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Published: Friday, 23 February 2024 21:25
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Precious Metals - Gold, silver:

I'm not a big fan of buying gold/silver, etc for investment purpose. Nor buying it for showoff.

History:

Good article on historical gold and silver statistics is here .

Gold vs paper currency

Before Gold came into existence as currency, people used barter system to sell/buy things. This involved exchanging items with each other. Since this was very inefficient process, gold came into the process as a medium of currency. Gold mining has been taking place from about 5000 B.C. , so it has been about 7000 years, since gold has been used in some form as a currency or asset.

Gold has been used as a currency, since it's very easy to store, can't be produced artificially  and also limited in quantity. It's 20 times heavier than water, so 1 litre cube of gold = 10cmx10cmx10cm weighs 20kg, as compared to water of 1kg. So, at today's price of $2K/ounce, that 1 litre cube of gold would cost about $1M. Since it's limited in quantity and only exists in mines, no one can produce it artificially. Any thing that could be produced artificially by man, could not be used as currency. As such, gold was used as currency, and people had confidence that only so much gold was available.

Somewhere down the line, paper currency came into existence. Governments said that they will issue paper currency, which would be as good as gold. However, no one would believe in paper currency, as it was just a piece of paper. So, in order to make it work, it was backed by gold. That meant that the government would only issue paper currency in exchange for gold. So, let's say there was 1000 gram of gold in that country that was in circulation, then the govt would issue 1000 papers (assuming 1 paper was assigned value equal to 1 gram of gold). These 1000 papers would be held by the govt in treasury, and wouldn't be given to anyone. Now, whenever someone came with 1 gram of gold, govt would give him 1 piece of paper. That meant that the total amount of currency in circulation was still the same (999 gram of gold and 1 paper currency). Similarly, if more people came to exchange their gold with paper currency, govt would get more and more gold in exchange for these papers. After there is sufficient confidence in the system, most of the money in circulation would be paper currency, with an equivalent amount of gold sitting in the government treasury.  That gave confidence to paper currency, as it was conceptually equivalent to gold, but instead of carrying gold around, you could exchange this gold for paper currency from the issuer of paper currency, and then carry paper currency around, which was much easier. At any given point of time, if you wanted to get your gold back, you could take your paper currency to the govt and get an equivalent amount of gold.

There is no clear statistic on total amount of gold mined since the advent of civilization. According to the link at top, total amount of gold ever mined is 5.5B ounces or 165K metric tonnes (1 metric ton is 1000 kg). About 10% of the gold ever mined has been lost, used or unaccounted, so there's about 5B ounces or 150K ton of gold in circulation today. This article suggests that total amount of gold that is mined every year since 1995 is about 80M ounces or 2500 Metric tonnes.  World gold production peaked at 2.6K ton in the year 2001, and has been declining since then. In the year 2010, it was at 2.4K ton. Assuming $2K/ounce of gold price, that's $150B of gold that is mined every year. More than 50% of the gold ever mined has been mined in the last 50 years, and 90% of the gold ever mined has been mined since 1850. So, Gold supply is increasing by about 2% every year on an average. The aggregate un-mined known reserves of all the world's gold mining companies is approximately 45K tonnes as mentioned here . So, at current pace, somewhere around 2030, all of the known gold reserves will be exhausted, and then gold supply will increase very slowly.

Of this 150K ton of gold that has been mined, 50% is consumed in jewelery by mixing gold with other metals as copper, etc which results in 22k, 18k, 14k or 10k purity gold as pure 24k gold is too soft to be used in making any jewelery. 40% of gold is consumed as investment in gold coins, bars, govt reserves, etc and remaining 10% is consumed in industry for making solders, IC connections, medical uses, etc.

Indian households hold about 18K ton of gold, which is about 12% of all the gold in the world ever mined. Most of it is held in form of jewelery. Some estimates, put the amount of gold owned by Indian households to be 25K to 30K ton, which would be about 20% of all gold.

Governments hold gold in their reserves too, as bank's reserve assets. About 30K ton or 20% of gold is held by various governments. As of 2010 end, US Fed has the largest gold reserve at 8K ton (5%), Germany 3.5K ton, Italy and France 2.5K ton each, China and Switzerland at 1K ton each, Russia, Japan, Netherlands and India each at more than 0.6K ton of gold. IMF (International Monetary fund) holds about 3K ton, while ECB (European Central bank) holds about 0.5K ton of gold.

Gold is also held privately in stocks/funds . These funds actually buy physical gold on your behalf, when you buy such stocks. As of 2011, 2.5K ton or 2% of gold is held in such funds. The most widely traded such exchange traded fund is SPDR gold ETF (ticker GLD), traded in US stock market. It has about 1.2K ton of gold held in its stocks.

Aside from 40% of gold accounted above, 10% of the gold is in industrial materials. So, the remaining 50% of the gold ever mined is in various countries as household jewelery, gold coins, bars, etc (excluding indian households).

Gold producing countries:

The world’s top five gold producing countries mine about 50% of gold of the total mined output of 2.4K ton. Countries producing about 2/3rd of total gold production in world are as follows: China - 370 ton (15%), South Africa- 275 ton (11%), Australia - 250 ton (10%), USA - 250 ton (10%), Peru - 210 ton (9%), Russia - 160 ton (7%), Canada - 105 ton (5%). By comparison, India produces only about 2.5 ton or 0.1% of total gold produced every year. South Africa was the largest producer of gold for many decades, producing over 800 tons every year, but all easy pickings have been done, resulting in precipitous decline of new and existing gold mines. So, it's getting more difficult and expensive to mine new gold. While gold mining cost were around $200/ounce at start of 2000, they are now over $700/ounce and going higher each year. This ABN AMRO paper has good statistics on gold mining costs. Still at prices over $2K/ounce, it's still profitable business.

Gold consuming countries:

In 2011, there was demand for about 4K ton of gold. Gold is not consumed in the true sense. 2K ton (50%) was consumed in jewelery, 1.6K ton (40%) in investment (1.4K ton in bars/coin, while 0.2K ton inETFs), and remaining 0.4K ton (10%) in industrial applications. Note that before the bull run of gold (year 2003 and before), about 80% of gold demand was for jewelery, 10% for investment and 10% for industrial applications. So, the rising price of gold has generated a lot of demand for gold as an investment. Since annual production of gold is about 2.4K, while demand is 4K, the shortfall is made up by recycling scrap gold, as well as by sale of gold by Banks around the world. The world’s largest consumer of gold is India, at 800 ton (20%), then China at 500 ton (12%), and a distant third is USA at 125 ton (3%). Rest all countries consume less than 100 ton, and consume roughly in line with what they produce. Gold demand has fallen significantly for all countries except India and China, since 2003 as prices for gold went up by a factor of 5. India's gold import was 1K ton in 2011, a record high.

 

 

Buying/Selling Precious Metals = Gold, Silver, Platinum, Palladium:

Gold/Silver coins are the best way to buy these precious metal, as they may be gifted to others. Platinum and Palladium and two other metals, that are considered alternative to gold, and are highly traded. However, we'll be looking at gold/silver only. There are few terms that we need to know before rushing to buy these.

  • Weight (in troy oz): The most common weight for these coins is 1troy oz (31.1g). NOTE: it's NOT 1 oz, as 1 oz is only 28.3g. We quote Gold/Silver in troy oz in USA and in international markets. Coins may be more than 1 troy oz in weight, as they have to be mixed with other metals to make them more durable. Many reputed mint companies will guarantee that gold/silver content itself is 1 troy oz. Most commonly seen with gold coins, where the weight of gold coin is 5-10% more than 1 troy oz, to give you 1 troy oz of gold.
  • Spot Price: Spot price is the price at which gold/silver is sold in huge commodity markets. Usually you have to pay a premium over the spot price to buy these from online merchants, as they have shipping costs, credit card costs, insurance cost, etc. No one can sell you physical gold/silver etc for spot price, as they will lose money doing that.
    • 2023: As of 2023, spot price for 1 troy oz of metals is: Gold = $2K,silver = $20, Platinum and Palladium = $1k. Coins for 1 oz sell for 2%-5%
  • Purity: Gold/Silver also have a purity noted on them, which specifies how much of the weight is pure gold/silver. Generally, these coins are mixed with other metals to make them more mintable. It's common to see gold/silver coins mixed with other metals. In India most coins are sold at 92% purity (i.e only 92% of the weight of the coin/bar is precious metal, the other 10% is less precious metal as Silver,Copper, etc). But they are priced as if it's 100% gold/silver. Gold/Silver purity is noted in karats. karats indicate the proportion of precious metal out of a total of 24 karats. 24 karats is 100% pure gold, So, a 22 Karat gold is 22/24=91.67% gold content. Most places sell gold at 18 karat or 22 karat purity. Here in US, all sorts of coins are sold with different purity levels. Purity is also noted in "spine". Four nines (99.99% or 0.9999) is called four spine. Three nines (99.9% or 0.999) is called three spine. A lot of coins that are minted by individual companies are 3 spine, that's 99.90%. Typically four spine is a little more valuable because there is more gold. Chinese gold pandas are 3 spine, for example. Us liberties or Buffalos are 4 spine.
  • Minting Companies: Companies may mint their own coins, and sell them. These don't have that lure, as you these are NOT considered currency. US Mint ( branch of Treasury Dept of US govt) has the authority to mint coins and sell gold, silver, Platinum and Palladium coins in different sizes. It doesn't directly sell to general public, via sells them via it's authorized sellers. These US Mint Coins are highly sought after, as they are internationally recognized as being of highest purity, backed by US govt and have legal tender value just like US currency (i.e 1 Dollar Gold coin has $50 written on it, meaning US govt will pay you $50 if you decide to use it as a legal tender. No one does it, since market price of that coins is lot higher at $2000) and may be included in Retirement (i.e. IRA) accounts too.
    • Link to US Mint coins: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coins_of_the_United_States_dollar => For Gold/Silver coins, the gold reference is "American Eagle" coins. They have guaranteed 1 oz of gold/silver with 3 or 4 spine purity. However, they carry premium over spot price.
      • American Gold Eagle (AGE): These are the only gold coins that you should buy as they may usually be bought with only 2% premium over spot price of gold. One thing to note is that these coins have low purity of 91.67% (22/24*100) as it's 22 carat gold. It has 3% Silver and 5.67% copper. However, it still contains 1 troy oz of gold, as the total weight of coin is 1.091 Troy oz, with 1 troy oz of that being gold. It's very durable, but less shiny than other coins which are 99.9% pure gold.
      • American Buffalo (AB): These were first minted in 2006, and are the only 24 karat gold coins with 99.99% purity offered by US Mint. These were offered to compete with pure gold coins offered by Canadian and Australian Mintage. Since these have no other metal content, their weight is 1 troy oz. They are more delicate and easy to chip, or get their gold brushed off.So, they have to be kept in a box or package.
      • American Silver Eagle (ASE): ASE are composed of 99.9% silver and 0.1% copper. These coins usually sell for $3-$4 over spot price of silver. You may buy other Silver coins (NOT ASE) by other minters which may be only $1-$2 premium over spot price. But expect to pay at least 5% over spot price, which makes it lot more difficult to make as much profit when selling (compared to gold).
    • Other Govt Mint coins: Government of many countries around the world also mint gold/silver coins. Some of the popular ones are Canadian Gold Maple Leaf (GML) coins with 99.99% purity, South African Krugerrand Gold coins of 22 Karat (Same as AGE with total weight being 1.09 oz), Australian Kangaroo coins produced by Australian Mint and Britannia coins produced by British Royal Mint. They are all guaranteed by the respective Governments, so are equally safe.
    • I would personally prefer to only buy AGE, and not bother with any other gold coins. They are very liquid, and easy to buy/sell. For Silver coins, since the premium for ASE is 20% over the spot price, I would prefer to buy it local minting companies, which sell it to you for 5%-10% over the spot price. You easily lose 2%-3% in gold and 5%-10% in silver each time you buy/sell compared to spot price. As for my recommendation, you should never ever sell anything you buy. So, just buy and keep it forever !!

Below are few merchants where you may buy these. 

EBAY: I used to buy them on ebay before 2014, as at that time they allowed you to buy gold/silver using ebay GC, which you could regularly get on discount for 5%-20%. So, that was a pretty good deal (easy 5%-20% profit). Since 2014, they stopped accepting GC for buying any precious metals. Now, there's no reason to buy on ebay. Actually you should avoid buying on ebay, as ebay has gone downhill, and still going that path. Lots of other retailers offer much better service at the same price.

COSTCO/WALMART: As of 2023, 2 biggest retailers - Walmart and Costco have started offering Gold/silver coins. Costco usually have gold coins on sale from time to time with only $30-$40 over the spot price of Gold. Silver coins go less on sale. However, their American Eagle silver coins usually sell for only $2 over spot price per coin, which is a decent markup (Not a bad deal, as other retialers usually have > $2 markup on these coins). Walmart has gold/silver coins via 3rd part sellers. One of the most reputed 3rd party sellers is "APMEX", but you may buy from any 3rd party sellers, as Walmart stands behind the product. Whenever I've Walmart GC to burn, I usually end up buying these gold/silver coins.

Shipping is always free, item is non returnable, and you can pay with credit card, and earn points (1%-2%). 

 

 

 

DEALS:

 

Costco:

 

Walmart:

 

 

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Published: Thursday, 01 February 2024 14:57
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Diet and Supplements

There are lots of things that we need in our diet to fulfill our body's nutritional requirement.

There are 6 essential nutrients that our body needs from food and drinks (our body can't make them):

  1. Macronutrients (Needed in large amounts)
    1. Carbohydrates => Main source of energy
    2. fats => Provided energy, and helps body absorb vitamins/minerals
    3. proteins => Needed for strong bones, muscles, organs, skin and nails
  2. Micronutrients (Needed in small amounts)
    1. vitamins => Body needs 13 different essential vitamins to fight infections, heal wounds, regulate hormones and more. There are two types of vitamins:
      1. Fat soluble Vitamins: Imp for muscle/bone
      2. Water soluble vitamins: Imp for nerves/heart
    2. minerals: More than a dozen minerals are needed
    3. water: Water makes up > 50% of our body. It helps to carry nutrients and bunch of other functions.

There are few non essential nutrients that your body makes. Ex are vitamins as cholesterol, Vit D, etc.

Let's look at some of the nutrients and associated food/diet. A more detailed section is in "Biology" section. Brief summary is again presented here.

 

 

Diet/Food:

Below are common food items along with their content:

  1. Milk: Milk is produced by mammary glands of animals, and as such has lot of nutrients to support health of babies. Dairy milk is milk collected from farm animals, mostly cattle. Initially, humans didn't have the ability to digest mammal milk as adults, as milk contained lactose. An enzyme, lactase was needed to digest lactose, which was present in high levels in small intestine of babies immediately after birth but declined as babies grew. However a chance mutation 1000's of yrs back enabled production of lactase in adults, and we started consuming this milk directly. Before that humans converted milk to curd, cheese, etc to consume as those had lower levels of lactose. 
    1. Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk
    2. Production: About 1B Ton of milk from 300M cows produced every year (~4000L/cow per year or 10L-15L ($10-$15 in milk assuming price of $1/L) per day per cow. About 1B ppl live in dairy farming households (10% of population). India is the largest producer and consumer of milk in world. It produced 200MT, followed by USA at 100MT. Cow and Buffalo milk are produced in largest quantity, with India and US producing 100MT and 90MT of cow milk, and India and Pakistan producing 90MT and 40MT buffalo milk. Goat milk is 3rd most produced milk with India and Bangladesh producing 6MT and 3MT. Milk yields per cow are highest in Israel at 12,000L/cow per yr, while India is pretty low at 1000L/cow per yr.
    3. Consumption:
    4. Nutritional value: asfwrite fixme
  2. Egg: Eggs have been consumed as food for millions of years. Most common is chicken eggs. Hens may live upto 10 year, but their peak egg laying age is from 1-3 years, where they lay 1 egg/day (200-300 eggs per year) under optimal conditions. By age 5 o 6, they stop laying eggs. In 2023, 90M tons of eggs were produced from about 9B hens (9B*200*50g=90B kg of eggs/yr). China is the largest producer of eggs at 1/3 of world production, followed by distant US and India at 8% and 5% respectively.
    1. Nutritional value: 100 g of egg contains water=75g, proteins=13g, fat=10g, carbs=1g (cholesterol=0.3g). It has 18 different amino acids, and various minerals and vitamins. It has 150 kcal. Since a medium egg is around 50g in weight, it has 6g of protein and about 75 kcal. Egg white is primarily water (88%), more protein and no cholesterol. Egg yolk (the center yellow part) has all the cholesterol and fat, and as such was considered not so healthy. However, research has found no evidence of this for people consume about 1 egg a day. Consuming too many eggs a day may cause diabetes and other cardiovascular issues, though research is not conclusive. Better to stick with no more than 1 egg per day.

Proteins are needed for body to build muscles. Proteins is in larger amount in meat products, but not so much in plant based products. So, for vegetarians, the big source of Proteins comes from dairy based products as milk, yogurt, cheese. For vegans, even dairy products are off the menu, so they have even limited things to fulfill their protein requirement.  It's also in lentils, beans, tofu etc for vegetarian and vegans out there. Our body needs massive amounts of protein to help build and maintain muscles. At a minimum, our body needs 0.36 g of protein per lb of weight or 0.8 g of protein per kg of body weight. Most people around 60 kg of weight need minimum of 50g of protein per day. Basically every year you need to consume about 20Kg of Protein, which is 1/3 of your body weight. This is huge amount of protein, and that's needed just to maintain muscles that you have !!

Link below states 0.8g to 1.2g of protein per kg of body weight. Very active people as body builders, marathon runners may go up to max of 2g of protein per kg of body weight but that's the upper limit. Too much protein may put stress on your kidneys as the by product from protein breakdown is Nitrogen which needs to be excreted out via kidneys.

Link => https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-truth-about-protein-how-to-get-enough-at-every-age

I'm listing below Protein products for a vegetarian diet:

Plants don't have too much protein. Each cup size serving may have max of 2g protein, which isn't going to suffice for your body, no matter how much plant you eat. Here are top vegetables rich in protein => https://www.self.com/story/high-protein-vegetables

Beans are another option for vegetarians, but lot of beans do cause gas and bloating (you might have heard that before from your elders).

Protein based supplements: You will have to supplement with Protein supplements. One of the most popular ones is whey protein. ON whey protein may be had for $10/lb (or $20/kg), which is a good price. It will cost you < $1/day in protein supplement.

 Isolate usually has higher protein concentration, but online videos claim there's not much difference b/w isolate and concentrate. FIXME ...

 

 

Proteins:

A more detailed section on Proteins is in "Biology" section. Brief summary is again presented here.

Proteins are needed for body to build muscles. Proteins is in larger amount in meat products, but not so much in plant based products. So, for vegetarians, the big source of Proteins comes from dairy based products as milk, yogurt, cheese. For vegans, even dairy products are off the menu, so they have even limited things to fulfill their protein requirement.  It's also in lentils, beans, tofu etc for vegetarian and vegans out there. Our body needs massive amounts of protein to help build and maintain muscles. At a minimum, our body needs 0.36 g of protein per lb of weight or 0.8 g of protein per kg of body weight. Most people around 60 kg of weight need minimum of 45g-50g of protein per day. Basically every year you need to consume about 20Kg of Protein, which is 1/3 of your body weight. This is huge amount of protein, and that's needed just to maintain what you have !!

Link below states 0.8g to 1.2g of protein per kg of body weight. Very active people as body builders, marathon runners may go up to max of 2g of protein per kg of body weight but that's the upper limit. Too much protein may put stress on your kidneys as the by product from protein breakdown is Nitrogen which needs to be excreted out via kidneys.

Link => https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-truth-about-protein-how-to-get-enough-at-every-age

I'm listing below Protein products for a vegetarian diet:

Plants don't have too much protein. Each cup size serving may have max of 2g protein, which isn't going to suffice for your body, no matter how much plant you eat. Here are top vegetables rich in protein => https://www.self.com/story/high-protein-vegetables

Beans are another option for vegetarians, but lot of beans do cause gas and bloating (you might have heard that before from your elders).

Protein based supplements: You will have to supplement with Protein supplements. One of the most popular ones is whey protein. ON whey protein may be had for $10/lb (or $20/kg), which is a good price. It will cost you < $1/day in protein supplement.

 Isolate usually has higher protein concentration, but online videos claim there's not much difference b/w isolate and concentrate. FIXME ...

Meals:

  • Breakfast: Get 2 bread slices (each 5g of protein for whole wheat bread with multi grain) with peanut butter on it (5 g of protein for 1 tablespoon). Drink a glass of milk (another 8g of protein in one glass) with Protein powder (1 scoop is around 10g of protein) in it. Do take 10 nuts which give you about 5g of protein. This will will give you around 30g-35g of protein in the morning meal.
  • Lunch/Dinner: For a vegetarian diet, I don't count too much on protein intake in home made curries, roti

 

 

Calcium:

Calcium is needed for bone development, and 1.2g per day is the recommended amount. Basically you need to consume 1/2 KG of calcium every year, which is a lot of calcium.

 

 

Vitamins:

Vitamin B12: Very essential

 

 

 

Deals: 

 

 

 

2025:

 

 

 

01/03/2025: Amazon Dymatize whey protein for $42 (5 lb)

This is cheaper than Costco, but brand is different. Also, it's concentrate and NOT isolate, which usually has slightly lower protein content. People like their Isolate version. This is cheaper than even Costco ON Whey protein, but this price is only for 1st S&S order.

https://slickdeals.net/f/18036396-5-lbs-dymatize-elite-100-whey-protein-powder-chocolate-42-13-w-s-s-free-shipping

 

 

 

 

2024:

 

 

 

12/26/2024: Costco ON whey protein for $49 (5.5 lb) in store => expires 01/20/2025

Costco has 5.5 lb (2.5Kg) ON whey protein isolate for $55 online and $49 in store.  Prices are lowest for buying in store. It's 5.47 lb for Vanilla flavor, and 5.64 lb for Chocolate flavor, but both of them have same protein 24g per scoop. Vanilla has 24g protein per 31g, while Chocolate has 24g protein per 32g. Either way, price is < $20/kg which is as low as it can get. So load up.

https://slickdeals.net/f/18002616-costco-members-5-64-lbs-optimum-nutrition-gold-100-whey-protein-powder-55-free-shipping

UPDATE 03/20/2025: Amazon has the vanilla flavor for $93 (with 5% S&S discount) for 10 lb bag ($9.30/lb). This is still more expensive than costco, as costco is $49 for 5.5lbs ($9/lb). Only If you get 4 more items and get the S&S discount to 10% bringing total down to $87, it'll be able to beat costco price. Good thing is that there's an extra 5% on Chase cards starting Apr 1 (for their next quarter), so you can have the delivery set for mid Apr, so that you can get this additional 5% off.

Link => https://slickdeals.net/f/18190279-10-lb-optimum-nutrition-gold-standard-100-whey-protein-powder-vanilla-ice-cream-93-22-w-s-s-free-shipping

 

 

 

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Published: Monday, 22 January 2024 06:03
Hits: 985

Deals: 

 Here are the deals from 2024. For deals from 2023, go to DEALS 2023

Deals starting from November till New year (aka Black Friday deals) for 2024 are also under this section itself

I've sticky deals and regular deals. Regular deals are posted below which are offered just one time. Sticky deals have separate section of their own, as they refer to deals which are offered multiple times a year.

 

 

Bank and Brokerage Deals (updated 2025):

 

01/01/2025: All bank and Brokerage bonus deals from 2025 onwards have been moved to "Sticky Deals" section

 

 

 

Previous unexpired/extended bank/brokerage deals from 2024 and before: 

 

 

 

10/28/2023: Robinhood (RH) Brokerage Offer of 1% bonus on total assets transferred  (3% bonus on IRA transfers) - expires Dec 8, 2023 expires Apr 30, 2024 (1% bonus offer extended to June 28, 2024)

Look in brokerage account bonus section for details of the offer: best brokerage bonus

 

 

10/20/2023: Chime - $245 $250 in SwagBucks for $200+ in direct deposit within 30 days (nationwide) => expires Oct 31, 2023 extended to Nov 30, 2023 Feb 29, 2024 Mar 31, 2024

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

UPDATE 03/18/2024: $10 bonus for tipping someone $10 or more. Valid 03/18/2024 - 03/20/2024. See above link for details

 

 

10/20/2023: TastyTrade (previously known as TastyWorks) Brokerage Bonus Offer of $2K for $100K+ - expires Mar 31, 2024. Ongoing as of July, 2024

Look in brokerage account bonus section for details of the offer: best brokerage bonus

 

 

10/01/2023: Wells Fargo - $325 for $1K+ in direct deposit within 90 days (nationwide) => expires Nov 13, 2023. extended to Jan 16, 2024 Apr 9, 2024

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

11/05/2023: Capital One - $1500 bonus for $100K+ in deposit in Savings account (nationwide) => expires Dec 6, 2023 => Still active as of 04/04/2024

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

 

 

Current Deals:

 

 

2024: 

 

 

 

12/26/2024: Costco ON whey protein for $49 (5.5 lb) in store => expires 01/20/2025

Look in "diets and supplements" under health section for details of the offer: diet and supplements

 

 

11/21/2024: Tracfone offer via HSN - 1 year service plan + 2 phones for $110 or less

Look in "phone services" under services section for details of the offer: phone service

 

 

10/26/2024: Open a Checking a/c at Alliant CU with $500+ DD - - get $150 via rakuten => expires Nov 2, 2024 (Now $200 as of 12/27/2024)

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

10/10/2024: Robinhood (RH) Brokerage Offer of 1% (or 2%) bonus on total assets transferred  (3% bonus on IRA transfers) - Valid from 10/16/24 to 10/27/24

Look in brokerage account bonus section for details of the offer: best brokerage bonus

 

 

09/28/2024: TradeUp Brokerage Bonus Offer => $2K bonus for $100K+ in brokerage account transfer => expires 31st Dec, 2024

Look in brokerage account bonus section for details of the offer: best brokerage bonus

 

 

10/01/2024: Bank of America - $300 bonus for $2K+ in direct deposit within first 3 months (nationwide) => expires Jan 31, 2025

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

09/25/2024: Laurel Road - $300 bonus + $20/month for $2.5K+ in direct deposit (nationwide, open to non-nurses too) => expiry unknown

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

09/15/2024: P&G - $15 rebate on $50+ for P&G selected items bought from any store: valid 09/15/24 to 12/29/24

Look in "stores" under shopping section for details of the offer: stores

 

 

09/10/2024: BMO Harris - $500 + $100GC for $7.5K+ in direct deposit within first 3 months (nationwide) => expires Oct 31, 2024

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

09/02/2024: Quorum Federal Credit Union - $300 for $1K+ in direct deposit in 60 days (nationwide) => expiry unknown

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

09/01/2024: US Bank - $450 for $8K+ in direct deposit in 3 months (only in selected states) => expires Sept 26, 2024

Look in bank account bonus section for details of the offer: best bank bonus

 

 

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Published: Wednesday, 03 January 2024 18:23
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RDC = Reset Domain Crossing

RDC is reset domain crossing. For a given reset signal, the logic being initialized by it, is defined as a reset domain. Just like clocks in CDC, reset signals crossing reset domains can be an issue if not done right. A problem can occur at the interface of 2 reset domains (same clock domain) when one is being reset while the other is not. These are some of the issues to be careful about when dealing with reset signal.

  1. Reset Synchronization: Just like CDC, RDC can be an issue when reset signal crosses clock domain. Reset signal needs to be synchronized properly across clock domains. This is irrespective of whether reset signal is going into D pin of flops or async set/reset pin of flops. In this case, reset signal is just like any other signal crossing clk domain, and hence needs to eb synchronized before being used. This is checked as part of CDC, and NOT RDC.
  2. Glitch free Reset: Just like Clock signal, reset signal should be clean, i.e no glitches. Else, flops may get incorrectly reset.
  3. Sync vs Async  Reset: We have 2 styles of reset methodology in design:
    1. Synchronous Reset => Sync set/reset flops have reset coming into D pin of flop, which makes reset similar to any other signal (nothing special to reset). This makes RDC checks very easy. In this methodology, at the reset port, we have a synchronizer that asserts and de-asserts reset synchronously. Using Sync Rest is the preferred design methodology for all designs. It is however not always possible to use a full sync reset methodology. Below are few cases, where we have to use Async reset methodology:
      • Clock is not guaranteed to be running when the reset is asserted. In such cases, reset can't pass thru the flop and rest the design, until clock comes, which may be too late.
      • When logic needs to be reset right upon reset assertion, then we need Async reset. Ex are IOs, PHYs, test logic, etc.
    2. Asynchronous Reset => Async set/reset flops have reset signal going into Async pin of flops. In this methodology, at the reset port, we have a synchronizer that asserts reset asynchronously, but de-asserts synchronously. So, de-assertion of reset is NOT an issue, but assertion is. Further, this reset signal goes to async set/reset pins of flops (instead of going to D pin of flops). STA tools do recovery/removal checks on these paths, making sure they don't violate setup/hold time wrt clock. But they don't time the path thru the Async pin going to output pin of flop, and then going into the D pin of next flop. This path may violate setup/hold time of next flop asit is async to other domain, and cause metastability. If all these flops are in the same reset domain, then it's not an issue, as all flops get reset assertion, so all flops are anyway going to be reset. However, if the destination flop is in a different reset domain, which is not being reset, then the metastability issue may cause the destination flop to have unknown value for a cycle, which may propagate to other flops. So, the main issue with Async reset methodology is due to STA tools not timing the path from Async set/reset pin to Q pin of the flop (reset assertion), resulting in metastability. RDC primarily catches all these issues. For designs where we have to use Async reset methodology, we should stick with following guideline:
      1. Only POR reset (power on reset) should be connected to async set/reset pin of flops. Using other software or functional resets exposes the design to potential RDC issues.
    3. Hybrid Reset => This is reset methodology where we mix sync and async reset methodology. In this case, we should have Reset port go thru 2 synchronizers in parallel, one for sync reset (both assertion and de-assertion is sync), and another for async reset (assertion is async, but de-assertion is sync). Sync reset flops are driven by sync reset synchronizer, while Async reset flops are driven by Async reset synchronizer. This keeps the 2 methodolies separate, and much less RDC issues across the two.

 

 

RDC Fixes:

 

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Published: Wednesday, 27 December 2023 08:11
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Verbs:

Verbs can be in different forms, different tenses, different moods. They can be main verb or auxillary verb, be in active voice or passive voice, etc. Thus it's hard to group verbs in just one tree branching out, as tenses, forms, voice, etc overlap with each other. Usually we know verbs by their tenses, i.e whether it's in past, present or future. However, keep in mind that tenses are just one classification style of verbs, there are other classifications too.

Link: https://espanol.lingolia.com/en/grammar/verbs

 

Verb forms:

English: In English, there are only 5 forms of verb as shown below. Forms means different transformation of the verb. For ex: run can have diff forms as run, ran, running, runs, etc. These are all different forms. Of these 5 forms, first 3 forms are most commonly learnt when learning => These are past/present/past_participle forms of verb.

Link: https://www.careerpower.in/verb-forms.html

  1. Present (Root) form of a verb (V1) => This is the base form of verb w/o modification. i.e I run. Here verb "run" is base form of verb.
  2. Simple Past form of a verb (V2) => This denotes action done in past, i.e I walked. These are formed by adding -ed/-d to end of base verb for regular verbs. For irregular verbs, no simple rules (i.e I ran)
  3. Past Participle form of a verb (V3) => This form of verb is similar to simple past form (V2), but always come with an auxiliary verb. Ex: "He played" vs "He had played". "He played" is simple past or V2 form, but "He had played" is V3 form. It needed auxillary verb "had". Past participle is refered as "past" since the verb form is of "simple past" with -ed/-d added. Sometimes, it's with -n added too (i.e took vs taken). However it doesn't mean event had already occurred. It can be used in past, present or future tense. Ex: He had been called, he is being called, he will be called => all 3 are V3 form and verb is in past form, but with the correct auxillary verb, it can represent all 3 tenses.
  4. Present Participle form of verb (V4) => This form is created by adding -ing to the base form. It’s used in the past, present, and future progressive verb tenses. Ex: He was running, he is running, he will be running => all 3 are V4 form, but in 3 diff tenses.
  5. Third -person singular Present form (V5) => This is the V1 verb, but instead this is used for 3rd person, i.e He, she, it, etc. It is denoted by addition of -s or-es to the base form, i.e he plays badminton. Here plays is V5 form.

Spanish: All Verbs in Spanish are of 2 forms - Personal and Impersonal. We choose which form to use depending on how the verb is to be used with the subject. We don't have 5 forms as in English. This will become clear later with examples.

Link: https://espanol.lingolia.com/en/grammar/verbs

  • Personal form: These are verbs which change according to nouns/pronouns attached with the verb (i.e I run). They follow the same 3x2 table as shown for pronouns in previous section -i.e whether nouns/pronouns are 1st, 2nd , 3rd person (nouns are treated as 3rd person) and whether they are singular/plural. (Same as 3x2 pronoun table shown). So, we have a 3x2 table with 6 versions of these verbs. These are called personal form as verb changes based on person and number. In English, I eat and you eat, both use same verb "eat", but in Spanish, "eat" changes based on "I eat" vs "you eat". In English, we sometimes do that with specific verbs => an ex is verb "run", as in "I run" vs "he runs". In Spanish, it happens with almost all the verbs. This is called Conjugation, where verbs change their endings to reflect the subject of the sentence in person and number. Since the verb form indirectly specifies the subject pronoun, we omit the pronoun all together for 1st and 2nd person (i.e instead of saying "I eat banana" or "yo como plátano" we just say "eat banana" or "como plátano" as verb "cpmo" (from base word comer)  implies "I eat"). We'll see these in ex below.
    • ex: I eat => como (base verb is comer, but is transformed based on pronoun "I")
  • Impersonal form: These are verbs which don't change based on noun/pronoun attached to the verb. So, they are called impersonal, as they don't depend on person. No complicated 3x2 table to memorize, as all forms are same. There are 3 forms of these verbs:
    1. Infinitive form: Every verb can be put in Infinitve form, where the verb remains in it's base form (i.e walk). This is same as V1 form in English, and is also the  simple present tense of the verb. The word "to" added in front of the verb doesn't change the base form of verb. So, "to walk" is also an infinitve form of verb. In Spanish, infinitive form of verb is with the word "to" in front of it. All verb infinitives end in -ar, -er or -ir.. These are base verbs, and all verbs are formed from one of these base verbs.The base word implies "to do something". ex: hablar which is an ar verb means "to speak". If we just say speak, then it's not hablar, but is transformed based on the noun doing the verb. So, this verb is converted to personal form that we read above.
      • ex: cantar => to sing
    2. Gerund form: The gerund of Spanish verbs is equivalent to the English -ing form. Explained under "gerund" section.
      • ex: cantar (to sing) => I am singing => estoy cantando
    3. Participle form: The participle is equivalent to the English past participle (V3 or third form of the verb). Explained under "participle" section.
      • ex: cantar (to sing) => I have sung => he cantado (NOTE: gerund form was cantando, while here it's cantado

NOTE:

  • Gender: Verbs do NOT have a gender. So, no matter the gender of noun, verb remains the same. But verbs change according to forms discussed above. For personal forms, it's 2X3 table. Each verb can exist in various tenses, and each tense has it's own 3x2 table. We'll discuss tenses below.
  • Endings: Verbs in Spanish always end in -ar, -er and -ir. Whenever you see a Spanish word with these endings, remember they will be verbs. In English, we can't look at a word, and say it's a verb (i.e "speak" - you can never figure out it's a verb, based on it's spelling, but in spanish, it's "hablar", and as soon as you see -ar, you know it's a verb).
  • Consecutive verbs: When we have 2 verbs back to back, how do we conjugate them. Do we conjugate both of them based on the subject or just one. Well, conjugating both verbs will sound weird and also unnecessary since conjugation of 1 verb will be enough to indicate who the subject is. We usually conjugate the 1st verb, and have the 2nd verb in infinitive or participle form. We saw in "Participle form" above that "I have sung", "have" is the one that's modified as per 3x2 table.

 

Verb Moods and Tenses:

In Spanish, verbs also have moods - Moods help specify the speaker’s intention. In Spanish, there are three verb moods: With each mood, we have certain tenses. Tenses are same as in English - past, present, past progressive, future tense, etc. There are 18 Spanish verb tenses. Link: https://blog.rosettastone.com/your-complete-guide-to-all-18-spanish-verb-tenses-with-examples/

Out of these 18 tenses,10 tenses go only with indicative, 6 go only with Subjunctive and 2 only with Imperative. Why do we talk about moods when talking about tenses? => Because, the verb conjugate differently depending on the mood. So, the same present tense will conjugate differently in 1 mood than the other mood. So, basically we have 18 conjugate tables that we have to learn for each verb. So, 6 entries for each conjugate table implies about 100 conjugations you have to remember for each verb. With 1000's of verbs, that's 100K of verb conjugations !! Fortunately, we can get away by learning just 3 conjugate tables for simple past, present and future.

Moods are 3 types => Most of the things we do are expressed in normal mood. Other mood is where you wish about something, and last mood is where you command someone to do something. The conjugation table changes depending on the mood (unlike English, where verb transformation remain same no matter the mood)

We'll see the Moods and allowable tenses in each mood:

  1. Indicative mood (el indicativo): It is used for objective statements, events, actions and facts. It is the default mood and  expresses real information that is known or certain. Normal sentences are usually formed in the indicative mood. It's how we normally talk in English (Indicative mood). It is present in all tenses as present, past and future. There are not just 3, but 10 tenses that go with indicative mode:
    1. Present tense (Presente): This is simple present tense just like Present tense in English (V1 form in English)
      1. ex: He cleans the Kitchen => limpia la cocina. limpiar means "to clean". 3rd person form is limpia.
    2. Past tense (Preterit or Pretérito/Indefinido): This is the simple past tense (V2 form in English).
      1. They bought a new car => Compraron un coche nuevo.
    3. Future (Futuro Simple): This is the future tense in English as "I will do", etc.
      1.  I will talk to my father tonight.=> Hablaré con mi padre esta noche.
    4. Perfect form (Perfecto): Perfect tenses are participle form, i.e I had studied. All perfect tenses use the auxiliary verb haber (ex: had) along with a past participle main verb (studied). We saw the Participle form above, which was the V3 form in English. Along with past participle conjugate, we need "haber" verb conjugate to form sentences like "I have eaten", etc. The past participle of main verb (eaten) is formed by removing the ending of the infinitive and adding -ado for -AR verbs or -ido for -ER and -IR verbs (this was already explained above). The perfect tense of auxillary verb (have) is added to this to form the perfect form. Spanish translation of "have" is haber. Haber comes in all 3 perfect tenses as present, past and future, just as in English => I have, I had, I will have, are all possible by having the 3 tenses for haber. The haber table for all 3 tenses is in Verbs - ar,er,ir section. The main verb remains the same. We show the 3 Perfect forms => Present, Past and Future:
      1. Present Perfect (Presente Perfecto): He has eaten
      2. Past Perfect (Preterito Perfecto): He had eaten. One other form of this exists as shown below.
        1. Preterite Perfect (Preterito anterior): This tense is mostly used in formal speech or in literature, so no need to learn this. It describes an action in the past that happened immediately before another action in the past. ex: After we had eaten, he served dessert.
      3. Future Perfect (Futuro Perfecto): He will have studied.
    5. Past Imperfect (Preterito Imperfecto): You use this tense to talk about past actions generally, without a specific duration. Also commonly referred as "Imperfect tense" (instead of "past imperfect tense") as past is already implied. Ex: He used to play tennis. See in Past Imperfect section.
    6. Conditional (condicional simple): This is used to talk about hypothetical situations and make requests. Ex: We would take out the trash for you.
      1. Conditional Perfect (condicional perfecto): There is another form of conditional mood. It’s used to talk about actions that would have happened, but didn’t due to another event. You can also use it to talk about actions that probably happened or were likely true. Ex: He would have read the book, but his friends came. Not important to learn these.
  2. Subjunctive mood (el subjuntivo): It is used for expressing emotions, desires, and possibilities. It s called subjunctive as it indicates subjectivity of the fact. Ex: I wish that it would rain today. 
    1. Present (Presente de subjuntivo): This is present tense. ex: Lamento que tengan que irse. = I’m sorry that they have to leave.
    2. Imperfect (Imperfecto de subjuntivo): This is past tense of subjunctive mood. used to talk about feelings related to past events, as well as hypothetical situations. ex: I wanted you to come to my party.
    3. Future (Futuro de subjuntivo): This is rarely found in modern Spanish, and its uses are largely covered by the present subjunctive. ex: Wherever you go, do what you see.
    4. Perfect form (Perfecto): Similar to perfect tense in Indicative form, we have it here too. they use auxillary verb "haber" along with main verb. All 3 tenses of present, past and future are present here too.
      1. Present Perfect: It is similar to the present subjunctive, except that it covers past actions that are connected to the present, as well as actions that will have happened at a certain point in the future.
        • ex: My teacher doubts that I have read the book.
      2. Past Perfect: It to describe hypothetical situations in the past, conditional situations in the past, and past actions that preceded other actions.
        • ex: If I had known, I would have come.
      3. Future Perfect: Similar to Future Subjunctive, this form is rarely used.
        • ex: Priority will be given to those matters that fall under the emergency procedures provision.
  3. Imperative (imperativo): Similar to perfect tense in Indicative form. It is used for giving commands, making requests, giving advice, etc. addressed to one or more people directly. These verbs don't conjugate or change the same way as is done for personal verbs. The 3x2 table is still there, but it it has it's own table for -ar, -er and -ir verbs. We'll look at those in verbs - ar, er, ir section. They come in 2 forms:
    1. Affirmative Imperative: When we give a cmd to do something in affirmative. ex: Eat your food.
    2. Negative Imperative: When we give a cmd NOT to do something. ex: Do NOT go there.

Most common verbs:

There are 300 most common verbs that will cover 99% of verbs ever used in conversations. Some of them are irregular (see below), but knowing conjugation for even some of them will enhance your Spanish a lot.

Link to 100 most used verbs with Pics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhIQ2BfrxTM

 

 

Verb Conjugation:

We are going to look thru various spanish verbs in next few sub sections. Verbs in Spanish come in only 3 different endings => -ar, -er and -ir.

ex: pintar => to paint

There are few exception verbs which don't end in -ar, -er or -ir:

  • busara => to search. Other word basura means Trash, garbage (i.e the physical garbage that we pick up).

Some words end in -ar, -er or -ir, but are not Verbs:

  • amanecer => sunrise. atardecer => sunset. (both end in -er)

Verbs conjugate (i.e transform) based on the mood, tense, etc. There's a 3x2 table that helps us in making this transformation. This transformation table id different for different tenses, moods, etc.

Irregular verbs: These verbs are irregular, meaning they don't follow our usual 3x2 transformation table. These are discussed under their own section, as there are too many here. We need to learn some of the most commonly used irregular verbs. A lot of regular verbs turn out to be irregular in some conjugation table. But this will come with practice.

 

 

Verb Structures:

Verbs exist in 3 different kind of structures. Usually a given verb exists in only one of these structures, but some verbs exist in more than one structure. Below are the 3:

  1. Normal Verbs: These are all verbs that we conjugate, and translate normally (i.e no abnormal translation). These are most common verbs, and discussed extensively in later sections. i.e I go => yo voy.
  2. Backward Verbs: These are verbs, which you translate differently. Here subject and object order is reversed. See in "Backward Verb" section. ex: I like this book => me gusta este libro. (We don't use "yo gusto")
  3. Reflexive verbs: These verbs use "subject" form from backward verbs, but conjugation of "normal" verb. See in "Reflexive Pronoun" section. ex: I take a shower => Me ducharse.

 

 

 

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