Financial Reviews

Many people had put forward that investors who invest in mutual funds should seek out those that are low cost so that they are not unnecessarily paying for the services of poor performing fund managers. With such an argument, these same people are touting that investing into index funds will be one of the best option available since they are typically low cost. Is such an investment style justified? After reviewing through the various options, I see that there is no point to deny competent fund managers an equitable renumeration if they are able to deliver value to my investments. The aim of investing via mutual funds is that risks are diversified and the services of professionals are engaged to manage the funds. Many people expressed dissatisfaction with management fees charged because the funds had not performed up to expectations. This is a justified complaint since no one is willing to be shortchanged when they are paying good money in anticipation of proper returns. But the truth

Network for Electronic Transfers, NETS, is owned by DBS, OCBC and UOB and it has just recently announced that transaction levies are going to be upped by between 0.75 and 2 percentage points over 3 months from 1 Jul 2007. This is going to be pegged at between 1.5 and 1.8 per cent of purchases bringing the levy close to credit-card transaction fees which stand at about 2 per cent for Visa transactions and around 3 per cent for American Express. While around 83 per cent of Singaporean residents currently use NETS for purchases in a strong embrace of cashless transactions, many retailers are starting to advise customers to pay cash or pay more for purchases. The levy increase appears to be against the original purpose of NETS, to offer alternative system for cashless payment. While NETS tries to justify that it is facing increasing competition from international card schemes and the increase is necessary to maintain its viability, insisting that NETS transaction fees are still the lowest

FairPrice Plus is a collaboration between NTUC FairPrice Co-operative Limited (NTUC FairPrice) and Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation Limited (OCBC Bank) with all banking products and services being provided by OCBC Bank unless stated. This collaboration seeks to offers simple banking solutions at all FairPrice supermarkets islandwide. This is a very new player on the banking market but it is worth taking a good look because of various interesting features... The Fairprice Plus Savings Account provides an interest rate of 1% p.a., much higher than that offered by most banks. Futhermore, there is no minimum opening balance, monthly balance requirements and monthly service charge and with this account, there is access to over 770 OCBC and UOB ATMs islandwide!! Being able to earn 1% interest from the first dollar deposited is something that had not been available to many in a long long time. Sounds good so far? There is more to come! The Fairprice Plus credit card offers free membership

There are lots of ways to make money via the Internet and making money online is an easy task which many people have had succeess. From the amatuerish ventures to those who have gained from affiliate marketing/adsense/adbrite/etc in a big way, there is a growing interest in how to harness the internet to generate the multiple streams of income automatically. Getting another income via the Internet is very attractive because it will function 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. Even when sleeping, the online business/programme will still be operating and bringing in money. By diversifying and having multiple streams of incomes , a great buffer is created and ensures continued income. Holding a mundane job is not longer necessary as long as sufficient success via website traffic/referrals/sales/etc is achieved and brings in the money automatically. Because of the recent request from some friends to join them under this Emailcashpro affiliate programme, I am starting to seriously look into

It is important to get a reliable online trading platform when doing online trading of shares. As delays in trades performed can potentially lose/gain us a lot of money, always have 1 or 2 backups from which trading can still be performed. Just today, DMG's site went down with the following message... Network Error (tcp_error) A communication error occurred: "" The Web Server may be down, too busy, or experiencing other problems preventing it from responding to requests. You may wish to try again at a later time. For assistance, contact your network support team. The problem is not with my network connection since I can access other sites such as yahoo, google, POEMS, Fundsupermart, DBS Vickers Securities and iOCBC perfectly well. Always cater for contingencies when trading to avoid being unnecessarily penalised for delays in accessing the online trading platform. Be warned, be careful.

Extended warranty is offered on many products these days and while some people found value in them, these plans are rarely a good deal. Retailers are pushing extended warranties because it generates almost pure profit. It is a triple bet that that the product will breakdown, that the damage will be covered by the extended warranty and that the repair costs will be more than the extended warranty's cost. Considering that the value of electronic products depreciate exponentially these days, purchasing extended warranties will more frequently be money down the drain. Where possible, charge your purchase to a credit card that extends the manufacturer's warranty and save the premium of the extended warranty. With the quality of products these days, by the time the gadget breaks down, enough will have been saved to replace the faulty product. If an extended service plan is really percieved to be essential, read the fine print carefully and not rely on the salesperson's assurances