Donations (Photo credit: Matthew Burpee)

While some people are just catching on to crowdfunding, others have been savvy to it for years.  The idea behind crowd funding is quite brilliant: raise small donations from a high number of people to fund your project.  Most people don’t mind throwing in $5 to a project they find intriguing. Or at least if it’s someone they care about.  Thousands of films, documentaries, books, games etc. have successfully been funded. Sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo are raking in the money by being the platform for these artists to fundraise.  Kickstarter has hit over a million dollars for a single project more than once.  So why isn’t everyone using crowd funding for projects? Well, it’s starting to look like small business and inventors are.

Banks: they’re a necessary evil. They pretend to look after our financial interests but really they’re just looking after their own. Some banks are worse than others. For example, in South Africa, banks charge people to deposit money, withdraw money, transfer money (even between accounts in the same name), and make payments, and that’s not counting monthly bank charges and other ‘admin fees’. By and large, the interest rates that banks all over the world charge on loans also borders on criminal. So, who is on the consumer’s side? Who monitors banks and ensures that they behave as ethically as possible?

Enter bank examiners.

Bank examiners are the watchmen of the banking world. They poke around behind the scenes to determine whether banks operate within the rules and regulations, whether their policies are fair and ethical, whether their procedures run smoothly and whether staff follow these procedures, protocols and keep proper records of all transactions. Bank examiners all check to see that staff are properly trained and qualified for their jobs.

Bank examiners can work for governmental departments, regulating bodies and banks themselves – to ensure that financial institutions don’t incur any penalties owing to dodgy practices.

Loan (Photo credit: Philip Taylor PT)

There are several categories of loans small business owners can pursue while trying to fund their start-up company. Before choosing which type of loan to capitalize on, you should know the advantages and disadvantages of the two most common categories of business loans.

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There are many online broker firms today that allow their users to personally conduct their own trading ventures for a small fee. This appeals to many individuals because it gives them a sense of control over their own portfolios. However, the process for placing a trade through an online brokerage is not as simple as clicking a button or an icon.

With the company Scottrade there are three different steps to perform for a basic stock or ETF trade. First there is the market trade, where the security is traded at the current price in the market. To accomplish this type of transaction the user clicks on the trade button found on the ‘Quick Quotes’ page. Next, select whether the action is to buy or sell and the total number of shares for the transaction. Follow this with the stock symbol of the company or the ETF symbol. Now the trader should click on the ‘Type Order’ button and select ‘Market.’ After the type of order has been selected, duration for the 'time in force' needs to be chosen. Market orders are only valid for the trading day that they are placed; therefore the time in force needs to reflect this stipulation. At this point, the trader will be asked to review the order. If everything is how it should be, then the user should place the trade.

The Mutual Fund Store office, 37308 Six Mile Road, Livonia, Michigan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Investing your money into appropriate investment cycles requires financial sense in order to keep earning steep profits. Before you begin investing your money, there are certain aspects that you must look into. Investment not only requires money, but also wise financial management that can help you earn greater profits.

Many investors have lost all their savings just because they invested impulsively. On the other hand, investors with low finance have been able to make big money just because of their financial prudence. Before you start investing, ask yourself five questions mentioned below:

Philippine stock market board (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The American stock market index, as will all such markets around the world, is subject to ups and downs on a daily basis that are caused by numerous factors. For example, who could have predicted the 9/11 terrorists attacks, which had a huge negative impact on world stock markets? When Lehman Brothers, a major American investment bank, collapsed in 2008, the value of all stocks and company shares in the USA fell dramatically. More recently, the Greek debt situation has had an adverse impact not only in Europe but also on the American stock market, as has the political unrest in Syria.

found photo: business leaders (Photo credit: squareintheteeth)

When opening a new business in London, the key to success is finding the right team to make it work. In business, just like in sport, teamwork is the key. And the quality that holds any great team together is the mysterious and mercurial ‘morale’.
Look at any great team in any field of life, whether it’s the current Barcelona football team or the team of web wizards behind the success of Google, and you’ll notice several things they have in common.

While individual brilliance is definitely needed for success, without a strong team unit individuals are unable to shine. The driving force behind any team is morale, or team spirit, a quality that is difficult to define and even more difficult to create. It involves all the team members being happy, comfortable and confident in their roles. But more than that, it is about each individual working for the greater good.

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You've kept your business receipts religiously. The dozen file folders you just pulled out, one for each month, that are brimming with restaurant receipts, office supplies receipts, gas receipts and mileage and maintenance receipts give testimony of your most excellent efforts. As you begin sorting them, you start feeling queasy, and a light sheen of perspiration breaks out across your forehead: Older receipts have faded, and now you can't read them! How are you going to justify the legitimate business expenses on your taxes? Don't automatically throw them away: You might be able to salvage their usefulness anyway.

One of the most revered presidents of the world bank is stepping down. Appointed by President George Bush in 2007, Robert Zoellick was World Bank President for five years, until today when he stepped down. He came from a highly experienced background as a US Trade Representative, former deputy Secretary of State, and working at Goldman Sachs before taking up the presidential seat of the largest bank in the world.

Crisis Initiative Achievements

Zoellick has been recognized as being the positive driving force behind World Bank’s historical role during the most recent economic crisis. During his tenure Zoellick used record financial capacity to assist developing countries with growth and poverty eradication.

This amazing businessman was the first person to alert the developing world to the food crisis that was about to hit and made a point of lending an additional $6billion per year to ensure agriculture could keep up with the demand.

The value of the equity invested in business not publicly traded is known as the private equity market.

Why not just get a bank loan?

Since the early 1970’s the private equity market has been growing steadily.  The private equity market continues performing strongly and is still in growth today despite the still unfavorable financial climate.  A greater proportion of equity is generated across the private equity market as venture capitalists invest less and less regularly and with smaller financial commitments.  Banks are becoming highly reluctant to lend with the economy remaining so volatile.  Businesses are looking more than ever to the private equity market to raise capital.