Money

Question: When is a loan considered income? Answer: When a bank wants a way to justify slipping a credit card into the wallet of a college student. That’s the contention of Jim Hawkins of the University of Houston Law Center, an assistant professor and author of a soon-to-be-published research study. The report , based on surveys of 500 students at the University of Houston and Baylor University    .. more …

By Mitch Lipka(Reuters) – Vitaly Pecharsky , chief technology officer for the shopping site SlickDeals.net, is something of a credit card collector and has 40 active credit cards to show for his passion.”I have cards for every situation in life,” says Pecharsky, 32, who lives in Las Vegas, Nevada . His portfolio of cards – the oldest of which he’s had for 16 years – grows when there’s a credit    .. more …

WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans took out more loans to buy cars and attend school in February but used their credit cards less frequently for the second straight month. The Federal Reserve said Friday that consumers increased borrowing by $8.7 billion, the sixth straight monthly increase. The jump in borrowing was driven by $11 billion increase in the category that mostly measures demand for auto    .. more …

Low-rate credit cards provide an alternative to the more popular purchase or balance transfer cards, especially for those people who don’t want to constantly chase promotional rates.Many of these cards don’t charge a balance transfer fee so, on larger balances, it may be cheaper to opt for this type of card compared with an interest-free card, especially if you are unable to repay the balance    .. more …

The Chinese unit of Citigroup will be the first non-Asian bank to launch credit cards in China.The US-based bank announced on Monday that the move had been approved by China’s banking regulator.Citibank (China) will offer credit cards to Chinese customers later this year.Citi is looking to cash in on China’s increasing consumption, and had already established consumer and corporate banking    .. more …

Lenders are courting small-business owners like you with growing numbers of new credit cards and generous rewards programs. And it’s easy to see why. About 42% of small-business owners carry a credit-card balance, according to July 2011 data from the National Small Business Association in Washington, D.C.But the cards often lack consumer protections and thus, they can hurt or destroy your credit    .. more …

CardRatings.com, a consumer credit card comparison website, announces its picks for the worst credit card deals of 2011. These credit cards landed in CardRatings.com’s 2011 “hall of shame” by featuring exorbitant interest rates , hidden fine print, deceptive marketing and tacky card designs .Foster City, CA (PRWEB) January 09, 2012 The credit cards that made CardRatings.com’s list of worst credit    .. more …

MasterCard offers a large selection of different cards to choose from, like gift cards, prepaid cards, business cards, debit cards and of course, traditional credit cards. MasterCard customers have numerous rewards available to them through partnerships MasterCard has established. Also, throughout the year, MasterCard runs many different contests and promotions in which cardholders are entered to    .. more …

*Note: This was written by a Yahoo! contributor. Do you have a personal finance story that you’d like to share? Sign up with the Yahoo! Contributor Network to start publishing your own finance articles. Even with low “teaser rates” sometimes available on new credit cards, paying interest to the credit card company is a lousy use of money. And I am a heavy user of my credit cards – I do not use    .. more …

The first thing you should keep in mind is that you should only ask people whose recommendations you would value. For example, if you know someone with teeth that are not in good shape, you should probably avoid using their dentist, unless of course you notice that their teeth have improved since visiting their dental office. If not, you can always learn which practitioner not to visit, which can    .. more …