Another food analogy? We love food! And, it's so fun! Can we work hard, make money and still have fun? Every time I eat Mac n Cheese, it makes me think of the fun times I had as a kid growing up on the South-East Side of Chicago. I remember when we used to make words out of our food and sometimes even some bad ones, Yikes!! and laughed and messed it up when Mom or Dad yelled "Stop Playing With Your Food". Now as an adult I still have fun with Mac n Cheese, but as I always do, I have found a way to connect life to my love of the markets. Here is my financial version, "Macro"-oni and Cheese, to help you filter the financial information you are getting everyday and help you make more money with it.

When I studied economics back in college, there were two core courses you had to take in order to get your BA: Macro-Economics and Micro-Economics. Macro-Economics assesses the big picture and may look at many different industry sectors as a whole. Micro-Economics focuses on specific pieces of a sector or business.

If I ask you, "What are you doing today?", you might respond back with something specific like, "I'm going to work on a project and then I'm going out to dinner with some friends." How about when I ask you, "What are you going to do this year?", your response is going to be vastly different and more broad. My goal is to help you tune in and decipher if your favorite analyst is passing you a Macro viewpoint or a Micro viewpoint. An analyst that gives a Macro forecast will typically offer advice ranging from 1 to 5 years. An analyst coming from the Micro side will be more specific and typically offer advice ranging from 1 day to 1 month. Placing your analyst on one side or the other will help you digest the news more realistically. It's very much like preparing for a 1 mile run or a 26 mile run. Once your objective is in place you can prepare yourself and risk accordingly.

The majority of financial market analysts focus on the conservative side and tell you about the Macro picture. It is safer because they can adjust their stance as the economy shifts to world events and smooth their forecast by saying things like "How was I supposed predict Lehman, Bear Sterns and AIG were all going to topple our economy in 2008". The problem with this type of information is that today's investor is looking for solid returns yesterday. This recipe spells disaster for most, but with some minor daily Micro adjustments, you can begin to ride the rhythm of the market with greater ease.

On the flip side the Micro Analyst makes short term predictions and strives for base-hits and doubles. The real-time outlook can be beneficial, because you are constantly adjusting daily to world events. This generally is a better match for our personalities, because we want those instant results. This, however, means more maintenance, but maybe we should start focusing on doing the "Right Thing" as opposed to the "Easy Thing". My suggestion is to consider an at home, real-time solution. We can help you balance life's challenges of work, family, health, spiritual fulfillment and finances. I hear the moaning and the nay sayers shouting, "Mike now I have to take control of my finances?" and my re sponse to you is, "YES"!!

As an educator, I want to first teach you to make your own Macro predictions with 5 minutes of simple addition and subtraction homework each night. If you haven't heard it from me before, I want to express again that the core ingredient to understand investing is interest rates. Some might disagree but I ask them, "What is the single, most influential factor on the markets?" Hopefully everybody shouts, "The Federal Reserve", run by Chairman Ben Bernanke. Their weapon of choice is interest rates. The Fed lowers or raises rates to either inspire the economy to spend or encourage the economy to slow down. The Fed doesn't physically buy or sell the Dollar, S&P 500, 10 Year Note, Oil, Gold or Corn but they influence these markets when they raise or lower rates. Their motive is a simple one: restore order and establish equ ilibrium to keep our fear and greed in check.

Now let's get to that homework that will pay you real dollars. There are two parts to it that will only take about 2 1/2 minutes each. Go to the CME Group website and search out the 30-Day Fed Fund Futures Contract. The "LAST" price column describes where the experts think interest rates are going and when they will move. Remember the current interest rate is officially pegged at 0.25 trending towards 0. A quick translation of how to view the 30-day Fed Funds pricing is to take note that a 0 interest rate would be equivalent to a price of 100. Use the 100 benchmark and subtract the price you see for each month. The Federal reserve typically moves intere st rates in 0.25 increments and if you look to the chart, you see expert interest rate predictions inching higher each month and pricing in a Fed move in November 2010. Caution: You must check this daily as the pricing may change based on world economic events.

Okay that's the big picture, but hold on!!, you and I know that in a Macro viewpoint world a lot of things can happen overnight, so we suggest you do one more simple piece of Micro homework to balance things when you sit down to try and time your investments. 2 1/2 minutes more I promise!! Let's work with our simple, daily homework rule, which is to calculate the 50% level of the previous day's range ((high plus low) / 2) of your favorite market. The homework rule will generate a picture that let's you know who is winning the game right now compared to yesterday's information. When today's prices are above the 50% mark, buyers are winning and when prices are below the 50% mark, sellers are winning.

So when you wake up tomorrow morning and prices are below the previous 50% mark and you have a bearish Macro outlook for your favorite market, SELL EM' !! When you make some money, you can say as a client of mine says when he wins "Now I can afford to put some Cheese on my Macaroni!!"

Prosperity is at your fingertips, GO GRAB IT!!

For more RDS articles on trading, visit www.rdstrader.com.