This week’s rally on the stock market emphasized one investing principal that we should all take time to remember: consistency.

It was just two weeks ago that the market dropped so much during a one week period that all of the gains from 2012 were completely wiped out.  Now the markets just capped off the best week of the entire year.

The S&P 500 rose 3.73% in the past five market days.

With the markets going up, down, up, and down again, how can the investing principal be consistency?

For me it is the reminder to consistently be investing in the market.

My wife and I have our Roth IRA contributions coming out weekly now rather than monthly.  That means some weeks the price is higher than the price we paid last week, and other weeks are on the other side of the equation.

But we’re investing and building up shares in our index mutual funds for the long run.  This type of consistency makes it easy to shrug off the worst week of the year followed by the best week of the year because we know, eventually, there will be another worst and best week of the year.  As long as we’re building up shares and the market goes up over time — which, historically, it has — then we come out ahead.

Want to forget about the ups and downs of the stock market? Here are some great reads:

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After an unexpectedly low jobs report the stock market dropped more than 2% on Friday.

Added in with the losses from the rest of the month of May, put the S&P 500 down 9.1% for the month.  Nearly all of the gains in the S&P 500 from the rest of the year have been wiped out — the index is only up 1.63% YTD.

If you’re nearing retirement, you just took a significant hit to your portfolio and should adjust accordingly.

However, for those with many years left to retirement the idea of the stock market going down should be soon as a good thing because the same amount of investment will buy more shares at lower prices than they would have at the beginning of May.

It can be difficult to see stocks as being “on sale”, but that mentality can help you significantly in your retirement planning.  These great reads will help you, too:

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Last week we told you Facebook went public and it went… okay.

At the time, the shares had just stayed about even.  This week did not go so well for Facebook.  Shares dropped to as low as $31.77 in trading — a 16% drop from the IPO price.

If that weren’t bad enough, now Facebook is being sued because it disclosed some information to some of the investment banks warning them that advertising revenues were off significantly.  That kind of information would change an investor’s valuation of the firm, but since it wasn’t publicly available information the banks stood to make a killing by shorting the stock or waiting until the share price dropped.

Whatever happens with the lawsuit, Zuckerburg and his investors came out okay, finally able to trade millions or billions worth of shares that they’ve held for quite some time.

We won’t all get billion dollar payouts, but you can save your way to a healthy retirement. These articles will help you get there:

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Facebook’s IPO finally hit the market at a raised price of $38 per share.

Some were expecting the shares to “pop” as soon as they start trading.

Instead, shares went up to the $40-41 range, but finished the day at $38.23.

I didn’t get into the action, but many others hopped on to get a slice of Facebook.  I’m still not convinced they should be trading at a Price-Earnings ratio of 122.  In comparison, GE trades at P/E of 15.5, Apple at P/E of 12.93, and Ford at P/E of 2.11 times earnings.

Did you buy shares of Facebook? If they skyrocket, these articles will help you manage the windfall:

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Facebook is set to have its formal IPO this week and trading will likely begin on Friday.

It is one of the most anticipated initial public offerings in history and will make Mark Zuckerberg quite the wealthy individual.

His employees won’t turn out so bad either — although they’ll likely pay about 45% in tax on the shares they sell.  That’s okay though, since the average tax hit is anticipated to be $1.1 million per employee.  ($1.1 million is 45% of $2.44 million, which would leave the average employee with $1.34 million.  Of course we know how averages work: some employees will have much more, some will have much less.)

One interesting tactic to avoid paying taxes on the IPO?  Renounce your US citizenship.  That’s what one of Facebook’s four co-founders just did.

While most of us won’t have to worry about selling our shares of Facebook at million dollar profits, here are some tactics to help you manage the money you do have:

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Not every company’s shareholder meeting turns into a type of personal finance carnival, but Warren Buffett’s company is anything but normal.

What is normally a decent sized annual event for shareholders has turned into a festival of sorts where investors and media flock to see what the Oracle of Omaha will say next.

The shareholder meeting is covered heavily in the media, and a classic event is where shareholders get to ask questions to Buffett in a public forum.

The next question on investors’ minds: who will follow Buffett in running the company?

Don’t have time for shareholder meetings? These articles can help you learn more on your own time:

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The infamous tech company Apple is virtually printing money through the explosive sales of its products around the world.

Until this week Apple’s stock had been sliding back a bit — coming off about 13% of its recent high.  Pundits feared that disappointing iPhone sales at AT&T and Verizon would hurt Apple.

Of course Apple came in and hit another home run with its fiscal Q2 numbers in 2012 by selling 35.1 million iPhones around the world.  A significant, but undisclosed, chunk of that amount came from China where the iPhone 4S launched on January 13th.

While Apple figures out what to do with an ever-increasing amount of cash on hand, here are some tips for you to handle your own cash on hand:

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A new scandal has caused the Secret Service to fire or “encourage” some agents to retire after prostitutes were brought into a facility the President was staying at in Colombia.

One of the prostitutes demanded payment, the agent wouldn’t pay, and the next thing you know embarrassing international headlines are everywhere.  Not only was it an embarrassment, it was also a severe breach of protocol that could have put the President in danger.

Dumb move!

We all make dumb moves — hopefully none as serious as the above — but they can still be costly. Here are some articles to help you avoid making bad financial moves:

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The deadline to file your taxes is rapidly approaching.

This year you have until April 17th to file your taxes — or have them postmarked and in the mail.

 Even if you aren’t sure your taxes are correct and you need to file for an extension, you need to do it now.  And remember, when you file for an extension you still must pay any tax due.  Failure to pay your tax due by the filing deadline can lead to penalties and fees in the future when you finally get your taxes sorted out.

I filed my taxes last weekend because I owed some money and didn’t feel like dealing with all of the paperwork until then.  What about you?

Expecting a big tax refund?  Keep your finances straight and use it wisely with the help of these articles:

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The recent rally of the stock market stumbled at the end of the week with a release of a “negative” jobs report.

I say “negative” because the headlines you saw were things like “Negative jobs report dampens markets” and “Silver lining in poor jobs report”.

This left me confused and somewhat annoying with business and economy reporting.

The “negative” jobs report that is being referred to is one that says only 120,000 additional people were employed in the economy in March than there were in February.  That sounds like good news to me — it’s a positive number!

The “negative” aspect kicks in because the number for February hiring was 240,000.  So the reports read that hiring is slowing, which might be true, but you still added over 100,000 jobs into the economy.  That’s a good thing.  It would be time for a negative report if the number showed that fewer people overall were employed in the economy.

Wall Street can bounce up and down based on reports and spin on those reports. Don’t let that rattle you. Use these articles to keep an even-keeled.

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