I've failed. It would appear that personal finance journalists' budgets are a bit like builders' houses. Never quite sorted out.

October was a crazy month for financial markets.

Gosh, that was a baptism by fire. I remember the day, in the aftermath of the October 1987 crash, when the Brierley share price dropped below $2 - down from more than $5 just a few weeks before.

NZ Super has taken direct control of the almost $260m in local equities formerly managed on its behalf by AMP Capital.

Having a mobile phone account in New Zealand has become quite a bit less of a hassle than it was just a few years ago.

How to put together a NZ fixed interest portfolio by focusing on the investment strategies typically employed by large institutional investors.

Heightened tensions between the world's two superpowers will test the diplomatic skills of Trade Minister Tim Groser who arrives in Beijing before John Key for the formal Apec leaders meeting.

Strategies to help you commit to finishing tasks and avoid interrupting the flow of your activities.

I am changing jobs and my new employer is exempt from automatically signing up employees to KiwiSaver as they have their own super scheme, while also offering KiwiSaver.

With more than 50 years' trading under his belt, US trading legend Larry Pesavento has learned a few things about the markets.

Digital disruption was the hot topic at the Institute of Finance Professionals (INFINZ) conference last week, writes Liam Dann.

Auckland Council's report on its transport future is a stark reminder about how the low-inflation landscape is changing everything, writes Bernard Hickey.

Getting a mortgage is much harder than it was before the global financial crisis. No longer will banks lend willy-nilly.

Australian investors have become excited about health insurance. The enthusiasm is over the privatisation of Medibank Private, Australia's largest health insurer.

A lawyer who misspelled the name of the trial judge incurs the wrath Justice Wylie and complaints against judges on the decline in this week's Caseload.

Where has inflation gone and does it have a return ticket? Little wonder the Reserve Bank has just left interest rates on hold and the markets expect no change in the official cash rate for another year or so.

Tech is part of everyone's life in Japan, but doesn't appear to have supplanted their livelihood, even for menial tasks.

With people living longer one of the biggest worries for soon-to-be-retired folks is how to make their savings stretch out for the long-haul.

Is inflation dead? The annual rate has fallen to 1 per cent, dangerously close to dropping outside the Reserve Bank's target band.

Our son will be studying in Australia for the next few years and will need to borrow money from us for fees, living expenses and so on.

Kiwi company BurgerFuel has pulled out of Iraq as a result of the increasing threat of the Islamic State jihadist group in that country.

It is a sign that the times, they are a-changin' when leading central bankers, of all people, are publicly deploring prevailing levels of, and trends in, inequality.

Outsourcing of Maori programming will make Television New Zealand less engaged in the Maori world - but that might suit the broadcaster.