Archive for January 14th, 2009
3 steps to online investing success…part 2
In the second of our three part series on what it takes to begin investing online I’m going to focus on some of the mechanics that you will need to follow.
The very first thing you should do is think! Not too hard then? Yes you need to decide on what approach you will take. Do you want to have a totally passive income, are you willing to market opportunities to others, would you be willing to spend some time in front of a computer every day to complete various tasks and perhaps most importantly what will you do about the tax on any earnings you make.
Addressing the last point first (as it’s important) it may pay great dividends to spend some time setting up your tax status before anything else. If you are looking to minimise your tax liability (legally of course) then take a look at Sovereign Life otherwise make sure that you make allowances by saving some of your proceeds for any taxes that become due. If you are able you should take full advantage of existing tax laws in your country so that you pay your taxes as late as possible. You won’t avoid them but hopefully you can use the funds to earn interest whilst they are available to you.
The next thing you should do is open an payment account. In the very early days of online investing credit card companies were happy to be used for providing funds to various programs. It soon became clear however, that crooks saw the opportunity provided by credit card companies to undertake charge backs that created fraudulent transactions. As a result it is now almost impossible to use credit cards for these types of program. Below I explain one way that this is now partially overcome.
Hence the need for an payment account. Some of the popular ones are AlertPay, Liberty Reserve and c-gold. Which one you choose will depend upon personal circumstances and how you can fund them. Also, online programs often dictate which payment options they take so you could end up with having an account with each of them.
As a start AlertPay is one that you should look at. Firstly it has the ability to accept direct payments from your bank (please check to make sure that this is available in your country as there are some restrictions). Also, when your account is validated you are able to associate two credit cards with your account. This allows you to send payments to programs and pay by credit card. Note that there is a limit of $250 per card per month currently so it may not be suitable for all your needs.
If you need to purchase Liberty Reserve or c-gold you will need to use the services of another third-party company and again there are many to choose from. Market leaders in this field are London Gold Exchange and Eforexgold.I would recommend London Gold Exchange as they have been in business for many years and their processing is very fast. If you live in an appropriate country you can also set up your account to make payments directly from your bank account.
As with all online transactions nowadays you should be prepared to provide verification of your details to all of these companies as without it they cannot do business with you. Also, remember that they are in existence to make a profit so you will be charged for their services. It’s important to build these charges into your calculations when determining how much to invest.
In our final post we’ll take a look at the various types of program available and how someone who is just starting out might begin.
FAP Turbo Forum roller coaster ride…
I thought it would be interesting for those who are considering a purchase of FAP Turbo to give you an insight on the happenings inside the member only forum.
Once you purchase the EA you get access to the forum and there are some very interesting discussions going on.
As the forum started there was a lot of discussion around which broker to use as many people weren’t that keen on the one being recommended by the FAP Turbo guys.
As the days went by much to-ing and fro-ing of opinions were generated and I think for many the whole thing became somewhat chaotic to the point that specific recommendations to suit everyone wasn’t a reality. Much of the wrangling centred around the spreads that the brokers were offering for the traded currency pairs. Whilst this debate hasn’t fully subsided there is some evidence that brokers such as FxPro are looking better than others, although even they still have detractors.
Other conversations relate to getting the latest version of FAP Turbo to work. As you might recall I published a post a few days ago advising that version 36 was now available. It seems that some users are still experiencing problems which is somewhat frustrating. Unfortunately the FAP Turbo support team still appear to be buried so people are getting frustrated when seeking help. Hopefully this situation will resolve in the next few days especially as version 23 expires on 15 January.
Not so much talk at the moment about Virtual Private Server (VPS) providers so it seems that most people are finding a service that they are comfortable with.
Personally, apart from the activation issue I had with version 36 and which was quickly resolved by following the advice given I am trading with no real problems. I’m hoping that over the next two weeks or so that I can give a full endorsement to FAP Turbo but I do want to wait to make sure that posts on the forum become somewhat more positive.
Once you purchase the EA you get access to the forum and there are some very interesting discussions going on.
As the forum started there was a lot of discussion around which broker to use as many people weren’t that keen on the one being recommended by the FAP Turbo guys.
As the days went by much to-ing and fro-ing of opinions were generated and I think for many the whole thing became somewhat chaotic to the point that specific recommendations to suit everyone wasn’t a reality. Much of the wrangling centred around the spreads that the brokers were offering for the traded currency pairs. Whilst this debate hasn’t fully subsided there is some evidence that brokers such as FxPro are looking better than others, although even they still have detractors.
Other conversations relate to getting the latest version of FAP Turbo to work. As you might recall I published a post a few days ago advising that version 36 was now available. It seems that some users are still experiencing problems which is somewhat frustrating. Unfortunately the FAP Turbo support team still appear to be buried so people are getting frustrated when seeking help. Hopefully this situation will resolve in the next few days especially as version 23 expires on 15 January.
Not so much talk at the moment about Virtual Private Server (VPS) providers so it seems that most people are finding a service that they are comfortable with.
Personally, apart from the activation issue I had with version 36 and which was quickly resolved by following the advice given I am trading with no real problems. I’m hoping that over the next two weeks or so that I can give a full endorsement to FAP Turbo but I do want to wait to make sure that posts on the forum become somewhat more positive.
