Wall Street banks have taken billions of taxpayer dollars

A number of Banks Want to go back Government Money..

Wall Street banks have taken billions of taxpayer dollars. Now some of them are starting to wonder if they should give the money back.

Even before the government announced its latest efforts to fix the troubled banking industry on Tuesday, executives at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley said they wanted to repay the money quickly. Both banks received $10 billion under the first rescue plan last fall.
Paying back all those funds would be difficult in this tough economic environment. But banking executives worry that the government may intrude further into their businesses as long as they are beholden to Washington.
“We just think that operating our business without the government capital would be an easier thing to do,” said David A. Viniar, the chief financial officer of Goldman. “We’d be under less scrutiny, and under less pressure. Not that we’d be out of the public eye; we’re still going to be in the public eye.”

The issue is likely to draw close scrutiny on Wednesday, when executives from eight banks are scheduled to testify on Capitol Hill. The efforts to break free of government support reflects a growing trepidation among Wall Street’s largest players about their independence and the new rules that may be imposed on them because they accepted federal capital.
In recent weeks, the Obama administration has announced that banks will have to disclose more information about their spending and cap executive pay at $500,000. Several lawmakers have gone further with proposed measures about compensation for all bank employees as well as halting certain types of immigration visas for companies that received government money.
Industry groups say the new rules are unfair.
“The contract says that Congress can change the law, and we were obviously concerned,” said Scott Talbott, senior vice president for government affairs for the Financial Services Roundtable. “But we didn’t think they would tip the scales this far. The more of these retroactive rules they place on institutions, the more institutions will look for an exit strategy.”
But the banks are likely to find that escape is a distant hope, analysts said. The government required banks to replace taxpayer money with new equity — in the form of common stock or preferred shares — before any repayment. And the markets for raising capital are all but dead, especially for financial companies.
Banks are not allowed to repay the government money out of their earnings for three years, though some bank executives are privately saying they think the government may reverse that rule for banks if they start earning money again. After all, bank executives said, it may be beneficial for the government to show taxpayers that some banks are regaining their financial strength.
Still, it is unclear that it would make sense for banks to repay the government money, given the uncertain outlook for their businesses, analysts said. One chief executive of a major bank said last week that he feared returning the money first would leave his bank as “the only one in the water without shark repellent.”
And, in a market of quickly shifting fortunes, any bank that returned capital could find itself in need again months later. Bank of America, for instance, was among the companies that appeared to be in a stronger position last fall when regulators met with chiefs of the eight banks. But at the end of the year, as the outlook for its merger with Merrill Lynch soured, the bank returned to the government for a second round of assistance. Citigroup has also received a second bailout.
And government funds are cheap with interest payments of only 5 percent and a few percentage points more for related warrants. Banks are unlikely to find other parties that would offer them such low rates, analysts said.
“I don’t think anyone should be in a hurry to pay it back,” said Jeffery Harte, a banking analyst at Sandler O’Neill. “But if you could prove able to pay it back, especially when other institutions are coming back for a second or third helping, it would send a pretty strong message to the market.”
Many banks have also issued new debt in recent months backed by the government. The program, run by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, has received far less attention than the capital injections, but it represents another subsidy to banks, which otherwise would have found issuing debt more expensive, or impossible. Banks that repay taxpayer money may still be beholden to the government if they issued these government-backed bonds.

US senators be in agreement economy bill

There have been a series of meetings to try to find a compromise position

The American people want us to work together - they don't want to see us dividing along partisan lines on the most serious crisis confronting our country

Senators in Washington say they have reached agreement on a huge economic stimulus package designed to revitalise the US economy.
Senior Democrats say they will back a plan worth $780bn (£534bn), instead of the $900bn sought by the president, in order to gain vital Republican support.
President Barack Obama denounced delays to the legislation, which mixes big spending plans and tax cuts.
The Senate is now due to hold a vote in the coming days.
President Obama has spoken of "an urgent and growing crisis" and said further Senate delays would be "inexcusable and irresponsible" and lead to "a catastrophe".
His comments came as the latest unemployment figures showed that the US had had its single worst month for job losses for 35 years.
Almost 600,000 people lost their jobs in January alone - figures Mr Obama described as devastating.

Rough water
President Obama is desperate to pass the package, the BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington says.

This is the president's first big legislative initiative since he took office, and it has hit some very rough water, our correspondent says.
The new $780bn plan is composed of 42% tax cuts and 58% new government spending, Democratic Senator John Kerry said, according to Reuters news agency.
Other details of the slimmed-down package are sketchy, but one Democrat told Reuters that the homebuyer tax credit and car tax credit were still in the bill.
The Democrats need to persuade two Republicans to vote in favour of the bill for it to gain the necessary 60 Senate votes.
Although Democrats hold a 58-41 majority, 60 votes are required to ensure the Republicans cannot block the bill with a filibuster.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said that at least three or four Republicans would vote for the bill.
"The American people want us to work together," said Senator Susan Collins, a Republican who will vote in favour.
"They don't want to see us dividing along partisan lines on the most serious crisis confronting our country."
However, the Senate minority leader, Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, said that "most of us are deeply sceptical that this will work".
And his Republican colleague, John McCain, defeated by Mr Obama in last year's presidential election said: "You can call it a lot of things but bipartisan isn't one of them."
'Echo chamber'
Mr Obama described as "devastating" the news that nearly 600,000 Americans lost their jobs in January.
"The situation could not be more serious. These numbers demand action," he said.

'Echo chamber'
Mr Obama described as "devastating" the news that nearly 600,000 Americans lost their jobs in January.
"The situation could not be more serious. These numbers demand action," he said.

Mr Obama's remarks came as he unveiled a new board of economic advisers, chaired by Paul Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve.
"I created this board to enlist voices that come from beyond the echo chamber of Washington DC," said Mr Obama, "and to ensure that no stone is unturned as we work to put people back to work and to get our economy moving."
Republicans and some centrist Democrats are keen to reduce the number of spending commitments in the bill, and without their support the bill may not have enough votes to pass in the Senate.
The House of Representatives approved its version of the package last week, worth $825bn, without any Republican support.
If the Senate gives its approval to the bill, the two different versions will then have to be reconciled in a joint House-Senate committee before facing a final vote.
President Obama has said he wants the passage of the bill to be completed by 16 February.

Are you in the US? Are you in favour of the stimulus bill? Is President Obama right to urge swift action on the measures? You can send us your comments

Very important Signs: Economic increase Looks Even Weaker

The dramatic downturn gripping the global economy has breathed new life into old questions about how best to run our economic systems.
Politicians, business leaders and policymakers searched for solutions at this year's World Economic Forum in Davos.
Meanwhile, different debates were taking place at the "alternative" World Social Forum in Belem, Brazil.
There, an eclectic mix of some 100,000 campaigners, thinkers, and working people came to starkly different conclusions about the causes of the downturn, and how best to address it.
We asked four participants from around the globe to give us their opinions. Click on the links below to read their arguments.

New World Order

In recent weeks, the world has been politely standing by and watching how things play out with the fiscal stimulus and latest bank-bailout plans in Washington. Yes, there's been some grumbling overseas about "buy American" provisions in the stimulus bill, but for the most part, officials elsewhere don't want to step on the toes of a new President to whom they are favorably disposed. They also don't want to endanger legislation that they hope will help jump-start the global economy.

Just wait a couple of months, though. Politicians from Beijing to Berlin to Brasília see the current crisis as the product of a messed-up global financial infrastructure dominated by the U.S., and they will soon be pushing for big changes--whether Americans like them or not.
All this will begin to gel on April 2, when the newish international organization known as the G-20--the leaders of 19 of the world's biggest national economies, plus the European Union--meets in London. An unofficial meeting has already taken place, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where G-20 officials (with the conspicuous exception of those from the U.S.) made speeches, conversed in the halls and gave a sense of the direction in which the world outside the U.S. wants to head. (Read TIME's special report on Davos 2009.)
The global discussion of the financial crisis is strikingly different from the one in the U.S. Here there's still something of a debate over whether the mess is the result of too much government interference in the housing market or too little government regulation of financial markets. In the rest of the world, that's no debate: inadequate and inconsistent financial regulation is uniformly blamed. What's more, a consensus seems to have emerged among the world's finance ministers and central-bank bosses that the chief underlying cause of the crisis was an unbalanced and out-of-control system of global capital flows in which some big-spender countries (namely the U.S.) ran up huge debts while big savers (China and India, for example) hoarded surpluses.
On the regulatory front, the path to a new global approach is pretty clear. Last spring the leaders of the G-7, a club of wealthy nations, agreed to create a "college of supervisors" to more closely coordinate regulation of multinational banks. The Group of Thirty, an influential organization of current and former central bankers and financial regulators, recommended in January that "systematically significant" financial institutions (those that are too big to fail) be identified in advance and subjected to higher capital requirements and tougher regulation. (See who's to blame for the financial crisis.)
Yet regulators around the world were already jointly setting bank-capital standards before the current crisis hit. A lot of good that did us. So there is also much talk about the need for a new architecture--"a new Bretton Woods" was a phrase that echoed around Davos--to rein in global financial flows.

Bretton Woods is the mountain resort in New Hampshire where in 1944 the Allied nations met--with the U.S. calling almost all the shots--to plan a postwar financial system. The Bretton Woods creations included the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and a quarter-century of fixed exchange rates built around a U.S. dollar that was linked to gold. The fixed exchange rates and gold standard unraveled in the 1970s, and ever since we've had a system in which the IMF occasionally steps in to help countries in currency crises (usually imposing harsh terms in the process) but exercises no real control over the global financial system.

After the emerging-market currency collapses of the late 1990s, in which IMF aid wasn't much help, the lesson that emerging economies such as China and India took was that they needed to build up gigantic reserves of U.S. dollars to protect their currencies. To build those reserves, they ran big trade surpluses, which were in turn enabled mainly by record trade deficits in the U.S., which were in turn enabled by massive borrowing from around the world. It was an extremely unbalanced financial ballet, and it has now come crashing to the ground.

latest........On deck: foreign trade, federal budget, retail sales, business inventories, consumer sentiment, and some timely talk from key Fed officials

Last week’s smaller-than-expected 3.8% drop in real gross domestic product in the fourth quarter was hardly good news for economic growth in the first half of 2009. The reason is the split between very weak demand and an unexpected rise in business inventories. The upswing in inventories contributed 1.3 percentage points to economic growth, while economists had anticipated a subtraction.

The problem is that overall spending last quarter dropped at a 5.1% annual rate, led by declines of 3.5% in consumer spending and 19.1% in capital spending by businesses. That’s 80% of U.S. demand right there. That sudden dropoff in demand, in addition to a huge 19.8% plunge in exports, caught businesses by surprise. Companies had been trimming their inventories for four consecutive quarters, but last quarter they couldn't cut fast enough to prevent an unwanted buildup, and ratio of inventories to sales has spiked sharply higher across all business sectors. That portends a steep liquidation in the first quarter, which will likely extend into the second quarter.
The resulting cutbacks in output and employment will weigh heavily on GDP growth, especially in the first quarter. Economists are now shifting their views of the pattern of GDP declines this year, and most now expect the first quarter contraction to be even sharper than last quarter.
This week’s data will help to determine just how weak current-quarter growth will be. The Bureau of Economic Analysis, which assembles the GDP numbers, did not have December data on business inventories and foreign trade when it issued its initial estimate of fourth-quarter GDP. The week offers reports on both, which could result in a significant revision to last quarter’s top-line number. Plus, the impact of those two reports on the mix of fourth-quarter GDP could have implications for growth this quarter. In addition, the government will issue data on January retail sales, which will offer guidance on how much drag consumers are exerting on overall demand this quarter.
Also of key market interest this week, two top Federal Reserve officials will be speaking on Tuesday. Bill Dudley, in his first public appearance since taking over as President of the New York Fed from current Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, will speak on Treasury Inflation Protected Securities (TIPS) at a conference in New York. His remarks will most likely include the subject of inflation. In addition, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke will be testifying before Congress on the Federal Reserve’s program to stem the financial crisis.

How is this a great investment plan?

Diversifying won't totally protect you from losses, but it can boost your returns by limited your risk.

Spread your money around

Answer: There have always been a lot of misconceptions and erroneous expectations when it comes to the benefits of diversification.Back in the go-go '90s I remember having lunch with a financial planner who sarcastically referred to diversification as "di-worse-ification." His contention was that it made no sense to diversify into different asset classes. Stocks clearly offered the highest returns over long periods, so it was foolhardy for anyone investing for the long-term to put their money in anything but stocks. You were just lowering your potential return. Funny thing is, back then, this "hooray, hooray, stocks all the way" approach wasn't that uncommon.Today, many people are having second thoughts about diversification because they feel that diversifying didn't offer their portfolio the protection they thought it should. For example, all but a handful of Morningstar's 69 fund categories were down in 2008. So even if you spread your money around quite liberally, you still might have eked out only a paltry return or suffered significant losses last year.Looked at from these two vantage points, it's easy to see why you and others would question the value of diversifying. If it holds you back in bull markets and doesn't offer much shelter during bears, what's the point?In fact, there is a real benefit to diversifying. But in order to make reasonable investing choices and set a coherent investment strategy, it's important to understand what its advantages are, as opposed to what we might think they are or wish they were. Otherwise, you may be investing on the basis of false hopes, which is a good recipe for disappointment.What diversification can do for youThe first thing you should know is that it can't guarantee you the highest possible return. In fact, it guarantees you won't earn the highest possible return. By spreading your money around you assure that you will have at least some of your money in lagging investments, which will reduce your portfolio's potential return.By the same token, diversification can't totally immunize you from losses. To do that, you would have to do the opposite of diversifying -- i.e., plow all your money into the most secure investments, such as Treasury bills or short-term bank CDs.What diversification can do for you, though, is give you a shot at higher returns than you will get in the most secure investments while limiting your risk somewhat.Notice I said "somewhat." Fact is, if you want the value of your money to grow more than it will in T-bills and the like, you've got to invest in asset classes that have the potential for higher long-term returns, such as stocks and bonds. But those higher returns come with more risk. In the investment world, that risk can take several forms, but generally the riskier an investment, the more volatile it is, the more its value will jump around from year to year.You can't eliminate that risk. But by investing your money in a mix of secure and more volatile assets, you can reduce the potential downside in a given year. For example, if you'd had all your money in a diversified portfolio of U.S. stocks last year, you'd have lost just under 40%. If, on the other hand, you'd had 60% of your money in stocks, 30% in a broad bond index fund and 10% in cash last year, you would have lost roughly half that amount, or around 20%.(See'>http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=7564789355139535583#Note">See editor's note.)That kind of cushion is important for a couple of reasons. For one thing, it makes you less likely to panic in a bad year and sell off riskier investments with higher long-term return potential at what may be the worst possible time. A less volatile portfolio is also less likely to take a devastating hit that may be difficult to recover from. That's an especially important consideration when you're dealing with 401(k)s or other retirement accounts and you're nearing retirement age or are already retired and withdrawing money from such accounts.So the key to getting the benefit of diversification is settling on a mix that's right for you.Ideally, your mix should consist of assets that don't all move in sync with each other or, to put it in investing terms, that aren't too highly correlated with each other.It's okay for gains in some investments to offset losses in others in some years. But on balance your gains should outweigh losses most years. And, while down years are inevitable with growth-oriented investments, whatever assets you're investing in should have a positive long-term return. Diversification isn't a magic formula that can turn recurring sizeable losses in your investments or your portfolio overall into long-term wealth.What diversification can't do for youBut as big an advocate as I am of diversifying among a variety of asset classes, I also feel that the concept has been stretched out of shape over the years, in some cases even beyond recognition.Specifically, I think the benefits of diversifying have been oversold by some advisers who seem intent on making themselves come off like investment wizards capable of creating all-upside-no-downside portfolios. But I'm wary of these supposedly more sophisticated portfolios.So I suggest keeping things simple. Start with a realistic sense of how much risk you can handle and then build a diversified portfolio of stocks, bonds and cash. If you want to get more fancy, you can throw in some foreign stock funds and maybe some REITs or real estate-related mutual funds. But don't go overboard. The more complicated your portfolio is and the more wide-flung your holdings, the more attention and care it will need.Finally, remember that to get the full benefit of diversifying you ought to rebalance periodically to restore your portfolio to its proper proportions.For guidance on how to divvy up your money given your goals and risk tolerance, you can use our asset allocator tool. And if you want to see how different combos of assets might perform, check out the asset allocator tool on T. Rowe Price's site.Of course, you can always take the other route you suggest and just buy CDs. But unless you have so much money that you can accumulate a large enough nest egg despite their low yields, I'm not sure that you can do this and also not worry.Editor's note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that a theoretical portfolio of 60% stocks, 10% broad bond index fund and 10% cash would have lost around 20% last year. The correct example is 60% stocks, 30% broad bond index fund and 10% cash.

Wall Street surges on hopes credit market easing will help temper recession; Dow rises 400

A rising wave of optimism lifted Wall Street Monday, propelling the Dow Jones industrials up more than 400 points on more signs of a reviving credit market and support from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke for further steps to aid the economy. All the major indexes finished with gains of 3 percent or more.
Investors who had sold furiously in recent weeks in response to immobile credit markets became more optimistic as bank-to-bank lending rates eased further. There's also less demand for ultra-safe Treasury bills, another sign that the credit markets are gradually returning to a healthier state.
The improvement in lending rates helped temper concerns that tight credit will contribute to a prolonged recession, but Bernanke still warned that the economy is likely to be "weak for several quarters, and with some risk of a protracted slowdown."
But he also told the House Budget Committee that a fresh round of government measures might help ease the country's economic weakness. There were no details but the White House said it was open to ideas that Congress might put forth.

"The market liked what Bernanke had to say, and there were hints that he's leaving the door open for further moves in terms of rate cuts or economic stimulus," said Ryan Larson, head of equity trading at Voyageur Asset Management. "And, with credit easing in slow baby steps, the market has started to realize that this is going to be a process."

Wall Street was also sifting through the first of hundreds of earnings reports expected this week, seeking clues about future business conditions. Among those reporting, oilfield services provider Halliburton Co. topped estimates, and CEO Dave Lesar told investors and analysts in a conference call, "We expect that any major macroeconomic disruptions will ultimately correct themselves."
Trading was orderly for much of the day, but the final hour again saw frenetic activity, this time to the upside, with the Dow rising nearly 140 points in the last 25 minutes. The market's tone was clearly better than during the previous two weeks, when investors' heightened anxiety about credit markets and the economy sent stocks plunging. The relative calm in Friday's session, when the Dow fell 127, and Monday's trading, had more investors feeling confident that the worst of the market's losses was behind it.Still, with back-and-forth trading a hallmark during recoveries from plunges in the past, analysts and investors were also expecting that Wall Street would be subject to volatile price swings for some time.

"We don't have any sense if this kind of a run is sustainable," said Phil Orlando, chief equity market strategist at Federated Investors. "We're groping quite literally for a bottom right here, but I'm not going to discount that we won't retest lows over the next couple of weeks."
The Dow rose 413.21, or 4.67 percent, to 9,265.43. The blue chips' gain were in line with a 4.68 percent gain registered Thursday, when the Dow jumped 401 points.
The rally marked the Dow's 23rd triple-digit move in 26 sessions. Most sessions have brought losses, however, with 11 of the past 14 showing declines.
Broader indexes also rose sharply Monday. The Standard & Poor's 500 index jumped 44.85, or 4.77 percent, to 985.40. The Nasdaq composite index rose 58.74, or 3.43 percent, to 1,770.03.Todd Leone, managing director of equity trading at Cowen & Co., said many investors were feeling optimistic that credit is slowly becoming more available. He also believes that Bernanke's remarks, along with the fact earnings haven't been dismal, are helping markets move higher.The benchmark 10-year Treasury note rose. The yield, which moves opposite its price, fell to 3.87 percent from 3.93 percent late Friday.

"People are just getting comfortable with buying again," said Todd Leone, managing director of equity trading at Cowen & Co. "We still could see another big drop, but those big drops are going to get less and less."
Investors also received a bit more detail about how Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson plans to roll out a $250 billion plan to recapitalize banks. Paulson said the government will own shares in the banks that should be paid back with a reasonable return, and expects that the investment will eventually make money.

Money Earning Tutorials & Resources

What's Affiliate Marketing? How do you turn your traffic into profit? Pay-per-Click vs. Pay-for-Performance? Pay-per-Click: the need for huge traffic? Pay-for-Performance Drives Results? How do large affiliate networks function? How / when do you get paid? Why is there a minimum amount policy? What if my revenue is below the minimum amount? How do you get a sponsor? A bit on rights & duties - How free are you?Earn Money Opportunities, Affiliate Marketing - Info + Tips, Search for one or more Sponsors for Your Web Site, Guide to Find the right Sponsors for Your Web Site, Tips for Beginning Webmasters, have a Business or Commercial Web Site? Here's an Excellent Opportunity for You, other Profitable and/or Advantageous Opportunities Available to You on our Web Site. The right sponsor(s) for Your Web Site - a Hot tip!

How to create a page that is: easy to make, beautiful, interesting, and profitable!E.g. add images and content royalty free to your pages and make money with them!

Earn Money Opportunities, Affiliate Marketing - Info + Tips, Search for one or more Sponsors for Your Web Site, Guide to Find the right Sponsors for Your Web Site, Tips for Beginning Webmasters, have a Business or Commercial Web Site? Here's an Excellent Opportunity for You, other Profitable and/or Advantageous Opportunities Available to You on our Web Site.

Free marketing resources for Webmasters and online entepreneurs. Free articles, free sales letters, free web-scripts, free promotion tools, etc.

Tutorial on advertisement and promotion related to making money through affiliate programs; also has a directory of affilate programs,

How to Make Money From Your Website

Now that you've created a website, how do you make money from it? There are at least two ways in which sites can make money:
1..Advertising Revenue
2..Selling Goods and Services
I shall deal with the second case, "Selling goods and services", in another article. In this article, I will address the issue of how your site can actually make money from advertising.

Making Money From Advertising
If you look at many websites, you will probably notice that there are banner advertisements displayed on most pages. If you are a newcomer to the scene, you might think that you must either be a company or that your site must be famous before you can get advertisers, just as it is the case in hardcopy publications.
In reality, anyone with a website can get advertisers. While it is true that if your site is well-known, you may get companies contacting you to offer to advertise on your site, you can get advertising revenue even if you are just starting out and your site is relatively unknown.
The way to do this is to join as an "affiliate" of various sites, either directly, or through an affiliate network. An affiliate network is simply an intermediary where you can select from a variety of advertisers.
Payment Schemes
Before joining any program, you should probably be aware of the different payment schemes available.
Pay Per Impression (CPM)
Here, you are paid according to the number of times the advertiser's banner is displayed on your site. The amount you earn is typically calculated based on the number of thousand impressions of the banner (impressions = number of times the banner is displayed), often abbreviated CPM (cost per thousand, with the M being the Latin numeral for thousand). That is, $5 CPM means that you get paid $5 for 1,000 displays of the banner. In general, the amount paid is usually small, but it is easy to earn since everytime a visitor loads the page, you earn. This is known as a "high conversion rate". Needless to say, this method will allow you to automatically earn more if your site attracts a lot of visitors.
Pay Per Click (PPC)
When you are paid per click, you are only paid when visitors click the advertiser's banner on your site. The amount paid is usually higher than the pay per impression scheme. Whether you get a high conversion rate here depends on the banner (whether it attracts people to click it), although in general, it has a higher conversion rate than the pay per sale method. A high traffic site will probably enjoy a higher click rate than a lower traffic site, although you will probably get better results if your banners are carefully selected to suit the target audience of your site.
Pay Per Sale or Lead
While you will probably get the highest payment rates with this method, it has the lowest conversion rate of the three schemes. You will only earn if your visitors click through the banner and either purchase an item from the advertiser or take some other prescribed action (eg, sign up for a service). Like the Pay Per Click method, you get much better results if you carefully select your advertisers to suit the target audience of your site.
In general, to avoid wasting resources in issuing cheques for very small amounts, advertisers will usually accrue the amount owing to you until it reaches a certain level (such as $25) before they pay you.
Where to Find Affiliate Programs
You can find a list of affiliate programs and affiliate networks on thefreecountry.com's Affiliate Program page at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml
To join an affiliate network or program, simply go to the site and complete their online application form. Some programs will give you instant approval while others require a human to check out your application before it is approved. Once it is approved, you'll be given some HTML code which you can cut and paste into your web page. Note that some affiliate networks and programs will not accept you unless you have your own domain name. If you are planning to earn from your site, you should seriously consider registering your own domain name.
How To Choose An Affiliate Program
How should you choose an affiliate program? My suggestion is not to choose a program according to the payment scheme, but rather according to the kind of people who are likely to visit your website. For example, if you are targeting parents on your site, links to affiliates with educational software, books and the like may generate more revenue than banners that link to web hosting companies. The most important rule of choosing an affiliate program is to know your target audience.
Another point to consider is whether you really want to join every single affiliate program that comes your way. Some studies suggest that sites that make the most money from affiliate programs are affiliates of only a small handful of programs. Furthermore, concentrating your advertisements from one network may allow you to be paid faster. If you advertise for hundreds of different affiliate networks on your site, you may wind up earning only (say) a few dollars per month from each network. If your advertiser's minimum payment amount is higher than what you can earn each month, it may take you a long time before you accrue enough to be paid.
On the other hand, that formula does not necessarily hold true for every site (or every page on your site, for that matter). For example, if your site has a particular theme, and an affiliate network only supports one or two suitable advertisers, you might want to sign up for a few affiliate networks so as to get a greater number of relevant advertisers. After all, advertisements that are relevant to your audience are more likely to be taken up than general advertisements. (What's the point of putting banners from only one affiliate if nobody is going to click them?)
Automated Context-Sensitive Advertising
One of the latest trends in website sponsorship is to sign up with an advertising network like Google AdSense The advertising network automatically checks your web page and determines the most relevant advertisement for the page. As a result, without much additional effort from you, you get advertisements targeted at the interests of your visitors. As mentioned earlier, targeted ads tend to result in better performance and returns.
Get Started
Advertising revenue is one of the most effortless way to earn money from your site. You merely have to put the banner there and wait for the money to roll in. (Well, okay, not quite. You will still need to have some visitors first before you can make anything.)
Why wait? If you already have a website, let it earn even while you sleep (literally). Every day you let your site "idle" without advertising is a day of lost opportunity.