Back in September, we had a peso forecasting game that elicited more or less 56 entries from MoneySmart readers and made many of us giddy with excitement .

It’s time to reveal the winner!

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Willy Arcilla is the image of the consummate Filipino executive OFW. He speaks with a neutral accent-slash-zero twang, is always in a suit (at least during the last couple of times I saw him in a public event), attentive all the time, and hands out his calling cards in that endearing Asian way (holding the lower left and right corners with forefinger and index finger).

I first met him at a press conference raving about Vietnam’s economic miracle. Here was yet another Filipino who had the skills this country needed, but loved another country other than his own, I thought. I was wrong.

Willy is one of the growing number of Filipinos who have gone against the tide of migration at a time thousands move out on a daily basis. And as regional manager of executive search firm ZMG Ward Howell, he is now helping other professional OFWs find well paying and challenging jobs right here in the country.

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(Photo from Agence France-Presse)

Malacanang has just confirmed plans to cut tariff on oil and petroleum product imports to 2% from 3%, hoping this will cushion the blow from rising oil prices overseas. Tariff, by the way, is in layman terms simply a tax on imported products. (Err, I don’t understand why they have to invent another word for “tax” heh) Wiki explains that it is the simplest and easiest way to collect taxes since it has to be paid so the product can land on shore.

Chopping off a one-percentage-point means around 35% reduction in tariff. President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo says she is hoping this will help “every Filipino family.”

Boy, do we all need that relief. We’re all feeling the pinch, wherever we are in the world. Oil has hit $100 a few days ago, just as many price watchers feared and everyone – from the balut vendor to the bigwigs at San Miguel Corp. – will have to think of a way to deal with it. Reuters came out with an interesting article that showed how a Beijing cab driver to a vendor selling food wrapped in banana leaves in Jakarta will suffer even more if oil climbs higher to beyond $100.

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Filipinos are still on a home-buying spree, even as the US housing sector still reels from the effects of the subprime mortgage mess. Thanks to money flowing in from Filipinos working overseas, the real estate sector in the Philippines seems to be set for another big year in 2008.

It’s good money flowing in for good reasons. At least, Filipinos are putting their money in something that will last and even appreciate in value, as opposed to appliances, cars and latest mobile phone models. Hello iPod? (Read this article on what families of OFWs do with money wired to them regularly.)

But although buying a home can be pretty straightforward (ok a bit challenging too), buying home insurance can feel like going through a maze. This article from our personal finance section says there are three MUST-ASK questions when buying home insurance (excerpt below):

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It’s fashionable to mock New Year resolutions because they often end up as 7-day wonders or even less. We’re so used to multi-tasking at the risk of focusing on nothing that I do get why focusing on two or three things that matter most can be met with such pessimism.

But I rather like making a list of goals and checking it twice (a day). In the first page of my 3-year journal (yes, I still keep one and it’s not digital!), it says “the palest ink is better than the brightest memory.” That’s an ancient Chinese proverb that I hope I won’t forget in the next 10 years. We all need every chance we can get to think more deeply about what we want, what we should focus our energies on, and a chance to start all over again. New beginnings…

So here are some ideas for New Year resolutions for money-smart geeks. Do jump in if you have other suggestions, because deepening the discussion can only do us more good!

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