Archives for August 2015

Free FICO Score from Citi Credit Cards

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

citidouble200This post provides updated information and instructions regarding the free FICO score that is available to Citibank credit card holders.

Background. While their plans were announced in late 2014, Citi started offering free FICO scores to select cardholders in January 2015.

FICO Score details.

How to find the score. You can find the free FICO score on your online account access. According to a January 2015 press release, you can also request them to mail it to you. After logging in, look for either the “View your FICO Score” link or click on the “Card Benefits” tab. See screenshot below (click to enlarge):

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Here are some example screenshots of what information is provided. Here is the latest score, a score meter, and the top two factors impacting your score:

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They also provide a score history:

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Here is a visual of the score range to help understand what each range means to lenders:

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Fine print:

Your FICO® Score is calculated based on data from Equifax using the FICO® Bankcard Score 8 model and may be different from other credit scores. FICO® Scores are intended for and delivered only to the Primary cardmember and only if a FICO® Score is available. Disclosure of this score is not available for all Citi products and Citi may discontinue displaying the score at our discretion.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Free FICO Score from Discover Credit Cards

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

Discover it 14 ImageThis post provides updated information and instructions regarding the free FICO score that is available to Discover credit card holders.

Background. While a pilot program started in late 2013, Discover started offering a free FICO score to all cardholders in early 2014.

FICO Score details.

  • FICO Score version: FICO Score 8, or FICO 08. This is the most widely used of the many FICO flavors. Score version is directly from TransUnion representative.
  • Credit bureau: TransUnion
  • Update frequency: Monthly
  • Limitations: Available to all Discover consumer cards. This includes:

How to find the score. You can find the free FICO score on your online account access, your paper statements, and the Discover mobile app.

Here are some screenshots from the website (click to enlarge):

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Here is a screenshot from the Discover app (click to enlarge):

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Here is a sample picture of a paper statement with the FICO score on it (click to enlarge):

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Fine print:

FICO® Credit Score Terms: Your FICO® Credit Score and key factors are based on data from TransUnion and may be different from other credit scores. This information is intended for and only provided to Primary cardmembers who have an available score. See Discover.com/FICO about the availability of your score. Your score is provided on the statement for individual accounts and on Discover.com with key factors for individual and joint accounts. You will see up to a year of recent scores starting when you become a cardmember. Discover and other lenders may use different inputs, such as a FICO® Credit Score, other credit scores and more information in credit decisions. This benefit may change or end in the future. FICO is a registered trademark of the Fair Isaac Corporation in the United States and other countries.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Stock Investing: Taking Your Money Off The Table Until Things Calm Down?

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

Updated 2020. How many e-mails have you gotten regarding “recent market volatility”? The advice is almost always the same, think long-term. Feeling some fear and uncertainty is normal. During extreme times, a phrase often heard will be “I’m just going to take some money off the table until things calm down. Why risk it?”

What happens when you play it safe? Here’s a 2015 chart from FiveThirtyEight.com comparing the results of a “cautious, play-it-safe” investor and the “do-nothing” investor:

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Imagine two people who each invested $1,000 in the S&P 500 at the beginning of 1980. The first one buys once and never sells. The second one is slightly more cautious: He sells any time the market loses 5 percent in a week, and buys back in once it rebounds 3 percent from wherever it bottoms out. At the end of last week, the first investor’s holdings would be worth $18,635. The second investor would have just $10,613.

This is interesting, because they let you (sort of) pick the temporary bottom. But as you can see, you miss the huge gains. Perhaps the key is that you waited to sell until the market dropped first. If you wait until that sharp drop, then it’s probably already too late.

Remember, the only two possibilities for the stock market are all-time high or a drawdown. The highs you don’t really feel. The drawdowns are quite painful. Here’s a continuously updated chart from Doug Short illustrating the drawdowns since 2009. Lots of painful drawdowns, but during that time the market is up over 200%.

This is also why financial advisors tell you to create an investment policy statement. That’s where you write down ahead of time “If [this] happens to my portfolio, I will do [action or lack of action] because [reason].” Then when the drop actually happens, you break out that piece of paper to remind yourself what the calm, rational version of yourself would have done.

I would also add that this is why I don’t support the “100% in stocks” argument that I hear 10X more often after a long bull market. With time and pain, I have come to appreciate the warm fuzzies that come from owning a nice chunk of safe, liquid bonds.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Amazon Underground: 450+ Free Android Apps with Free In-App Purchases

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

amazonundergroundIf you have an Android smartphone or tablet, Amazon just released Amazon Underground, which adds a collection of 450+ apps which have agreed to be 100% free, including all in-app purchases. Amazon will somehow pay the publishers based on how much time you spend use each specific app. You pay nothing.

Looking over the list of available apps, I see an Office document viewer, a photo editor, a mobile PDF scanner, and a bunch of games. I don’t play games much so I can’t tell which are good, but I recognize a few like Cut the Rope, Angry Birds, and Fruit Ninja. There are also several Disney apps for those with young children. I don’t really understand why a Goat Simulator is the #1 featured app, but hey it’s free!

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Free FICO Score from American Express Credit Cards

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

amex_spgThis post provides updated information and instructions regarding the free FICO score that is available to American Express credit card holders.

Background. In late 2014, American Express started piloting free FICO scores to select cardholders. In late August 2015, American Express has rolled out the free FICO scores much more widely. See additional information below. In previous years, AmEx cardholders could view their Experian PLUS credit score and credit report once every 12 months.

FICO Score details.

  • FICO Score version: FICO Score 8, or FICO 08. This is the most widely used of the many FICO flavors. Score version is directly shown on the website.
  • Credit bureau: Experian
  • Update frequency: Monthly
  • Limitations: Available to all American Express consumer credit and charge cards. See details below.

How to find the score. You can find the score after logging into your online account access. In order to see it, you must be viewing the American Express website in its “new” design layout (see screenshots below). If you are still on the “old” layout, try to unlink any cards for which you are the authorized user. In many cases, this will let you revert to the new design layout. Here are some screenshots.

Look for the “My Free FICO Score” link on your sidebar (click to enlarge):

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You will have to opt-in:

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Here’s what your score report looks like (click to enlarge):

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Fine print:

The FICO® Score we provide is the FICO® Score 8 based on data from Experian and may be different from other credit scores. FICO® Scores and educational content are delivered only to Primary card members who get a monthly statement and have an available score. This information is intended only for the Primary card members own review purposes. American Express and other lenders may use different inputs like a FICO® Score, other credit scores and more information in credit decisions. Because it is continuously updated, your FICO® Score may not reflect the most current data on your credit report. This benefit may change or end in the future.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


The Many Flavors of FICO Credit Scores

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

fico_brEvery week it seems there is a new way to get a free FICO score. Over the last 10 years, I’m pretty sure I’ve only paid for a FICO score once when I was paranoid about my first mortgage application. Why aren’t they charging us $15 a pop anymore? My opinion is that FICO realized that:

  1. If they didn’t start making FICO scores more accessible, the government would force them offer free FICO scores to everyone like they did with free annual credit reports. Nowadays, I think we take for granted that we get a free credit report every year. Before the 2003 FACT Act, we had to pay to view our own credit report data.
  2. The alternative free credit score providers were getting very cozy directly with the credit bureaus, and their free FAKO scores and partial reports were getting good enough and popular enough that people might stop caring about FICO scores if they didn’t start marketing directly to consumers. Nowadays the FICO brand has much more publicity.

Anyhow, I was doings some research on their website when I noticed that they provided the following chart about the various versions of FICO:

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While these flavors have been around for a long time, they’ve only been well-known to industry insiders (and credit card afficionados). I had never seen FICO actually share all of these versions in the name of “consumer education”. If people actually knew there were so many different credit score flavors, they would have been less willing to pay big bucks for a single score that their lender may not even use. I guess now the game is that you get a single free “vanilla” FICO score from select credit cards, but you can buy all 19 FICO flavors for a $60 one-time snapshot from all 3 bureaus, or $30 a month for an ongoing subscription. If you get all these scores, you’re at least likely to see what the lender sees. Nicely done.

My own scores always hover in the upper 700s but rarely goes far above 800 because I am constantly “using” them to try out new credit card perks and take advantage of attractive sign-up bonuses. There is definitely a happy range where I can do this while not experiencing any ill effects like a higher auto insurance premium. However, I still don’t see the need to pay $360 a year to track my FICO scores. I’d rather spend my money at Baskin Robbins and pick from their 31 delicious flavors.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Elizabeth Gilbert On Taking Back 30 Minutes A Day For Yourself

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

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Right this second, there are probably 37 different things vying for your time and attention. Are you letting the right things get through? Elizabeth Gilbert is best known for her bestselling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. In a recent Facebook post, she credits turning off the Sopranos with giving her the time to write her seven books (and become wildly rich and successful). Here are selected parts of her post, I left out some parts for brevity:

Yesterday I posted a message about not giving up on your daydream, and a lovely follower of this page asked what you should do if you have “too much family stuff” going on in order to live your dream? […]

But what if you could find 40 minutes a day? What if you could borrow those minutes from the time that you normally spend watching your favorite TV show, or hanging out on social media?

Back in my twenties, I once complained to a successful older woman artist that I had no time to write, and she said, “What’s your favorite TV show?” I replied, “The Sopranos!” She said, “Not anymore, it isn’t. Give yourself back that time. Turn off your TV.”

She was right. So I turned off my TV. And I STILL haven’t seen the last three seasons of The Sopranos. But since that conversation, I have written seven books.

By the same token, I must admit that I always smile when somebody gets on this Facebook page to tell me that they don’t have any free time in their lives to be creative. As much as I LOVE to see you all on this page, my first reaction to such a statement is always to say, “Why don’t you start by signing off Facebook right this minute?”

If you have enough free time to get on Facebook and tell me that you don’t have any free time, then you have some free time.

What would happen if you committed yourself to that time? What if you used it to create, or to meditate, or to exercise, or to volunteer, or to dream…or even to just devote some serious single-minded attention to the process of making an escape plan — such that, five years from now, your life looks entirely different than it looks today. In other words — what could YOU make out of your life in an extra forty minutes a day? Might that be worth exploring?

She also directs people to read a beautifully-drawn Zen Pencils comic by Gavin Aung Than (shown above) that was based on an article by James Rhodes, a largely self-taught concert pianist. Here’s the original Rhodes piece and here’s a short excerpt:

What if for a couple of hundred quid you could get an old upright on eBay delivered? And then you were told that with the right teacher and 40 minutes proper practice a day you could learn a piece you’ve always wanted to play within a few short weeks. Is that not worth exploring?

(Also see: Another Zen Pencils comic about Alan Watts.)

Regular readers may recall that Charlie Munger of Berkshire Hathaway also tells people to work for yourself for an hour each day.

The takeaway is that these are not coincidences! Not everyone has a little voice inside them, telling them something is missing. But if you do, read all the full versions above, get inspired, and take some of your time back.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Expedia+ Voyager Card from Citi Review

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

This offer is expired.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Expedia+ Credit Card from Citi Review

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

This offer is expired.

expediaplusExpedia.com has revamped their in-house loyalty rewards program. Citi and Expedia have partnered on a new set of co-branded credit cards.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


CoPatient: Helping You Answer “Is This a Reasonable Medical Bill?”

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

copatient0High-deductible health plans are still growing in popularity. While these can be a great way to save on your monthly premiums, it also means that when you do have to visit the emergency room, you get to tackle nearly the entire bill instead of a small co-pay. The problem is that most medical bills cannot be understood by mere mortals. Likely, the doctors and nurses themselves have no clue how that $6,344 bill for a broken arm got generated.

Right now there are honest people that just got their bill, but they are frantically doing internet research because they have no idea if their huge bill is correct or what is “reasonable”. It would be nice for this problem not to exist, but until then I wanted to point out a service called CoPatient. They are made of health insurance company veterans and hire their own medical billers and coders.

You send them your unpaid medical bills, and they review it for free to determine if there are any errors or overcharges. They will send you a free estimate of what they think they can do for you. If you allow them to negotiate on your behalf, they work on a contingency basis and keep 35% of the actual savings. If they don’t save you money, you pay nothing.

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Here’s an example patient flowchart (click to enlarge):

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The legwork that the consumer needs to do is request a detailed, itemized bill from the hospital providers. Some tips from ABC News:

Ask what services are covered under your room and facility charges
Ask what treatments were provided
Identify the date and time of when you were admitted
Clarify medical terminology that is confusing
Specifically look for erroneous double charges, for mischarges, and for situations where a charge defies common sense (e.g., a $22 Q tip).

Here are some quick stats, taken from their website and marketing materials:

More than 80 percent of the medical bills that CoPatient analyzes provide opportunities for meaningful savings. On average, CoPatient saves its customers 40 percent on their medical bills. Since its launch in 2014, CoPatient has saved consumers more than $1 million.

According their iPhone app page, CoPatient finds errors on 80% of all bills it reviews and saves folks an average of $3,000. Their FAQ states that it usually takes ~5 days for the review (more for complicated cases), and 3-6 weeks for the appeals and negotiation process. There is no minimum bill size, they will investigate that $500 unpaid bill.

I’ve never used CoPatient myself, but I would definitely consider it if I was faced with a $5,000+ bill that I didn’t understand. I mean, what would I have to lose?

On a related note, this is yet another consumer service that offers to save money on a contingency basis. That is, they only make money if they save you money. A few others:

  • AutoSlash: Helps you track price drops on rental cards. They make money when you rebook at a lower price with them.
  • Paribus: Helps you automatically request price adjustments on all your online retail purchases. They take a cut of the price drop savings.
  • AirHelp, Refund.Me, AirTaxBack: Get fees refunded for certain cancelled or missed flights to/from Europe. They take a cut of the refund.
My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Data Breach Counter Tool: Exactly What Personal Information Has Been Exposed?

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

The New York Times has come out with another neat interactive tool that provides a sobering count of both how many and what types of your personal information has been exposed to hackers. I like that they break things down as exposing your e-mail address is very different than your Social Security Number.

Half of American adults had their personal information exposed to hackers last year alone. In a recent attack at the federal Office of Personnel Management, hackers stole the most sensitive personal data for 21.5 million people.

I took the quiz and here are my results:

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All in all, I would say it could be worse. My credit and debit cards all have “zero fraud liability” and I carefully go through each statement every month. The scariest part is that the worst data breaches will probably occur where you couldn’t do anything about it. For example, the recent governmental database breach involved every single person given a government background check for the last 15 years. That hack exposed Social Security Numbers, financial histories, employment records, and fingerprints.

The advice that the NYT gives is to make sure you have different passwords for every website, and to turn on two-factor authentication whenever possible. As I’ve noted, I use 1Password and I definitely love the feature set but admit it is somewhat expensive. All my accounts now have passwords that look like “j6VQDqa$oE2zYa” and I can access them with a thumbprint on my iPhone. The website TwoFactorAuth.org is a useful database of which sites offer two-factor authentication (2FA). There are still many financial sites that don’t support 2FA.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.


Playing “Fill-In-The-Blank” Mad Libs with Financial Buzzwords

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone.

madlibscoverAfter you spend enough time consuming financial media week after week, you start seeing patterns in the noise. I understand why of course, as creating content to feed the beast can get quite exhausting. But hopefully, by pointing out these out, you as an individual investor can realize that there may or may not be any substance behind the marketing buzzwords and short-term forecasts. Entertaining? Yes. Useful and actionable? Much less likely.

A good analogy would be with the classic word game Mad Libs, where “one player prompts others for a list of words to substitute for blanks in a story, before reading the – often comical or nonsensical – story aloud.”

Here’s how the usual “Profile of successful mutual fund manager” article usually goes. I am paraphrasing myself in 2006.

[Name of recently successful mutual fund manager] may not look the part, but at the helm of [formidable sounding firm], his [mutual fund name] has outperformed its benchmark by [big number]% annually over the past 5 years. The key is to [something skill-based like “on-the-ground” human research or complex computer algorithms] and also [something classic like “long-term perspective” or “focus on the fundamentals”]. As a result, the manager says that people should [something vague and simple for the Average Joe investor].

There are also the marketing materials coming directly from the firms themselves. Here’s an actual quote taken from a 2008 fund brochure. I’ve bolded the buzzwords for your convenience:

The OIM Core Plus Fixed Income strategy is rooted in the idea that individual security selection produces the best opportunity for risk-adjusted excess returns over time. Through an extensive, bottom-up research process, our portfolio management team focuses on optimal bond selection of investment grade corporate bonds, mortgage-backed securities, US Government Treasuries and taxable municipal bonds. The team employs a tightly controlled duration discipline and closely manages all portfolio risk factors. The portfolio management team’s objective is to produce predictable, consistent excess returns net of fees over the Barclay’s Capital Aggregate Bond Index.

The Oppenheimer Core Plus fund was supposed to be very conservative and was marketed to those with children within 5 years of college. What happened next? It proceeded to lose 38% of its value in 2008, while the fund’s benchmark actually rose 5.24%.

Barry Ritholz probably digests more financial media than 99.9% of folks out there, and in a recent WaPo article he pretty much nails the average CNBC guest who gets the question “Where’s the Dow going to be in a year?”:

“Our view is that the economy in the U.S. continues to _______, and we foresee _______ problems overseas ______. China is _______, and that has ramifications for the Pacific Rim’s ______. Greece is ______ in Europe. The commodity complex is causing _____ for emerging markets. But many sectors of the U.S. economy remain _______, and some sectors overseas are still _______. The valuation issue continues to be _____, and that means _____ for investors. That has ramifications for corporate profits that will be ______. We think the economy is going to do ______, and you know that means inflation will be _____, which will force interest rates to ______. Under these conditions, the sectors most likely to benefit from this are ______, ______ and ______. The companies best positioned to take advantage of this are ____, ____ and ____. Based on all that, we especially recommend an overweight allocation to ____, ____ and ____. Thus, we believe the Dow will be at ______ next year.”

There are good mutual fund managers, good financial reporters, and good hedge fund managers out there trying to do the right thing. But the problem is that when you see such meaningless words and phrases, you just can’t tell if they are good or bad. Next time you watch CNBC, Fox Business, or Bloomberg TV, see if you can match up the blanks and buzzwords. Thanks to reader CJ for the Ritholz article tip.

My Money Blog has partnered with CardRatings and may receive a commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on this site are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. MyMoneyBlog.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers. All opinions expressed are the author’s alone, and has not been provided nor approved by any of the companies mentioned.

MyMoneyBlog.com is also a member of the Amazon Associate Program, and if you click through to Amazon and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission. Thank you for your support.