There were no major movements this week on the stock markets around the world with the highest change being in China again with the Hang Seng moving up by 3.7%.

It was a mixed week of stock market movements with some indices falling in parts of the world whereas others rose and even in the UK the FTSE 100 fell whilst the broader FTSE 250 gained on the week.

Oil has more or less halted this week at just under $70 per barrel and gold pretty much the same gaining just 0.3% on the week.
End of the week saw:

All the world stock markets dropped this week with the Chinese Hanseng falling the most at 5.1% and in the UK the FTSE 250 dropped the most.

The price of oil dropped this week and which halted the last few weeks rises to close at $69.55 a barrell and gold dropped back further too to close at $936.20 per ounce.
End of the week saw:

With news springing up that the recession is over and there are signs of recovery in world economies governments need to be very careful not to repeat the problems of the past originally sparked off by 9/11 in the US – businesses need time to recover fully!

I previously wrote about how the attacks of September 11 sparked off a wave of interest rate cuts which began in the US and was followed across the world. This gave way to billions of “Cheap Money” and led to the banks lending to less credit worthy individuals. Once the economies started to regain composure post 9/11 the US government started to put up interest rates and we know where the story led after that with the American economy, the world banks and the collapse of major corporations across the world!

There is talk that with life coming back into the UK economy that the Bank of England could begin to think about putting up interest rates. However, the UK economy and the US economy and others across the world are far from out of the problems caused by past events.

Data is currently being released that unemployment is still rising with it being reported today by the BBC that “UK unemployment rose to 2.261 million in the three months to April, the highest since November 1996“. Government officials need to be considerate of the delayed effect or lag effect on world economies of unemployment.

As the jobless total increases there is less money spent within the economy and businesses suffer still further, and may need to make yet more people redundant and so on.

It is excellent news that we are seeing this positive news coming to the fore and this will in turn give businesses and people more confidence, which will hopefully begin a positive upward spiral.

Business opportunity advert

I have already invested $20,000 US in 3/8 unit in the same oil well.  I do not have any more capital to invest otherwise I would. 

Another invester has been forced to return his 12 units to America as he no longer has the funds to pay for them. Each unit is for sale for $52,500 US.  The broker charges 1% commission fee which is payable when the units are purchased.  Minimum investment is 1/8 TH unit. 

I am informed that 60% of the well will be sold to Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) early next week (week commencing Monday 15/06/2009) and that the sale of the units will result in 7 x the investment.   Even if all 12 units are not sold and the sale of the well does not go ahead with the SWT the units will be sold to market and you will realise 3 x your investment.  The well is currently producing hydrocarbons. 

I am not an oilman.  I am trying to maximise my investment by helping my broker to find investors quickly so that the deal with the SWF can go ahead.  Please contact me before Tuesday 16TH June 2009.  Mobile Tel:- 07748 485493

Disclaimer

Advertisers of businesses and business opportunities on www.in-business.org.uk are not vetted nor verified by in-business, unless otherwise stated, so anyone should do their own due dilligence and make all the necessary checks before going ahead and investing their own money. in-business accepts no responsiblility or liability whatsoever for any loss incurred by any person acting on an advert posted by users registered on www.in-business.org.uk.

This week has seen the continued rise in the oil price per barrel finishing the week at $72.04 per barrel a rise of another 5.4% over the 3% rise last week!

With talk about economies coming out of recession this week and now the rise in interest rates on peoples tongues Gold has continued to fall back again this week by a further 1.7%.

Global stock markets have not changed much in the week with some European markets dropping back slightly. The Japanese Nikkei was the biggest riser in the week climbing 3.7% with the Australian ASX being the next biggest winner closing up by 2.3%.
End of the week saw:

If you have a blog or if you are looking to set up a blog then to help promote your posts you should submit it to a number of blog directories.

Blog directories are a source of traffic and will help your ranking in the search engines so I recommend that you register with as many of these blog directories as you can:

Blogarama – Get Listed At One Of The Largest FREE Blog Directories Online. Let People Find And Rate Your Blog In The Blog Directory!  

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Bloghub – Bloghub.com is an online directory and community where members from around the world gather and exchange ideas. If you run a blog site, you can add your site to their blog directory, search their blogger directory for blog templates, blog skins, create blog or join them for a chat at their exciting online Blogger forum.

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Blogflux – “No matter which subject you choose to write your blog about, and no matter what theme you choose or have made for your site – there is one thing, and one thing only, that will truly make your blog …” is what they say at Blogflux!  

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Blogtoplist – 68223 blogs in the directory at the time of writing this article. Statistics resets every week. Get live statistics over your blog, reach thousands of new readers, get ranked by a new unique way, 100% Free to submit your blog(s). 

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Topblogarea – Submit to this blog directory and get 100% free to sign up, thousands of new visitors, use their free blog tools and free Statistics over your blog.  

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Ontoplist – With this blog directory you can – Publish your blog and distribute content, get and manage your own blog ranking, connect with other bloggers, share your blog with the world and it is Free.

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Bloggapedia – Bloggapedia is a blog directory, blog search engine and a social network for bloggers. Register now to find other bloggers and blog posts that you like!  

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Blogcatalog – Blog Catalog is the premiere social blog directory on the internet. Search, Browse, Rate and Review thousands of blog sites.

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You can also claim your blog at Technorati – Technorati was founded to help bloggers succeed by collecting, highlighting, and distributing the global online conversation. Founded as the first blog search engine, Technorati has expanded to a full service media company providing services to the blogs and social media sites and connecting them with advertisers who want to join the conversation, and whose online properties introduce blog content to millions of consumers.

Gold has halted its rising run and dropped a little this week closing at $956.70 per ounce – so maybe it will not reach the $1,000 level.

On the commodities front, a good week for all global stock markets with the US NASDAQ and the Australian ASX rising by over 4% each this week and oil has continued to rise again closing up by a further 3% this week.
End of the week saw:

Small business administration is top of the list of important considerations for success in business.

All businesses have a life cycle and depending on where you are in this cycle will depend on your focus at that time. The business cycle in this context is not the economic business cycle, but instead refers to the various stages a business goes through from “Start-up” and all the way through to “Selling-up” and getting out of your business.

The stages in a business cycle

Start-up stage of a business – at this stage in the life cycle of a business the considerations and planning needed fall into how to start a small business. A well prepared business plan will see your business get off to a great start and set it off in the right direction. All too many businesses do not have a plan and find that the business flounders around without direction!

In the early stages of a business one key factor that is top of the list is managing your financial growth – there are many new businesses that end up over-trading and simply run out of cash even though they are profitable! Preparing a good cash flow forecast before you begin is crucial so that you obtain the necessary funding you need to take the business forward.

Make sure you have good debt collections so that your customers pay-up on time and in full – a profitable company with no cash-flow is a business on route to failure. Consider very carefully your payment-terms for your customers; the obvious best payment option would be cash up front or for your customers to pay by direct debit or standing order. However, this is not always possible, so you may have to give credit to your customers.

Be careful though and do not give too much on this and ideally no more than 30-days. If you are on a “Cash on Delivery” payment basis with your suppliers and you give say 60-days to your customers, it will not be too long before you run out of cash as your business expands, even where you are making a profit.

Other aspects of your business to get right from the out-set are as follows:

- Paying your taxes on time, whether this be the employment taxes deducted from your employees or if you are VAT registered or in the USA sales tax payments. Also, your Corporate tax on profits needs to be set aside and budgeted for and then paid on time.

- Insuring your business – Make sure you take out the right insurances and I recommend you register with a good insurance broker. Business interruption insurance, professional indemnity, public and employers liability insurance and contents insurance are to name a few important policies to take out and maintain. Always make sure you are up-front when completing the forms so that you never have a problem should you need to make a claim.

- Use up-to-date technology – subject to finances you should try to use the latest in technology for your industry, which will make sure your business is run efficiently.

- Registering with relevant organisations – your business sector may be governed by certain government organisations or it might be that there are some well known organisations that it would help for you to be registered with. Make sure you know who you must be registered with and who it would be helpful to be connected to create the right impression with your customers.

Managing your business on an on-going basis – As your business becomes established you will find that there are many things you will need to get to grips with. You will find in the early stages a steep learning curve is what is faced by most new business owners. So long as you get to the top of this curve and survive the first 2-5 years you should continue into the future. The stages you will go through include employing other people to do the work and getting to grips with delegation.

The problem faced by most business owners is the worry that your employees will not do the job as well as you! However, so long as they are at least 80% as good then things will be fine. If you are faced with this dilemma of the fear of employing someone to take your place in the business, then take time to look around – there are thousands of businesses that are totally employment run whereby the owners can take a back-seat. It does work and it will make your business more valuable to potential buyers when you get to the final closing stages of your business.

By having a managed-run business you open the market up to a whole set of other potential buyers – investors that want to buy a business, but not to get their hands dirty as it were.

Expanding and growing your business – Assuming that you have the management of your business sorted out and you have begun to delegate work to employees then you can concentrate more of your resources on expanding the business. Focus on your existing customers so that you can get a reputation for great customer service and ensure that your customer spend is high and they return to you and not to your competition!

Spend time on looking at ways to get your existing customers to keep buying and ways to grow your business and increase profit! You should also develop key performance indicators for your business which are those indicators that show how your business is performing and allow you to monitor those indicators that make a difference.

Selling your business – the final stage in any business is when you decide to sell up and move on. In all the stages leading up to this final stage will make a difference to how easy it is to sell your business. A well run, profitable, employee managed business will attract a higher profit-multiple for your business when you sell it – a business that has its finger on the pulse as it were will be much more attractive to buyers than one where the information is difficult to extract.

So if you have this final stage in your sights as part of your business plan out the out-set then you will make sure of a quick and easy sale whereby you get much more money for your business than you would ordinarily have.

I felt it necessary to write something about Internet Business Scams, as I get bombarded with emails all the time on spurious offers!

The most obvious one is the Nigerian (or similar) that has millions of Dollars that he or she needs to be transferred to your bank account and the scam usually involves some official or government minister. This internet scam also involves you sharing in the funds so that you are promised to receive several million dollars yourself! – if you have not seen one of these emails or if you are not aware of this scam – note that “if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is!”

If anyone has been scammed by this type of fraudster then please post your comments here, as I and others are sure to want to know. The way I understand that this works is that they get your bank details and ask you to deposit funds into one of their own banks in order to set the deal up.

If you get sucked in and deposit the first amount requested, they then come up with a reason why you should deposit more…and so on. It was reported a while ago that one person ended up loosing some £50,000 in one of these Nigerian Internet Business Scams!

Other types of Internet Business Scams are whereby you are promised to make a fortune overnight, when in fact there is little chance of doing anything of the sort. There are many MLM schemes or Multi Level Marketing schemes out there that promise the world and in reality have no substance.

My suggestion would be to use known and reputed affiliate programs like Commission Junction or DGM and set up your own website whereby your visitors click on links to your own affiliates, whereby you earn a commission for every sale made from the traffic you send their way.

If however, you are considering a MLM scheme please use your common sense and take time to check out the company. Ask to speak with existing MLM members and ask for testimonials. Make sure that the company does have an office and you might even want to get a copy of their accounts from Companies House if it is a UK company, or the official government organisation where company accounts are submitted in your country or of where the company is registered.

When looking at an MLM type scheme look at whether their claims seem realistic and also look at how long there particular scheme has been running for. Has the market already been saturated with the product or are the claims that the company makes about the product realistic. See if you can get copies of customer testimonials to verify any claims.

It is unlikely that you will make money quickly in whatever you do – there are many “Get Rich Quick Schemes” out there that simply do not work. These companies work on people’s emotions and one of these emotions they work on is greed and the need to have money. They also suggest that you will make it without too much hard work – think about this very carefully.

Oil continued its rise this week having rising by over 9% last week and closing up a further 7.5% this week at $66.31 a barrel.

Gold is still being seen as a safe haven as the price of an ounce is approaching $1,000 per ounce! Gold rose a further 2% this week which would imply that investors are seeing more problems ahead for world economies, when gold is always seen as a safe investment.

Sterling had a good week rising by over 9% against the Japanese Yen and 2% on the US dollar!
End of the week saw: