Author: News Room

The White House will propose a rule intended to lower credit card late fees to approximately $8.  The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) will propose the rule at President Biden’s fourth Competition Council meeting.BIDEN CLOSES REMARKS ON ‘JUNK’ FEES: ‘I APPRECIATE THE FRUSTRATION OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE’ “Over a decade ago, Congress banned excessive credit card late fees, but companies have exploited a regulatory loophole that has allowed them to escape scrutiny for charging an otherwise illegal junk fee,” CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a press release. “Today’s proposed rule seeks to save families billions of dollars and ensure…

Our goal here at Credible Operations, Inc., NMLS Number 1681276, referred to as “Credible” below, is to give you the tools and confidence you need to improve your finances. Although we do promote products from our partner lenders who compensate us for our services, all opinions are our own. Rates for well-qualified borrowers using the Credible marketplace to refinance student loans rose this week for 10-year fixed-rate loans and fell for 5-year variable-rate loans. For borrowers with credit scores of 720 or higher who used the Credible marketplace to select a lender during the week of Feb. 27, 2023:Rates on…

Our goal here at Credible Operations, Inc., NMLS Number 1681276, referred to as “Credible” below, is to give you the tools and confidence you need to improve your finances. Although we do promote products from our partner lenders who compensate us for our services, all opinions are our own. Based on data compiled by Credible, mortgage rates for home purchases are mixed today, with two key rates falling, one rising, and one holding steady since yesterday. Rates last updated on March 24, 2023. These rates are based on the assumptions shown here. Actual rates may vary. Credible, a personal finance…

The client approached my desk, clearly unhappy. Her new granite countertops didn’t look as handsome in her kitchen as she had expected. She thought maybe the fabricator had installed the wrong slab. I sent our project manager to the job site, paperwork in hand, to check. He confirmed that she did get the Santa Cecilia – very popular in 2005 – she’d chosen. The problem was her lighting, which was making the heavily patterned gold and brown stone look downright ugly. If tunable lighting had been available back then, her problem could have been solved with simple user-operated color controls.…

Silicon Valley Bank’s (SIVB VB ) sudden collapse and seizure by the FDIC on March 10 sent shockwaves through the financial markets and eroded confidence in other banks. While a thorough analysis shows U.S. banks to be solvent overall, the concern about banks has spread globally. The challenge of analyzing bank safety is that a severe loss of confidence can actually cause an otherwise functioning financial institution to collapse. Thus, it is crucial to monitor the health of the banks with as high-frequency data as possible. The most accessible and frequent data is bank stock prices. Bank stocks have been…

Today’s Social Security column addresses questions about whether filing dates can affect the application of COLAs to benefits, how public pensions can affect spousal benefits and submitting applications before benefits begin. Larry Kotlikoff is a Professor of Economics at Boston University and the founder and president of Economic Security Planning, Inc. Should My Husband Have Filed In January Or Earlier To Receive The COLA? My husband was receiving spousal benefits before he filed for his benefit at 70. He turned 70 in December of last year. Should he have filed for his retirement benefit to have begun in January 2023…

Late last year, Congress passed and President Biden signed SECURE 2.0 legislation as part of the Omnibus spending bill. Enactment of this legislation is a clear signal that policymakers understand the depths of the frightening retirement savings shortfall facing millions of Americans. The reasons are many for the nation’s retirement crisis – from rising costs to fewer pensions to longer life expectancy. Despite these challenges, one segment of the workforce has been on stable ground when it comes to retirement: the state and local government workforce. Today, the vast majority of state and local workers have a defined benefit (DB)…

Nothing drives up fear in the financial system like news of runs on banks. We had several large institutions go through a collapse in the last few weeks. Because of this, there has been renewed interest in understanding whether our individual deposits are safe. This is where it is important to understand how the FDIC works. While bank failures are rare and justifiably headline-grabbing, the scarcity of failures is due, in part, to the banking system being undergirded by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or what is commonly known as the FDIC. The FDIC was established in 1933 to offer…

So far this year, China-based software concern Baidu (BIDU) twice conquered the $159 area – its highest level in more than 12 months – with the most recent trip up the charts taking place in late March. Following that peak, however, BIDU turned in five-straight losses, and was last seen on track for its sixth. Though the shares now sport a fractional year-over-year deficit, traders shouldn’t fret just yet, as they’re now trading near a trendline with historically bullish implications. Specifically, Baidu stock is within one standard deviation of its 50-day moving average. According to data from Schaeffer’s Senior Quantitative…

I hate to see folks trying to time this banking mess with regular stocks like JPMorgan Chase JPM & Co. (JPM). Especially when they can easily swap their big-bank stocks for “preferred” dividends yielding 8% and up! That’s a far sight better than the magic trick mainstream investors are attempting, as they try to dodge into big banks like JPM at just the right moment. Worse, JPM only yields 3% today. And you and I both know that markets can thrash around for weeks looking for a bottom. That’s why, instead of squinting at price charts, we’re calmly picking up…