There really is no knowing when the economy will start to recover. Unemployment rose at a faster pace in June. Unemployment hit 9.5%, the highest since 1983. With consumer spending accounting for 2/3 of the total GDP, higher unemployment means less income. Less income means less spending.

The US economy is of concern to alot of countries because the US is a major trade partner to many countries. As long as the US economy doesn’t stabilize, the global economy will not stabilize.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The economy will only start to recover when people stop losing jobs. And this is where the government comes in to play a role by creating more jobs. Only then will the economy kickstart again.

I could not believe what I was reading. British airways offered its workers to work for free. So, the employees work for free, and the company survives. Well, how are the employees going to survive? These people have mortgages and bills to pay. Many people live from paycheck to paycheck.

The Management should have proposed the employees to reduce their salaries by 8.33% which is equivalent to a month’s salary over 12 months. This way, the employees could tighten their belts without drastic changes to their lifestyles.

The proposal by British Airways may hint at more serious issues to come. British Airways could be facing a cashflow crisis. By offering its employees to work for free one month, the company will save the cashflow upfront on month. If the company had offered its employees to reduce salaries, then the cashflow savings is smaller per month and is spread out over many months. Why did the company offer “work for free” instead of “reduce salary”? Maybe because it needed to minimize cash outflow quickly.

So, would you work for free? I wouldn’t, if I am an employee. However, if I’m working on my own business, then yes I would work for free.

Is buying a house still the common way to build wealth? Nearly half of the people surveyed didn’t think so according to this article “Many say homeownership no longer a path to wealth“.

“The results released on Monday found that nearly one-third of those polled don’t think they will ever be able to afford to buy a home. Forty-two percent of people who have purchased a home — but no longer own it — don’t think they’ll ever be able to afford to buy another. And 31% of those who still own a home don’t think they’ll ever be able to buy another — whether it’s to upgrade their existing home or buy a vacation home.”

That’s alot of people saying they can no longer afford a home. What I can gather from the above paragraph is that houses are getting more expensive and that the income of the average working man isn’t catching up with the price of the houses. It’s another one of those “the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer”.

If you can’t bring the prices of the houses down, then we need to improve our income. We need to improve our knowledge, skills, and earning capabilities to move ahead of the pack.

People need to have a roof over their heads, to protect them from rain or shine. If you’re renting your roof, then you need to seriously find ways to buy your own roof. The wealthy became wealthy because they stopped paying others and started paying themselves.

I was having this conversation with a friend and we were talking about the stock market. I had told him that I speculated on some counters, and in the end I lost money in the last bull run. He said it’s better to invest in fundamental stocks. Can sleep better at night.

Then I started to think, if a person invests ALL his money into one or a few companies with good fundamentals, could it be considered speculating? Will this person be able to sleep comfortably at night knowing that all his assets are tied to these few companies, and his wealth will rise or fall together with the stock prices of these companies?

I find this very fascinating. Because I have invested most of my money into the stock market. And I have started buying fundamental stocks instead of speculating. However, I still find that I often check the prices of my stocks every now and then. Why am I doing this? Is this a habit? Am I speculating with fundamental stocks? Or maybe I have invested more than I can afford to lose?

These are some questions I will ponder upon…. when I sleep tonight.

This week, I have opened a futures trading account. So far, I have longed a futures contract, and short a futures contract. From my experience so far, futures trading is more geared towards short-term. There are two reasons for this statement.

The futures contract are short term in nature. 1 month, 2 months, 3 months or 6 months contracts. Unlike company stock whereby you can hold long term for dividends and capital appreciation.

The tools used are mainly charts, like the candlestick chart. People track these weekly, daily or even hourly charts.

It seems to me futures is like a gambling tool. Betting on the direction of the index or prices. It’s different from investing, like buying stocks, which is actually buying a part of the business.