In an up and down year for stocks like the one we’re just closing, if you have a taxable account, odds are you’ve got a mish-mash of winners and losers. You can sell any winners and avoid the capital gains tax as long as you offset the gains by selling losers. If you choose not to sell any winners (or don’t have any!), you can still deduct up to $3,000 of income by selling losing stocks. That’s worth $750 if you are in the 25% tax bracket. But you must wait 30 days before re-buying the same stocks. This is also a good time to rebalance your portfolio back to your target mix of stocks and bonds. You can rebalance anytime. But it’s a natural part of year-end moves like gifting shares and harvesting tax losses. This is also a good moment to rethink your stocks and mutual funds, not just to remain diversified and balanced but to position yourself for the economic climate ahead. If you believe the recessionary environment may ease, think about tilting a bit toward beleaguered bank stocks and other economy sensitive shares, as Warren Buffett seems to be doing.