Well, so far so good.

Through November year-to-date, the Wilshire 5000, an index of most U.S. stocks traded, is up over 14 percent.

This has been a very interesting year. It seems to me that some stocks have done poorly, and some have done really well.

That has been more prevalent this year than in past times. At least it seems like that to me.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 stocks is up only over 6 percent. How about that? The NASDAQ Composite is up 15.5 percent, and the Standard and Poor’s 500 is up 12.6.

The Russell 2000 index of smaller stocks is up 10.9 percent while the Standard and Poor’s MidCap index is up 13.8 percent.

We are all over the place.

If you just look at those numbers, it appears that for the broad market to be up 14 percent, the NASDAQ and the MidCap stocks must be playing a big part in the performance. You may or may not own those stocks. One way or the other, if you own stocks, you may have made some money.

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The bond market continues to provide little if any income to investors.

Money market yields are right around ½ of one percent. A five year certificate of deposit is around 1.3 percent, and the 10 year Treasury is around a 1.1 percent yield.

If you are a buyer of housing, the average 30 year mortgage is about 3.6 percent.

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In commodities that directly affect you and me, crude oil is actually down 10 percent for the year, but natural gas is up 19 percent.

Looking at things we eat, cattle is up 3.3 percent, wheat is up 29 percent, soybeans are up 21 percent, hogs are down just slightly, and corn is up almost 16 percent. The farmers like most of this if they are not raising cattle or hogs but selling their soybeans and corn to the market.

Gold is up 9.8 percent, but silver continues to outshine it, up over 20 percent.

If you are a traveler, travel to Europe could be a little cheaper as the euro has lost some value, but not much, against the dollar.

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What to do now? Well, it appears that we may end the year on a positive note. This means that you should be looking at any potential capital gains in mutual funds. You should know exactly where you are with respect to gains and losses of all sorts.

You should consider what your investment portfolio looks like. Have you reviewed it with your adviser in the past few months? If not, why not?

Are you prudently invested? Do you own too many or not enough stocks?

You need to take a look at your situation and ask yourself this question: if the market goes up or down 20 percent how much money will I make or lose? If you have a good adviser, he or she should be able help you with that.

In my opinion that is really important for you to understand. Markets go up and they go down. You should understand the consequences of how you are invested.

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Short term, markets responded very poorly to President Obama’s re-election. They responded the same way when he was elected four years ago.

Is that a sign of things to come? Perhaps not. Normally, unless someone really screws up, events like that have very short term consequences on the market.

It’s all about the economies around the world I think. If they get back on track, we should be OK.

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The wife came storming back into the man cave the other day wondering aloud what I was up to. I told her I was reading a biblical story about money.

She looked at me with that one eyebrow of skepticism about two inches above the other.

“And exactly what biblical story is it that you are reading?’ she asked.

I told her that it was about King Ozymandias of Assyria, and the fact that he was running out of money after years of war with the Hittites.

His last great possession was the Star of the Euphrates, the most valuable diamond in the world. Desperate, he went to Croesus, the pawnbroker, to get a loan against the Star diamond. Croesus said that he would give the King 100,000 dinars for it.

The King said, “I paid a million dinars for it. Don’t you know that I am the King?”

Croesus replied, “When you wish to pawn a Star, makes no difference who you are.”

The wife turned and ran out of the room yelling that she didn’t think I was funny.

Howie Pentony is a Saxonburg client portfolio manager.