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Glory Days & maturity Scam Watch: Healthcare law is fodder for scheme By Stuart Pfeifer Los Angeles Times (MCT) Here is a roundup of alleged cons, frauds and schemes to watch out for. AFFORDABLE CARE ACT President Obama's Affordable Care Act has opened the door to a new wave of fraud, the Federal Trade Commission said in a recent bulletin. People have been making unsolicited telephone calls to U.S. residents, asking for personal information and credit card numbers that allegedly would help the resi- dents get coverage under the new healthcare law. If consumers receive calls from people who claim to be from the government and ask for personal informa- tion, such as the person's name, Social Security number or birth date, they should hang up immediately, the FTC said. JOB HUNTING As the U.S. jobs market remains weak, criminals are looking to exploit desperate people looking for work. The Better Business Bureau said a recent scam involves emails that use the names of real companies but are really efforts to obtain consumers' personal information that can be used to defraud them. To avoid being scammed, the BBB said, consumers should not respond to ads that contain grammatical mistakes or ask applicants to pay for training. MAGAZINE SALES door-to-door salespeople offering discount magazine subscriptions, the BBB said in a bulletin on its website. Consumers have filed hundreds of complaints against several companies that appear to be "part of an extensive, organized network of thieves," the BBB said. The salespeople often have stories of tragedy and des- peration, but the magazines they promise never arrive, the BBB said. Consumers should be cautious when dealing with Consumers should research the subscription compa- nies before buying and, if they do buy, should use a credit card, making it easier to receive a refund. Staying social online while avoiding scams By Michelle Maltais Los Angeles Times (MCT) If you're on Facebook you've probably seen the tantalizing come-on: full downloads of the just- released blockbuster movie, free gift cards at your favorite store, and even a look at who is peeping at your profile. sucker — and victim — out of you with a click that takes a nanosecond. The only thing these promises fulfill is making a The result can range from annoying to devastating, from a hacker hijacking your email to send nefarious offers to your friends to implanting a virus that can knock out your computer. Knowing that danger potentially lurks with every click could be enough to make you unplug. So how do you avoid being taken without going offline? To be blunt, the best overall approach is to be a bit antisocial in a social world, said Phil Lieberman, president and chief executive of Lieberman Software. Although many of us click "likes" and links as automatically as we blink, you should trust no one enough to click without thinking. Sites such as Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr and Face- book encourage just the kind of click-quick mentali- ty that works in the favor of thieves. More often than not, we have no idea where that one click of a link is taking us, and thieves can easily make you think you're entering a legitimate website. The easy availability of personal information on social media sites enables criminals to personalize their pitch with details about your location and make it look as if your friends are involved with very min- imal effort or skill. And, with the viral nature of sharing through these sites, sometimes your friends become unwitting accomplices because they've clicked a link or shared something that looks legitimate. And just like the flu, it spreads because it's not just telling two friends, it's hitting possibly hundreds or thousands of friends in a single post, pin or tweet. To that end, the one thing all people surfing the LOS ANGELES (MCT) — Americans wor- ried about running out of money in their golden years are trying a new investment strategy: day trading their retirement funds. conventional buy-and-hold approach, baby boomers are anxious to improve their retirement prospects after two punishing bear markets in the last decade. Some people are trading the mutual funds in their 401(k) plans more fre- quently. Others are ventur- ing into options. And some aggressive investors have begun day trading their nest eggs — all in a bid to make up for lost time. "A lot more frequent trading is happening," said Chad Carlson, a financial planner based outside Chicago. "People are say- ing, 'I'm that much closer to retirement so I have to do something.'" Disillusioned with the 49-year-old Vlad Tokarev to start day trading his three individual retirement accounts last year. That thinking prompted The Minneapolis bio- medical software engineer wants to quit working before age 65. But after watching his 401(k) get pounded in the last bear market, he fears that anoth- er plunge in the stock mar- ket could wreak havoc with his plans. ket closes every day, Tokarev buys or sells a mutual fund linked to the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index. His goal is to profit from temporary fluc- tuations in stock prices, so he buys when stocks are falling and sells when they're rising. Minutes before the mar- has come out with a book called "401(k) Day Trad- ing: The Art of Cashing in on a Shaky Market in Min- utes a Day." The book, published in October by Wiley Trading, has a list price of $49.95. "I've seen so many peo- "I didn't see a lot of returns using the buy-and- hold method," he said. Most Americans with IRA or 401(k) accounts embrace the "set it and for- get it" philosophy. Only about 15 percent of investors made any change to their 401(k)s last year, according to benefits firm Aon Hewitt. Web should do, whether on or off social networks, is to inoculate their computers as best they can. Make sure the antivirus and operating system soft- ware on the computer are up-to-date, said Chris Boyd, senior threat researcher for GFI Software. Although scammers can adapt their tactics and shift rather quickly, antivirus software is armor, however imperfect and occasionally penetrable, against attack. Another rule of thumb is to avoid strangers bearing gifts. filling out a survey or clicking a link most likely won't pan out. If it sounds too good to be true, it sim- ply is. Those offers of gift cards and free iPads just for Another popular scam on Facebook is one that appeals to our egos — or maybe the paranoid person inside — and one that's been around since the heyday of Myspace: the chance to see who's been accessing our profiles. "They were the survey scammers of the day," Boyd said. "Unfortunately, we're just too curious." Ultimately, as a social network citizen, you've got to be your own best neighborhood watch and apply your real-world street smarts to think before you click. to make shifts, there's a growing inclination to do so more frequently as retirement approaches, according to some financial planners. These experts sympathize with investor frustrations but predict that this type of trading will backfire for most. Day trading was popular during the bull market of the 1990s, when investors moved in and out of stocks dozens of times each day seeking a quick profit. It was considered a risky practice at the time, and the technology crash a few years later wiped out many day traders. "You get the guy who hits the home run who everyone wants to be like, and then you get the guy who is the big loser," said Winfield Evens, a partner at Aon Hewitt. The average 60-year-old has only $114,500 in his or her 401(k), and half have less than $37,300, accord- ing to Aon Hewitt. Ameri- cans are a collective $6.6 trillion short of the amount they need to retire comfort- ably, according to a 2010 analysis by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. But among those willing have even helped spur a cottage industry for advi- sors who preach the bene- fits of trading 401(k) and other retirement accounts. Richard Schmitt, an adjunct professor at Golden Gate University in San Francisco and a former retirement plan consultant, Those type of numbers ple make their 401(k)s into 201(k)s," Schmitt said of day trading. "This gives you the opportunity to make it into an 801(k)." Schmitt has been day trading his 401(k) account for four years, during which time, he said, he has beaten the S&P 500 by 15.2 percent. Todd Larsen, a mechan- ical engineer from Willow Park, Texas, runs www.401ktradingsystem.c om, a website that advises followers to shift their money once a month. The site, which charges a one- time fee of $199, says it recommends safe money- market funds about 75 per- cent of the time and guides people into higher-risk stock funds only "when conditions are very favor- able for a gain." Younger Americans who have been frustrated by the market also are try- ing their hand at day trad- ing. about it she was really ner- vous ... until I educated her on what it all entails and how poorly (the 401k) was performing before that," Hansman said. "She's still not 100 percent behind it but she said, 'Just don't lose everything. If you do I'll divorce you.'" frowns on day trading, which it says raises costs for other investors, and imposes fees and restric- tions to prohibit it. The fund industry falling stock, or sell a rising one, in exchange for a set payment. The goal is to pocket steady fees without having to buy or sell at inopportune times. As many as 40 percent of people trading options at the Motley Fool do so in retirement accounts, said Jeff Fischer, an options advisor at the investment website. cumvent the rules by using multiple accounts — buy- ing in one and selling in another — to mask the fre- quency of their trading. Trading also has been made easier by the increas- ing availability of so-called brokerage windows, which are accounts within 401(k) plans that typically allow daily trading in funds and stocks. Schmitt and others cir- About 29 percent of companies offer them, up from 12 percent a decade ago, according to Aon Hewitt. Joe Hansman, 29, who handles customer com- plaints at Wells Fargo, shifts money among two conservative mutual funds in his 401(k) and the bank- ing company's own stock. He trades 10 to 15 times a month, steering money into Wells Fargo's stock when he expects it to rally for a few days. "When I told my wife offering brokerage win- dows are Home Depot Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co. Brokerage windows typically are used by expe- rienced investors with higher incomes and larger 401(k) balances. The aver- age person with such an account trades more than 20 times a year, according to Charles Schwab Corp. Some people are trying another potentially risky tactic to overcome the weak market — trading stock options in their IRA accounts. Among the companies They agree to buy a lifestyles Investors day trading within 401(k)s, IRAs Saturday, July 21, 2012 – Daily News 7A "There is — I don't want to use the word 'despera- tion' — but it's close to that," Fischer said. "Ten years of a flat stock market bumps up against reality for people in their 50s or 60s who are running out of time to see appreciation" in the stock market. Prudent options invest- ing can generate annual returns of 6 percent to 12 percent, Fischer said. But there are risks, including being forced to buy stocks as they plummet in price. "We have had a few sad stories like that," Fischer said. Trading options can be scary, said a retiree who uses options to boost his income. "The very first trade, my palms were sweating so badly that I almost drenched a keyboard," said the man, who asked that his name not be used. over time, he said. "I want to do the things in retirement that I have always wanted to do," he said. "Traveling has been at the top of our list, and options [have] helped finance going to some very nice vacation spots." 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