The Gold IRA: A Brilliant Opportunity

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Great investments come and go, but for more than 5,000 years gold has provided value, stability, and safety for its owners. And moving forward, stability is going to be a critical and even primary consideration to any element in any IRA portfolio. The $18 trillion dollar debt that the U.S. has and continues to amass is ultimately destined to wreak havoc on global economies. It’s not even a question of if, but when. And gold has a long and proven track record of successfully defending its investors from inflation, deflation, and general currency debasement.

Existing laws allow qualified retirement plans, such as traditional IRA’s, Roth IRA’s, Thrift Savings Plans (TSP), Self Employed Pensions (SEP), 401(a), 401(k), 403(b), 457, and others to be rolled over, or transferred into a self-directed IRA plan with a custodian capable of protecting and holding your physical metal. Possession of physical metal is critical, because the metal itself contains the value.

Due to the overblown hassle and expense of the physical ownership of gold, particularly in an IRA, financial instruments such as gold stocks have been created and presented as comparable alternatives. But at the end of the day, a stock or certificate of ownership is only as good as the institution, country, or whatever is backing the “value” of the certificate. “Ownership is nine tenths of the law” has never been so important or well represented.

This is why it is of the utmost importance that you align yourself with an accredited, respected and experienced organization like American Bullion, which professionally handles numismatic and physical metal related investments and takes particular pride in making gold investment through an IRA a safe, simple and brilliant opportunity.

Vapor Cigarettes: Harm Reduction?

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Cool.  Refreshing.  Safe?

Electronic cigarette usage has skyrocketed in the past several years appearing in many forms such as “hookah pens” to the popular “Blu E-Cigs”.  Tobacco fans across the world seem to be excited about the developing sensation of “vapor”, which is not exactly toxic smoke, but a variation that seems to be a less harmful substitute.

Marlboro4wiki2Electronic cigarettes could be considered a method of quitting traditional cigarettes, switching to vapor & tapering from higher levels of nicotine to little or no nicotine.  At this point the user is inhaling flavored “vapor”, which doesn’t carry the same toxins found in cigarette smoke.

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Electronic cigarettes are such a recent phenomenon it makes the long term effects difficult to forecast. Compared to traditional cigarette smoking, electronic cigarettes seem like a clear form of harm reduction, but let’s not celebrate just yet. There are some factors to consider;  What about middle school and high school students who catch on to this trend?  They see their role models such as Stephen Dorff on TV ads, looking cool, taking a nice smooth drag from an E-Cig, and it’s game on.  Also, many people will use electronic cigarettes between smoking cigarettes in areas where regular cigarette smoking is not permitted.  In these cases it wouldn’t be harm reduction, but adding another method of depriving organs like the lungs and brain of oxygen.

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Electronic cigarettes may be fun, relaxing, and help you to look cool, but the fact is we have only scratched the surface of the effect they have on your body.  The best way to quit something is to find a healthy alternative. Electronic cigarettes aren’t healthy, but if they assist people who are struggling to quit cigarette smoking, more power to them.

 

Golden “Good Luck Charm” Gets Man Booted From Brazilian Flight

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Austrian businessman, Werner Rydl was apprehended yesterday in the town of Varzea Grande, Brazil for attempting to board his plane with a 23-ounce gold bar.  This gold bar is referred to as a “good luck charm”, which Rydl has kept by his side throughout his travels worldwide.

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Rydl’s lawyer states, “He’s travelled the world with this bar of gold and till now nothing had happened”

Brazilian authorities claim that it is not permitted to travel with that amount of gold without a receipt.  Customs requirements vary depending on where you travel.  Precautions like these are implemented to prevent criminal activity such as smuggling.  In the case of Rydl, I trust he won’t forget to bring the necessary documentation along with his gold bar next time he’s in Brazil.

Jay Z & Tidal Streaming Music

JAYZJay Z announced this morning that he will be unveiling his new music streaming service “Tidal”.   This service will stand alone as the only streaming music provider to offer high-res audio instead of compressed mp3 like rival providers such as Spotify.  This will of course come at a higher cost to the consumer, who will decide if the upgrade to higher quality vs. standard quality is worth the service fee. tidal-share.9d1c0023Tidal’s services start at $9.99 for a Premium subscription.  Membership will feature exclusive content and access to music & video.

The Rise of Snapchat

Snapchat_LogoIn the past 3 years, Snapchat has grown from a simple photo/video sharing application aimed towards teenagers, into a multi-functional resource for communication,  live global events, and updates in world news.  Unlike Instagram & Facebook, pictures and videos are temporary, leaving a maximum of 10 seconds to be viewed.  The idea is, there doesn’t need to be a good reason to “snap” a picture/video, because it’s temporary.  This concept has people “snapping” nearly anything that occurs throughout their day, from a morning cup of coffee to a selfie among friends.

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Snapchat’s most recent development is a feature called “Discover”.  With the discover option, users can view the latest trends within categories from various popular networks such as CNN, ESPN, National Geographic, etc.  screen shot 2015-01-27 at 11.50.04 amThe Discover feature will create a one stop shop for users to check the news, sports updates, upcoming events, and of course interact with friends and family through pictures/video.

 

Nintendo Gaming To Go Mobile

nintendo-150951_640Fans and shareholders of Nintendo products will be happy to hear that the popular gaming franchise has expanded into the mobile universe.  Devices such as smart phones and tablets will offer Nintendo brand games in the near future.  This announcement has caused a surge in Nintendo’s stock price a whopping 28% overnight.  154434519_624Expect to see your favorite Nintendo apps available for your iOS & Android devices in the next few years.  What games are we most excited to see on our mobile devices?

Will Ferrel’s #Ferreltakesthefield

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Will Ferrel has played some memorable sport’s characters in his acting career;  A competitive boy’s soccer coach in “Kicking and Screaming”; basketball team owner, Jackie Moon in “Semi-Pro”;  Figure skater, Chazz Michael Michaels in “Blades of Glory”; and of course NASCAR driver, Ricky Bobby in “Talladega Nights”.

Ferrel’s most recent sports act took him into the realm of professional baseball, and not just one position, but EVERY position within ten teams… 

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Within one day, Ferrel traveled to 5 different cactus league ballparks and suited up to play a few positions for each team.  These were only spring training games so Ferrel’s participation will not impact the teams in the regular season.  The event #Ferreltakesthefield was documented for an HBO special and dedicated to the fight against cancer.  All in all, a pretty classy move from Mr. Ferrel.

 

Anticipation & Apprehension for the Apple Watch

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The clock is ticking… The dawn of the Apple Watch era is nearly upon us.  Apple is ready to enter its first model into the smart watch game, which has aroused speculation that is anything but certain.  How will it fare against other smart watches?  What will it introduce to make it a quintessential Apple product? And is it a concept that Apple can make soar as they have in the past with laptops, phones and tablets? – We are forced to sit in anticipation until the release of the product on April 24th.apple-store-customers-line-600x399

This is a fresh young branch that has stemmed from Apple’s “tree” of technologies.  At this stage, we really don’t know how it will be implemented among other devices.   What will create the demand for this product?  Will it replace every watch I own? Will I be able to leave my iPhone at home when I wear it?  These are questions I look forward to asking on April 24th.

 

Michael Jordan is Forbes “Rookie of the Year”

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Welcome to the billionaire club Michael Jordan!  Forbes magazine released their annual list on Monday morning that included MJ among the worlds wealthiest individuals.  With an estimated net worth of $1 Billion, Jordan is positioned at the 1,741 spot on the list.  Pretty low in comparison to the higher ranking billionaires like Bill Gates & Mark Zuckerberg, but I’m sure Jordan is plenty satisfied with where he sits.

I don’t think this is the last milestone we’ll see Michael Jordan reach.  If His Airness has taught us anything, it’s that his ability to soar is not confined to the basketball court.