Taking a break from commenting on Wall Street, the Dow’s highs and personal finance topics, I recorded a show yesterday with San Antonio, TX-based smart commentary site, Plaza de Armas. A friend and fellow small finance business owner Shirley Gonzales announced her candidacy for San Antonio City Council, District 5.  Shirley had previously introduced me to

Here’s my hypothesis[1]: The abundance of cheap domestic natural gas – what I’m calling the Natural Gas Revolution – makes “renewable” energy sources like wind and solar financially untenable, and possibly unnecessary, for the next 90 years.[2] I can’t prove my hypothesis because energy pricing is complicated. Figuring out the ‘price’ of energy derived from

This audio interview is a continuation of an earlier interview with Shirley, in which we talked about her pawn shop, and the customer service they offer that banks rarely offer. In this portion of the interview Shirley and I talked about serving the traditionally Hispanic West Side of San Antonio, and the barriers to trying

Q. Dear Banker, My wife and I are planning an addition to our house. We need the additional space, but I do not want this project to stretch our overall budget. Since I have a specific idea of how much I want to pay, a rise in interest rates would cause us to make different