During the “Go-Go” Wall Street days of a few years ago, some companies got rich by being middle-men between 401k mutual funds and short sellers who wanted to borrow their stock.
The short sellers put up collateral, agreed to pay dividends, and paid a small amount of interest. These middle-men companies took a big slice of [...]
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac own or guarantee nearly half the $12 trillion U.S. mortgage market. Not long ago, they were the darlings of Wall Street, ranking next to U.S. bonds as among the safest and most conservative investments in the world.
Preferred shares of these GSEs (”government-sponsored enterprises”) were considered so safe that banking [...]
A mutual fund is a collection of money, pooled together by all of its investors, used to purchase specific types of securities. These investments within these mutual funds are decided by investment professionals who will run the mutual fund. The professional picks from a wide choice of stocks, bonds, money market instruments, or other financial [...]
