Third Avenue funds to close

Third Avenue Real Estate Value Fund (TAREX) and Third Avenue International Value Fund (TAVIX) will close to new investors at the close of business on June 30, 2005.

Third Avenue Real Estate Value Fund, with assets of $2.7 billion, seeks long-term capital appreciation by investing in undervalued real estate and real estate oriented securities.



Third Avenue International Value Fund, with assets of $1.3 billion, seeks long-term capital appreciation by investing in undervalued foreign securities.



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Dark Tower

This sure brings back some memories. I remember playing this board game. Now someone's made a flash version.

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Mercedes Credit Cards

Appears that Daimler/Chrysler has a partnership with Bank of America, which already issues cards tied to the Chrysler brands. Now, they have unveiled two Mercedes cards: a Visa Signature, as well as a standard Visa (Platinum?). The Signature carries a $90 annual fee, as well as an enhanced rewards program, when compared to the normal version, which has no annual fee.

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Videoconferencing on Skype

Dialcom's Spontania video plug-in is designed to be integrated with any 3rd party Internet-based communication solution, Skype first. It uses your regular webcam.

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Skype: read

Credit Card Foreign Fees

Alot of the credit card companies are hiking their foreign currency fees. Usually credit unions will not charge extra fees above the Visa/Mastercard 1%.

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How much can aging be slowed?

Life expectancy is increasing in the developed world. But Cambridge University geneticist Aubrey de Grey believes it will soon extend dramatically to 1,000.

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SENS: read

Eat Some Curry

Tests in mice showed that curcumin, an active compound found in turmeric, helped stop the spread of breast cancer tumor cells to the lungs.

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The AMT needs to go

Article in Fortune about how the crummy AMT is overtaking our tax system. The govt. needs the balls to ditch this flawed system, but it brings in too much money. Its really bad for the American taxpayer. With this deficit, It seems unlikely they would want to get rid of a source of so much money. The problem will only get worse, as the AMT applies to more taxpayers each year, and earns a larger and larger share of income tax revenue.

Unlike the regular income tax, the AMT was never indexed for inflation, so every year it devours another mouthful of victims who, in real terms, are poorer than last year's batch. The beast has finally chewed its way down to the vast middle range of American taxpayers. Next year a family of four with an income of $67,890, barely north of the median income for all four-person households, will find itself right at the maw of the AMT. A family of four earning $80,000 will see its income tax jump 17%, a nasty shock that will surprise tens of millions of taxpayers in the next couple of years.

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