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By JESSICA SILVER-GREENBERG Amid all the junk mail pouring into your house in recent months, you might have noticed a solicitation or two for a “professional card,” otherwise known as a small-business or corporate credit card. If so, watch out. While J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.’s Ink from ...Read More

By ELEANOR LAISE Computer-driven mutual funds, chastened by a string of poor results and a wave of redemptions, are striving to bring more of a human touch to their investment decisions. Journal Reports Read the complete Investing in Funds report . These so-called quantitative funds, which rely largely ...Read More

Hey, retirees: Looking for a way to bring in more money? Give back all the Social Security checks you have received so far. But you had better do it fast, since this loophole could soon close. An often-overlooked provision allows Social Security recipients to withdraw their original application ...Read More

There is a new regulator in town. Will it make a real difference?The newly established Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has a wide-ranging mandate and broad powers for investigating and regulating things like checking accounts, credit cards, and education and home loans.There always is the risk that it will ...Read More

By AMY HOAK A growing number of homeowners are choosing to pay down their mortgages at a faster rate–even if it means a substantial jump in their monthly payments.Between January and June, 26% of homeowners who refinanced chose a 15-year fixed-rate mortgage, according to data from CoreLogic, a ...Read More

By GREGORY ZUCKERMAN Amid growing worries about deflation, or a sustained period of falling prices, some analysts recommend that investors buy bonds, which can do better in that kind of dangerous environment.But interest rates on all kinds of bonds are at such skimpy levels that fixed income may ...Read More

By JEFF D. OPDYKE “It isn’t fair.”I’d be willing to bet that somewhere, some kid is uttering those words at this very moment. And most likely the outburst was triggered by sibling rivalry.Amy and I got a taste of it (hardly our first) a while back when we ...Read More

By JONNELLE MARTE New rules taking effect today could make giving and receiving gift cards more appealing.The regulations, which are part of the Credit Card Act, apply to retail gift cards for individual stores as well as cards with a MasterCard, Visa, American Express or Discover logo that ...Read More

By JANE J. KIM View Full Image A similar hedging approach involves buying protective puts on stocks you already own in your portfolio. Say you own shares of International Business Machines Corp., which are trading at about $127. For about $7.60 you could buy a put that allows ...Read More

Investors who follow the adage buy low, sell high may want to avoid airline “bonus mileage” programs. Travelers who buy frequent-flier miles pay about 3 cents per mile, but then they typically redeem them for tickets at 1.5 cents each—or even less. Then they found they could sell ...Read More