Computers that move at the speed of the human brain. A world where every human being can know anything, anywhere, any time. Data streaming through a trillion sensors to connect the whole world. Though these things sound like part of a science fiction movie about the...
California’s Drought Hits Wallets – and Health
It takes nearly five gallons of water to cultivate a single walnut - more than it takes to grow a head of lettuce. But in drought stricken California, the water it takes for those and other fruit and vegetable crops is in drastically short supply – and that has...
Drug Lord or Hero: The Silk Road’s Founder Confounds Expectations
The Silk Road is dead. That eclectic online marketplace for trafficking in illegal substances of every kind was raided and shut down in 2013 by the FBI and other federal agencies, who confiscated its multimillion dollar store of Bit coin. But its mysterious founder,...
The Fed’s Stimulus Strategy: Silencing Skeptics?
In the end, did hard easing work? That contradictory term for Qualitative Easing version 3, the Federal Reserve’s controversial and much disputed stimulus plan, has been in the news and on the minds of economists and financial advisers since it was conceived in 2012...
Can Corporate Tax Inversions Harm the Economy?
The chief financial officer of drugstore giant Walgreen’s just departed his job. And while the movements of higher ups at megacorporations often resemble a round of musical chairs, this particular job change sheds light on a new trend in corporate tax evasion: tax...
Bitcoin For Real Estate: A New Frontier
In spite of outcry from government banks and cyberpolice worried about connections to Internet crime, the Bitcoin just keeps on trucking, with more and more sellers accepting the digital currency. But the growing use of Bitcoin for buying real estate is raising...
5 Investing Mistakes That Cost You Money
Investing is supposed to make you money, not make you lose it. But it’s easy to fall into a few traps that can cause exactly that – whether you’re new to investing or have been around the block a few times. Regardless of how you’re investing, financial professionals...
Gen Y: Changing the Economic Game
Move over, baby boomers. There’s a batch of new kids in town, and their numbers have knocked you out of first place as the biggest age cohort in the country. We’re talking about the millennials, or Generation Y, whose buying patterns and lifestyle choices are changing...
The MintChip: Mainstream Banking Tries to Get Digital
It sounds like a new kind of snack: the MintChip. But this product of the Royal Canadian Mint represents a new stage in the evolution of digital currency: digital money created and controlled by a state bank. And its demise in April 2014 serves as a cautionary tale...
Emerging Markets Worry About Stimulus Fallout
The Federal Reserve may be optimistic about the outcomes of its decision to taper down the ongoing bond buying stimulus program, but the rest of the world isn’t so sure. Among issues on the table at an upcoming meeting of the world’s money policymakers in Sydney are...