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Is This A Scam? Woman added me on LinkedIn first, then e-mailed offering me millions of dollars [duplicate] | This is totally a scam. I didn't read the whole thing. Didn't need to after I read "abandoned sum of 22.5 million" which implied part of it was yours to take after you do something for them.. Logically speaking.. No stranger would disclose this to you. |
What happens to my savings if my country defaults or restructures its debt? | I am going to add in an opinion here from the Wall Street Journal that I read this morning in What's at Stake in the Greek Vote, in light of current events and elections in Greece. The article claims that if the election results make it sound like a break from the Euro is imminent then ... we will see a full-fledged bank run. Greek banks would collapse ... The market exchange-rate would likely be two or three drachmas to the euro, which would double or triple the Greek price of imported goods within a few days. Prices of assets, including real-estate assets, would crumble. Those who moved their deposits abroad would be able to buy these assets cheaply, leading to a significant, regressive redistribution of Greek wealth. In short, you'd lose two-thirds of your savings unless you were storing them somewhere safe from the conversion. The article also predicts difficulty importing goods (other nations will demand to be paid in euro, not drachma) leading to disruption of trade and various supply shortages. I will note that the predictions here seem to be in opposition to some other advice here which suggests that real estate will be an effective hedge. |
understand taxes when geting money from a project built long time ago plus my full time job | You need to register as self-employed with HMRC (it is perfectly fine to be self-employed and employed by an employer at the same time, in exactly your kind of situation). Then, when the income arrives you will need to declare it on your yearly tax return. HMRC information about registering for self-employment and declaring the income is here: https://www.gov.uk/working-for-yourself/overview There's a few extra hoops if your clients are outside the UK; the detail depends on whether they are in the EU or not. More details about this are here: https://www.gov.uk/online-and-distance-selling-for-businesses/selling-overseas . |
Doctor's office won't submit claim to insurance after 5 months | I'm a business law student, so medical stuff isn't really my specialty. I'll share with you what I know though. First, as to the legality, I'm not aware of anything making it illegal for them to consider their business with you concluded. Absent any contract between you and the doctor, it seems to me that you agreed to pay them in cash. If I was the business, I'd assume our business had been concluded as well. As for any contracts between the insurance company and the doctor's office, as far as I know, that's between them. That wouldn't give you standing to sue the doctor. I'm unfamiliar with a patient submitting insurance claims, but if that's something you are allowed to do with your insurance company and all you need is more information, submit a request for your medical records to the doctor. Under United States law, your medical records are yours. You have a right to receive a copy of them. Keep in mind though that the doctor's office may charge you a small copying fee to cover expenses they incur while making a copy for you. As far as complaining, I would suggest your local Better Business Bureau. Each state generally has a medical board which oversees doctors. You might lodge a complaint with them as well. I hope this helps. Keep in mind that I'm not an attorney. This is not legal advice. This is only what I personally would do if I were in your situation. You can and should consult an attorney who is licensed to practice law in your particular jurisdiction. |
Why is the fractional-reserve banking not a Ponzi scheme? | The Ponzi/Madoff schemes were closed loops, so the only source of the so-called "interest" on the money was the contributions of future investors. The economy is more like a living thing, and the availability of capital allows people to develop new ways to do things in a more productive way. Agriculture is a great example -- for most of human history the overwhelming majority of human labor was dedicated to producing food. Now that proportion is dramatically smaller -- the descendants of farmers 100 years ago are doctors and computer programmers... professions that could not exist. Fractional reserve banking makes the economy more efficient by putting capital that would otherwise be hoarded in circulation. Money is a medium of exchange, so the more it turns over, the better it is. Genoa and Britain pioneered this concept centuries ago, and were able to defeat larger rivals in large part because of the economic advantages that the practice brought to bear. That's not to say that banking doesn't come with its warts as well. I'd suggest reading "A Free Nation Deep in Debt", which does a good job of explaining how we got to where we are today. |
Can the Delta be used to calculate the option premium given a certain target? | In a simple world yes, but not in the real world. Option pricing isn't that simplistic in real life. Generally option pricing uses a Monte Carlo simulation of the Black Scholes formula/binomial and then plot them nomally to decide the optimum price of the option. Primarily multiple scenarios are generated and under that specific scenario the option is priced and then a price is derived for the option in real life, using the prices which were predicted in the scenarios. So you don't generate a single price for an option, because you have to look into the future to see how the price of the option would behave, under the real elements of the market. So what you price is an assumption that this is the most likely value under my scenarios, which I predicted into the future. Because of the market, if you price an option higher/lower than another competitor you introduce an option for arbitrage by others. So you try to be as close to the real value of the option, which your competitor also does. The more closer your option value is to the real price the better it is for all. Did you try the book from Hull ? EDIT: While pricing you generally take variables which would affect the price of your option. The more variables you take(more nearer you are to the real situation) the more realistic your price will be and you would converge on the real price faster. So simple formula is an option, but the deviations maybe large from the real value. And you would end up loosing money, most of the time. So the complicated formula is there for getting a more accurate price, not to confuse people. You can use your formula, but there will be odds stacked against you to loose money, from the onset, because you didn't consider the variables which might/would affect the price of your option. |
Why Google Finance puts to two decimal places for the trading volumes? | Many brokerages offer automatic dividend reinvestment. It is very infrequent that these dividends are exactly a whole share. So, if you have signed up for automatic dividend reinvestment, many brokerages will reinvest your dividends and assign to you a fractional share. I can't speak for how these shares work with regards to voting, but I can say that the value of these fractional holdings does change with stock price as if one genuinely could hold a fraction of a share. |
Multiple accounts stagnant after quitting job. | What is my best bet with the 401K? I know very little about retirement plans and don't plan to ever touch this money until I retire but could this money be of better use somewhere else? You can roll over a 401k into an IRA. This lets you invest in other funds and stocks that were not available with your 401k plan. Fidelity and Vanguard are 2 huge companies that offer a number of investment opportunities. When I left an employer that had the 401k plan with Fidelity, I was able to rollover the investments and leave them in the existing mutual funds (several of the funds have been closed to new investors for years). Usually, when leaving an employer, I have the funds transferred directly to the place my IRA is at - this avoids tax penalties and potential pitfalls. The student loans.... pay them off in one shot? If the interest is higher than you could earn in a savings account, then it is smarter to pay them off at once. My student loans are 1.8%, so I can earn more money in my mutual funds. I'm suspicious and think something hinky is going to happen with the fiscal cliff negotiations, so I'm going to be paying off my student loans in early 2013. Disclaimer: I have IRA accounts with both Fidelity and Vanguard. My current 401k plan is with Vanguard. |
Has anyone compared an in-person Tax Advisor to software like Turbo Tax? | It depends on the person. i will take turbo tax over any mediocre or poor accountant ANY DAY. You get consistent, accurate tax preparation with the software (desktop - not the online version) I was in a housing rental partnership with my brothers and one of them insisted on using his accountant... what a mistake. I have been using turbo tax for 10+ years and have always been happy. It handles my non trivial situation with ease: I am happy with it but have to admit I don't have a good accountant to compare it to. I see no reason to go to an accountant except for planning purposes. Just for tax prep it is more than worth it and more than you will need. |
Does renting a room on AirBnB make all interest taxable? | It says that you are exempt "as long as such interest income is not effectively connected with a United States trade or business". So the interest is from money earned from doing business with/through AirBnb, a US company. So you will have to report it. Even if your bank doesn't send you a 1099-INT, you have to report it, unless it is under $0.49 because the IRS allows rounding. |
Primerica: All it claims to be? | Primerica's primary value proposition is that switching from whole or universal life to term life, and investing the difference is a good idea for most people. However, there are a number of other important factors to consider when purchasing life insurance, and I would also be wary of anyone claiming that one product will be the "best" for you under all circumstances. Best Insurance? Without getting into a much larger discussion on how to pick insurance companies or products, here are a few things that concern me about Primerica: They have a "captive" sales force, meaning their agents sell only Primerica products. This means that they are not shopping around for the best deal for you. Given how much prices on term life have changed in recent years, I would highly recommend taking the time to get alternate quotes online or from an independent broker who will shop around for you. Their staff are primarily part-time employees. I am not saying they are incompetent or don't care, just that you are more likely to be working with someone for whom insurance is not their primary line of work. If you have substantial reason to believe that you may someday need whole life, their products may not suit you well. Primerica does not offer whole life as far as I am aware, which also means that you cannot convert your term life policy through them to whole life should you need to do so. For example, if you experience an accident, are disabled, or have a significant change in your health status in the future and do not have access to a group life policy, you may be unable to renew your individual policy. Above Average Returns? I am also highly skeptical about this claim. The only possible context in which I could find this valid would be if they mean that your returns on average will be better if you invest in the stock market directly as compared to the returns you would get from the "cash value" portion of a life insurance product such as universal life, as those types of products generally have very high fees. Can you clarify if this is the claim that was made, or if they are promising returns above those of the general stock market? If it is the latter, run! Only a handful of superstar investors (think Warren Buffet, Peter Lynch, and Bill Gross) have ever consistently outperformed the stock market as a whole, and typically only for a limited period of time. In either case, I would have the same concerns here as stated in reasons #1 and #2 above. Even more so than with insurance, if you need investment advice, I'd recommend working with someone who is fully dedicated to that type of work, such as a fee-only financial planner (http://www.napfa.org/ is a good place to find one). Once you know how you want to invest, I would again recommend shopping around for a reputable but inexpensive broker and compare their fees with Primerica's. Kudos on having a healthy level of skepticism and listening to your gut. Also, remember that if you are not interested in their offer, you don't have to prove them wrong - you can simply say "no thank you." Best of luck! |
Why doesn't change in accounts receivable on balance sheet match cash flow statement? | It is difficult to reconcile historical balance sheets with historical cash flow statements because there are adjustments that are not always clearly disclosed. Practitioners consider activity on historical cash flow statements but generally don't invest time reconciling historical accounts, instead focusing on balancing projected balance sheets / cash flow statements. If you had non-public internal books, you could reconcile the figures (presuming they are accurate). In regards to Mike Haskel's comment, there's also a section pertaining to operating capital, not just effects on net income. |
Why don't share prices of a company rise every other Friday when the company buys shares for its own employees? | Many companies actually just issue new shares for employee compensation instead of buying back existing ones. So actually, the share price should go down because the same value is now diluted over more shares. In addition, this would not necessarily affect companies with many employees than those with fewer employees because companies with more employees tend to be bigger and thus have more shares (among which the change in demand would be distributed). Also, I think many companies do not issue shares to employees every pay day, but just e.g. once every quarter. |
How to decide on split between large/mid/small cap on 401(k) and how often rebalance | I really like keshlam's answer. Your age is also a consideration. If you make your own target fund by matching the allocations of whatever Vanguard offers, I'd suggest re-balancing every year or every other year. But if you're just going to match the allocations of their target fund, you might as well just invest in the target fund itself. Most (not all, just most) target funds do not charge an additional management fee. So you just pay the fees of the underlying funds, same as if you mirrored the target fund yourself. (Check the prospectus to see if an additional fee is charged or not.) You may want to consider a more aggressive approach than the target funds. You can accomplish this by selecting a target fund later than your actual retirement age, or by picking your own allocations. The target funds become more conservative as you approach retirement age, so selecting a later target is a way of moving the risk/reward ratio. (I'm not saying target funds are necessarily the best choice, you should get professional advice, etc etc.) |
As a young adult, what can I be doing with my excess income? | You apparently assume that pouring money into a landlord's pocket is a bad thing. Not necessarily. Whether it makes sense to purchase your own home or to live in a rental property varies based on the market prices and rents of properties. In the long term, real estate prices closely follow inflation. However, in some areas it may be possible that real estate prices have increased by more than inflation in the past, say, 10 years. This may mean that some (stupid) people assume that real estate prices continue to appreciate at this rate in the future. The price of real estates when compared to rents may become unrealistically high so that the rental yield becomes low, and the only reasonable way of obtaining money from real estate investments is price appreciation continuing. No, it will not continue forever. Furthermore, an individual real estate is a very poorly diversified investment. And a very risky investment, too: a mold problem can destroy the entire value of your investment, if you invest in only one property. Real estates are commonly said to be less risky than stocks, but this applies only to large real estate portfolios when compared with large stock portfolios. It is easier to build a large stock portfolio with a small amount of money to invest when compared to building a large real estate portfolio. Thus, I would consider this: how much return are you going to get (by not needing to pay rent, but needing to pay some minor maintenance costs) when purchasing your own home? How much does the home cost? What is the annual return on the investment? Is it larger than smaller when compared to investing the same amount of money in the stock market? As I said, an individual house is a more risky investment than a well-diversified stock portfolio. Thus, if a well-diversified stock portfolio yields 8% annually, I would demand 10% return from an individual house before considering to move my money from stocks to a house. |
Difference between full and mini futures contract | Both of these are futures contracts on the Ibovespa Brasil Sao Paulo Stock Exchange Index; the mini being exactly that, a mini version (or portion) of the regular futures contract. The mini counterpart makes trading the index more affordable to individual investors and hence increase liquidity. |
Account that is debited and account that is credited | The credit and debit terms here is, talking from bank's point of view (shouldn't be a surprise, banks are never known to look at things from the customers' POV ;)). In accounting, a liability (loans, owners capital etc) is a credit balance and asset (cash, buildings and such) is a debit balance. Your account is a liability to the bank (in accounting parlance that is because they owe you every single penny that is there in your account, btw, in literal parlance too if you really make their life harder ;)) So when the bank accepts money from you, they need to increase their asset (cash) which they will debit (higher debit balance for asset means more assets), and at the same time they also have to account for the added liability by "crediting" the deposited money into your account. So when bank says they have credited your account, it means you have more money in your account. Now, if you transfer money from your account to another, or make a payment through your account, your account will be debited and the beneficiary account will be credited(bank's liability towards you reduces) More or less what everyone else said here... but hey, I could also take a swipe at banks ;)) |
How can one get their FICO/credit scores for free? (really free) | I've seen credit cards that provide you your credit score for free, updated once a month and even charted over the last year. Unfortunately the bank I used to have this card with was bought and the purchasing bank discontinued the feature. Perhaps someone out there knows of some cards that still offer a feature like this? |
How dividend payout happens | The ex-dividend date is the first date on which you may sell without losing your dividend. In this case that date is August 5th (thanks, Victor). The price opens on the ex-dividend date lower than it closed on the previous day (by the amount of the dividend). Therefore you may sell any time on August 5th (including during pre-market trading) and still get the dividend. You must be the owner of the stock as of the end of after-hours trading on the 4th (and therefore overnight) in order to get the dividend. Intel's Dividend Dates The record date isn't important to your trading decision. |
What options do I have at 26 years old, with 1.2 million USD? | You should invest your money. To figure out what rate of return you need, use this equation: (How Much Money You Want Per Year) / (Total Amount of Cash You Have) = (Annualized Interest Rate) If we plug in the amount of annualized interest you can expect to safely get while not managing your money personally, 2% by my estimate, we get X / 1.2m = 0.02%; X=24K/year A measly $24,000 / year. Many people say that you can get 10, 12, even 30% return on your investment. I won't speculate on if this is true, but I will guarantee that you cannot get those returns simply by handing your money over to a money manager. So your options are, 1) Earn a guaranteed $24,000 and earn the rest you need to live by working 2) Learn to invest your money (and then do so intelligently) and earn enough to live off the interest To learn how to invest your money, read Beating the Street, by Peter Lynch. https://www.amazon.ca/Beating-Street-Peter-Lynch/dp/0671891634 Good luck! |
Offer Price for my stock not shown on quote and a subsequent sale higher than my offer | There are a few things you are missing here. These appear to be penny stocks or subpenny stocks. Buying these are easy.... selling is a total different ball game. Buying commissions are low and selling commissions are outrageous. Another thing you are missing in this order is... some trading platform may assume the "AON" sale. That is All Or None. There was an offer of 10k shares @ .63. The buyer only wanted 10k what was the broker to do with the other 20k? Did you inform the broker that partial sales where acceptable? You may want to contact your broker and explain this to them. The ALL OR NONE order has made plenty of investor a little unhappy, which seems to be your new learning experience for the day. Sorry, school of hard knocks is not always fun. |
Paying off mortgage or invest in annuity | There is no formula to answer the question. You have to balance return on investment with risk. There's also the question of whether you have any children or other heirs that you would like to leave money to. The mortgage is presumably a guaranteed thing: you know exactly how much the payments will be for the rest of the loan. I think most annuities have a fixed rate of return, but they terminate when you both die. There are annuities with a variable return, but usually with a guaranteed minimum. So if you got an annuity with a fixed 3.85% return, and you lived exactly 18 more years, then (ignoring tax implications), there'd be no practical difference between the two choices. If you lived longer than 18 years, the annuity would be better. If less, paying off the mortgage would be better. Another option to consider is doing neither, but keeping the money in the 401k or some other investment. This will usually give better than 3.85% return, and the principal will be available to leave to your heirs. The big drawback to this is risk: investments in the stock market and the like usually do better than 3 or 4%, but not always, and sometimes they lose money. Earlier I said "ignoring tax implications". Of course that can be a significant factor. Mortgages get special tax treatment, so the effective interest rate on a mortgage is less than the nominal rate. 401ks also get special tax treatment. So this complicates up calculations trying to compare. I can't give definitive numbers without knowing the returns you might get on an annuity and your tax situation. |
Chase bank not breaking large bills for non-account holders | Yes it is (legal). There is of course no law requiring any business you walk in to break your money. What made you think there would be? Being a bank in the US (and in other countries) has some legal consequences, but none of them relates to 'having to do business with anyone that walks in', neither 'having to break bills for people' (not even for established customers). Yes, it was historically commonplace for most banks to do all money-breaking for free, but that does not establish any obligation to do it. Maybe the FED is required to do that, but that won't help you if you don't live near either. |
The Asset Allocation Paradox | Asset Allocation serves many purposes, not just mitigating risk via a diversification of asset classes, but also allowing you to take a level of risk that is appropriate for a given investor at a given time by how much is allocated to which asset classes. A younger investor with a longer timeframe, may wish to take a lot more risk, investing heavily in equities, and perhaps managed funds that are of the 'aggressive growth' variety, seeking better than market returns. Someone a little older may wish to pull back a bit, especially after a bull market has brought them substantial gains, and begin to 'take money off the table' perhaps by starting to establish some fixed income positions, or pulling back to slightly less risky index, 'value' or 'balanced' funds. An investor who is near or in retirement will generally want even less risk, going to a much more balanced approach with half or more of their investments in fixed income, and the remainder often in income producing 'blue chip' type stocks, or 'income funds'. This allows them to protect a good amount of their wealth from potential loss at a time when they have to be able to depend on it for a majority of their income. An institution such as Yale has very different concerns, and may always be in a more aggressive 'long term' mode since 'retirement' is not a factor for them. They are willing to invest mostly in very aggressive ways, using diversification to protect them from one of those choices 'tanking' but still overall taking a pretty high level of risk, much more so than might be appropriate for an individual who will generally need to seek safety and to preserve gains as they get older. For example look at the PDF that @JLDugger linked, and observe the overall risk level that Yale is taking, and in addition observe the large allocations they make to things like private equity with a 27%+ risk level compared to their very small amount of fixed income with a 10% risk level. Yale has a very long time horizon and invests in a way that is atypical of the needs and concerns of an individual investor. They also have as you pointed out, the economy of scale (with something like #17B in assets?) to afford to hire proven experts, and their own internal PHD level experts to watch over the whole thing, all of which very few individual investors have. For either class of investor, diversification, is a means to mitigate risk by not having all your eggs in one basket. Via having multiple different investments (such as picking multiple individual stocks, or aggressive funds with different approaches, or just an index fund to get multiple stocks) you are protected from being wiped out as might happen if a single choice might fail. For example imagine what would have happened if you had in 2005 put all your money into a single stock with a company that had been showing record profits such as Lehman Brothers, and left it there until 2008 when the stock tanked. or even faster collapses such as Enron, etc that all 'looked great' up until shortly after they failed utterly. Being allocated across multiple asset classes provides some diversification all on it's own, but you can also be diversified within a class. Yale uses the diversification across several asset classes to have lower risk than being invested in a single asset class such as private equity. But their allocation places much more of their funds in high risk classes and much less of their funds in the lowest risk classes such as fixed income. |
Buying shares in a company after you quit | US law dictates that you cannot buy / sell shares in a company you work for except during open trading windows. I understand lockout periods when you're in a company but what about after you quit? There's no such law. Trading lockouts are imposed by companies themselves to avoid the complexities of identifying "insiders". For large companies it sometimes is easier/cheaper to assume everyone is insider instead of imposing internal data flow controls and limitations. For such companies, their internal policies would also manage how the employees who are leaving should be treated. |
Distribution rules LLC vs. S-Corp | LLC is not a federal tax designation. It's a state-level organization. Your LLC can elect to be treated as a partnership, a disregarded entity (i.e., just report the taxes in your individual income tax), or as an S-Corp for federal tax purposes. If you have elected S-Corp, I expect that all the S-Corp rules will apply, as well as any state-level LLC rules that may apply. Disclaimer: I'm not 100% familiar with S-corp rules, so I can't evaluate whether the statements you made about proportional payouts are correct. |
How to declare foreign gift of nearly $10,000 | Actually banks aren't required to (and don't) report on 8300 because they already report $10k+ cash transactions to FinCEN as a Currency Transaction Report (CTR), which is substantively similar; see the first item under Exceptions in the second column of page 3 of the actual form. Yes, 8300 is for businesses, that's why the form title is '... Received In A Trade Or Business'. You did not receive the money as part of a trade or business, and it's not taxable income to you, so you aren't required to report receiving it. Your tenses are unclear, but assuming you haven't deposited yet, when you do the bank will confirm your identity and file their CTR. It is extremely unlikely the government will investigate you for a single transaction close to $10k -- they're after whales and killer sharks, not minnows (metaphorically) -- but if they do, when they do, you simply explain where the money came from. The IRS abuses were with respect to people (mostly small businesses) that made numerous cash deposits slightly under $10k, which can be (but in the abuse cases actually was not) an attempt to avoid reporting, which is called 'structuring'. As long as you cooperate with the bank's required reporting and don't avoid it, you are fine. |
How much taxes do corporations have to pay on dividends they receive from other companies? | Summary: The corporation pays 33.3% tax on dividends it receives and gets a tax refund at the same rate when it pays dividends out. According to http://www.kpmg.com/Ca/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/TaxRates/Federal-and-Provincial-Territorial-Tax-Rates-for-Income-Earned-CCPC-2015-Dec-31.pdf the corporate tax rates for 2015 are: According to page 3: The federal and provincial tax rates shown in the tables apply to investment income earned by a CCPC, other than capital gains and dividends received from Canadian corporations. The rates that apply to capital gains are one-half of the rates shown in the tables. Dividends received from Canadian corporations are deductible in computing regular Part I tax, but may be subject to Part IV tax, calculated at a rate of 33 1/3%. If I understand that correctly, this means that a Corporation in Quebec pays 46.6% on investment income other than capital gains and dividends, 23.3% on capital gains and 33.33% on dividends. I'm marking this answer as community wiki so anyone can correct these numbers if they are incorrect. UPDATE: According to http://www.pwc.com/ca/en/tax/publications/pwc-facts-figures-2014-07-en.pdf page 22 the tax rate on taxable dividends received from certain Canadian corporations is 33 1/3%. Further, this is refunded to the corporation through the "refundable dividend tax on hand" (RDTOH) mechanism at a rate of $1 for every $3 of taxable dividends paid. My interpretation is as follows: if the corporation receives $100 of dividends from another company, it pays $33.33 tax. If that corporation then pays out $100 of dividends at a later time, it receives a tax refund of $33.33. Meaning, the original tax gets refunded. Note the first line is for the 2015 tax year while the second link is for the 2014 tax year. The numbers might be a little different but the tax/refund process remains the same. |
Why did the Swiss National Bank fix the EUR/CHF exchange rate at CHF 1.20? | Due to the issues in the Eurozone, many foreign investors were buying Swiss Francs as a hedge against a Euro devaluation. They were in effect treating the Franc like gold, silver or some other commodity with perceived intrinsic value. This causes huge problems from the Swiss, as the value of the Franc increased and their exports became more expensive for foreigners to purchase. Things were getting bad enough that the Swiss in some places were travelling to Germany to buy groceries! To enforce this "fixing" of the Franc, the Swiss Central Bank announced that they would buy foreign currency in unlimited quantities by printing Francs. In reality, just announcing that they were going to do this was sufficient to discourage foreign investors from loading up on Francs. NPR's Planet Money did a really good job covering this topic: |
Can capital loss in traditional IRA and Roth IRA be used to offset taxable income? | No, you cannot. If you withdraw everything from all your Roth IRA's and end up with less than the total basis - you can deduct the difference on your schedule A (at the time of the last withdrawal) as an itemized deduction (as misc. deductions with 2% AGI cap). Regular IRA's are pre-tax, you cannot deduct anything from them. |
Where can I see the detailed historical data for a specified stock? | To see a chart with 1-minute data for a stock on a specific date: For example, here is the chart for TWTR on November 7, 2013 - the day of the IPO: Here is the chart for TWTR on November 8, 2013 - its second day of trading: Here is the chart for TWTR on November 11, 2013 - its third day of trading: |
Pension or Property: Should I invest in more properties, or in a pension? | Investing in property hoping that it will gain value is usually foolish; real estate increases about 3% a year in the long run. Investing in property to rent is labor-intensive; you have to deal with tenants, and also have to take care of repairs. It's essentially getting a second job. I don't know what the word pension implies in Europe; in America, it's an employer-funded retirement plan separate from personally funded retirement. I'd invest in personally funded retirement well before buying real estate to rent, and diversify my money in that retirement plan widely if I was within 10-20 years of retirement. |
Will a credit card company close my account if I stop using it? | Assuming the question is "will they close it for inactivity (alone)".. the answer is "Nope" ... unequivocally. Update: < My answer is geared to credit Cards issues by companies that deal in credit, not merchandise (i.e. store cards, retailer cards, etc). Retailers (like Amazon, etc), want to sell goods and are in the credit card business to generate sales. Banks and credit companies (about whom I am referring) make their money primarily on interest and secondarily on service charges (either point of use charged to the vendor that accepts payment, or fees charged to the user).> The only major issuer I will say that it might be possible is Discover, because I never kept a Discover card. I also don't keep department store cards, which might possibly do this; but I do doubt it in either of those cases too. My answer is based on Having 2 AMEX cards (Optima and Blue) and multiple other Visa/MC's that I NEVER use... and most of these I have not for over 10+ years. Since I am also presuming that you are also not talking about an account that charges a yearly or other maintenance fee.. Why would they keep the account open with the overhead (statements and other mailings,etc)? Because you MIGHT use it. You MIGHT not be able to pay it off each month. Because you MIGHT end up paying thousands in interest over many years. The pennies they pay for maintaining your account and sending you new cards with chip technology, etc.. are all worth the gamble of getting recouped from you! This is why sales people waste their time with lots of people who will not buy their product, even though it costs them time and money to prospect.. because they MIGHT buy. Naturally, there are a multitude of reasons for canceling a card; but inactivity is not one. I have no less than 10+ "inactive" cards, one that has a balance, and two I use "infrequently". I really would not mind if they closed all those accounts.. but they won't ;) So enjoy your AMEX knowing that your Visa will be there when you need/want it.. The bank that issues your Visa is banking on it! (presuming you don't foul up financially) Cheers! |
What Happens To Stocks During Hyperinflation | Stocks in the Weimar hyperinflation are discussed in When Money Dies. I don't own a copy of the book but here is a link to a blog post about it. Speculation on the stock exchange has spread to all ranks of the population and shares rise like air balloons to limitless heights Basically, the stock market did very well (i.e. the US dollar value of stocks increased quite a lot. Of course, the price of everything increased if measured in marks.) Quote from the article: Bottom line: In marks, stocks had an amazing run. Even in USD they had a nice runup. It makes sense that the stock market would skyrocket because (a) if money has no value, then people will want to replace money with tangible things like goods, and since a stock represents a share in the factories and things which a company owns, it makes sense that you would want them and (b) if money has no value anyway, why not gamble with it? I would be interested to hear what happened in other hyperinflations. |
How does the process of “assignment” work for in-the-money Options? | When the strike price ($25 in this case) is in-the-money, even by $0.01, your shares will be sold the day after expiration if you take no action. If you want to let your shares go,. allow assignment rather than close the short position and sell the long position...it will be cheaper that way. If you want to keep your shares you must buy back the option prior to 4Pm EST on expiration Friday. First ask yourself why you want to keep the shares. Is it to write another option? Is it to hold for a longer term strategy? Assuming this is a covered call writing account, you should consider "rolling" the option. This involves buying back the near-term option and selling the later date option of a similar or higher strike. Make sure to check to see if there is an upcoming earnings report in the latter month because you may want to avoid writing a call in that situation. I never write a call when there's an upcoming ER prior to expiration. Good luck. Alan |
Trouble sticking to a budget when using credit cards for day to day transactions? | If you keep going over budget with your credit card, then stop using the credit card. If you plan to pay off the card every month, then your balance should always be under whatever your budget is. For example, if you budget to spend $500, then even though your card has a limit of $5,000 you will never carry a balance of over $500. Most banks have an option to email and / or text message you when you pass a certain balance threshold; in this instance, you would set two notices, one when your balance exceeds $400 (warning you that you're close & need to start paying closer attention), and one when you exceed $500. Additionally, maybe you aren't ready to pay for everything with your credit card. I prefer to use mine just for groceries, and then pay it off at the end of the month. Whatever rewards you get for putting all of your purchases on the card are more than paid for when you cross your budget limit, costing you more in interest and fees. Perhaps starting with just one type of purchase (groceries or gas are good choices, as most consumers are fairly consistent in their purchases of both) would allow you to ease into using the card until you get used to managing your budget with it. Personal finances are all about behavior, not knowledge. Don't worry too much about slipping up right now and making a mistake; just keep practicing good behavior with your credit card, and soon managing your budget with it will be as natural for you as when you only used cash. |
Implications of receiving small amounts of money on the side | HMRC may or may not find out about it; the risks and penalties involved if they do find out make it unwise not to just declare it and pay the tax on it. Based on the fact you asked the question, I am assuming that you currently pay all your tax through PAYE and don't do a tax return. You would need to register for Self Assessment and complete a return; this is not at all difficult if your tax situation is straightforward, which it sounds like yours is. Then you would owe the tax on the additional money, at whatever applicable rate (which depends on how much you earn in your main job, the rate tables are here: https://www.gov.uk/income-tax-rates/current-rates-and-allowances ). If it truly is a one off you could simply declare it on your return as other income, but if it is more than that then you would need to look at setting up as Self Employed - there is some good advice on the differences here: http://www.brighton-accountants.com/blog/tax-self-employment-still-employed/ : Broadly, you are likely to be running a business if you have a regular, organised activity with a profit motive, which continues for at least a few months. If the work is one-off, or very occasional (say, a few times per year), or not very organised, or of very low value (say, under £2,000 per year), then it might qualify as casual income. If you think it is beyond the definition of casual income then you would also need to pay National Insurance, as described in the previous link, but otherwise the tax treatment would be the same. |
Do I need to pay tax on the amount of savings I have in the bank? | Not for the amount in the accounts but for the interest you earn per year is taxable. But the sum of your all taxable incomes is under the limit, then you dont need to pay any income tax. The limit is available at wiki here But you should intimate your bank not to deduct TDS (Tax Deducted at Source) by submitting Form 15G/15H (which will be normally available in Bank itself), provided your total interest income for the year will not fall within overall taxable limits. You may calculate your income tax amount at Official website at here |
First 401K portfolio with high expense ratios - which funds to pick? (24yo) | If it was me, I would withdraw money from savings and be debt free today. I would then pour the $500 into building back your savings. Then of course, never again carry a balance on your CC. At your age MSFRX is a losing game. You can handle the volatility of better performing funds, I would have zero in there. If it was me, I would do something totally different then you are doing: Keep in mind you are doing very good as is. The best way to win with money is to make good moves overtime, and given your debt level, savings, and willingness to contribute to a 401K your moves are pretty darn good. Keep in mind you will probably want to start saving a down payment for a house. This should be done outside of your 401K. Overall good work! |
What is the best way to make a bet that a certain stock will go up in the medium term? | You could try to refine your options strategy: For instance you could buy the USD 750 call option(s) you mentioned and at the same time sell (short) call options with a higher strike price, which is above the share price level you expect that Apple will trade at in one year (for instance USD 1,100). By doing this, you would receive the premium of the call option(s) with the higher option, which in turn would help you finance buying your USD 750 call(s). The net effect of this trading strategy would be that you would give up the extra profit you would earn if Apple would rose above USD 1,100 (the strike price of the call option sold short). Your total risk would be even less than with your actual strategy (in my view). |
Currently a Microsoft Money user on PC, need a replacement suitable for Mac | I haven't found a drop-in replacement for MS Money, but I've tried a few of the Mac desktop programs. I settled on Iggsoftware's iBank, which seems to do what I need it to do. It also appears to be able to import transactions from MS Money if you export your accounts as QIF files at the MS Money end, but I never tried it. |
Insurance broker - Online vs. physical location? | Traditional insurance agent guy here. There is no right answer in my opinion because your individual needs cannot be generalized. There are a variety of factors that influence the price charged to you including but not limited to your past claims history, geographic location, credit profile, and the carrier's book of business itself. This is just a small sampling, in reality their pricing calculations may be far more complicated. The point is there is no one-size-fits all carrier. My agency works with 15 different carriers. Sometimes we can offer the best combination of coverage and cost to a prospective client that beats their existing coverage; other times we are nowhere close to being competitive. The most important thing you can do is find a person/site/company you can trust and one that does not take advantage of you. Insurance policies are complex and "getting the best deal" may oftentimes mean lessening coverage without realizing it. So I would recommend using whatever service channel (online, phone, local agent) that's most convenient and consultative for you. And otherwise, shop around once every year or two to make sure you're still getting the most for your money. |
Should I have more than one brokerage account? | I believe the answer here is no: SIPC protection of customers with multiple accounts is determined by "separate capacity." Each separate capacity is protected up to $500,000 for securities and cash (including a $250,000 limit for cash only). Accounts held in the same capacity are combined for purposes of the SIPC protection limits. So even having 2 individual accounts - you would only be covered for $500,000/$250,000. You can see more about the type of accounts that would give your more coverage here. Also note: If you own a stock - the record probably exist. Therefore you would not lose your ownership or shares. The SIPC is there to protect the times this does not happen. |
Buy or sell futures contracts | In general there are two types of futures contract, a put and call. Both contract types have both common sides of a transaction, a buyer and a seller. You can sell a put contract, or sell a call contract also; you're just taking the other side of the agreement. If you're selling it would commonly be called a "sell to open" meaning you're opening your position by selling a contract which is different from simply selling an option that you currently own to close your position. A put contract gives the buyer the right to sell shares (or some asset/commodity) for a specified price on a specified date; the buyer of the contract gets to put the shares on someone else. A call contract gives the buyer the right to buy shares (or some asset/commodity) for a specified price on a specified date; the buyer of the contract gets to call on someone for shares. "American" options contracts allow the buyer can exercise their rights under the contract on or before the expiration date; while "European" type contracts can only be exercised on the expiration date. To address your example. Typically for stock an option contract involves 100 shares of a stock. The value of these contracts fluctuates the same way other assets do. Typically retail investors don't actually exercise their contracts, they just close a profitable position before the exercise deadline, and let unprofitable positions expire worthless. If you were to buy a single call contract with an exercise price of $100 with a maturity date of August 1 for $1 per share, the contract will have cost you $100. Let's say on August 1 the underlying shares are now available for $110 per share. You have two options: Option 1: On August 1, you can exercise your contract to buy 100 shares for $100 per share. You would exercise for $10,000 ($100 times 100 shares), then sell the shares for $10 profit per share; less the cost of the contract and transaction costs. Option 2: Your contract is now worth something closer to $10 per share, up from $1 per share when you bought it. You can just sell your contract without ever exercising it to someone with an account large enough to exercise and/or an actual desire to receive the asset or commodity. |
How to choose a company for an IRA? | The fees for Vanguard and Fidelity IRA housing cannot be lower, because they are zero. Depending on the fund you invest in, one or the other will have pretty low fees and are often the lowest in the industry. I don't qualify for TIAA-CREF, but my mother does and she loves them. She can call up and get some advice for free. I would not qualify it as the best advice in the world, but it certainly isn't horrible. So it really depends on what you are looking for. If you want a little investment advice, I would go with TIAA-CREF. If you are a do it yourself-er go with Vanguard. |
Is 0% credit card utilization worse than 1-20% credit card utilization for any reason other than pure statistics? | I too was very confused when I tried to be tricky and paid down my balance BEFORE the bill date. I thought this would be a great thing because it would show my utilization near zero percent. The opposite happen, it dropped my credit score from 762 to 708. Here is the best example I can come up with when it comes to utilization. Lets pretend you are an insurance company and you trying to figure out who are the best risk drivers. The people that drive 10% of the day are a better risk than the people that drive 50% of the day. The people that drive 50% of the day are a better risk than the people that drive 90% of the day. Here is the rub when people drive 0%. When you look at the people at 0% they appear to be walking, busing or flying. What they are NOT doing is driving. Since they are not driving (using Credit) they are viewed as POOR drivers since they are not keeping up on their driving skills. (Paying bills, watching how they spend, and managing their debt). So, now before the billing date I pay down my balance to something between 5 to 10% of my utilization. After the bill is issued, I pay it off in FULL. ( I am not going to PAY these crazy interest rates). What shows up on my credit report is a person that is driving his credit between 5 and 10% utilization. It shows I know I how to manage my revolving accounts. I know it's dumb, you would think they reward people that have zero debt, I don't hate banks I hate the game. ( I do love me some reward points =)) |
How can rebuilding a city/large area be considered an economic boost? | The problem here is that the metrics that are used to track the economy are looking for things like growth and change. In a perfect world, everyone would have exactly what they need and there would no need for economists because the economy would be static. |
Are U.S. salaries typically measured/reported before tax, or after tax? | In the U.S., virtually all salaries are expressed as "gross salaries", which are before the taxes that the individual must pay on their income. The numbers shown in the links are almost certainly gross salary figures. However, the "gross salary" is not the entire "total compensation" number, which is the total value of all compensation and benefits that the employee receives for his work. Total compensation includes not only salary and bonuses, but the cost or value of any employer-paid healthcare, retirement, company car, expense account, stock options, and other valuable goods or services. That's still not the total amount of money the company has to pay to have you; there are employer-paid payroll taxes totaling 6.2% of your gross salary, plus practical costs like the cost of your computer, cubicle or office furniture, and the portion of utility costs that keep you well-lit, clean and comfortable. This complete number is called "total employee cost", and the general rule of thumb is that it's double your gross cash compensation (salary + bonuses). Lastly, $100k in California isn't worth as much, in real terms, as $100k in other parts of the U.S. The cost of living in California, especially in Silicon Valley where the majority of the people who make six figures by being C++ programmers are located, is ridiculously expensive. There are other tech hubs in the U.S., like DFW, Austin TX, Atlanta GA, St Louis MO, Raleigh NC, etc where people earn less, but also spend less to live and so can use more of their salary in a "discretionary" manner. |
Accepting personal “donations” (not as a non-profit) | I would be inclined to back the 'tip jar' weblink idea, this is very prolific within the Twitch community, as a method of tipping and thereby supporting content creators. I know that there are numerous tutorials on how to set up 'tip' sites for such usage, so that may point you in the right direction. Also you could turn to crowd-funding opportunities, such as Kickstarter and others, however I am not sure on the ruling of these companies and whether you have to offer the completed project as a reward for backers (it tends to be the done thing). And depending on how serious your friends are in helping you as a fledgeling indie developer, you could investigate in setting yourself up as a limited business. This would allow your supporters to purchase shares in your business, turning them into true stakeholders, but whilst retaining the limited status of the company. However, I must stress, on this point I know very little and may be wrong (I am actually hoping someone else contradicts this so I can learn). |
US Citizen Buying Rental Property in Canada | You've asked a number of questions. I can answer a few. I've quoted your question before each answer. What are the ins and outs of a foreigner like myself buying rental property in Canada? This is a pretty broad question which can address location, finances, basic suggestions etc. Here's some things to consider: Provincial considerations: Some ins and outs will depend on what province you are considering and what area in that Province. If you plan on owning in Montreal, for example, that's in the province of Quebec and that means you (or someone) will need to be able to operate in the French language. There are other things that might be different from province to province. See stat info below. Canadian vs. US Dollar: Now might be a great time to buy property in Canada since the Canada dollar is weak right now. To give you an idea, at a non-cash rate of 1.2846, a little over $76,000 US will get you over $100k Canadian. That's using the currency converter at rbcroyalbank.com. Taxes for non-resident rental property owners: According to the T4144 Income Tax Guide for Electing Under Section 216 – 2015: "When you receive rental income from real or immovable property in Canada, the payer, such as the tenant or a property manager, has to withhold non-resident tax at the rate of 25% on the gross rental income paid or credited to you. The payer has to pay us the tax on or before the 15th day of the month following the month the rental income is paid or credited to you." If you prefer to send a separate Canadian tax return, you can choose to elect under section 216 of the Income Tax Act. A benefit of this way is that "electing under section 216 allows you to pay tax on your net Canadian-source rental income instead of on the gross amount. If the non-resident tax withheld by the payer is more than the amount of tax payable calculated on your section 216 return, [they] will refund the excess to you." You can find this guide at Canada Revenue's site: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pub/tg/t4144/README.html Stats: A good place for stats is the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). So, if you are interesting in vacancy rates for example, you can see a table that will show you that the vacancy rate in Ontario is 2.3% and in British Columbia it's 1.5%. However, in New Brunswick it's 8%. The rate for metropolitan areas across Canada is 2.8%. If you want to see or download this table showing the vacancy rates by province and also by metropolitan areas, go to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation site http://www.cmhc.ca/housingmarketinformation/. You can get all sorts of housing information, reports and market information there. I've done well with Condos/Town-homes and would be interested in the same thing over there. Is it pretty much all the same? See the stat site mentioned above to get market info about condos, etc. What are the down payment requirements? For non-owner occupied properties, the down payment is at least 20%. Update in response to comments about being double taxed: Regarding being taxed on income received from the property, if you claim the foreign tax credit you will not be double taxed. According to the IRS, "The foreign tax credit intends to reduce the double tax burden that would otherwise arise when foreign source income is taxed by both the United States and the foreign country from which the income is derived." (from IRS Topic 856 - Foreign Tax Credit) About property taxes: From my understanding, these would not be claimed for the foreign tax credit but can be deducted as business expenses. There are various exceptions and stipulations based on your circumstance, so you need to read Publication 856 - Foreign Tax Credit for Individuals. Here's an excerpt: "In most cases, only foreign income taxes qualify for the foreign tax credit. Other taxes, such as foreign real and personal property taxes, do not qualify. But you may be able to deduct these other taxes even if you claim the foreign tax credit for foreign income taxes. In most cases, you can deduct these other taxes only if they are expenses incurred in a trade or business or in the production of income. However, you can deduct foreign real property taxes that are not trade or business expenses as an itemized deduction on Schedule A (Form 1040)." Disclaimers: Sources: IRS Topic 514 Foreign Tax Credit and Publication 856 Foreign Tax Credit for Individuals |
What is the difference between a 'trader' and a 'stockbroker'? | The traditional role of a stockbroker is to arrange for the buying and selling of stock by finding buyers and sellers at an agreed upon price. The broker does not purchase the stock for himself but merely arranges for the stock to be traded. A trader is one who purchases stock with the hope of selling it for a gain. The trader will use a broker to help with the purchase and sale of a stock. |
How to file tax for the sale of stocks from form 1099B? | You can group your like-kind (same symbol, ST/LT) stock positions, just be sure that your totals match the total dollar amounts on the 1099. An inconsistency will possibly result in a letter from IRS to clarify. So, if you sold the 100 shares, and they came from 7 different buys, list it once. The sell price and date is known, and for the buy price, add all the buys and put "Various" for the date. If you have both long term and short term groups as part of those 7 buys, split them into two groups and list them separately. |
Explain the details and benefits of rebalancing a retirement portfolio? | Rebalancing your portfolio doesn't have to include selling. You could simply adjust your buying to keep your portfolio in balance. If you portfolio has shifted from 50% stocks and 50% bonds to 75% stocks and 25% bonds, you can just only use new savings to buy bonds, until you are back at 50-50. Remember to take into account taxes if you are thinking of selling to rebalance in taxable accounts. The goal of rebalancing is to keep your exposures the way that you want them. Assuming that you had a good reason to have a portfolio of 50% stocks and 50% bonds, you probably want to keep your portfolio similar in the future. If you end up with a portfolio of 75% stocks and 25% bonds due to stock market fluctuations, the exposure and the risk / return profile of your portfolio will have changed, and it's probably not something that you want. You don't want to rebalance just for the sake of rebalancing either. There can be costs to rebalancing (taxes, transaction fees, etc...) and these aren't always worth the effort. That's why you don't need to rebalance every month or if your portfolio has shifted from 50/50 to 51/49. I take a look at my portfolio once a year, and adjust my automated investments so that by the end of the next year I'm back to the ratio I want. |
How to get started with savings, paying off debt, and retirement? | The word you are looking for is "budget" You can't pay off debt if you are spending more than you earn. Therefore, start a budget that you both work on at the same time, and both agree 100% with. Evaluate your progress on that budget on a regular basis. From your question, you understand what your obligations are and you seem to manage money pretty well. Therefore your key to retirement is just the ticket you need. As newlyweds, you both have to be VERY aware that the main reason a marriage fails in the US is money issues. Starting out with a groundwork where you both agree to your budget and can keep it will help you a lot in your upcoming life. Then, for some details Sprinkle your charitable donations anywhere in the list where you feel it is important. |
Are the guaranteed returns of regulated utilities really what they sound like? | Typically a private company is hit by demand supply issues and cost of inputs. In effect at times the cost of input may go up, it cannot raise the prices, because this will reduce demand. However certain public sectors companies, typically in Oil & Engery segements the services are offered by Public sector companies, and the price they charge is governed by Regulatory authorities. In essence the PG&E, the agreement for price to customers would be calculated as cost of inputs to PG&E, Plus Expenses Plus 11.35% Profit. Thus the regulated price itself governs that the company makes atleast 11.35% profit year on year. Does this mean that the shares are good buy? Just to give an example, say the price was $100 at face value, So essentially by year end logically you would have made 111.35/-. Assuming the company did not pay dividend ... Now lets say you began trading this share, there would be quite a few people who would say I am ready to pay $200 and even if I get 11.35 [on 200] it still means I have got ~6% return. Someone may be ready to pay $400, it still gives ~3% ... So in short the price of the stock would keep changing depending how the market percieves the value that a company would return. If the markets are down or the sentiments are down on energy sectors, the prices would go down. So investing in PG&E is not a sure shot way of making money. For actual returns over the years see the graph at http://www.pgecorp.com/investors/financial_reports/annual_report_proxy_statement/ar_html/2011/index.htm#CS |
Income At the Sell or Reception? | It looks like fair-market value when you receive your virtual currency is counted as income. And you're also subject to self-employment tax on that income. Here's an FAQ from the IRS: Q-8: Does a taxpayer who “mines” virtual currency (for example, uses computer resources to validate Bitcoin transactions and maintain the public Bitcoin transaction ledger) realize gross income upon receipt of the virtual currency resulting from those activities? A-8: Yes, when a taxpayer successfully “mines” virtual currency, the fair market value of the virtual currency as of the date of receipt is includible in gross income. See Publication 525, Taxable and Nontaxable Income, for more information on taxable income.Q-9: Is an individual who “mines” virtual currency as a trade or business subject to self-employment tax on the income derived from those activities? A-9: If a taxpayer’s “mining” of virtual currency constitutes a trade or business, and the “mining” activity is not undertaken by the taxpayer as an employee, the net earnings from self-employment (generally, gross income derived from carrying on a trade or business less allowable deductions) resulting from those activities constitute selfemployment income and are subject to the self-employment tax. See Chapter 10 of Publication 334, Tax Guide for Small Business, for more information on selfemployment tax and Publication 535, Business Expenses, for more information on determining whether expenses are from a business activity carried on to make a profit. You'd of course be able to offset that income with the expense of mining the virtual currency, depreciation of dedicated mining equipment, electricity, not sure what else. Edit: Here's a good resource on filing taxes with Bitcoin: Filling in the 1040 Income from Bitcoins and all crypto-currencies is declared as either capital gains income or ordinary income, for example from mining. Income Ordinary income will be declared on either your 1040 (line 21 - Other Income) for an individual, or within your Schedule C, if you are self-employed or have sole-proprietor business. Capital Gains Capital gains income, or losses, are declared on Schedule D. Since there are no reported 1099 forms from Bitcoin exchanges, you will need to include your totals with Box C checked for short-term gains, and with Box F checked for long-term gains. Interesting notes from that article, your first example could actually be trickier than expected if you started mining before there was a Monero to USD exchange. Also, there can also be capital gains implications from using your virtual currency to buy goods, which sounds like a pain to keep track of. |
Best Time to buy a stock in a day | You can't predict when to buy a stock during the day to guarantee not having a loss for the day. In the short run stock prices are really pretty random. There are many day traders who try to accomplish exactly this and most of them lose money. If you don't believe me, create an account on Investopedia and use their free stock market simulator and try day trading for a few months. |
Is dividend included in EPS | EPS is often earnings/diluted shares. That is counting shares as if all convertible securities (employee stock options for example) were converted. Looking at page 3 of Q4 2015 Reissued Earnings Press Release we find both basic ($1.13) and diluted EPS ($1.11). Dividends are not paid on diluted shares, but only actual shares. If we pull put this chart @ Yahoo finance, and hovering our mouse over the blue diamond with a "D", we find that Pfizer paid dividends of $0.28, $0.28, $0.28, $0.30 in 2015. Or $1.14 per share. Very close to the $1.13, non-diluted EPS. A wrinkle is that one can think of the dividend payment as being from last quarter, so the first one in 2015 is from 2014. Leaving us with $0.28, $0.28, $0.30, and unknown. Returning to page three of Q4 2015 Reissued Earnings Press Release, Pfizer last $0.03 per share. So they paid more in dividends that quarter than they made. And from the other view, the $0.30 cents they paid came from the prior quarter, then if they pay Q1 2016 from Q4 2015, then they are paying more in that view also. |
Electric car lease or buy? | The good news about maintenance is that there's much less scheduled maintenance because the cars are mechanically much simpler. See the official service schedule. Most of it is just "rotate tires / replace cabin air filter". The brake and suspension systems are very similar to those of a normal car and require comparable maintenance. The bad news is the battery will decay over time and is a major component of the cost of the car. From that link: In the UK, the LEAF’s standard battery capacity loss warranty is for 60,000 miles or five years So you should factor your warrantied battery lifetime into the depreciation calculation. I don't think there are going to be many ten- or twenty- year old electric cars from the current crop in 2030 or 2040 as they're still improving dramatically year-on-year. (Slightly too long for a comment, slightly too short for a proper answer) |
Why is day trading considered riskier than long-term trading? | I think, the top three answers by Joe, Anthony and Bigh are giving you all the detail that you need on a technical sense. Although I would like to add a simple picture that underlines, that you can not really compare day trading to long-term trading and that the addictive and psychologic aspect that you mentioned can not be taken out of consideration. The long term investor is like someone buying a house for investment. You carefully look at all offers on the market. You choose by many factors, price, location, quality, environment, neighborhood and extras. After a long research, you pick your favorites and give them a closer look until you finally choose the object of desire, which will pay off in 10 years and will be a wise investment in your future. Now this sounds like a careful but smart person, who knows what he wants and has enough patience to have his earnings in the future. The short term investor is like someone running into the casino for a game of black-jack, roulette or poker. He is a person that thinks he has found the one and only formula, the philosopher's stone, the money-press and is seeking immense profits in just one night. And if it does not work, he is sure, that this was just bad coincidence and that his "formula" is correct and will work the next night. This person is a pure gambler and running the risk of becoming addicted. He is seeking quick and massive profits and does not give up, even though he knows, that the chances of becoming a millionaire in a casino are quite unrealistic and not better than playing in a lottery. So if you are a gamer, and the profit is less important than the "fun", then short term is the thing for you. If you are not necessarily seeking tons of millions, but just want to keep your risk of loss to a minimum, then long term is your way to go. So it is a question of personality, expectations and priorities. The answer why losses are bigger on high frequency signals is answered elsewhere. But I am convinced in reality it is a question of what you want and therefore very subjective. I have worked for both. I have worked for a portfolio company that has gone through periods of ups and downs, but on the long term has made a very tempting profit, which made me regret, that I did not ask for shares instead of money as payment. These people are very calm and intelligent people. They spend all their time investigating and searching for interesting objects for their portfolio and replace losers with winners. They are working for your money and investors just relax and wait. This has a very serious taste to it and I for my part would always prefer this form of investment. I have worked for an investment broker selling futures. I programmed the account management for their customers and in all those years I have only seen one customer that made the million. But tons of customers that had made huge losses. And this company was very emotional, harsh, unpersonal - employees changing day by day, top sellers coming in corvettes. All the people working there where gamblers, just like their customers. Well, it ended one day, when the police came and confiscated all computers from them, because customers have complained about their huge losses. I am glad, that I worked as a remote developer for them and got paid in money and not in options. So both worlds are so different from each other. The chances for bigger profits are higher on day trading, but so are the chances for bigger losses - so it is pure gambling. If you like gambling, split your investment: half in long term and other half in short term, that is fun and wise in one. But one thing is for sure: in over ten years, I have seen many customers loosing loads of money in options in the future markets or currencies. But I have never seen anyone making a loss in long term portfolio investment. There have been hard years, where the value dropped almost 30%, but that was caught up by the following years, so that the only risk was minimizing the profit. |
TD Webbroker.ca did not execute my limit sell order even though my stock went .02 over limit | What happened here is pretty obvious: You were trying to sell 2000 shares and apparently didn't mark your order to permit partial execution. While they had a buyer at 94.66 they didn't want 2000 shares. Thus your order went unfilled. |
Short-sell, or try to rent out? | There is another option. Stay where you are. |
How can I determine if leaving a lower paying, tax advantaged, job for a higher paying one makes sense financially? | You'd be moving from 33.5K of taxable income + 16.5K of untaxable income, to 65K of taxable income (worst case). So the question is whether the net from the extra 31.5K of taxable income is more than the 16.5K, and since marginal tax rates in the relevant brackets are no more than 32% according to the table you posted (22% federal and 10% provincial), it's definitely a win to move jobs. More precisely, the marginal tax rate is 25% on the first 8044 (41544-33500) and 32% on the rest, making for total extra tax of about 9.5K and thus net income (beyond the 33.5K baseline) of 22K. Compared to the 16.5K this leaves you 5.5K up. If you end up at the 70K end, you're another 3.4K up beyond that. |
What are some good, easy to use personal finance software? [UK] | +1 for YNAB. I used to use MS Money until it was decommissioned. I used that to historically record my spending and investing, and plot my net worth. Whilst YNAB will do that, it is actually geared towards forward planning much more so. In this area, it is fantastic. I like that there are mobile apps for it too. |
Process for dissolving a recently-opened Colorado LLC? | Forms for the Colorado LLCs are online. You can find the link to the dissolution form here, and instructions here. IRS instructions are here. That's what they want: To close your business account, send us a letter that includes the complete legal name of the entity, the EIN, the business address and the reason you wish to close your account. If you have a copy of the EIN Assignment Notice that was issued when your EIN was assigned, include that when you write to us at: Internal Revenue Service Cincinnati, Ohio 45999 Everything is pretty straight forward. Note that you might be required to file a initial/final tax return if you had any transactions. |
What is a mutual fund? | The simple answer is: YES, the JP Morgan emerging markets equity fund is a mutual fund. A mutual fund is a pooling of money from investors to invest in stocks and bonds. Investors in mutual funds arrive there in different ways. Some get there via their company 401K, others by an IRA, still others as a taxable account. The fund can be sold by the company directly or through a broker. You can also have a fund of funds. So the investors are other funds. Some investors are only indirect investors. They are owed a pension by a past or current employer, and the pension fund has invested in a mutual fund. |
Will my current employer find out if I have a sole proprietarship/corporation? | I can see why you'd be reluctant to tell them, but I think you need to be open and honest with them about what you're doing and where you see it going. If the roles were reversed, what would you want your employee to do in this situation? If it were me, I'd be much happier to be told up front than to find out some other way later. If I found out later, I'd feel somewhat betrayed and angry. With the Internet, it seems unlikely that they wouldn't find out eventually, so I think being up front about it is your best option. I also suggest you have a backup plan in case they say no. Perhaps you'd need to find another full-time job that is more tolerant (or even encouraging) of side businesses. |
Is it sensible to keep savings in a foreign currency? | Is it sensible to keep savings in a foreign currency? The answer varies from one country to the next, but in the UK (or any other mature economy), I would advise against it. There are better ways to hedge against currency risks with the funds readily available to you through your ISA. You can keep your money relatively safe and liquid without ever paying a currency exchange fee. |
How can small children contribute to the “family economy”? | There is also babysitting, dog walking and house sitting. Depending on their age of course. You should also investigate what is required to get them the ability to setup their own Roth IRA. I know one of the requirements is you can't put more into the Roth then was earned in income in the year. They might also have to file an income tax return (not sure about that one). Just think of how far ahead of the game they will be if they can get a couple of grand or more in a Roth account while in their early teens. |
Credit cards: How is a cash advance different from a purchase? Why are the fees so high? | Think about the credit card business model... they have two revenue generators: interest and fees from borrowers and commissions and fees to merchants. The key to a successful credit card is to both sign up lots of borrowers AND lots of merchants. Credit card fortunes have improved dramatically since the 1990's when formerly off-limits merchants like grocery stores began to accept cards. So when a credit card lets you just pull cash out of any ATM, there are a few costs they need to account for when pricing the cost for such a service: Credit card banks have managed to make cash advances both a profit center and a self-serving perk. Knowing that you can always draw upon your credit line for an emergency when cash is necessary makes you less likely to actually carry cash and more likely to just rely on your credit card. |
What is the opposite of a sunk cost? A “sunk gain”? | A "sunk cost" is a cost that you have already incurred, and won't get back. The "sunk cost fallacy," as you described, is when you make a bad decision based on your sunk cost. When you identify a sunk cost, you realize that the money has been spent, and the decision is irreversible. Future decisions should not take this cost into account. When you commit the "sunk cost fallacy," you are keeping something that is bad simply because you spent a lot of money on it. You are failing to identify the correct current value of something based on its high cost to you in the past. The other fallacy you describe, the opposite of the sunk cost fallacy, is when you get rid of something that is good simply because you spent little on it. As before, you are also failing to correctly identify the correct current value of something, but in this case, you are assigning too little a value based on the low cost in the past. You could call this a type of "opportunity cost," a loss of future benefits due to a mistake made today. It seems reasonable to describe this type of fallacy as an "opportunity cost fallacy." |
What can I do when the trading price of a stock or ETF I want to buy is too high? | You have a couple of options: Auto-investing in an open-end mutual fund. Some companies may waive a minimum if you sign up for an automatic investing, e.g. T. Rowe Price will waive its minimum if you agree to invest $100/month. There may be some lower ones out there as well. Some brokers like ShareBuilder have programs where someone could auto-invest getting fractional shares with each purchase. However, something to consider is what percentage is it costing you to buy each time as it may be quite a bit of friction if you are paying $4 a purchase and only buying $40, this is 10% of your investment being eaten up in costs that I'd highly advise taking the first option. |
How do I calculate ownership percentage for shared home ownership? | The bottom line is that you can decide whatever you want to do. It is good of you to get everything in writing. What happens if she decides to move to a different city? What happens if she also wants to be bought out? It should also include contingencies for your husband and yourself. God forbid anything negative happens, but what happens if you two get divorced? Does your husband want to be an agreement with your sister if you pass away? There does not seem to be any math to do in this case. While she is paying the lion's share of the payment, she is also receiving the benefit of having a place to live. It is unlikely that she can rent an equivalent place for anything close to 1400/month. I would estimate it would be at least 1800/month to rent an equivalent property. So she put no money down, and she is paying below market "rent" to live somewhere. Many people would be happy to have $400/month off and handle their own repairs (let alone you still kicking in half). Now all that said, if you want to give her some equity based upon generosity or the desire to give her some dignity, then you are free to do so. Perhaps 10%? |
How to share income after marriage and kids? | The bottom line is choosing the right partner. If your partner works as hard as you do, than everything should be split, irregardless of who makes more. Unfortunately, my bf, now by separated husband, borrowed money from me before we were married. I saw a lack of work ethic in him from the beginning, loved him anyway and married him but decided to keep my money separate as a result. This was a beginning with lack of trust and knowing I would be the higher earner, harder worker, and better provider. Down the road he won a lawsuit and got about $700k. I saw about $25k of this money to pay bills created with the intention of him paying them off when he got the money, and because he pilfered it away, we lost our house and it ended in my leaving.... I'm still doing ok because I work hard for what I have. He is struggling. We were never on the same page, never discussed finances because of his lack of work ethic and my mistrust of how he would decide how the money would be used. Sadly, who you decide to be your partner is the most important decision here...It should be based on mutual respect, both working hard to achieve a common goal, and communicating the budget every year, perhaps even each month.... I'm the terrible example. |
Buying a home with down payment from family as a “loan” | I would recommend against loans from family members. But if you decide to go down that path take care of the basics: This is a business decision so treat it like one. I would add that the situation you describe sounds extremely generous to your family member. I'd look at standard loan agreements (ie. in the marketplace) and model your situation more on them - if you do this, even with you paying a premium, you'd never come up with something as generous as what you have described. |
Calculate Estimated Tax on Hobby Business LLC | I assume your employer does standard withholding? Then what you need to do is figure what bracket that puts you in after you've done all your normal deductions. Let's say it's 25%. Then multiply your freelance income after business expenses, and that's your estimated tax, approximately. (Unless the income causes you to jump a bracket.) To that you have to add approximately 12-13% Social Security/Medicare for income between the $90K and $118,500. Filling out Form 1040SSE will give you a better estimate. But there is a "safe harbor" provision, in that if what you pay in estimated tax (and withholding) this year is at least as much as you owed last year, there's no penalty. I've always done mine this way, dividing last year's tax by 4, since my income is quite variable, and I've never been able to make sense of the worksheets on the 1040-ES. |
In the stock market, why is the “open” price value never the same as previous day's “close”? | Besides overnight news events and auction mechanisms there is a more fundamental reason the price of a stock is always moving. Theoretically the stock price will move slightly even in the unlikely scenario that absolutely nothing of interest happens during the entire night. Let me go into that in some more detail: Stock valuation using Discounted Cash FLow One of the fundamental reasons that stock value is constantly changing is because underneath every stock there is a company that expects to make some kind of profit or loss in the future. We have to go into the fundamentals of stock value to understand why this is important: One popular way to determine the value of a stock is by looking into the future and summing up all the earnings (or cashflows) it has yet to produce. You have to reduce each amount by a certain factor that gets larger for payments that are farther into the future. Think of it this way: a dollar in hand now is better than a dollar that you get tomorrow. This method of valuation is called Discounted Cash Flow (abbr. DCF; see the wikipedia article on DCF) Time's effect on stock value Now take the Close price C, and the open price O. Let's assume that since there has been no news, the expectations for future earnings are the same for C and O. Remember that the discounting factor for these earnings is dependent on the time until the cashflow occurs? For O, this time is slightly shorter than for C, and therefore the value will be slightly higher (or lower, when the company is expected to incur losses). So now you can see that even without all the external forces that continuously push and pull on the stock price, a stock still changes in value over time. Hope this helps. |
How do credit card payments work? What ensures the retailer charges the right amount? | Your credit card limit is nothing more than a simple number. When you purchase something, the merchant receives a number (i.e. the amount of the transaction) from your card company (e.g. Visa) in their bank account, and that number is subtracted from your limit (added to your balance). The amount is recorded, and isn't changed, so that's how they get the "exact" amount you paid. Transferring a number is easier than the retailer having to wait for cash to get from you to your card company to them. Moving numbers around is the basis of the modern financial system. And yes, it is always a risk to let someone else have your credit card number. An untrustworthy company/person may use it to charge you without your permission, or if they have your full details they could use it as if they were you. With a reputable retailer like Amazon, the main risk is data theft: If a security hole is found in Amazon's system, someone could steal your credit card info and misuse it. |
Can value from labor provided to oneself be taxed? | This is called imputed income, which is generally not taxed in the US. |
How can I legally and efficiently help my girlfriend build equity by helping with a mortgage? | I agree with everyone who has simply told you 'Dont' and 'You can't' and add a few more considerations that you don't want to deal with: What you want to do is admirable but very complicated from a financial and legal perspective. If this is really a route that you want to go down you should give up on the 'simple' and consider hiring a lawyer. |
Why charge gross receipts taxes to the customer? | the state of New Mexico provides guidance in this exact situation. On page 4: Gross receipts DOES NOT include: Example: When the seller passes tax to the buyer, the seller should separate, or “back out”, that tax from the total income to arrive at "Gross Receipts," the amount reported in Column D of the CRS-1 Form. (Please see the example on page 48.) and on page 48: How do I separate (“back out”) gross receipts tax from total gross receipts? See the following examples of how to separate the gross receipts tax: 1) To separate (back out) tax from total receipts at the end of the report period, first subtract deductible and exempt receipts, and then divide total receipts including the tax for the report period by one plus the applicable gross receipts tax rate. For example, if your tax rate is 5.5% and your total receipts including tax are $1,055.00 with no deductions or exemptions, divide $1,055.00 by 1.055. The result is your gross receipts excluding tax (to enter in Column D of the CRS-1 Form) or $1,000. 2) If your tax rate is 5.5%, and your total gross receipts including tax are $1,055.00, and included in that figure are $60 in deductions and another $45 in exemptions: a) Subtract $105 (the sum of your deductions and exemptions) from $1,055. The remainder is $950. This figure still includes the tax you have recovered from your buyers. b) Divide $950 by 1.055 (1 plus the 5.5% tax rate). The result is $900.47. c) In Column D enter the sum of $900.47 plus $60 (the amount of deductible receipts)*, or $960.47. This figure is your gross receipts excluding tax. |
Finance car with or with out a balloon payment | That interest rate (13%) is steep, and the balloon payment will have him paying more interest longer. Investing the difference is a risky proposition because past performance of an investment is no guarantee of future performance. Is taking that risk worth netting 2%? Not for me, but you must answer that last question for yourself. To your edit: How disruptive would losing the car and/or getting negative marks on your credit be? If you can quantify that in dollars then you have your answer. |
How do I invest and buy/sell stocks? What does “use a broker” mean? | I'm posting this because I think I can do a better job of explaining and detailing everything from start to stop. :) A "broker" is just someone who connect buyers and sellers - a middleman of sorts who is easy to deal with. There are many kinds of brokers; the ones you'll most commonly hear about these days are "mortgage broker" (for arranging home loans) and "stockbroker". The stockbroker helps you buy and sell stock. The stockbroker has a connection to one or more stock exchanges (e.g. Nasdaq, NYSE) and will submit your orders to them in order to fulfill it. This way Nasdaq and NYSE don't have to be in the business of managing millions of customer accounts (and submitting tax information about those accounts to the government and what-not) - they just manage relationships with brokerages, which is much easier for them. To invest in a stock, you will need to: In this day and age, most brokers that you care about will be easily accessed via the Internet, the applications will be available on the Internet, and the trading interface will be over the Internet. There may also be paper and/or telephone interfaces to the brokerage, but the Internet interface will work better. Be aware that post-IPO social media stock is risky; don't invest any money if you're not prepared for the possibility of losing every penny of it. Also, don't forget that a variety of alternative things exist that you can buy from a broker, such as an S&P 500 index fund or exchange-traded corporate bond fund; these will earn you some reward over time with significantly less risk. If you do not already have similar holdings through a retirement plan, you should consider purchasing some of these sooner or later. |
Which is better when working as a contractor, 1099 or incorporating? | I am surprised no one has mentioned the two biggest things (in my opinion). Or I should say, the two biggest things to me. First, 1099 have to file quarterly self employment taxes. I do not know for certain but I have heard that often times you will end up paying more this way then even a W-2 employees. Second, an LLC allows you to deduct business expenses off the top prior to determining what you pay in taxes as pass-through income. With 1099 you pay the same taxes regardless of your business expenses unless they are specifically allowed as a 1099 contractor (which most are not I believe). So what you should really do is figure out the expense you incur as a result of doing your business and check with an accountant to see if those expenses would be deductible in an LLC and if it offsets a decent amount of your income to see if it would be worth it. But I have read a lot of books and listened to a lot of interviews about wealthy people and most deal in companies not contracts. Most would open a new business and add clients rather than dealing in 1099 contracts. Just my two cents... Good luck and much prosperity. |
How do I figure out the market value of used books? | Half of original MSRP at Amazon is a good option for books that are in good condition. Another option would be to use eBay, specifically Half.com. |
What is this discrepency between Fidelity's and Google's stock price chart; large price spike? | This is from Google Finance right now. |
Do I have to work a certain amount of hours in order to get paid monthly? | Frequency of paychecks is up to the company. Many pay monthly. Some pay twice a month, or every other week. I haven't heard of any paying more frequently unless they were tiny "mom and pop" businesses or grunt-labor/fast-food minimum-wage jobs. Cutting the checks more often is more expensive for the company. And frequency of pay is one of the things you agreed to in the paperwork you signed when you were hired. |
Opening 5 credit cards at once with no history to ruin, is it a good idea? | I would not call this a "good" idea. But I wouldn't necessarily call it a bad idea either. Before you even consider it, you need to do a little bit of soul searching. If there is ANY chance that having multiple credit cards could entice you to spend more than you otherwise would, then this is definitely a bad idea. Avoiding temptation is the key to preventing regrettable actions (in all aspects of life). Psychoanalysis aside, let's take a mathematical approach to the question. I believe your conclusion is correct if you add some qualifiers to it: A few years from now, then your credit score will probably be higher than if you just had 1 credit card. Here are some other things to consider: And, saving the best for last: As for the hard inquiries, they should only have an effect on your credit score for 1 year (though they can be seen on your report for 2 years). Final thought: if you decide to do this (and I personally don't recommend it), I would keep the number of applications smaller (3-5 instead of 10-15). I also would only choose cards that have no annual fee. Try to choose 1 card that has 1-2% cash back and make that your regular card. |
Using 2 different social security numbers | While I agree with keshlam@ that the gym had no reason (or right) to ask for your SSN, giving false SSN to obtain credit or services (including gym membership) may be considered a crime. While courts disagree on whether you can be charged with identity theft in this scenario, you may very well be charged with fraud, and if State lines are crossed (which in case of store cards is likely the case) - it would be a Federal felony charge. Other than criminal persecution, obviously not paying your debt will affect your credit report. Since you provided false identity information, the negative report may not be matched to you right away, but it may eventually. In the case the lender discovers later that you materially misrepresented information on your mortgage application - they may call on your loan and either demand repayment in full at once or foreclose on you. Also, material misrepresentation of facts on loan application is also a criminal fraud. Again, if State lines are crossed (which in most cases, with mortgages they are), it becomes a Federal wire fraud case. On mortgage application you're required to disclose your debts, and that includes lines of credits (store cards and credit cards are the same thing) and unpaid debts (like your gym membership, if its in collection). |
Where should my money go next: savings, investments, retirement, or my mortgage? | There's a ton of great advice here. It's very challenging to come up with something that hasn't already been suggested. I'm curious to know how many years you have left to pay down the mortgage at the regular rate of payment. If it's more than 15 years, it might be worthwhile to consider refinancing your mortgage to a shorter term (15 years or even 10 years if your income supports it). Rates on fixed-interest mortgages at those terms are down in the 3% range and lower (at least according to bankrate.com). Refinancing to a shorter term would be another way of paying off your home faster (with fewer of those dollars going toward interest payments). If you've got fewer than 15 years left to pay off your mortgage, following any of the other advice you've received here should keep you in great financial shape. |
What are the tax benefits of dividends vs selling stock | In the US, dividends are presently taxed at the same rates as capital gains, however selling stock could lead to less tax owed for the same amount of cash raised, because you are getting a return of basis or can elect to engage in a "loss harvesting" strategy. So to reply to the title question specifically, there are more tax "benefits" to selling stock to raise income versus receiving dividends. You have precise control of the realization of gains. However, the reason dividends (or dividend funds) are used for retirement income is for matching cash flow to expenses and preventing a liquidity crunch. One feature of retirement is that you're not working to earn a salary, yet you still have daily living expenses. Dividends are stable and more predictable than capital gains, and generate cash generally quarterly. While companies can reduce or suspend their dividend, you can generally budget for your portfolio to put a reliable amount of cash in your pocket on schedule. If you rely on selling shares quarterly for retirement living expenses, what would you have done (or how much of the total position would you have needed to sell) in order to eat during a decline in the market such as in 2007-2008? |
Is it possible to sell a stock at a higher value than the market price? | Yes You could write a covered call and the stock gets called away at the price + premium. You could convince someone to buy it regardless of the market price. |
If a bank has a transfer limit, what happens if another bank pushes/pulls more than that? | If bank B has a transfer limit set, you bet that there is a nice reason for that. Either risk of fraud, liability, client preferences, profiling, credit scoring, etc, etc. For a bank, the cost of denying something [1] is way lower than the potential damages and liabilities of allowing something to go through. Regarding your concerns for the ACH, here is the summarized transaction walkthrough source: An Originator– whether that’s an individual, a corporation or another entity– initiates either a Direct Deposit or Direct Payment transaction using the ACH Network. ACH transactions can be either debit or credit payments and commonly include Direct Deposit of payroll, government and Social Security benefits, mortgage and bill payments, online banking payments, person-to-person (P2P) and business-to-business (B2B) payments, to name a few. Instead of using paper checks, ACH entries are entered and transmitted electronically, making transactions quicker, safer and easier. The Originating Depository Financial institution (ODFI) enters the ACH entry at the request of the Originator. The ODFI aggregates payments from customers and transmits them in batches at regular, predetermined intervals to an ACH Operator. ACH Operators (two central clearing facilities: The Federal Reserve or The Clearing House) receive batches of ACH entries from the ODFI. The ACH transactions are sorted and made available by the ACH Operator to the Receiving Depository Financial Institution (RDFI). The Receiver’s account is debited or credited by the RDFI, according to the type of ACH entry. Individuals, businesses and other entities can all be Receivers. Each ACH credit transaction settles in one to two business days, and each debit transaction settles in just one business day, as per the Rules. Take heed of this like: The Originator initiates a direct deposit/payment transaction. In your scenario, the originator would be B. But since the transaction amount is higher than the limit, B would not even initiate the ACH transaction. The request would be denied. So the transaction would look like this: [1] Usually this cost comes down to just the processing costs of the denied transaction (and it is rather fail-fast like). For the other parties involved it may have additional costs (missed deadlines, penalties for not fulfilling an obligation, fines, etc), but for the bank that is irrelevant. |
What are the implications of lending money to my sole member S-corp? | You can make a capital contribution, not a loan. It's not a taxable event, no interest, and you can take a distribution later when the business has the money to pay you back. So yes, transfer the money. If you use software like Quickbooks, make use of unique accounts for tracking the contribution |
Value of a call option spread | The Explanation is correct. The Traders buys the 1st call and profits linearly form 40$ onwards. At at 45 the short call kick in and neutralizes any further profit on the first call. |
How might trading volume affect future share price? | There tends to be high volume around big changes in stock price. The volume of a stock does not remain constant and the term "fat fingers" can influence price.--> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-01/that-japanese-fat-finger-can-absolutely-happen-in-u-s-.html That being said keshlam is 99% right when it comes to a stock moving when their is no news or earnings announcements. Check out these papers. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1475-6803.2010.01285.x/full They do a time series analysis to try and predict future prices off of past demand during news events. They forecast using auto-regressive models. google "forecasting autoregressive model" and the upenn lecture will be helpful. I would post another link but I cannot because I do not have enough rep/ This is more of a quant question. Hope this helps. JL |
What would the broker do about this naked call option? | Yes, it can buy back the call, but much before stock hits the $30 mark. Let us say you got 1$ from selling the call. So the total money in your account is 4$ + 1 $ = 5 $. When stock hits 10$ (your strike), the maintenance margin is 5$. As soon as stock goes past 10, your maintenance margin is violated. So broker will buy back your call (at least IB does that, it does not wait for a margin call). Now if the stock gapped up from 8 to 30,then yes, broker will buy it back at 30, so your account will have a negative balance. Assume the call cost 20$ when stock hit 30, your balance is: 5 - (30-10) = -15. Depending on broker, I suppose they will ask you to bring your account balance back up to positive. If they don't do that, they risk going out of business. |
How to take advantage of home appreciation | Even selling isn't riskless. Sure, your house has gained value-- but unless that's due to improvements you made to it, every other house in the neighborhood you might buy has gained value too, so moving might not result in extracting any net value. This is one of the reasons I keep reminding folks that a house is not an investment. It can be a business, if you're renting it out. But if you're occupying it, it is simply housing. If you are lucky you'll make a profit if and when you sell it, but don't count on that. It does store value, but except for taking loans against that it's had to access that value. And lower loan rates than you'd otherwise pay are not a huge value when you'd save more if you don't borrow at all. The only use I'm making of my house's value is that by taking a very-low-rate mortgage when I could have paid cash I was able to leave more money in my investments -- arguably the safest leveraged investment possible. |
How come I can't sell short certain stocks? My broker says “no shares are available” | You can't short a stock unless there is someone willing and able to "lend" shares to you. And there are several reasons why that might not be the case. First, BSFT is a "new" stock, which means that NO ONE has held it very long. It's much easier to short IBM or Exxon Mobil, where there are some long-term holders who would like to earn a little extra money lending you THEIR shares. But if "everyone" involved is busy buying or selling the stock, there won't be many people to lend it. That's not manipulation, that's just the market. Another reason may be a large "short" interest. That is many OTHERS have shorted it before you. That's dangerous for you, because if some lenders want to pull their shares off the market, they can cause a "short squeeze" that will drive the price much higher. And stock shortages can be orchestrated by the company or large investors to artificially drive the price higher. Unless you have a lot of experience, don't try shorting small cap stocks. Try to gain some experience with large caps like IBM or Exxon Mobil first. Those are stocks that people at least can't "play games" with. YOu will win or lose based on the market itself. |
Owing state tax Interest and a result of living in Maryland and working in Virginia | The reciprocity agreement in the Washington DC area means that you only pay income taxes where you live, not where you work. Because you live in Maryland you only need to pay income taxes to Maryland. You need to do the following things. Line 3. If you are not subject to Virginia withholding, check the box on this line. You are not subject to withholding if you meet any one of the conditions listed below. Form VA-4 must be filed with your employer for each calendar year for which you claim exemption from Virginia withholding. (a) You had no liability for Virginia income tax last year and you do not expect to have any liability for this year. ... (d) You are a domiciliary or legal resident of Maryland, Pennsylvania or West Virginia whose only Virginia source income is from salaries and wages and such salaries and wages are subject to income taxation by your state of domicile. My company has its only office in Maryland, and conducts all of its business there. Several of our employees are Virginia residents who commute to work on a daily basis. Are we required to withhold Virginia income tax from their wages? No. Because your company is not paying wages to employees for services performed in Virginia, you are not required to withhold Virginia tax. If you would like to withhold the tax as a courtesy to your employees, you may register for a Virginia withholding tax account online or by submitting a Registration Application. Additional withholding per pay period under agreement with employer. If you are not having enough tax withheld, you may ask your employer to withhold more by entering an additional amount on line 2. |
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