Financial Literacy

The NASD announced a $10-million project Tuesday to provide information and tools to help investors better understand the financial markets as more and more Americans entrust their money to Wall Street. The initiative, spearheaded by the NASD's nonprofit Investor Education Foundation, comes as popular investments such as mutual funds are marred in an improper-trading scandal, which has heightened the importance of disclosure.

Warren Buffett, ukulele-strumming folk singer? The billionaire investor debuted his musical chops just in time for the Year of the Dragon, performing “I've Been Working on the Railroad” for a Chinese television station on the first day of the Lunar New Year. In the clip, the Oracle of Omaha is clad in a simple sweater and backed by a large model railroad set as he croons in a slighty gruff voice. At the end of his set, the Berkshire Hathaway chairman waves and says “xie xie,” or “thank you” in Mandarin.

Los Angeles officials are considering a plan to turn the library card into a form of identification that the city's large illegal immigrant population could use to open bank accounts and access an array of city services. The City Council unanimously voted recently to consider the proposal, which would have Los Angeles join the growing number of cities across the nation that offer various forms of identification to undocumented workers and others who cannot get driver's licenses because of their immigration status.

More college students are overusing credit cards, academics and policy makers said Thursday as they urged Congress to act on the problem. "Often it's their unknowing parents who end up dealing with the debt," Ellen Frishberg, director of student financial services at Johns Hopkins University, told the Senate Banking Committee. Of undergraduates, 83% had at least one credit card last year, up from 67% in 1998, according to a study by Nellie Mae, a provider of student loans.

The Clinton administration is proposing a $30-million plan to help millions of low-income people open low-cost, basic bank accounts, Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers said Monday. An estimated 10% of U.S. households, or about 10 million families, do not have bank accounts, in part because of rising bank and ATM fees, the closing of bank branches in poor city neighborhoods and rural towns, and distrust of banks in general.

Directors of the Borrego Springs Bank, which specializes in financial services for Native Americans, have given the go-ahead for the bank's majority shareholder -- the Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians -- to buy out minority investors. The proposed deal would pay $23.7 million in cash to minority shareholders in the three-branch San Diego County bank, which had struggled for many years.

Financial institutions have been increasingly recognizing the potential of Southern California's ethnic and minority communities. One of the latest efforts to foster economic development in those communities is a $77-million, three-year pilot program launched by Merrill Lynch, the Greenlining Institute and the Orange County Alliance. The program is taking a three-pronged approach to investment in ethnically diverse neighborhoods in Orange and Los Angeles counties.

Simple question: How much of a weekly allowance do you give your kids? According to a survey from the American Institute of CPAs , which presumably knows a thing or two about how we use our money, the average allowance these days is $15. Seriously. Fifteen bucks. And as if that wasn't an eye-opening enough number, the CPAs also say that kids aren't even saving their cash. They tend to spend it as quickly as they receive it. "These findings make clear that it can pay to be a kid," says Jordan Amin, chair of the institute's National CPA Financial Literacy Commission.

PERUNDURAI, India - When visitors approach, the flightless birds with the large eyes and jerky necks kick their neighbors and peck at their sores as they crowd against the fence, desperate for food and a bit of attention after being all but abandoned last month. In this part of southern India known for scams that vary from teak plantations and gold to real estate and foreign exchange, this was a con with a difference. Rather than dangling the usual bling to attract investors to their get-rich-quick scheme, these "entrepreneurs" used emus.

Investor education has never been a top priority for state spending in California, and that's truer than ever in these budget-strapped times. Lacking specific funding for educational outreach, the Department of Corporations, the state securities regulator, runs occasional seminars and workshops at which enforcement officials offer tips on avoiding investment scams, according to spokeswoman Kam Coveyou. The agency also provides information by mail and over its Web site, at www.corp.ca.