's review - "no detail was too small" - as they poked and prodded the various available trading tools and features, even going so far as to go incognito - calling customer support lines and posing as prospective brokerage customers, while jotting down comments in regards to the quality of the phone service they received. For new and seasoned investors, this list serves as an excellent jumping off point for those on the fence and not sure which investment broker to go with or to switch to. While the exact sequencing order of the rankings

By MoneyBlueBook

Update: New FDIC and NCUA Insured Limits Extended Until January 1, 2014

After months of bank failures and gloomy economic news, we finally have some good tidings from our federal government. No, it's not another round of stimulus checks for those of you who have been hoping and waiting with bated breath, but rather, it pertains to the FDIC insurance that guarantees the safety and security of bank deposits.

The current increased FDIC insurance limits of $250,000 were scheduled to be rolled back to the previous $100,000 limits on the last day of 2009. However just recently, Congress voted to extend the deadline for four more years - through December 31, 2013. Those of us who have significant amounts of money in the bank or sizable funds invested into long term certificates of deposit (CD rates) undoubtedly have been nervously eyeing the impending December 31 expiration date of the $250,000 threshold. Thus this news ought to come as a tremendous welcomed relief. Those of us who have been considering renewing our certificates of deposit can now consider maturities with a longer time horizon without fear of falling outside of federally protected limits.

Avoid Banks That Are Not FDIC Insured, Or Credit Unions That Are Not NCUA Protected

As many of you may know, if you have money in a bank account, your bank deposits are generally insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) up to the maximum current limit of $250,000. Similarly, if you have money saved in a credit union account, your deposits are

By MoneyBlueBook

Well it's that time of the month again. It's time to calculate my net worth, and update readers with a review of my current financial situation and prospective outlook. So, after spending a few months overseas for personal family reasons, I've finally returned home. As the bulk of my online and so-called real life business operations are run and managed over email, instant messaging, and Skype, there was barely a blip on my small business operations while I was away. In fact, despite me not even being in the country to run things for much of the last few months, the month of May still saw a pretty healthy bump up in income (as reflected by the significant increase in total assets), thanks primarily to the acquisition of several new legal clients and online affiliate partners. As my total net income is comprised of several income sources to form a diversified base, I've fortunately avoided much of the devastating carnage leveled by this ongoing economic recession. Only time will tell whether this healthy income streak will be able to continue for the foreseeable future at its current rate - however, I remain hopeful despite my cautiously bearish nature of late.

Thus, as far as I can tell based on current projections and observations, the only significantly damaging element that has the foreseeable potential to hurt me financially in a big way - is higher federal and state income taxes. Hopefully President Obama will play nice and leave existing federal tax rates alone and not