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When buying a call option, is the financial stability of the option writer relevant? | Exchange traded options are issued in a way that there is no counter party risk. Consider, stocks and options are held in street name. So, for example, if I am short and you are long shares, no matter what happens on my end, your shares are yours. To be complete, it's possible to enter into a direct deal, where you have a contract for some non-standard option, but that would be very rare for the average investor. |
Am I considered in debt if I pay a mortgage? | Yes, a mortgage is debt. It's unique in that you have a house which should be worth far more than the mortgage. After the mortgage crisis, many found their homes under water i.e. worth less than the mortgage. The word debt is a simple noun for money owed, it carries no judgement or negative connotation except when it's used to buy short lived items with money one doesn't have. Aside from my mortgage, I get a monthly credit card bill which I pay in full. That's debt too, only it carried no interest and rewards me with 2% cash back. Many people would avoid this as it's still debt. |
New or Used Car Advice for Recent College Grad | Never buy a new car if cost is an issue. A big chunk of the price will disappear to depreciation as you drive it off the lot. If you want a shiny new car with the latest equipment (and if you can afford it!), buy a lightly-used car. Normally I would recommend a 1-3 year old car. 95% of the value, with a big cost savings. But this depends on your financial situation. Given that you just need a commuter car for mostly highway driving, in a place where the weather is easier on cars, you could be fine with a 5-6 year old import. Camry's, Accords, Civics, etc are all well-built, reliable, and affordable due to their numbers. As for financing, shop around. Don't blindly use dealer financing. Check with banks and especially local credit unions and see what rate they can offer you. Then, when you are ready to go, get pre-approved (this is when they pull your credit) and get the car. |
Multiple hard inquiry for a single loan from car dealer? | (I'm a bit surprised that nobody talked about the impact of multiple inquiries on a loan, since OP is concerned with credit building. Probably an answer as opposed to a comment is justified.) Yes. In fact when you shop for auto loan you are expected to have your credit score/report be pulled by different banks, credit unions, and/or the financing arm of the car manufacturer or the dealership, so that you can hopefully get the best rate possible. This is especially true if the dealer is requesting quotes on rates on your behalf, as they would probably use a batch process to send out applications to multiple financial institutions all at once. Yes, and a bit unusual - CALVERT TOYO (your dealer) pulled your report twice on the same day. Presumably they are not getting any new information on the second pull. Maybe a fat finger? Regardless, you should not worry about this too much (to be explained below). I would say "don't bother". The idea behind hard inquiries lowering credit score is that lenders see the number of hard inquiries as your desire for credit. Too high a number is often viewed as either "desperate for credit" or "unable to qualify for credit". But as explained above, it is very common for a person to request quotes for multiple financial institutions and thus to have multiple hard inquiries in a short period of time when shopping for loans. To account for that, the credit bureau's model would usually combine hard inquiries for a same type of loan (auto, mortgage, etc.) within 30 days. Hence a person sending quote request to 3 banks won't be rated higher for credit than if he were to request quotes from 5 banks. Therefore in your case your credit profile is not going to be different if you had been pulled just once. my credit score goes down for 15 points I'm assuming you are talking about the credit score provided by Credit Karma. The score CK provided is FAKO. The score lenders care about is FICO. They are well correlated but still different. Google these two terms and you should be able to figure out the difference quickly. You can also refer to my answer to a different question here: Equifax credit score discrepancy in 1 month, why? |
Why do people always talk about stocks that pay high dividends? | When you invest in stocks, there are two possible ways to make money: Many people speculate just on the stock price, which would result in a gain (or loss), but only once you have resold the shares. Others don't really care about the stock price. They get dividends every so often, and hopefully, the return will be better than other types of investments. If you're in there for the long run, you do not really care what the price of the stock is. It is often highly volatile, and often completely disconnected from anything, so it's not because today you have a theoretical gain (because the current stock price is higher than your buying price) that you will effectively realise that gain when you sell (need I enumerate the numerous crashes that prevented this from happening?). Returns will often be more spectacular on share resale than on dividends, but it goes both ways (you can lose a lot if you resell at the wrong time). Dividends tend to be a bit more stable, and unless the company goes bankrupt (or a few other unfortunate events), you still hold shares in the company even if the price goes down, and you could still get dividends. And you can still resell the stock on top of that! Of course, not all companies distribute dividends. In that case, you only have the hope of reselling at a higher price (or that the company will distribute dividends in the future). Welcome to the next bubble... |
What is an effective way to convert large sums of US based investments to foreign currencies? | A stock, bond or ETF is basically a commodity. Where you bought it does not really matter, and it has a value in USD only inasmuch as there is a current market price quoted at an American exchange. But nothing prevents you from turning around and selling it on a European exchange where it is also listed for an equivalent amount of EUR (arbitrage activities of investment banks ensure that the price will be equivalent in regard to the current exchange rate). In fact, this can be used as a cheap form of currency conversion. For blue chips at least this is trivial; exotic securities might not be listed in Europe. All you need is a broker who allows you to trade on European exchanges and hold an account denominated in EUR. If necessary, transfer your securities to a broker who does, which should not cost more than a nominal fee. Mutual funds are a different beast though; it might be possible to sell shares on an exchange anyway, or sell them back to the issuer for EUR. It depends. In any case, however, transferring 7 figure sums internationally can trigger all kinds of tax events and money laundering investigations. You really need to hire a financial advisor who has international investment experience for this kind of thing, not ask a web forum! |
Is the money you get from shorting a stock free to use for going long on other stocks? | You sold $10,000 worth of stock so that money is essentially yours. However, you sold this stock without actually owning any which means that you, through your broker, are currently borrowing shares amounting to (at the time of your sale) $10,000 from someone who actually owns this stock. You will be paying this person interest for the privilege of borrowing their shares, the exact amount charged varies wildly and depends on factors such as short interest in the stock (loads of people want to go short = shareholders can charge high interest) etc. If I remember correctly hovering over the "position" column in your portfolio in the IB Workstation should give you information about the interest rate charged. You will have to buy back these shares from the lender at some point which is why the $10k isn't just "free money." If the stock has gone up in price in the meantime you are going to be paying more than the $10k you got for the same amount of shares and vice versa. |
That “write your own mortgage” thing; how to learn about it | If an entity or individual has full rights to the land and land improvements, they can hold, transfer, delegate, or dispose of them on their terms. The only exception may be eminent domain. If the sovereignty meets the public necessity or public purpose tests they can assume or change the rights to your property in exchange for compensation. As others have said writing your own mortgage falls under the category of seller financing. A seller can write a mortgage with the help of a loan servicing company. Some loan service companies report to credit agencies, to help with buyer refinancing at a later point. Other forms of seller financing: Leasing Land contracts mineral contracts and more... Additionally, the seller can finance the minority of the property, called a junior mortgage. For example, the Bank finances 79% of the value, the seller finances 11%, and the buyer's 10% down payment covers the rest. If the buyer defaults, the superior mortgage (bank's) has collection priority. More commonly, the seller can option for a wrap-around mortgage or an 'all-inclusive mortgage'. The seller holds or refinances the existing mortgage and provides a junior mortgage in exchange for a secured promissory note and an all-inclusive trust deed. If the buyer defaults, the seller has foreclosure rights. It is not uncommon for entities or people to use financing strategies other than the traditional mortgage if they are unable to exclude the gain on sale. Check out section 1031 exchanges. In almost all cases I would tell people not to make decisions based on tax consequences alone, if your financial objective/goal for seller financing sounds like a 1031 exchange, take exception and carefully consider the tax consequences. |
What one bit of financial advice do you wish you could've given yourself five years ago? | Bank every dollar possible to have more cash available for investing during the 2008/2009 crisis. |
Is my mortgage more likely to be sold if I pre-pay principal? | There are two ways that mortgages are sold: The loan is collateralized and sold to investors. This allows the bank to free up money for more loans. Of course sometime the loan may be treated like in the game of hot potato nobody want s to be holding a shaky loan when it goes into default. The second way that a loan is sold is through the servicing of the loan. This is the company or bank that collects your monthly payments, and handles the disbursement of escrow funds. Some banks lenders never sell servicing, others never do the servicing themselves. Once the servicing is sold the first time there is no telling how many times it will be sold. The servicing of the loan is separate from the collateralization of the loan. When you applied for the loan you should have been given a Servicing Disclosure Statement Servicing Disclosure Statement. RESPA requires the lender or mortgage broker to tell you in writing, when you apply for a loan or within the next three business days, whether it expects that someone else will be servicing your loan (collecting your payments). The language is set by the US government: [We may assign, sell, or transfer the servicing of your loan while the loan is outstanding.] [or] [We do not service mortgage loans of the type for which you applied. We intend to assign, sell, or transfer the servicing of your mortgage loan before the first payment is due.] [or] [The loan for which you have applied will be serviced at this financial institution and we do not intend to sell, transfer, or assign the servicing of the loan.] [INSTRUCTIONS TO PREPARER: Insert the date and select the appropriate language under "Servicing Transfer Information." The model format may be annotated with further information that clarifies or enhances the model language.] |
Can I participate in trading Facebook shares on their IPO day from any brokerage? | By definition, an IPO'd stock is publicly traded, and you can buy shares if you wish. There's often an excitement on the first day that doesn't carry over to the next days or weeks. The opening price may be well above the IPO price, depending on that demand. |
Should I finance a new home theater at 0% even though I have the cash for it? | I think most people have already answered this one pretty well. (It's usually worth it, as long as you pay it off before the interest kicks in, and you don't get hit with any fees.) I just wanted to add one thing that no one else has pointed out: Applying for the loan usually counts as a hard pull on your credit history. It also changes your Debt-to-income ratio (DTI). This can negatively impact your credit score. Usually, the credit score impact for these (relatively) small loans isn't that much. And your score will rebound over time. However, if it makes your score drop below a certain threshold, (e.g. FICO dips below 700), it could trip you up if you are also applying for other sources of credit in the immediate future. Not a big deal, but it is something to keep in mind. |
Can you explain “time value of money” and “compound interest” and provide examples of each? | Here are some really excellent video tutorials on these topics: Introduction to Compound Interest Introduction to Present Value |
Started new job. Rollover previous employer 401k to new 401k, IRA or Roth IRA? | You can't roll it over to a Roth IRA without tax penalties. The best thing to do is roll it to an IRA that isn't tied to work at all. Second best is to roll it into your new employer's 401k. The reason that an IRA makes sense is that it gives you the same tax savings as a 401k, but it allows you to remain in control of the money regardless of your employment status. |
Working for recruiter on W-2 vs. working for client on 1099? | I don't think anyone can give you a definitive answer without knowing all about your situation, but some things to consider: If you are on a 1099, you have to pay self-employment tax, while on a W-2 you do not. That is, social security tax is 12.4% of your income. If you're a 1099, you pay the full 12.4%. If you're W-2, you pay 6.2% and the employer pays 6.2%. So if they offer you the same nominal rate of pay, you're 6.2% better off with the W-2. What sort of insurance could you get privately and what would it cost you? I have no idea what the going rates for insurance are in California. If you're all in generally good health, you might want to consider a high-deductible policy. Then if no one gets seriously sick you've saved a bunch of money on premiums. If someone does get sick you might still pay less paying the deductible than you would have paid on higher premiums. I won't go into further details as that's getting off into another question. Even if the benefits are poor, if there are any benefits at all it can be better than nothing. The only advantage I see to going with a 1099 is that if you are legally an independent contractor, then all your business expenses are deductible, while if you are an employee, there are sharp limits on deducting employee business expenses. Maybe others can think of other advantages. If there is some reason to go the 1099 route, I understand that setting up an LLC is not that hard. I've never done it, but I briefly looked into it once and it appeared to basically be a matter of filling out a form and paying a modest fee. |
Personal taxes for Shopify / Paypal shop? | I'm assuming you're in the United States for this. I highly recommend getting a CPA to help you navigate the tax implications. Likely, you'll pay taxes as a sole proprietor, on top of any other income you made. Hopefully you kept good records because you'll be essentially paying for the profits, but you'll need to show the revenue and expenditures that you had. If you have any capital expenditures you may be able ton amortize them. But again, definitely hire a professional to help you, it will be well worth the cost. |
How to measure a currencies valuation or devaluation in relevance to itself | It's very hard to measure the worth of an abstract concept like money, particularly over long periods of time. In the modern era we have things like the Consumer Price Index (CPI) in the United States, where the Bureau of Labor Statistics literally sends "shoppers" out to find prices of things and surveys people to find out what they buy. This results in a variety of "indexes" which variously get reported by media outlets as "inflation" (or "deflation" if the change in value goes the other way). There are also other measurements available like the MIT Billion Prices Project which attempt to make their own reading of the "worth" of currencies. Those kinds of things are about the only ways to measure a currency's change in "value to itself" because a currency is basically only worth what one can buy with it. While it isn't "all the world's currencies combined", there is a concept of the International Monetary Fund's "Special Drawing Rights (SDR)", which is a basket of five currencies used by world central banks to help "back" each other's currencies, and is (very) occasionally used as a unit of currency for international contracts. One might be able to compare the price of one currency to that of the SDR, or even to any other weighted average of world currencies that one wanted, but I don't think it's done nearly as often as comparing currencies to the basket of goods one can buy to find "inflation". Even though one might think what would be important to measure would be overall Money Supply Inflation, much more often people care more about measuring Price Inflation. (Occasionally people worry about Wage Inflation, but generally that's considered a result of high Price Inflation.) In order to try to keep this on topic as a "personal finance" thing rather than an "economics" thing, I guess the question is: Why do you want to know? If you have some assets in a particular currency, you probably care most about what you'll be able to buy with them in the future when you want or need to spend them. In that sense, it's inflation that you're likely caring about the most. If you're trying to figure out which currency to keep your assets in, it largely depends on what currency your future expenses are likely to be in, though I can imagine that one might want to move out of a particular currency if there's a lot of political instability that you're expecting to lead to high inflation in a currency for a time. |
Can a Company which is listed at OTC and TSX considered to be serious? | The assumption that companies listed OTC are not serious is far from the truth. Many companies on the OTC are just starting off there because they don't meet the requirements to be listed on the NASDAQ or NYSE. Major stock exchanges like the NASDAQ and the NYSE only want the best companies to trade on their exchanges.The NASDAQ, for example, has three sets of listing requirements. A company must meet at least one of the three requirement sets, as well as the main rules for all companies. These include: Now don't assume that the OTC doesn't have rules either, as this is far from the truth as well. While there are no minimum level of revenue, profits or assets required to get listed on the OTC there are requirements for audited financial statements and ongoing filing and reporting to the SEC and NASD. Additionally there are several different levels of the OTC, including the OTCQX, the OTCCB and the OTC Pink, each with their own set of requirements. For more information about what it takes to be listed on OTC look here: http://www.otcmarkets.com/learn/otc-trading A company deciding to trade on the OTC is making the decision to take their company public, and they are investing to make it happen. Currently the fees to get listed on the OTC range from $30,000 to $150,000 depending on the firm you decide to go with and the services they offer as part as their package. Now, I know I wouldn't consider $30K (or more) to not be serious money! When I looked into the process of getting a company listed on the TSX the requirements seemed a lot more relaxed than those of the major U.S. markets as well, consisting of an application, records submission and then a decision made by a TSX committee about whether you get listed. More information about the TSX here: http://apps.tmx.com/en/listings/listing_with_us/process/index.html I think the way that the OTC markets have gotten such a bad reputation is from these "Get Rich on Penny Stock" companies that you see pumping up OTC company stocks and getting massive amounts of people to buy without doing their due diligence and investigating the company and reading its prospectus. Then when they loose a bunch of money on an ill-informed investment decision they blame it on the company being an OTC stock. Whether you decide to trade the OTC market or not, I wouldn't make a decision based on how many exchanges the company is listed on, but rather based on the research you do into the company. |
Comprehensive tutorial on double-entry personal finance? | I found this book to be pretty decent: It is a workbook, and full of little exercises. |
When should I open a “Line of credit” at my bank? | The only really good reason to open a line of credit is that you want to buy something that you don't have money for. That's got its own risks - see plenty of other places to see warnings about not borrowing too much. The only other reason is that you might want to use a line of credit as your emergency fund. The usual way of doing this is to keep the money in an easily acccessible savings account - but such accounts usually pay rather now interest, and there is an argument for instead investing your emergency money in a higher-interest but less-accessible fund and using a line of credit to tide you over until you can extract the money. I'm worried about the comment that you can "deduct my interest on my tax returns". That is usually only possible if you are borrowing money to invest. It sounds as if your banker is going to persuade you to not only open a line of credit, but then invest that money in something. Be aware that this kind of 'leveraging' is much higher risk than investing money you already own. |
Low risk hybrid investment strategy | I think you may be confused on terminology here. Financial leverage is debt that you have taken on, in order to invest. It increases your returns, because it allows you to invest with more money than what you actually own. Example: If a $1,000 mutual fund investment returns $60 [6%], then you could also take on $1,000 of debt at 3% interest, and earn $120 from both mutual fund investments, paying $30 in interest, leaving you with a net $90 [9% of your initial $1,000]. However, if the mutual fund 'takes a nose dive', and loses money, you still need to pay the $30 interest. In this way, using financial leverage actually increases your risk. It may provide higher returns, but you have the risk of losing more than just your initial principle amount. In the example above, imagine if the mutual fund you owned collapsed, and was worth nothing. Now, you would have lost $1,000 from the money you invested in the first place, and you would also still owe $1,000 to the bank. The key take away is that 'no risk' and 'high returns' do not go together. Safe returns right now are hovering around 0% interest rates. If you ever feel you have concocted a mix of options that leaves you with no risk and high returns, check your math again. As an addendum, if instead what you plan on doing is investing, say, 90% of your money in safe(r) money-market type funds, and 10% in the stock market, then this is a good way to reduce your risk. However, it also reduces your returns, as only a small portion of your portfolio will realize the (typically higher) gains of the stock market. Once again, being safer with your investments leads to less return. That is not necessarily a bad thing; in fact investing some part of your portfolio in interest-earning low risk investments is often advised. 99% is basically the same as 100%, however, so you almost don't benefit at all by investing that 1% in the stock market. |
Should I sell my stocks when the stock hits a 52-week high in order to “Buy Low, Sell High”? | Obviously a stock that's hit a high is profit waiting to be taken, be safe, take the money, Sell Sell Sell!! Ah.. but wait, they say "run your winners, cut your losers", so here this stock is a winner... keep on to it, Hold Hold Hold!!!!! Of course, if you're holding, then you think it's going to return even higher.... Buy Buy Buy!!!! So, hope that's clears things up for you - Sell, Hold, or maybe Buy :-) A more serious answer is not ever to worry about past performance, if its gone past a reasonable valuation then consider selling, but never care about selling out just because its reached some arbitrary share price. If you are worried about losses, you might like to set a trailing stop and sell if it drops, but if you're a LTBH type person, just keep it until you feel it is overvalued compared to its fundamentals. |
Is there any site you can find out about the 'bonus features' of credit cards? | Billshrink offers some pretty neat analysis tools to help you pick a credit card. They focus more on rewards than the features you mention but it might be worth a look. If you use Mint, they offer a similar service, too. If you're not already using Mint, though, I'd look at Billshrink as Mint requires some extensive setup. MOD EDIT Looks like billshrink.com is shut down. From their site: Dear BillShrink customer, As you may have heard, BillShrink.com was shut down on July 31, 2013. While we’re sad to say goodbye, we hope we’ve been able to help you be better informed and save some money along the way! The good news is that much of the innovative award-winning BillShrink technology will still be available via our StatementRewards platform (made available to customers by our partnering financial institutions). Moreover, we expect to re-launch a new money-saving service in the future. To see more of what we’re up to, visit Truaxis.com. We have deleted your personal information as of July 31. We will retain your email address only to announce a preview of the new tool. If you do not want us to retain your email address, you can opt out in the form below. This opt out feature will be available until September 31, 2013. If you have already opted out previously, you do not need to opt out again. If you have any further questions, contact us at info@billshrink.com. Thanks, The BillShrink/Truaxis Team |
Why can't you just have someone invest for you and split the profits (and losses) with him? | The issue is the time frame. With a one year investment horizon the only way for a fund manager to be confident that they are not going to lose their shirt is to invest your money in ultra conservative low volatility investments. Otherwise a year like 2008 in the US stock market would break them. Note if you are willing to expand your payback time period to multiple years then you are essentially looking at an annuity and it's market loss rider. Of course those contacts are always structured such that the insurance company is extremely confident that they will be able to make more in the market than they are promising to pay back (multiple decade time horizons). |
Is Bogleheadism (index fund investing) dead? | One alternative to bogleheadism is the permanent portfolio concept (do NOT buy the mutual fund behind this idea as you can easily obtain access to a low cost money market fund, stock index fund, and bond fund and significantly reduce the overall cost). It doesn't have the huge booms that stock plans do, but it also doesn't have the crushing blows either. One thing some advisers mention is success is more about what you can stick to than what "traditionally" makes sense, as you may not be able to stick to what traditionally makes sense (all people differ). This is an excellent pro and con critique of the permanent portfolio (read the whole thing) that does highlight some of the concerns with it, especially the big one: how well will it do in a world of high interest rates? Assuming we ever see a world of high interest rates, it may not provide a great return. The authors make the assumption that interest rates will be rising in the future, thus the permanent portfolio is riskier than a traditional 60/40. As we're seeing in Europe, I think we're headed for a world of negative interest rates - something in the past most advisers have thought was very unlikely. I don't know if we'll see interest rates above 6% in my lifetime and if I live as long as my father, that's a good 60+ years ahead. (I realize people will think this is crazy to write, but consider that people are willing to pay governments money to hold their cash - that's how crazy our world is and I don't see this changing.) |
Historical company performance data | The S&P report (aka STARS report) for each company has 10 years of financial data. These reports are available free at several online brokers (like E-Trade) if you have an account with the brokerage. |
How does on-demand insurance company Trov prevent insurance fraud or high prices? | Anything can be insured for the right price... this product is offered for devices at higher risk, which would be logical purpose of owner needing coverage for a specific length of time. Typically this would be a type of adverse selection, but TROV targets customers that typically would not require insurance on their device, but as you said they may be traveling and putting their devices at added risk. Like all insurance companies, their Loss Ratio (Losses/Premiums) will depend on the law of large numbers and spread of risk. As we know, the majority of the time trips are taken, electronics make it back home safely. Like many tech companies, their advantage over conventional insurers is likely low overhead costs. Being on a mobile platform, they likely have a fraction of the claims handling cost of a conventional insurer. Payments are likely automated by linking bank accounts, so there is little transaction cost burden on this company. In short, their operation is likely highly automated with few staff and low expenses, allowing them to take on a higher loss ratio than conventional insurers and still leave room for profit. Without having ever used this service, I can tell you they likely price in anticipated fraud, the same way Walmart prices in inventory loss (shoplifting) into their prices. I personally would share your concern that it'd be difficult to combat fraud on such a platform, especially with no claims adjusters whom are typically the first line of defense. Again, I answer this never having used their service, but I work as an Analyst at a large insurer and these would be my assumptions based on what I know of TROV. |
83(b) and long term capital gain | You should apply for 83(b) within 30 days. 10 months is too late, sorry. |
GnuCash: Reimbursable expenses paid by credit card | GNUCash won't show 'Credit Card' type accounts in "Process Payment", as of v.2.6.1. A workaround is to create another account of type A/Payable. Then, transfer the operations you want to pay via "Process Payment" to this new account. It should be visible now. A drawback is that you have split your current Credit Card debt, which makes it harder to track. Alternatively you may wish to only use this new account for all your credit card related expenses. Another alternative is processing payments for these purchases manually to keep the 'credit card' accounts consistent. |
Do Options take Dividend into account? | The CBOE had a great article on this. I will search for it and edit. The normal dividends are not adjusted. Which is why you see early exercise of just out of the money options sometimes. To get that dividend. A special dividend, say a $50 stock with $1/yr dividend but now has a $3 one time dividend would likely result in an option strike adjustment. |
How can I find data on delisted stocks? | In general you cannot. Once the security is no longer listed on the exchange - it doesn't have to provide information to the exchange and regulators (unless it wants to be re-listed). That's one of the reasons companies go private - to keep their (financial and other) information private. If it was listed in 1999, and is no longer listed now - you can dig through SEC archives for the information. You can try and reach out to the company's investors' relations contact and see if they can help you with the specific information you're looking for. |
Am I eligible for a student maintenance loan? | Looking at https://www.gov.uk/student-finance/who-qualifies, it says: You can only apply if: As you meet all three requirements I think you are counted as a English student in every respect. I would advise applying as soon as possible though to verify this. EDIT: also, getting a British passport anyway might not hurt; it makes sense as you've spent almost all your life here, and it would insulate you against any issues that might arise if Britain ends up leaving the EU. |
How to send money across borders physically and inexpensively, but not via cash? | There are checks, international wire transfers (SWIFT), depending on country pair remittance services. |
Is it better to buy this used car from Craigslist or from a dealership? | I agree with the previous comments one thing that got brought up a while back when I was looking into purchasing a Prius was the battery replacement, someone once told me it was very expensive in the event it failed and needed to be changed, I'm not talking about the 12 volt but the big nickel metal hydride one. Another thing to factor is the gas that you will save, normally the Prius get double the gas milage of that of civic or a corolla but unless you drive a bunch of miles per day you really don't see the pay off. Also if you can pull a CarFax on the car, the 20 dollar investment is worth it because you can find out if it was in an accident or if it's a lemon! I once bought a bmw and didn't do a CarFax and later ended up finding out that the car had more owners than a taxi had customers. Also just like said above 200k car vs 100k doest always mean the 100k is better off, especially if the previous owner never services it well. Get the car checkout before you make the deal to buy. |
Changing Mailing Adress | If you call them, you can make sure they'll use the new address, but if you want to do it online, there is some risk that the update is delayed. Note also that an address change with an immediate request for a replacement debit card smells very fishy - this what a hacker / thief would do to get your money. Calling seems to be the better approach, as you can verify your identity further. Otherwise, you might well run into an automated block. |
What would a stock be worth if dividends did not exist? [duplicate] | In the unlikely case that noone finds a way to extract resources from the company and distribute them to shareholders periodically in a way that's de facto equivalent to dividends, any company can be dissolved. The assets of the company would be sold for their market value, the liabilities would have to be settled, and the net result of all this (company cash + sale results - liabilities) would be distributed to shareholders proportionally to their shares. The 'liquidation value' is generally lower than the market value of a company as an ongoing concern that's making business and earning profit, but it does put a floor on it's value - if the stock price is too low, someone can buy enough stock to get control of the company, vote to dissolve it, and make a profit that way; and the mere fact that this can happen props up the stock price. Companies could even be created for a limited time period in the first hand (which has some historical precedent with shareholders of 'trading companies' with lifetime of a single trade voyage). Imagine that there is some company Megacorp2015 where shareholders want to receive $1M of its cash as "dividends". They can make appropriate contracts that will form a new company called Megacorp2016 that will take over all the ongoing business and assets except $1M in cash, and then liquidate Megacorp2015 and distribute it's assets (shares of Megacorp2016 and the "dividend") among themselves. The main difference from normal dividends is that in this process, you need cooperation from any lenders involved, so if the company has some long-term debts then they would need agreement from those banks in order to pay out "dividends". Oh, and everyone would have to pay a bunch more to lawyers simply to do "dividends" in this or some other convoluted way. |
I'm an American in my mid 20's. Is there something I should be doing to secure myself financially? | On average, you should be saving at least 10-15% of your income in order to be financially secure when you retire. Different people will tell you different things, but really this can be split between short term savings (cash), long term savings (401ks, IRAs, stocks & bonds), and paying down debt. That $5k is a good start on an emergency fund, but you probably want a little more. As justkt said, 6 months' worth is what you want to aim for. Put this in a Money Market account, where you'll earn a little more interest but won't be penalized from withdrawing it when its needed (you may have to live off it, after all). Beyond that, I would split things up; if possible, have payroll deductions going to a broker (sharebuilder is a good one to start with if you can't spare much change), as well as an IRA at a bank. Set up a separate checking account just for rent and utilities, put a month's worth of cash in there, and have another payroll deduction that covers your living expenses + maybe 5% put in there automatically. Then, set up automatic bill payments, so you don't even have to think about it. Check it once a month to make sure there aren't any surprises. Pay off your credit cards every month. These are, by far, the most expensive forms of credit that most people have. You shouldn't be financing large purchases with them (you'll get better rates by taking a personal loan from a bank). Set specific goals for savings, and set up automatic payroll deductions to work towards them. Especially for buying a house; most responsible lenders will ask for 20% down. In today's market, that means you need to write a check for $40k or $50k. While it's tempting to finance up to 100% of the property value, it's also risky considering how volatile markets can be. You don't want to end up owing more on the property than it's worth two years down the road. If you find yourself at the end of the month with an extra $50 or so, consider your savings goals or your current debt instead of blowing it on a toy. Especially if you have long term debt (high balance credit cards, vehicle or property loans), applying that money directly to principal can save you months (or years) paying it back, and hundreds or thousands of dollars of interest (all depending on the details of the loan, of course). Above all, have fun with it :) Think of your personal net worth as you do your Gamer score on the XBox, and look for ways to maximize it with a minimum of effort or investment on your part! Investing in yourself and your future can be incredibly rewarding emotionally :) |
Ways to get individual securities from ETF's | ETFs are legally required to publicly disclose their positions at every point in time. The reason for this is that for an ETF to issue shares of ETF they do NOT take cash in exchange but underlying securities - this is called a creation unit. So people need to know which shares to deliver to the fund to get a share of ETF in exchange. This is never done by retail clients, however, but by nominated market makers. Retail persons will normally trade shares only in the secondary market (ie. on a stock exchange), which does not require new shares of the ETF to be issued. However, they do not normally make it easy to find this information in a digestible way, and each ETF does it their own way. So typically services that offer this information are payable (as somebody has to scrape the information from a variety of sources or incentivise ETF providers to send it to them). If you have access to a Bloomberg terminal, this information is available from there. Otherwise there are paid for services that offer it. Searching on Google for ETF constituent data, I found two companies that offer it: See if you can find what you need there. Good luck. (etfdb even has a stock exposure tool freely available that allows you to see which ETFs have large exposure to a stock of your choosing, see here: http://etfdb.com/tool/etf-stock-exposure-tool/). Since this data is in a table format you could easily download it automatically using table parsing tools for your chosen programming language. PS: Don't bother with underlying index constituents, they are NOT required to be made public and index providers will normally charge handsomely for this so normally only institutional investors will have this information. |
Freelance trading of products in India | For most goods there is no license required, unless you are trading in restricted goods. Remittance need to be routed via banks and they should comply with FMEA. Your Bank or a qualified CA can guide you. |
What is a Student Loan and does it allow you to cover a wide range of expenses relating to school? | Short answer: student loans are loans given to people that are currently enrolled in school and yes, you can use them for personal expenses. Long answer: be very careful because you can easily be financially ruined if you borrow too much and can't repay it quickly. Once the loans get beyond a certain size relative to your income, you can find it hard to stay ahead of the interest payments let alone actually pay off the principal. These are the facts you need to know: |
Do developed country equities have a higher return than emerging market equities, when measured in the latter currency? | What you were told isn't an absolute truth, so trying to counter something fundamentally flawed won't get you anywhere. For example: chinese midcap equities are up 20% this year, even from their high of 100%. While the BSE Sensex in India is down several percentage points on the year. Your portfolio would have lost money this year taking advice from your peers. The fluctuation in the rupees and remnibi would not have changed this fact. What you are asking is a pretty common area of research, as in several people will write their dissertation on the exact same topic every year, and you should be able to find various analysis and theories on the subject. But the macroeconomic landscape changes, a lot. |
How do banks lose money on foreclosures? | The "just accounting" is how money market works these days. Lets look at this simplified example: The bank creates an asset - loan in the amount of X, secured by a house worth 1.25*X (assuming 20% downpayment). The bank also creates a liability in the amount of X to its depositors, because the money lent was the money first deposited into the bank by someone else (or borrowed by the bank from the Federal Reserve(*), which is, again, a liability). That liability is not secured. Now the person defaults on the loan in the amount of X, but at that time the prices dropped, and the house is now worth 0.8*X. The bank forecloses, sells the house, recovers 80% of the loan, and removes the asset of the loan, creating an asset of cash in the value of 0.8*X. But the liability in the amount of X didn't go anywhere. Bank still has to repay the X amount of money back to its depositors/Feds. The difference? 20% of X in our scenario - that's the bank's loss. (*) Federal Reserve is the US equivalent of a central bank. |
How profitable is selling your customer base? | There are business that exist by harvesting leads and selling them to other companies. These leads can be access to resumes they sell to business looking for employees; they can be eyeballs that view their adds; they can be list of people that meet a specific credit profile. All are legitimate business and many are growing businesses. But in all these cases they are upfront with the things they are doing. They all have escape mechanisms for you to either stop them from selling your info to other customers, or to restrict the ability of those customers to contact you. There are also companies that are less honest with their collecting and selling of information. They are not honest about what they are collecting, and they have no care about how others use it. There are also cases where when a company buys another company, and one main item in the transaction is the current and potential list of customers. Business with a legitimate product to sell, protect that customer list, that is the keys to the kingdom. They are the likely people who will buy the next version; they are also the ones that their competitors would love to target to convert them to another product. In some businesses, the company that develops the platform will sell to developers of add ons access to the marketplace. They may charge a flat fee for access, or charge a percentage of sales, or both. What you can do, and how you are allowed to do it, and what mechanisms are in place to protect people, are dependent on the country you operate in. |
I'm in Australia. What should I look for in an online stock broker, for trading mostly on the ASX? | It depends what you want to do with them. If you are just simply going to drip-feed into pre-identified shares or ETFs every few months at the market price, you don't need fancy features: just go with whoever is cheaper. You can always open another account later if you need something more exotic. Some brokerages are associated with banks and that may give you a benefit if you already deal with that bank: faster transfers (anz-etrade), or zero brokerage (westpac brokerage on westpac structured products.) There's normally no account fee so you can shop around. |
Where should I invest to hedge against the stock market going down? | If you were certain you would probably do best by short selling an ETF that tracked the index for the market you think was about to tank. You'd certainly make a lot more money on that strategy than precious metals. If you were feeling super confident and want to make your money earn even more, you could also buy a bunch of put options on those same ETF funds. Obligatory Warning: Short selling and options can be extremely risky. While most investments cap your potential losses to your total investment, a short sale has no theoretical limit to the amount of money you can lose. |
Forex vs day trading for beginner investor | Forex vs Day Trading: These can be one and the same, as most people who trade forex do it as day trading. Forex is the instrument you are trading and day trading is the time frame you are doing it in. If your meaning from your question was comparing trading forex vs stocks, then it depends on a number of things. Forex is more liquid so most professional traders prefer it as it can be easier to get in and out without being gapped. However, if you are not trading large amounts of money and you stay away from more volatile stocks, this should not matter too much. It may also depend on what you understand more and prefer to trade. You need to be comfortable with what you are trading. If on the other hand you are referring to day trading vs longer term trading and/or investing, then this can depend largely on the instrument you are trading and the time frame you are more comfortable with. Forex is used more for shorter term trading, from day trading to having a position open for a couple of days. Stocks on the other hand can be day traded to traded over days, weeks, months or years. It is much more common to have positions open for longer periods with stocks. Other instruments like commodities, can also be traded over different time frames. The shorter the time frame you trade the higher risk involved as you have to make quick decisions and be happy with making a lot of smaller gains with the potential to make a large loss if things go wrong. It is best once again to chose a time frame you are comfortable with. I tend to trade Australian stocks as I know them well and am comfortable with them. I usually trade in the medium to long term, however I let the market decide how long I am in a position and when I get out of it. I try to follow the trend and stay in a position as long as the trend continues. I put automatic stop losses on all my positions, so if the market turns against me I am automatically taken out. I can be in a position for as little as a day (can happen if I buy one day and the next day the stock falls by 15% or more) to over a year (as long as the trend continues). By doing this I avoid the daily market noise and let my profits run and keep my losses small. No matter what instrument you end up trading and the time frame you choose to trade in, you should always have a tested trading plan and a risk management strategy in place. These are the areas you should first gain knowledge in to further your pursuits in trading. |
Withdrawing cash from investment: take money from underperforming fund? | The root of the advice Bob is being given is from the premise that the market is temporarily down. If the market is temporarily down, then the stocks in "Fund #1" are on-sale and likely to go up soon (soon is very subjective). If the market is going to go up soon (again subjective) you are probably better in fictitious Fund #1. This is the valid logic that is being used by the rep. I don't think this is manipulative based on costs. It's really up to Bob whether he agrees with that logic or if he disagrees with that logic and to make his own decision based on that. If this were my account, I would make the decision on where to withdraw based on my target asset allocation. Bob (for good or bad reasons) decided on 2/3 Fund 1 and 1/3 Fund 2. I'd make the withdraw that returns me to my target allocation of 2/3 Fund 1 and 1/3 Fund 2. Depending on performance and contributions, that might be selling Fund 1, selling Fund 2, or selling some of both. |
What are the pros and cons of buying a house just to rent it out? | I would suggest the use of a management company to handle a rental property. They will take care of things like collecting rent, coordinating repairs and all the little things that come up when dealing with a renters. They typically charge a percentage of the rent or a flat fee, so make sure you include that in your rent calculation. You take a little bit of a financial hit, but save a lot of head aches - especially if you decide to acquire multiple properties in the future. |
Does settlement of second mortgage count as short sale? | No that will not count as a short sale although it may still affect your chances of getting a loan because some lenders wont want to see it on your credit if you are pursuing a new FHA loan. In the best case scenario you will need an explanation letter of why you did this. In the worst case scenario the lender will want you to wait to get financing. Try and find a lender with NO FHA overages which means they don't put additional restrictions on giving you an FHA insured loan. That type of lender will be your best choice because they just follow FHA rules and don't add any additional requirements. |
Pay for a cheap car or take out a loan? | You are really showing some wisdom here, and congratulations on finishing college. Its a lot about likelihoods. If you buy a new car, there is something like a 99.5% chance you will get a car that will not need repairs. If you buy a car for $1200 there is probably a 20% chance that the car will only need minimal repairs. So the answer is there is no real guarantee that spending any amount of money you will end up with a car with no repairs. You also can't assume that with buying a car it will immediately need repairs. Its possible, that you could spend 1200 on a car and it will need an oil change. In three months it might need brakes and in 6 months tires. If that is the case, you could save up the money for repairs. Have you looked for a car? It will take some work, but you might be able to find something in good condition for your budget. If you shop for a loan, go with a good credit union or local bank. Mostly you are looking for a low rate. However, I would advise against it. You worked so hard on getting out of school without debt, why start now? Be weird and buy a car for cash. Heck someone may be able to loan you a car for a short time while you save some money. |
PayPal wants me to “add a bank account”, another funding source. Credit card isn't working. Why? | I would guess that this is due to the card issuer, not Paypal. Credit card transactions are tagged with a code describing the type of purchase, and some issuers disallow certain types (such as gambling). |
What expenses do most people not prepare for that turn into “emergencies” but are not covered by an Emergency Fund? | While it is true that homeowners insurance will cover emergencies, it is very important to check and make sure that your policy is covering everything that it needs to. A great example is what happened to all of those without flood insurance in Tennessee last year. You may opt not to get additional coverage, but then you should make sure that you are setting aside funds for such a catastrophe. |
Optimal way for withdrawing vested company match from my 401k? | Why would you want to withdraw only the company match, and presumably leave your personal contributions sitting in your ex-company's 401k plan? Generally, 401k plans have larger annual expenses and provide for poorer investment choices than are available to you if you roll over your 401k investments into an IRA. So, unless you have specific reasons for wanting to continue to leave your money in the 401k plan (e.g. you have access to investments that are not available to nonparticipants and you think those investments are where you want your money to be), roll over part (or all) of your 401k assets into an IRA, and withdraw the rest for personal expenses. If your personal contributions are in a Roth 401k, roll them over to a Roth IRA, but, as I remember it, company contributions are not part of the Roth 401k and must be rolled over into a Traditional IRA. Perhaps this is why you want to take those in cash to pay for your personal purchase? Also, what is this 30% hit you are talking about? You will owe income tax on the money withdrawn from the 401k (and custodians traditionally withhold 20% and send it to the IRS on your behalf) plus penalty for early withdrawal (which the custodian may also withhold if you ask them), but the tax that you will pay on the money withdrawn will depend on your tax bracket, which may be lower if you are laid off and do not immediately take on a new job. That is, the 30% hit may be on the cash flow, but you may get some of it back as a refund when you file your income tax return. |
Why is the difference between adjusted close and close price slightly different between each day? | Prices are adjusted for return and not payout. So if you take the ratio of the close price and the adjusted close price, it should remain constant. The idea behind a total return (back-)adjustment is to give you a feeling how much money you would have needed back then to reach the price today under the premise that all distributions (dividends, spin-offs, etc.) are reinvested instantly and that reinvestment doesn't cost anything. |
How does historical data get adjusted for dividends, exactly? | I had both closing price and adjusted price of Apple showing the same amount after "download data" csv file was opened in excel. https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AAPL/history?period1=1463599361&period2=1495135361&interval=div%7Csplit&filter=split&frequency=1d Its frustrating. My last option was to get the dividends history of the stock and add back to the adjusted price to compute the total return for a select stock for the period. |
What are the options for a 19-year-old college student who only has about $1000? | Kid, you need to start thinking in thresholds. There are several monetary thresholds that separate your class from a more well funded class. 1) You cannot use margin with less than $2000 dollars Brokers require that you have at least $2000 before they will lend to you 2) In 2010, Congress banned under 21 year olds from getting access to credit. UNLESS they get cosigned. This means that even if you have $2000, no broker will give you margin unless you have a (good) credit history already. There was a good reason for this, but its based on the assumption that everyone is stupid, not the assumption that some people are objective thinkers. 3) The brokers that will open an account for you have high commissions. The commissions are so high that it will destroy any capital gains you may make with your $1000. For the most part. 4) The pattern day trader rule. You cannot employ sophisticated risk management while being subject to the pattern day trader rule. It basically limits you from trading 3 times a day (its more complicated than that read it yourself) if you have less than $25,000 in one account. 5) Non-trade or stock related investments: Buy municipal or treasury bonds. They will give you more than a savings account would, and municipals are tax free. This isn't exactly what I would call liquid though - ie. if you wanted to access your money to invest in something else on a whim. 6) What are you studying? If its anything technical then you might get a good idea that you could risk your money on to create value. But I would stick to high growth stocks before blowing your $1000 on an idea. Thats not exactly what I would call "access to capital". 7) Arbitrage. Lets say you know a friend that buys the trendy collectors shoes at discount and sells them for a profit. He might do this with one $200 pair of tennis shoes, and then use the $60 profit different to go buy video games for himself. If he wanted to scale up, he couldn't because he never has more than $200 to play with. In comparison, you could do 5 pairs ($200 x 5) and immediately have a larger operation than him, making a larger profit ($60 x 5 = $300, now you have $1300 and could do it again with 6 pairs to make an even great er profit) not because you are better or worked at it, but solely because you have more capital to start with. Keep an eye out for arbitrage opportunities, usually there is a good reason they exist if you notice it: the market is too small and illiquid to scale up with, or the entire market will be saturated the next day. (Efficient Market Theory, learn about it) 8) Take everything I just taught you, and make a "small investor newsletter" website with subscribers. Online sites have low overhead costs. |
can the government or debt collectors garnish money from any bank account to which the debtor has access? | I would call the bank and ask how the person is on the account. If they are an owner, or are an authorized user, or what type of owner they are, etc. If the bank makes the distinction between "user" and "owner" then most likely, your funds are not able to be seized. If they are a joint owner, then, typically, 100% of the money is yours and 100% of the money is theirs and either of you could withdraw all the money, close the account, or have the money seized as part of a legal action. |
What is the correct answer for percent change when the start amount is zero dollars $0? | There is no numerical convention in finance that I have ever seen. If you look at statements or reports that measure growth when the starting value is negative or zero, you typically see "n/a" or "-" or "*" as the result. Any numerical result would be meaningless. Suppose you used 100% and another company had a legitimate 150% gain - where would the 100% change rank? What do my manager and investors expect to see? As a financial analyst - I would not want to see 100%. I would instead rather see something that indicates that the % change is meaningless. As an example, here's the WSJ documentation on change in Net Income: Net Income percent change is the change from the same period from a year ago. Percent change is not provided if either the latest period or the year-ago period contains a net loss. Thinking about it in another context: Yesterday you and your friend had no apples. Today you have 1 and your friend has 20. What percentage increase did you both have? Did you both have a 100% increase? How can you indicate that your friend had a larger "increase"? In that case (and in finance), the context needs to turn from a percentage increase to an absolute increase. A percentage increase is that scenario is meaningless. |
Layman's guide to getting started with Forex (foreign exchange trading)? | Unless you have a lot of money to get rid of you should spend at least a year trading with a dummy account. It takes a long time to work out what is gong on and your training will get very expensive if you start using real money. Don't start trading with real money until you : Have a strategy. Never trade on a whim. Only trade if your strategy says it is time to trade. Are able to stick to that strategy. It is amazing how easy it is to stray from your strategy just because you feel it is right or you have to try to make up some losses. You will lose money doing this. You are making significant profits for at least 6 months using 1. and 2. with your dummy account. Even after all this, you will probably still lose money. Make sure you only trade with money you can afford to lose. ie. Never trade with this months rent money. |
Selling stocks as LIFO or FIFO | According to the IRS, you must have written confirmation from your broker "or other agent" whenever you sell shares using a method other than FIFO: Specific share identification. If you adequately identify the shares you sold, you can use the adjusted basis of those particular shares to figure your gain or loss. You will adequately identify your mutual fund shares, even if you bought the shares in different lots at various prices and times, if you: Specify to your broker or other agent the particular shares to be sold or transferred at the time of the sale or transfer, and Receive confirmation in writing from your broker or other agent within a reasonable time of your specification of the particular shares sold or transferred. If you don't have a stockbroker, I'm not sure how you even got the shares. If you have an actual stock certificate, then you are selling very specific shares and the purchase date corresponds to the purchase date of those shares represented on the certificate. |
Last trade is bought? or sold? | When there is a trade the shares were both bought and sold. In any trade on the secondary market there has to be both a buyer and a seller for the trade to take place. So in "lasttradesize" a buyer has bought the shares from a seller. |
Should an IRA be disclaimed to allow it to be distributed according to a will? | There are two different possible taxes based on various scenarios proposed by the OP or the lawyer who drew up the OP's father's will or the OP's mother. First, there is the estate tax which is paid by the estate of the deceased, and the heirs get what is left. Most estates in the US pay no estate tax whatsoever because most estates are smaller than $5.4M lifetime gift and estate tax exemption. But, for the record, even though IRAs pass from owner to beneficiary independent of whatever the will might say about the disposition of the IRAs, the value of the deceased's IRAs is part of the estate, and if the estate is large enough that estate tax is due and there is not enough money in the rest of the estate to pay the estate tax (e.g. most of the estate value is IRA money and there are no other investments, just a bank account with a small balance), then the executor of the will can petition the probate court to claw back some of the IRA money from the IRA beneficiaries to pay the estate tax due. Second, there is income tax that the estate must pay on income received from the estate's assets, e.g. mutual fund dividends paid between the date of death and the distribution of the assets to the beneficiaries, or income from cashing in IRAs that have the estate as the beneficiary. Now, most of OP's father's estate is in IRAs which have the OP's mother as the primary beneficiary and there are no named secondary beneficiaries. Thus, by default, the estate is the IRA beneficiary should the OP's mother disclaim the IRAs as the lawyer has suggested. As @JoeTaxpayer says in a comment, if the OP's mother disclaims the IRA, then the estate must distribute all the IRA assets to the three beneficiaries by December 31 of the year in which the fifth anniversary of the death occurs. If the estate decides to do this by itself, then the distribution from the IRA to the estate is taxable income to the estate (best avoided if possible because of the high tax rates on trusts). What is commonly done is that before December 31 of the year following the year in which the death occurred, the estate (as the beneficiary) informs the IRA Custodian that the estate's beneficiaries are the surviving spouse (50%), and the two children (25% each) and requests the IRA custodian to divide the IRA assets accordingly and let each beneficiary be responsible for meeting the requirements of the 5-year rule for his/her share. Any assets not distributed in timely fashion are subject to a 50% excise tax as penalty each year until such time as these monies are actually withdrawn explicitly from the IRA (that is, the excise tax is not deducted from the remaining IRA assets; the beneficiary has to pay the excise tax out of pocket). As far as the IRS is concerned, there are no yearly distribution requirements to be met but the IRA Custodial Agreement might have its own rules, and so Publication 590b recommends discussing the distribution requirements for the 5-year rule with the IRA Custodian. The money distributed from the IRA is taxable income to the recipients. In particular, the children cannot roll the money over into another IRA so as to avoid immediate taxation; the spouse might be able to roll over the money into another IRA, but I am not sure about this; Publication 590b is very confusing on this point. All this is assuming that the deceased passed away before well before his 70.5th birthday so that there are no issues with RMDs (the interactions of all the rules in this case is an even bigger can of worms that I will leave to someone else to explicate). On the other hand, if the OP's mother does not disclaim the IRAs, then she, as the surviving spouse, has the option of treating the inherited IRAs as her own IRAs, and she could then name her two children as the beneficiaries of the inherited IRAs when she passes away. Of course, by the same token, she could opt to make someone else the beneficiary (e.g, her children from a previous marriage) or change her mind at any later time and make someone else the beneficiary (e.g. if she remarries, or becomes very fond of the person taking care of her in a nursing home and decides to leave all her assets to this person instead of her children, etc). But even if such disinheritances are unlikely and the children are perfectly happy to wait to inherit till Mom passes away, as JoeTaxpayer points out, by not disclaiming the IRAs, the OP's mother can delay taking distributions from the IRAs till age 70.5, etc. which is also a good option to have. The worst scenario is for the OP's mother to not disclaim the IRAs, cash them in right away (huge income tax whack on her) or at least 50% of them, and gift the OP and his sibling half of what she withdrew (or possibly after taking into account what she had to pay in income tax on the distribution). Gift tax need not be paid by the OP's mother if she files Form 709 and reduces her lifetime combined gift and estate tax exemption, and the OP and his sibling don't owe any tax (income or otherwise) on the gift amount. But, all that money has changed from tax-deferred assets to ordinary assets, and any additional earnings on these assets in the future will be taxable income. So, unless the OP and his sibling need the cash right away (pay off credit card debt, make a downpayment on a house, etc), this is not a good idea at all. |
For Federal Crimes, where does the money collected from penalties go? | The SFGate had an article on this a few years ago: http://www.sfgate.com/business/networth/article/When-government-fines-companies-who-gets-cash-3189724.php "Civil penalties, often referred to as fines, usually go to the U.S. Treasury or victims." Short answer in the case you references it would be the US Treasury. In cases where there is a harmed party then they would get something to account for their loss. But it can get complicated depending on the crime. |
Other than being able to borrow to invest, how is a margin trading account different from a cash account? | Two more esoteric differences, related to the same cause... When you have an outstanding debit balance in a margin the broker may lend out your securities to short sellers. (They may well be able to lend them out even if there's no debit balance -- check your account agreement and relevant regulations). You'll never know this (there's no indication in your account of it) unless you ask, and maybe not even then. If the securities pay out dividends while lent out, you don't get the dividends (directly). The dividends go to the person who bought them from the short-seller. The short-seller has to pay the dividend amount to his broker who pays them to your broker who pays them to you. If the dividends that were paid out by the security were qualified dividends (15% max rate) the qualified-ness goes to the person who bought the security from the short-seller. What you received weren't dividends at all, but a payment-in-lieu of dividends and qualified dividend treatment isn't available for them. Some (many? all?) brokers will pay you a gross-up payment to compensate you for the extra tax you had to pay due to your qualified dividends on that security not actually being qualified. A similar thing happens if there's a shareholder vote. If the stock was lent out on the record date to establish voting eligibility, the person eligible to vote is the person who bought them from the short-seller, not you. So if for some reason you really want/need to vote in a shareholder vote, call your broker and ask them to journal the shares in question over to the cash side of your account before the record date for determining voting eligibility. |
Algorithmic trading in linux using python | You can have a look at betabrokers. It's an simulated stock trading platform which is entirely email-based. You start with 10 000$ and you make transactions with commands in the subject line of the email (e.g. "buy 250$ AAPL" or "cover 20 shares of AAPL"). It should be straightforward to add an email interface to your python script. |
Is an analyst's “price target” assumed to be for 12 months out? | Most commonly, unless you read 'fair value target price,' an analyst's target price is a 12-month target price. Typically, there is a firm wide policy determining which time horizon to use. No analyst would provide an open ended target price, it doesn't make any sense (you discount cash flows to a certain period, adjust for inflation, etc). So there is always a time horizon. |
Record retention requirements for individuals in the U.S.? | Indeed the IRS publication references the 3-6 year time span. And no limit for fraud. But. I get a notice that some stock I owned 10 years ago has a settlement pending, and the records of this stock purchase and sale would potentially get me back some money. I get my Social Security statement (the one they stopped sending, but this was before then) and I see the 1995 income shows zero. Both of these were easily resolved with my returns going all the way back, and my brokerage statement as well. For the brokerage, I recently started downloading all statements as PDFs, and storing a copy away from home. Less concerned about the bank statements as I've never had an issue where I'd need them. |
Get car loan w/ part time job as student with no credit, no-cosigner but no expenses | Ben already covered most of this in his answer, but I want to emphasize the most important part of getting a loan with limited credit history. Go into a credit union or community bank and talk to the loan officer there in person. Ask for recommendations on how much they would lend based on your income to get the best interest rate that they can offer. Sometimes shortening the length of the loan will get you a lower rate, sometimes it won't. (In any case, make sure you can pay it off quickly no matter the term that you sign with.) Each bank may have different policies. Talk to at least two of them even if the first one offers you terms that you like. Talking to a loan officer is valuable life experience, and if you discuss your goals directly with them, then they will be able to give you feedback about whether they think a small loan is worth their time. |
Am I liable for an auto accident if I'm a cosigner but not on the title, registration, or insurance policy? | You can be sued if some random stranger that you never had any interaction with gets in an accident. There is really no barrier to people suing you if they get it in their head that they want to. Winning that lawsuit is another matter entirely. Whether you would be held liable and lose the lawsuit depends on whether someone can convince a court that you are partially responsible for a financial loss. Not sure how anyone could possibly successfully argue that in this situation. |
Buy or sell futures contracts | We struck a deal. I sold an asset to some body on june 1 . However he says, he would pay me any time on or before august 1st . This puts me in a dilemma. What if price goes down by august 1st and i would have to accept lower payment from him.? If price goes up till august 1st, then obviously i make money since ,even though item is sold,price is yet to be fixed between parties. However i know anytime on or before august 1st, i would get paid the price quoted on that particular day. This price could be high in my favor, or low against me. And, this uncertainty is causing me sleepless nights. i went to futures market exchange. My item (sugar,gold,wheat,shares etc..anything). i short sell a futures which just happens to be equivalent to the quantity of my amount i sold to the acquirer of my item. I shorted at $ 100 , with expiry on august 1st. Now fast orward and august 1st comes. price is $ 120 quoted . lets Get paid from the guy who was supposed to pay on or before august 1st. He pays 120 $. his bad luck, he should have paid us 100 $ on june 1st instead of waiting for august 1st . His judgement of price movement faulted. WE earned 20 $ extra than we expected to earn on june 1st (100$) . However the futures short of 100$ is now 120$ and you must exit your position by purchasing it at back. sell at 100$ and buy at 120$ = loss of 20$ . Thus 20 $ gained from selling item is forwarded to exchange . Thus we had hedged our position on june 1st and exit the hedge by august 1st. i hope this helps |
Paying extra on a mortgage. How much can I save? [duplicate] | When is the best time to pay? At the end of each year? If you save $1,000 each month at 1% so as to pay $12,000 at EOY on a 4.75% loan, you've lost "4.75% - 1% = 3.75%" over that year. (And that's presuming you put the money in a "high yield" online savings account.) Thus, the best time to pay is as soon as you have the money. EDIT: This all assumes that you have an emergency fund (more than the bare minimum $1K), zero other debt with a higher rate than 4.75% and that you are getting the full company match from 401(k). |
Opportunity to buy Illinois bonds that can never default? | If you give money to a person or entity, and they don't have the ability to pay you back, it doesn't matter if they are legally required to pay you. |
Can you recommend some good websites/brokers for buying/selling stocks in India? | Indiabulls. Low brokerage (If you bargain) I'm user of it and I'm getting 25paisa for delivery and 5 paisa for intraday. All transactions can be done online. Also they provide an stand alone application PowerIndiabulls, which is too good and appraised by many users as best in the industry. Not sure about it, but I think Powerindiabulls application is the answer for this. Please have a look at their website for more details. |
Why do stores and manufacturers use mail in rebates? A scam, or is there a way to use them effectively? | Not so much a scam, if you fill the required paperwork and actually take time to mail it in assuming it's done correctly; you will get your money. That being said, having a mail-in rebate program is usually a win-win for the seller. While they may have to pay a small fee to a third party who handles the rebate almost always this influences a potential buyer to choose a specific product over the alternative. The seller knows very well that very few people will actually go through with it. And yes, they do often make the process needlessly complicated and long as a deterrent. Plus, let's be real, no one likes sending out physical letters anymore. From a marketing standpoint the mail-in rebate is a brilliant idea. However, it's usually more of an annoyance for the consumer. |
What is the purpose of endorsing a check? | I actually had to go to the bank today and so I decided to ask. The answer I was given is that a check is a legal document (a promise to pay). In order to get your money from the bank, you need to sign the check over to them. By endorsing the check you are attesting to the fact that you have transferred said document to them and they can draw on that account. |
Buying a house 50/50 | I don't like it using percentages makes no sense. Find out what market value is for rent and pay 1/2 of that to your partner, adjust annually. You partner should be protected from inflation if he is going to invest in real estate. |
Why is property investment good if properties de-valuate over time? | One reason for this is that many people don't simply allow their houses to rot and decay. If you're talking about a house built in 1980 and left vacant and unmaintained for 35 years, it probably will be in pretty poor shape. But a homeowner generally wants to preserve their house and maintain it in good condition, so they invest in things like new roofs, siding, gutters, windows, paint, exterminators, new furnaces, hot water heaters, air conditioners, etc... All this stuff costs money (and for tax purposes, can often be factored into the cost basis of the house when it is sold), but it maintains the value of the property. A small hole in the roof may be fairly cheap to fix, but if left unrepaired, it could eventually cause much of the building to rot, making the structure near worthless. If a car slams into your living room, you don't generally leave it there; most people repair the damage. It's not uncommon in some areas to have 100 year old houses (or 300+ year old houses in some countries) that were built well in the first place and have been well maintained in the interim. People also renovate their homes, ripping out outdated construction and appliances and sometimes building new additions, decks, porches, etc... This also serves to make the property more attractive and increases its value. |
What happens to your ability to borrow money based on our joint finances? | It might be worth talking to a mortgage broker, even if you don't actually end up doing business with them. Upfront Mortgage Brokers explained Finding an upfront broker near you In a nutshell, upfront brokers disclose what they are paid for their services openly and transparently. Many brokers don't, and you can't be too careful. But a consultation should be free. An experienced broker can help you to navigate the pros and cons mentioned by the other responders. Personally, I would never do business with a broker who can't/won't show me a rate sheet on the day of the lock. That's my personal acid test. You might be surprised by what the broker has to say regarding your situation. That was my experience, anyway. |
Higher auto insurance costs: keep car or switch to public transit? | Looking at your numbers, I would definitively consider selling the car, and use the public transportation instead. You could easily save $450 month, plus gas and maintenance. As you mentioned, public transportation will be only a fraction of this amount, so you might end up saving around $400 monthly. If you decide to keep the car, the amount that you will spent monthly is easily a payment for a brand-new car. What if, God forbid, for any kind of reason, you get a traffic ticket that can increase your insurance premium? What if the engine stops working, and you will need to spent thousands of dollars fixing the car? With this, and all of the other expenses pilled up, you might be unable to afford all this at some point. If you decide to sell the car, the money that you will save monthly can be put in a savings account (or in any other sort of "safe" investment instrument). In this way, if your situation changes where you need a car again, you will be able to easily afford a new car. Regarding your need to visit your friends on the suburbs every other weekend, I think you can just talk with them, and meet on places where public transportation is available, or ask them to pick you up in the nearest station to the suburbs. In conclusion, based on what you said, I do not think the "little" convenience that you get in owning the car outweighs the big savings that you get monthly, if you decide to sell the car. |
Investing in low cost index fund — does the timing matter? | A much less verbose answer is. Don't worry about buying low. You have a whole lifetime to dollar cost average your retirement dollars. |
I'm getting gouged on prices for medical services when using my HSA plan. How to be billed fairly? | The big difference for me under the High deductible plan has been that instead of paying the co-pay, now I am now responsible for the negotiated rate until I reach the deductible limit. The HSA is only a way to funnel medical payments through a tax free account the insurance company and the doctor don't care about the HSA. If we go out-of-network, then I am responsible for the full rate, but they only count the negotiated rate as a credit against the out of pocket/deductible. This big difference makes it very important to pick a doctor in-network. For your example: I would have paid $50 under the PPO, but $200 under the high deducible plan. If I go out-of-network I would have to pay whatever the doctor want me to pay, but the insurance company would only credit me $200 against my deductible. I can pull the extra $350 from the HSA. It is hard to get good pricing information from some doctors, but the price difference for me has been so large that in-network is the only way to go. For prescriptions the high deductible plan has been worse, because we pay the full price with no discounts for the medicine, until we reach the plan deductible. That makes the cost of the prescriptions as much as 10x's more expensive. In fact the annual cost of our prescriptions all but guarantees that we hit the deductible each year. |
Is it legal to not get a 1099-b until March 15? | The deadline to mail is February 15. However, if the form is being prepared by a middleman (i.e. Wells Fargo) then they have until March 15th (on page 24). Also, if you haven't received your 1099 form by February 14, you may contact the IRS and they will contact and request the missing form on your behalf. I know that's a lot of information, but to answer your question, yes, there are situations where March 15th is the deadline instead of February 15th. |
Asset classes: Is a Guaranteed Investment Certificate (GIC) considered a bond? | There is a third type of asset that a GIC falls into: Cash. So while it does share some characteristics of a bond, such as (often) having a fixed interest rate, and having the ability to ladder their maturities, they would generally be considered part of your Cash component of your portfolio. |
Planning to invest in stock, age 16 | First of all, since you're 16 - you will not invest in anything. You cannot, you're a minor. You cannot enter contracts, and as such - you cannot transact in property. Your bank accounts are all UGMA accounts. I.e.: your guardian (or someone else who's the trustee on the account) will be the one transacting, not you. You can ask them to do trades, but they don't have to. They must make decisions in your best interest, which trades may not necessarily be. If however they decide to make trades, or earn interest, or make any other decision that results in gains - these are your gains, and you will be taxed on them. The way taxes work is that you're taxed on income. You're free to do with it whatever you want, but you're taxed on it. So if you realized gains by selling stocks, and reinvested them - you had income (the gains) which you did with whatever you felt like (reinvested). The taxman doesn't care what you did with the gains, the taxman cares that you had them. For losses it is a bit more complicated, and while you can deduct losses - there are limitations on how much you can deduct, and some losses cannot be deducted at all when realized (like wash sale losses or passive activity losses). When you have stock transactions, you will probably need to file a tax return reporting the transactions and your gains/losses on them. You may end up not paying any tax at all, but since the broker is reporting the transactions - you should too, if only to avoid IRS asking why you didn't. This, again, should be done by your guardian, since you personally cannot legally sign documents. You asked if your gains can affect your parents' taxes. Not exactly - your parents' taxes can affect you. This is called "Kiddie Tax" (unofficially of course). You may want read about it and take it into account when discussing your investments with your guardian/parents. If kiddie tax provisions apply to you - your parents should probably discuss it with their tax adviser. |
How to properly do background check for future tenant in my own house? | If you can find a tenant by networking -- co-worker, friend of a friend, etc. -- rather than openly advertising, that often gives you a better pool. Side advice: Check what local housing laws apply to renting a room rather than having a housemate. Once you start advertising this you may be subject to fair housing laws, additional code requirements, and so on. |
Is the contribution towards Employment Insurance (EI) wasted if I never get fired, or are my premiums refunded? | Actually, most insurance policies DON'T have a cash value if you don't make a claim. The reason that some life insurance policies do this is that they are really tax sheltered investments posing as insurance. With that in mind, the root of your question is really whether insurance premiums are wasted if you never make a claim. It really makes no difference if you are talking about EI, Auto, or Homeowner's insurance. My answer to that is no. What you are paying for when you buy insurance is financial risk avoidance. Look at it this way, you don't buy EI as an investment where you hope to get a return on your investment. You are buying the right to be protected against catastrophic financial difficulty associated with losing your job. Whether you claim it or not you did receive that protection. This is what drives me so crazy when I hear people talk about how an insurance company is ripping you off because you paid more in premiums than they paid out in benefits. Of course you did! If most people didn't pay in more than the company paid out there would be no financial interest for someone to form an insurance company. |
Are Certificates of Deposit worth it compared to investing in the stock market? | A CD is guaranteed to pay its return on maturation. So if you need a certain amount of money at a specific time in the future, the CD is a more reliable way of getting it. The stock market might give you more money or less. More is obviously OK. Less is not if you're planning to pay basic expenses with it, e.g. food, rent, etc. Most retirement portfolios will have a mix of investments. Some securities (stocks and bonds), some guaranteed returns (CDs, treasuries), and some cash equivalents (money market, savings, and checking accounts). Cash equivalents are good for short term expenses and an emergency fund. Guaranteed returns are good for medium term expenses. Securities are good for the long term. Once retired, the general system is to maintain enough cash equivalents for the next few months of expenses and emergencies. Then schedule CDs for the next few years so that you have a predictable amount. Finally, keep the bulk of your wealth in securities. As you get older, your potential emergencies increase and your need for savings decreases, so the mix shifts more and more to the cash equivalents and guaranteed returns and away from securities. CDs have limited use prior to retirement (and the couple years right before retirement), mainly saving up for a large purchase like a house, car, or major appliance. Even there if you have the option of delaying the purchase, that might allow you to use securities instead. Perhaps some of your emergency fund in a short term CD that you keep rolling over. Note that the problem isn't so much that securities will fall. It's that they'll fall right when you need the money. So rather than sell 1% of your securities to meet your needs, you have to sell 2%. That's a dead weight loss of 1% that you have to deduct from your returns. That roughly matches the drop from the height of 2007 to the trough of 2009 of the S&P 500. And it was 2012 before it recovered. If in 2007, you had put the 1% of your portfolio in a two-year CD, you'd be ahead even at zero interest in 2009. |
Why can't you just have someone invest for you and split the profits (and losses) with him? | At this point the cost of borrowing money is very low. For the sake of argument, say it is 1% per year for a large institution. I can either go out and find a client to invest 100,000$ and split profit and loss with them. Or, I could borrow 50,000$, pay 500$/year in interest, and get the same return and loss, while moving the market half as much (which would let me double my position!) In both cases the company is responsible for covering all fixed costs, like paying for traders, trades, office space, branding, management, regulatory compliance, etc. For your system to work, the cost to gather clients and interact with them has to be significantly less than 1% of the capital they provide you per year. At the 50% level, that might actually be worth it for the company in question. Except at the 50% level you'd have really horrible returns even when the market went up. So suppose a more reasonable level is the client keeps 75% of the returns (which compares to existing companies which offer larger investors an 80% cut on profits, but no coverage on losses). Now the cost to gather and interact with clients has to be lower than 2500$ per million dollars provided to beat out a simple loan arrangement. A single sales employee with 100% overhead (office, all marketing, support, benefits) earning 40,000$/year has to bring in 32 million dollar-years worth of investment every year to break even. Cash is cheap. Investment houses sell cash management, and charge for it. They don't sell shared investment risk (at least not to retail investors), because it would take a lot of cash for it to be worth their bother. More explicitly, for this to be viable, they'd basically have to constantly arrange large hedges against the market going down to cover any losses. That is the kind of thing that some margin loans may require. That would all by itself lower their profits significantly, and they would be exposed to counter-party risk on top of that. It is much harder to come up with a pile of cash when the markets go down significantly. If you are large enough to be worthwhile, finding a safe counterparty may be nearly impossible. |
If there's no volume discount, does buying in bulk still make sense? | There is a trade-off. It can be worthwhile because you save those extra trips. (On the other hand, don't you need to go shopping all the time for perishable items anyway?) On the other hand, having those items on stock implies inventory costs (the space they take up might be limited, the money they represent is sleeping and cannot be put to other usage, some of them might break...). This trade-off gives you the economic order quantity. Your stock levels over time based on that would look like a saw-blade. In addition, you might want to keep a safety stock for emergencies (if you use them faster than expected, if there is a supply shortage...). |
How U.S. Depreciation works Explain in brief? | If a business tool has a limited lifespan, it's value decreases (depreciates) from year to year. The business can capture that loss of value on some things that it couldn't otherwise write off as expenses. A few tools can be either expenses or depreciated, but only one of those can be chosen for that particular object. This is generally not relevant for individual taxpayers, unless you can show that the item is being used for income-producing purposes. |
Ongoing things to do and read to improve knowledge of finance? | I've found Pragmatic Capitalism very helpful. |
collateralized mortgage obligations | Say there are 5 people took loan of $100000 each. Those 5 people work in different jobs and have different capacity to payoff loan. Someone earning $40000 a year has higher risk to default on their payment then someone making $250000 a year. As Bank wants to sell this CDO to investor but how would investor know what the risk factor for this CDO is. This is where rating agency comes in picture. They apparently look at the underlying asset and assign rating to this CDO say AAA, B, AA etc which give investor idea of underlying risk. Problem here is rating agency gets paid by Bank to rate their CDO. So if a rating agency starts rating their CDO to higher risk Bank will go to next agency round the corner to get better rating and agency will lose commission. You can see the problem here. Now if people start struggling to pay loan, bank will not get money and it cannot pay CDO holders. If house that was worth $100000 when CDO was created is devalued to say $50000 today the underlying asset is not worth as much when CDO was sold. That is what happened when market crashed in 2008 and GFC hit. |
Why buy bonds in a no-arbitrage market? | If by "putting money in the bank" you mean regular savings or checking, then the bond locks a rate for a period of time, whereas your savings/checking rate can vary over that period. That variation might go for you or against you. Depending on your situation, you might prefer to take a determined rate to the variations. In addition, some bond types provide tax benefits (e.g. treasuries and municipal bonds) that change the effective return - You cannot just compare the interest rates. Finally, the bonds have "resale" value on the secondary market like stock - Depending on your outlook and strategy, you might by the bond for its value as a security rather than for the interest specifically just like you'd could buy a dividend-paying stock for its value as a security rather than for the dividend. In other words, you might think that bond values are going up, so you buy bonds with the intent of making a capital gain rather than counting on the interest returned. (The bond market does depend on the interest rate, so these are not independent factors.) I see the other answer that mentions the potential for your bank busting and you losing money beyond the FDIC insurance limit. The question doesn't specify U.S. Government bonds though, so I don't think that answer is generally good. It would be good in the case that you had a lot of money (especially an institution or foreign government) and you were specifically interested in U.S. Treasury bonds. Not so much if you invest in corporate bonds where you have no government insurance / assurance of any sort. Municipal bounds are also not backed by the U.S. (federal) government, but they may have some backing at the state level, depending on the state. |
Friend was brainwashed by MLM-/ponzi investment scam. What can I do? | Chances are high your friend isn't in it for the money, but the community or some vague dream of having a future income-generating side business because he can't get a loan for a 7-11 franchise. I run a few successful online businesses and had an import/export so naturally I run into these guys looking for advice on selling their MLM wares easier. I always point out they can make a lot of money cutting out the middle man MLM distributor and buy the same products from eBay or the same local supplier the MLM uses for a fraction of costs...then collect all the profit sans kickbacks to their host MLM goon/sponsor/father. I've never had anyone that bailed on the MLM, but I could see their eyes gloss over after they realized their own middle man is holding them back from making a lot of money (assuming they could offload that stuff). People actually in it for the money tend to bail (better sales job exist, MLM dreams don't pay rent, etc.) so you'll probably just need to isolate your friend from these losers somehow. You could investigate his sponsor and find out how much money he's actually making....if he tells your friend he's rich, but you find out he lives in the slums with his mom, your friend might bail on friendship/association with the group out of sheer disgust. It's the friends, not the logic you need to attack. His MLM friends would consider it a betrayal if he left them so you need to show him it's the MLM group that's betrayed his friendship. Point out all the long-term members driving junky cars to events who brag about their $$$. Laugh at the piss poor finance credentials of the local group leaders....ask where the investor perks are and suggest the sponsor/leaders are just hording them. Point out that he's a success and the fellow team members are just milking him to prop up their failing investments/sales/recruitment numbers. Nobody wants to let a team down....but the team isn't good enough for him. Deep down he knows the logic is questionable or at least risky/improbable, but his faith in the good intentions of his MLM cohorts is high.....crush that faith and all he's left with is bad finance tips or cheap protein shakes. |
Which first time Stocks and Shares ISA for UK, frequent trader UK markets? | I wouldn't only consider the entry/exit cost per trade. That's a good comparison page by the way. I would also consider the following. This depends if you are planning on using your online broker to provide all the information for you to trade. I have lower expectations of my online broker, not meant to be harsh on the online brokers, but I expect brokers to assist me in buying/selling, not in selecting. Edit: to add to the answer following a comment. Here are three pieces of software to assist in stock selection |
Offered a job: Should I go as consultant / independent contractor, or employee? | I think it really depends on what work/lifestyle you are looking for. I'm sure your more than capable of going down either route, but you should weigh up the pros and cons of each A consultant would be great, you'd be your own boss and you have overall say on how your business/career plans out, but be prepared to put in a hell of a lot of work to get it off the ground. Long hours, little time for social/family etc. But in the long run it'll pay off Employee, no worries about running your company, just turn up and perform your duties. You'll get the whole benefit package: healthcare/pension etc. You can probably go on expense paid training courses etc It depends, do you want to just be an employee working "for the man" or do you want to be "the man"? I wish you luck in whatever you do! :D |
Protecting savings from exceptional taxes | Don't worry. The Cyprus situation could only occur because those banks were paying interest rates well above EU market rates, and the government did not tax them at all. Even the one-time 6.75% tax discussed is comparable to e.g. Germany and the Netherlands, if you average over the last 5 years. The simple solution is to just spread your money over multiple banks, with assets at each bank staying below EUR 100.000. There are more than 100 banks large enough that they'll come under ECB supervision this year; you'd be able to squirrel away over 10 million there. (Each branch of the Dutch Rabobank is insured individually, so you could even save 14 million there alone, and they're collectively AAA-rated.) Additionally, those savings will then be backed by more than 10 governments, many of which are still AAA-rated. Once you have to worry about those limits, you should really talk to an independent advisor. Investing in AAA government bonds is also pretty safe. The examples given by littleadv all involve known risky bonds. E.g. Argentina was on a credit watch, and paying 16% interest rates. |
Is there an ETF or Mutual Fund which tracks James O'Shaugnessy's Trending 25 stock strategy? | Funds can't limit themselves to a small number of stocks without also limiting themselves to a small amount of total investment. I think 25 companies is too small to be practical from their point of view. |
Investing using leverage | Let's do a real example of leverage on the SPY. Imagine you have $20K today and plan on having $100K by JAN 2018. You could get 100 shares of SPY and ride it out. Maybe buying another 100 shares every few months until 2018, ending up with less than 500 shares to your name ( and zero cash in the bank ). or You could lever with DEC 2017 LEAP CALLS. They'll expire in 2.5 years, so you'd have to re-up sooner than your plan. With 20K starting cash, in my example we'll go with 5 contracts to start with. If we choose the $230 strike they'd cost $1250 each (putting roughly $6250 at risk). The plan in is if the stock market goes up, you've got leverage. You are the proud owner of contracts worth 500 shares of SPY and have only spent 1/3rd of your present day dollars. If the market goes down in the next two years, sure, you lost the entire $6250, but likely saved $93,750 powder dry and can try your luck with the 2021 LEAPS. Probably get down votes for this, but I'll even argue that proper use of leverage can very much reduce your risk. One truth is you'll never get a margin call from holding long options. |
When the market crashes, should I sell bonds and buy equities for the inevitable recovery? | The problem with the proposed plan is the word "inevitable". There is no such thing as a recovery that is guaranteed (though we may wish it to be so), and even if there was there is no telling how long it will take for a recovery to occur to a sufficient degree. There are also no foolproof ways to determine when you have hit the bottom. For historical examples, consider the Nikkei. In 2000 the value fell from 20000 to 15000 in a single year. Had you bought then, you would have found the market still fell and didn't get back to 15k until 2005...where it went up and down for years, when in 2008 it fell again and would not get back to that level again until 2014. Lest you think this was an isolated international incident, the same issues happened to the S&P in 2002, where things went up until they fell even lower in 2009 before finally climbing again. Will there be another recession at some point? Surely. Will there be a single, double, or triple dip, and at what point is the true bottom - and will it take 5, 10, or 20+ years for things to get back above when you bought? No one really knows, and we can only guess. So if you want to double down after a recession, you can, but it's important you not fool yourself into thinking you aren't greatly increasing your risk exposure, because you are. |
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