Personal Finance and Investing

If anyone ever deserved a visit from the ghosts of Christmases past, present and future it’s Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary.  He makes the original Scrooge look generous. If he isn’t suggesting that it is perfectly reasonable for people to stand up for a budget flight, he’s on national radio muttering about charging them to use the loo in mid-air.

And not all his ludicrous-sounding ideas are just about getting free publicity – a good few actually end up getting implemented. Just think – even five years ago, would you ever have thought you’d have to pay extra just to check in for your flight? Quite.   Anyway, this week O’Leary’s been at it again. Ryanai

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Although the economy and the credit sector is still far from being strong, there does seem to be small changes taking place that are giving many economists reason to be optimistic.

Creditors have begun extending credit to excellent credit card customers, also called “superprime” customers, as evident in the increase in credit card offers being delivered to the homes of these consumers.

In fact, credit card promotional mail volume rose 34 percent between September and October, which equals about 180 million pieces of new mail. This level is the highest it’s been since December 2008. It wa

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We’ve grown accustomed to bad news in the US over the past couple of years. Media outlets have been accused of celebrating that bad news, highlighting it in an effort to continue the ratings bonanza that started with people glued to cable news stations as the economy was falling apart. Over the past few months a little bit of good news has started to creep in, mostly around the stabilization of the financial markets and of the housing market. The job market has continued to be a source of consistently bad news, something that changed with the newly released November numbers.

November’s job losses were the mildest since the recession began two years ago. In

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You see those ads all the time, “Get approved today!”, or “Get approved within minutes!”. Does this really mean anything, or does it actually work, that is the question? Well, when it comes down to student credit cards, I don’t want to burst your bubble, but most of the time, it’s going to take a day or so to get approval, because many credit card companies are strict, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t apply.

The reason that many credit card companies won’t approve you instantly is based on your credit score. Since many college students generally don’t have a credit history, they aren’t just going to approve you, but instead, they need to verify that you’re going to college, and that you’re legitimate. They want to make sure th

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