Here's an interesting story, which speaks volumes about the psychological dynamic of the markets. On Friday the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) will report on end-of-season inventories, often called 'ending stocks.' Traders are getting word the report may show inventories are lower-than-usual. Against that backdrop, as a trader you certainly don't want to take a short position. So what to do? You buy, of course.

Monday's buying drove corn prices to a record high of $7.6025 per bushel, up 24.25 cents, as reported in the Wall Street Journal. Country Hedging, a brokerage firm, said: "Federal forecasters could drop the projection to less than 500 million bushels from last month's 675 million. This is a 15 year low."

Most investors would like a "do over."

They look back on certain investments and wish they'd never heard of, much less put money in them. Sure things like your good friend's invention that would make beer in one day from water and weeds. Or your brother's idea of selling real estate on Saturn. Everyone has their own stories. Mine are usually related to private investments in the medical device field or biotech, though I did have one out of Florida that made a "pig" that ran through oil pipelines to check on their safety. After meeting the founder who looked more like a used car salesman that caught a great sale on polyester suits, I should have known better right then. But I didn't.

Are credit card rates too high? The answer is a resounding YES! The Federal Reserve just gave the banks $600 billion in cash in the form of a second round of quantitative easing. What are they doing with it? Raising the rates on credit cards, of course, so they can turn that $600 billion into $1.2 trillion in four years.

You are probably wondering how they are doing this. It's very simple. If you use the rule of 72s, at 18%, money doubles itself every four years (you divide 72 by the rate of interest).

The Dow broke 12,000 today. What's next? Again we have those who say the glass is half full and those who say it is half empty.

Traders believe that the glass is half full. Dow 12,000 is only a number, although a psychological number. Round numbers catch the public's attention. There will be sellers screaming 'get me out' if they have recouped their losses. The market probably will absorb the half empty guys and march upward. That may not be a straight line, but the momentum is strong enough to push higher.

When searching for a mutual fund, what do you look for? Obviously, you want solid performance over time. Many funds are flashy but only shine for a year or two then fall by the wayside.

The Wall Street Journal features two no-load funds that have topped their peers. What sets them apart is that they don't follow the crowd. They do intensive research and filter out all but a few holdings. They are not index traders.

Sometimes trouble and dissatisfaction propel us to move out of the box, to create something new and different. Such was the case of the World Gold Council. Founded in 1987 by a group of mining companies, its primary goal is to promote the use of gold.

For nearly 20 years the organization plodded along with little success. Then Chris Thompson, the group's chairman came up with the idea of creating a gold fund that would allow ordinary investors to buy into the gold market without either buying physical gold or gold futures. So in 2004, the Council created the SPDR Gold Shares Fund, as reported in the Financial Times.

Personal bankruptcy filings have been climbing steadily since 2007 when the U.S. tumbled into a deep recession. With unemployment near 10%, bankruptcy filings are on the rise.

For the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, more that 1.5 million non-business bankruptcy filings were processed, according to data released by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts and reported in CNNMoney. That's a 14% increase from 2009.

Say you have $20,000 to $100,000 to invest. You can put it in stocks, hope to make a 10% return over time, and if the market moves up, you could walk away with an extra $2,000 to $10,000 before taxes. Or, you could take that same investment, and put it into something that could generate far greater returns.

James Altucher, Managing Director of Formula Capital, says that a better way to reap big returns is to exploit your employer. (See video.)

Let the good times roll. Those 0% APR credit cards are back. For more than a year credit card companies have been slashing credit lines and raising rates to astronomical levels. Much of the delinquencies have been wrung out of the system. Delinquency rates are down 26% from a year ago.

With that pressure lifted, card companies are sending out 0% promotion letters to customers with credit scores 720 or higher, as reported in Smart Money and the Wall Street Journal. The number of promotions is up 71% from 53%. Promotions are for a longer period, 21 months instead of the 12 months last year.

The U.S. stock market had its best September since 1939, as reported in the Financial Times. The S&P index gained 8.8%.

If we look around we'll find analysts on both sides of the market now. The market is at a crossroads, sitting right at resistance levels. If we break through this resistance, we could see it go higher.

The bulls are saying that this is the biggest opportunity in decades. The bears are in there selling, looking for a correction. The short index, as a percent of total shares, stands at for the S&P hit 4.61%, the highest since November 2009.

Having accepted a speaking engagement at a university school of business recently, I had to think about what introductory information I could impart to the students about investing that would be practical, immediately useful and establish a foundation for whatever direction their paths might lead. This was supposed to be the first in a series. However, since I pull no punches and can be a little edgy in my candor and presentation, who knew if I would be invited back?

My outline had five basic elements. The first thing I told them was to start now!

How much do you owe on your credit card? If you owe $4,951 your debit balance is average. This is down from 13% from $5,719, according to Trans Union and The Associated Press.

The credit reporting agency said that this was the first time since 2002 that balances fell below $5,000. Late payments fell to less than 1%, down from 1.17% last year.