From Toyota’s massive recalls to Greece’s debt worries and subsequent rescue to Snowmaggedon burying the Mid-Atlantic states, there’s been a lot of turmoil around the world.  That’s why it’s great to have a nice long weekend (for some) with the President’s Day holiday on Monday.  Maybe you’ll watch the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.  There’s always the NBA All-Star Weekend too.  Maybe you’ll go watch Valentine’s Day on its namesake holiday with your special someone this Sunday.  If you’re solo this Valentine’s Day, you might want to opt for The Wolfman or Percy Jackson & The Olympians which also open this weekend.  This weekend also marks the start of the Lunar New Year and Asian people across the world will welcome the Year of the Tiger with celebration.  I can’t remember the last time so many events intersected in one weekend.  Whatever you do, I hope you have a good time.

So how accurate is it?  Well, over the past 40 years, it’s been correct 32 times or 80%.  While that’s a pretty heady percentage, it hasn’t been very accurate over the past decade with accuracy of just 60%.  In fact, the past decade has actually bogged down the theory’s accuracy and if you exclude it, the theory’s accuracy jumps to 87% over the 30 years from 1970 to 1999.

With that said, what’s the prediction this year?  January was a not a good month for the market and the S&P 500 dipped 3.82%.  That foretells a down year, but I’m going to bet that this is another year where the prediction is wrong and the market will actually repeat last year’s positive performance.  Here’s hoping I’m right.

Watch a video interview (when he was up to £30,000) with Charlie below.  Here’s a more up-to-date video.

Update 2/1/2010: The total is now over £195,000!

With the recent market declines, this month is not looking much better.  Whether this January ends up or down, I’m still confident that the market will continue its recovery and will reach its peak levels again.  And I’m not the only one.

The tax deadline may be in April, but it’s always good to get an early start.  If that’s you, here are some new tax items to be aware of when going through your returns.  Looking ahead, here’s a great article about 10 Astute Tax Moves in 2010.

1.       Don’t type in your PIN when getting gas at the pump.

2.       Only use Bank ATMs

3.       Monitor your accounts

For more information, read this article: Debit-Card ‘Skimming’ Scams.

If improving your credit is one of them, I suggest getting your credit report from annualcreditreport.com and then learning more about managing your credit at Credit Fairy.  There’s even some quizzes you can take at the latter.

I did pretty well on the Credit Myths Quiz only missing one, but I have to bone to pick on that one.  The third question states “Paying cash for every purchase hurts your credit.”  I said False, but the “correct” answer is True.  I still stand by my answer though because while paying cash doesn’t help with credit, I think the effect is actually none instead of negative.  So if you miss that one too, I don’t think you need to worry.  The Credit Literacy Quiz on the other hand is a whole ‘nother animal.

Happy New Year!  I hope everyone had a good time ringing in 2010.

Today also marks the 2^nd anniversary of this blog.  I totally forgot last year about this milestone, but was determined not to this year.  Mission accomplished.  Thanks to everyone out there for reading these past 2 years!  I appreciate all of your support.

The Aughts has been an interesting decade.  We experienced the peak of the dot-com boom and the subsequent bust, the September 11 terrorist acts, wars in the Middle East, hurricanes and earthquakes, the rise of social networking, the election of the first multiracial president of the United States, and the worst recession since the Great Depression.

With that said, here’s looking to a new year and a new decade.

Here’s another indicator related to the holiday: the Boston Snow Indicator.  This is where a white Christmas in Boston predicts an up market the following year.  There isn’t strong evidence for this, but given the blizzards in Boston, I’m hopeful.  The market has recovered a lot of lost ground this year, but it still has a long way to go to get back to summer 2008 levels.