It’s fun to see people in holiday mode. We all should have fun, despite the gloom-talk. We all should have a little bit of a break. We all should enjoy the Christmas parties and the delightful sounds and smells of Christmas. I love the festive spirit!

However, we will enjoy them more when we don’t have a Christmas-party-and-forget-the-financial-responsibilities-of-next-year kind of thinking. So, do shop and enjoy, but know your limits!

Here are the biggest stories of the week:
Personal Finance

Financial planning for the masses. Yes, a few banks are hunkering down and talking to those who are still on their way up. It only makes sense both business-wise and passion-wise, and this is exactly what the country needs. I still have many issues about how banks do business, but generally you come across some that actually help people.

Stolen holiday joy. As you jostle and shop within a crowd, make sure you secure your credit cards, ATM or debit cards, and other valuables. Losing them at this time of the year is no picnic in the park! And if you do, make sure you report the loss immediately to the bank. A great tip after I read this article is to memorize the numbers of banks’ hotlines so that you can immediately notify them if there is any problem. There are more tips, so check out the article.

How do you talk to your kids about financial difficulties? Do you feel comfortable telling them you’re broke? In this article, Parents talk money in recession-hit US, the author says kids have this sixth sense when something is wrong, thus there is no use hiding stuff from them. I agree. But I also suggest that you think carefully about how you are going to say things. Your children are NOT your therapists!

In this crisis, cash isn’t just king, it’s god, says Ralph Liew of the International Association of Registered Financial Consultants. These 300 cash-rich Chinese visit US to buy houses seem to be showing just that. While the West is depressed, they went shopping!

Some finds from the web that I found interesting this week. Tasha Gets Money Smart promised herself to move to a different company if she doesn’t get the raise she deserves. But she balances this off by making sure that she really deserves that raise. A huge part of personal finance for most of the world’s population is career planning. A lot of us will be making most of our wealth through our jobs, and it doesn’t make sense to get stuck in a dead-end one. But great pay and great jobs will not just happen to us, we have to plan them.

Frugal Pinoy asks what are you going to do with your extra cash this Christmas, a fitting question during this season. This is a highly personal decision, but one that needs careful thought. Too many of us just go through that windfall even before we receive them! Right now, I have been moving towards increasing my emergency fund.

Ready To Be Rich talks about how to survive a no spending day. Hey, I like this idea! How I wish I can do this, this holiday season. I would dare forecast, however, that a lot of us will be remembering Ready To Be Rich’s blog post come January when the bills come rushing in, heh.

Macroeconomy

No surprises again this week; we have all seen this in the headlines before.

2009 growth seen lowest in 8 years, say a couple of economists polled by Reuters.

“All economists revised down their 2009 forecasts to account for the impact of the worst global financial crisis in decades on the export-driven country of 90 million people. Forecasts ranged from 0.7 percent to 4.1 percent in 2009.”

Financial crisis to deepen in 2009, says the IMF and the Asian Development Bank is saying that emerging Asia’s growth will slacken to 4.5 percent this year and 3.5 percent next year.

For the 10 countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), it forecast growth averaging 3.5 percent. It said growth in emerging East Asia—comprising the ASEAN countries, China, Hong Kong, Taipei, and South—would slow down to 5.7 percent in 2009 from an estimated 6.9 percent this year. With the global economy facing a major downturn, the region’s economic resilience will be tested by weakening exports and a sharp slowdown in capital flows, the report said.”

Businessmen join Ayala rally but lie low. I’ve been wondering about whether we can really move forward just ignoring politics. Sigh.

The peso fluctuated a little bit this week, the stock market was still erratic, gold and other commodities the same, and oil is still going down. At one point, the peso retreated to P48:$1, and then it gained on the back of strong remittances by the end of the week, going back to the P47 level.

Italy in recession is an important story because we have a lot of overseas Filipinos living and working in Italy. I hope that they are coping well, despite the difficulties a recession might impose on them.

BSP sets 2010 inflation target at 3.5%-5.5%. The average inflation target is now at 3.5 to 5.5 percent for 2010, lower than the forecast range of 6.0-8.0 percent average inflation for 2009 because of lower commodity prices.

Banking

Any depositor’s nightmare: to find that your bank is closed and you have no access to your deposits. This week, many depositors across the country are hurting this way.

4 rural banks closed; 4 declare bank holiday. These are: Rural Bank of Parañaque; Rural Bank of Bais (Negros Oriental); Pilipino Rural Bank (Cebu) and Rural Bank of San Jose (Batangas). The four banks that have declared a bank holiday were Philippine Countryside Bank (Cebu); Dynamic Bank (Rural Bank of Calatagan); San Pablo City Development Bank and Nation Bank (Bacolod City).

RBS Bank suspends business. This bank is part of the Legacy group that is currently in a legal tussle with the BSP.

The PDIC is proposing a “bridge banking solution for troubled banks”. PDIC president Jose Nograles said in a statement:

“This will protect depositors of a failed bank by ensuring that there will be no disruption in banking services,” PDIC president Jose Nograles said in a statement. “Hence, [it will] maintain depositor confidence in the Philippines.” He added that a bridge bank would “provide allowance in terms of time for a better and well-planned final resolution of a failed bank.”

HSBC’s Mark Watkinson was most likely eager to share some good news, and I don’t blame him. The gloom talk is not helping, although of course we need to be realistic about the economy. So this article was in our top 10 most-read: HSBC to hire 1,000 more in BPO.

Unfortunately, head office doesn’t think it was a good story to tell the media, maybe because they are retrenching in other parts of the globe, so they sent out a denial about Watkinson’s statement (read this article: HSBC says no plans yet to expand BPO). INQUIRER.net, of course, stands by its story and that Doris Dumlao, the reporter, was not in error as proven by a voice file and transcript of the interview uploaded on the site.

Lehman investors in HK urge refund is an interesting story, especially if the government will allow it.

BDO sees lending slowdown in 2009, not surprisingly of course, what with the economy bound to slow down. In fact, Moodys has downgraded bank credit rating outlook to negative from “stable” saying the challenging global environment could dampen bank earnings and trigger a rise in loan delinquency.

Corporate News

Still, cash-rich SM group is not slowing down its spending. It has opened the 3rd biggest mall in the world and is planning a P5-billion borrowing to fund mall construction in the next three years. Cash really is king.

That’s it for this week. Over and out.