Investment

In his State of the Union Address, President Obama barely touched on the country's soon-to-be $16 trillion national debt, massive joblessness, entitlement insolvency, economy-crippling government regulations and the other compelling issues ("Obama targets economy, taxes in address," Jan. 25). Sounding like an Occupy Wall Street interviewee, he once again attributed virtually all of the country's ills to the supposed failure of "millionaires and billionaires" to pay their "fair share.

T. Rowe Price Group's stake in Facebook Inc. more than tripled in value as the social networking giant went public Friday. At the close of the market Friday, T. Rowe's investment in Facebook was valued at $695.8 million. The Baltimore-based mutual fund company invested $190.5 million in Facebook last spring. Shares of Facebook finished trading at $38.23 — just 23 cents above the initial public offering price set by the company and its underwriters. T. Rowe holds 18.2 million Facebook shares, which are spread across 80 mutual funds and accounts controlled by the investment company, according to Facebook's IPO registration statement filed earlier this year.

SAVING THE city or creating a more prosperous state doesn't concern the pension boards of Baltimore City and the state of Maryland. For them, it appears, the less spent locally the better. That's why Mayor Martin O'Malley exploded at a recent Board of Estimates meeting over what he perceives as the trustees' anti-city attitude. The city's two pension boards are hurting, not helping, Baltimore. The mayor wasn't the first government leader to complain about the elitist, anti-local investment strategy of pension boards.

How long does it take for an investment to double in value? You can get a pretty good idea by using the "Rule of 72."Divide 72 by the total return your investment is earning. For example, if you invest $1,000 in a certificate of deposit earning 5 percent, you would have $2,000 in 14.4 years. (72 divided by 5 equals 14.4.)Warning: This rule works only if the annualized return remains stable for the life of your investment and you reinvest your earnings.Investors can use this rule when setting financial goals.

Plenty of people believe that mutual funds are such a simplistic investment that an educated chimp could pick a good one. But that doesn't mean you want to monkey around with that chimp's advice. "Sammy, the chatting chimp" claims to provide "astute accounting advice" in his column in the Weekly World News - the supermarket tabloid known for its extensive coverage of space aliens and Bigfoot - but what he really does is give a voice to some common misconceptions about money. Now I don't put too much stock in Sammy, but cynics would say that's because I'm trying to protect my job from a competitor.

Last week, I got a call from a stockbroker recommending an energy growth fund. I was told it is yielding 17 percent. Do you think this is risky? What is its potential for future income? How can I tell if the original investment is going up or down?In 1994, I lost some money in a bond fund, and now I'm kind of scared.The investment you are considering is not a mutual fund. Rather, it is an oil-and-gas limited partnership. As such, there is no accurate way to gauge whether the investment is going up or down until the partnership sells its assets, which probably will not happen for at least five to 10 years and most likely much longer.

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Women are increasingly attuned to the stock market and are making investment decisions for themselves and their families, according to a recent poll by Oppenheimer Funds.This is good news because many companies are discontinuing traditional pension plans and replacing them with "self-directed" retirement plans, requiring employees to be their own pension managers.At least 40 million Americans already have invested at least $1 trillion in 401(k) and related plans.Although the Oppenheimer poll shows that women in general don't have as firm a grip as men do on investment specifics, such as the relationship between interest rates and bond prices, they are eager to learn more.

NEW YORK -- The United States has been inundated with technological innovations in the past decade. We have been on a wonderful technological shopping spree. Innovation and change have become almost a way of life. Yet have we fully realized how this past decade has transformed our economic behavior? Our economy possibly has been pushed into an uncharted orbit and we are still viewing it with pre-Internet eyes. Clayton Christensen at Harvard University pioneered the concept of "disruptive technologies" -- new industries or technologies that replace existing ones because they are cheaper and more consumer friendly and, therefore, take over the market from the more established product or firm.

Forstmann Little & Co. has signed an initial agreement to invest $350 million for a one-third interest in Whittle Communications, the media company that was founded by Christopher Whittle.The investment would reduce the stakes in Whittle now held by Time Warner Inc., Associated Newspapers of London, Whittle and 60 Whittle executives.Forstmann Little, an investment firm that has historically specialized in leveraged buyouts while avoiding the "junk bonds" that characterized many of those deals in the 1980s, is expected to put up the $350 million in subordinated financing, convertible at a future date into a one-third equity stake.

AFTER I finished a talk at an investor conference in Newton, Mass., a woman approached me with a piece of paper in her hand. On it was written her investment portfolio. "There's just one thing I want to know," she said. "How could this happen to me?" Behind each investment on that paper, there was a story. Backing up each tale was one fundamental truth: With each purchase or sale, she had thought she was doing the right thing. Instead, she had wound up with a portfolio no investor would be proud to own, a mess of overlapping investments and strategies that, when viewed in hindsight, appear fairly certain to deliver mediocrity.