Ken Fisher is a money manager, Forbes columnist, and is one of the Forbes 400 richest Americans. He is also author of several books, including his two latest, a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0470285362?ie=UTF8tag=antiquestocka-20linkCode=as2camp=1789creative=9325creativeASIN=0470285362"The Ten Roads to Riches: The Ways the Wealthy Got There (And How You Can Too!) (Fisher Investments Press)/aimg src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=antiquestocka-20l=as2o=1a=0470285362" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" / and a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/047052653X?ie=UTF8tag=antiquestocka-20linkCode=as2camp=1789creative=9325creativeASIN=047052653X"How to Smell a Rat: The Five Signs of Financial Fraud (Fisher Investments Press)/aimg src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=antiquestocka-20l=as2o=1a=047052653X" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" /br /br /Ken Fisher Interview Part 4br /br /span style="font-weight:bold;"Stockerblog/span: I wanted to talk just a bit about con men versus con women. Do you see more women becoming con artists in the future or do you think it will primarily be men?br /br /span style="font-weight:bold;"Fisher/span: The history, as I mentioned in the book a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/047052653X?ie=UTF8tag=antiquestocka-20linkCode=as2camp=1789creative=9325creativeASIN=047052653X"How to Smell a Rat/aimg src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=antiquestocka-20l=as2o=1a=047052653X" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; ...

The FDIC is considering tapping its emergency line of credit with the Treasury. FDIC Chair Sheila Bair recently hinted after a speech at Georgetown University that all options are on the table when it comes time to replenish the dwindling Deposit Insurance Fund. We’ll find out more in the next few weeks after the FDIC board of directors meets.

Stock market bulls aren’t concerned about the inevitable acceleration in bank failures — at least for now. Even though deposits will be insured against loss, the loss of local banks will still have a depressing effect on hundreds of small communities. These communities are going to lose their only access to business credit when their local zombie banks — loaded with toxic construction or commercial real estate loans — are liquidated or merged into other weak banks.

Meanwhile, the latest monthly figures show that commercial bank balance sheets are shrinking at a fairly

...

Three Investing Lessons from Bernie Madoff

by Mark Skousen, Contributing Editor

Last week I caused a bit of a controversy on Fox News when I suggested that Bernie Madoff might do more good than harm in the long run - there are some good investing lessons for everyone to note.

Don’t get me wrong. Madoff himself is a despicable person. Over a twenty-year period, he created the world’s biggest Ponzi scheme worth an estimated $65 billion. Hundreds of individuals, retirees, and charities were hurt or destroyed by Madoff’s deception.

He deserved to get the maximum penalty (150 years).

Nevertheless, I look at all the positive side effects of the Madoff scandal. Here are the three most valuable lessons we can learn from the biggest crime on Wall Street in a hundred years.

Investigate before you invest

Millions have now learned a powerful investing lesson. Don’t blindly turn your hard-earned funds over to a money manager just because he

...

A reader left a lengthy comment about Modern Portfolio Theory that you can read here. Where better to go to discuss theory than the Delta Tau Chi house at Faber College? Fortunately this post will be short as I am no MPT scholar. First here is the Investopedia quick and dirty on MPT. Basically the reader aspires to be a money manager, spent some time working for someone very big in the industry who succeeded by not using MPT and so the reader seems conflicted by this. Really, I don't think the reader is conflicted, he doesn't believe in it, maybe that will be temporary or maybe not. MPT is a very important building block for professional management of a portfolio. The principles behind it are important and despite the reader's experience and what is contained in this link left by the ...