The Sun’s Financial Diary

May 2009 turned to be another solid month for our net worth as the stock market recorded its third straight monthly gain. After reaching the lows on March 9, which now seems to be the bottom of the stock market, the Dow has gained nearly 30% as of May 31, the Nasdaq almost 40%, and [...]

Not now, but in about two to three months.
We have been living in New Jersey for the past 13 years, moved a few times, but always in the state. Probably because of having been here for so long, we kind of like where we live. We think we are going to stay in NJ [...]

On top of the 9% gain in March, our net worth grew strongly in April, due to the robust rebound in the stock market, even though we took out cash last month to pay taxes. Without house and vehicle related items, our net worth at the end of April showed a gain of $58,504.90 to [...]

It seems we had a pretty good month in March. For the first time this year, our net worth actually went up by a rather significant amount with the help from the big rally in the stock market. Excluding house and cars, we had a total of $486,449.83 on March 31, an increase of $40,196.76, [...]

I was very surprised when I finished calculating our net worth at the end of February. With major stock indices losing more than 10% for the month, our net worth, with everything considered, only saw a moderate loss of $5,955.99 (1.32%) over a month ago to a total of $446,280.10 on February 28th.

Details of each [...]

After the 5.31% rebound in the last month of 2008, our net worth took a hit again in January, thanks to the 8.57% plunge (the S&P 500) of the stock market. On January 31, 2009, our net worth totaled at $452,236.08 without items related to house and cars. That’s $20,524.23 (4.34%) less than a month [...]

As I continue to review our finance, where I have covered trading, passive income, and net worth so far, the next item on my list is to examine our spending last year. The reason I want to check where our money went is the increase of our cash in 2008. Though the gain of nearly [...]

So far I have looked at how I traded stocks in 2008 and my passive income last year. Now it’s time to examine the progress on building up our net worth. Before I get to the details, one thing is for sure: It’s not pretty, as I have already shown through my monthly net worth [...]

OK, now it’s time to tally my passive incomes in 2008 as the second part of the 2008 Year In Review (the 2008 Stock Trades was the first part).
As you know, generating passive income, which I define as incomes without my active involvements, is one of the two goals that I have for my taxable [...]

I traded more stocks in 2008 than all I did in the past few years. Not that I suddenly became an active trader or anything like that. In fact, I have long been a buy and hold type of investor and I still am. Sometime, I felt that I may have been too buy-and-hold with [...]