Personal Finance Sources and Further Reading: where the research comes from

About this page

Every claim in Personal Finance traces back to a primary source: regulators, central banks, standard-setters and the statutes themselves. This page collects those references, grouped by topic, so you can check any figure or rule at its origin.

If you are studying, writing or building a model, start here. The links point to government and standard-setter pages that change rarely, so they stay useful for years. Each entry says what the source supports, so you can go straight to the one you need.

A sample of the sources (167 entries on the full page)

Federal Reserve — FOMC statement, September 16, 2026: target range raised to 3.75%–4.00%

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED) — 10-year TIPS yield, series DFII10: real yield and breakeven inflation (7.8)

NCUA — Share insurance coverage: credit-union coverage (2.6)

CFPB — Technical correction and update to the credit invisibles estimate (June 2025): credit-invisible share (3.7)

CFPB — Debt validation notices: validation rights (3.8)

U.S. Courts — Chapter 7 bankruptcy basics: liquidation and the means test (3.8)

Federal Register — Federal student loan program final regulations, May 1, 2026: RAP, Tiered Standard and PSLF plan rules (4.2, 4.3)

IRS — Instructions for Form 8863: AOTC and Lifetime Learning Credit (4.6)

CFPB — What is a Closing Disclosure?: three-business-day review (5.3, A.1)

IRS — COLA increases for dollar limitations: $72,000 overall limit and other limits (6.2, 6.8)

IRS — Publication 15-B (2026): dependent-care exclusion (6.6)

IRS — Retirement savings contributions credit (saver’s credit): saver’s credit (9.1 and 9.4)

Investor.gov (SEC) — Form CRS: relationship summaries (7.9)

HealthCare.gov — Dates and deadlines: Marketplace open enrollment (A.1)

IRS — Federal income tax rates and brackets: bracket tables (9.1)

IRS — Publication 501: filing requirements (1.7)

Social Security Administration — Contribution and benefit base: 2026 wage base (1.6, 6.8)

CMS — Final CY 2026 Part D redesign program instructions: Part D out-of-pocket cap (10.9)

NOLHGA — How you’re protected: guaranty association limits (10.10)

IRS — Publication 551: basis of inherited property (11.7)

FTC — IdentityTheft.gov: identity theft reports and recovery plans (13.4)

CFPB — Regulation Z §1026.12 and §1026.13: credit-card liability and billing errors (13.4)

DICGC — Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation: ₹5 lakh deposit insurance

Ministry of Home Affairs (I4C) — National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal: reporting cyber fraud

Good to know

Why primary sources matter: a summary, including this one, can lag the rule or dataset it describes. A regulator’s rule text, a central bank’s data release or a standard-setter’s publication is the authoritative record, and it shows the exact definition, date and scope behind a number. When two summaries disagree, the primary source settles it.

How the page is organized: entries are grouped by topic, and each one says what the source supports, so you can go straight to the document you need instead of searching a long publication for the right page. Where a source updates on a schedule, the Figures That Change register in the same volume says when it will next be reviewed.

About FinoLib: it is my free finance education library. It runs to five volumes, from the whole-economy view in Volume I to household-level detail in Volume V, and every article is written to be read on its own, with worked numbers and primary sources behind the facts.

How the articles are built: each one opens with a plain-words explanation and a short summary, develops the idea with a worked example, and closes with a decision rule, the costliest mistake, a recap and a self-check quiz. The aim is that you can read any single article without having read the others.

Who it is for: students who want the foundations explained properly, professionals who want a precise reference they can check against primary sources, and anyone managing their own money who would rather understand the mechanism than follow a rule of thumb.