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What publicly available software do professional stock traders use for stock analysis? | If you are looking to analyze stocks and don't need the other features provided by Bloomberg and Reuters (e.g. derivatives and FX), you could also look at WorldCap, which is a mobile solution to analyze global stocks, at FactSet and S&P CapitalIQ. Please note that I am affiliated with WorldCap. |
Little hazy on how the entire RSU's and etrade works | Is the remaining amount tax free? As in, if the amount shown (which I can sell) on etrade is $5000 then if I sell the entire shares will my bank account be increased by $5000? The stocks they sell are withholding. So let's say you had $7000 of stock and they sold $2000 for taxes. That leaves you with $5000. But the actual taxes paid might be more or less than $2000. They go in the same bucket as the rest of your withholding. If too much is withheld, you get a refund. Too little and you owe them. Way too little and you have to pay penalties. At the end of the year, you will show $7000 as income and $2000 as withheld for taxes from that transaction. You may also have a capital gain if the stock increases in price. They do not generally withhold on stock sales, as they don't necessarily know what was your gain and what was your loss. You usually have to handle that yourself. The main point that I wanted to make is that the sale is not tax free. It's just that you already had tax withheld. It may or may not be enough. |
Is it possible to allocate pre-tax money to a specific stock? | Whether an investment is pre-tax is determined by the type of account (i.e., tax-advantaged vs ordinary taxable account), but whether you can invest in individual stocks is determined by the provider (i.e., the particular bank where you have the account). These are orthogonal choices. If you want to invest in individual stocks, you need to look for a bank that offers an IRA/401k/other tax-advantaged account and allows you to invest in individual stocks with it. For example, this page suggests that Fidelity would let you do that. Obviously you should look into various providers yourself to find one that offers the mix of features you want. |
Should I charge my children interest when they borrow money? | This is largely a cultural issue. I would be appalled at the very idea that my parents would charge me interest for lending me money. Just as they would be appalled if I were to do so if lending them money. I find the idea of attempting to make money off of your children fundamentally wrong. I realize that you only want to do this to teach them, that you have their best interests in mind and not your own profit. Nevertheless, what will actually happen were you to charge them interest is that you would accrue a monetary gain at the expense of your children. Is that really something you would be comfortable with? Now, as I stated at the beginning, this is clearly a cultural issue. Based on the other answers here, many cultures, probably including your own, find nothing wrong with this. I've even heard of people charging their adult children rent when they come home for the holidays, something that is completely baffling to me. The point I am trying to make is that asking other people's opinions on whether you should do this is not very useful unless those people share your own cultural background. My family and culture are such that the idea of charging interest to one's family members seems downright immoral to me. Given that you are asking here, it seems like you might be on the fence about it yourself. However, I freely admit that my answer is colored by my own cultural prejudices and may very well not be applicable to you. Still, ask yourself, is a relatively small amount of money in the grand scheme of things—or, for that matter, an entire fortune—worth jeopardizing your relationship with your children? Do you really believe that having their parents retroactively charge them interest for a loan will somehow teach them something about the "real world" that your already adult children don't know? One of the main reasons they came to you and didn't go to a bank is precisely that they expected the loan to be interest free. So, sure, tell them that you won't lend any more until they repay what they owe. Even better, sit them down and have an honest, adult conversation, explaining that the absence of the money they owe is making itself felt in your household and work out a way they can repay you. What, in my opinion, you most certainly shouldn't do is treat your relationship with your children as a regular business transaction. It isn't and I am sure you don't want it to be. |
What is high trading volume in a stock indicative of? Is high liquidity a good thing or a bad thing? | Stocks with a low average daily trading volume ("thinly traded stocks") will also tend to have higher spreads. So you'll tend to pay more when you buy and get less when you sell. |
Should I sell a 2nd home, or rent it out? | If you can generate a higher ROI by renting than by cashing out and investing, then you should rent it out. Please consider your risk tolerance as well. It's always a personal decision whether to assume higher risk for a higher return. |
Where are Bogleheadian World ETFs or Index funds? | Half VTI (Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF) and half VEU (Vanguard FTSE All-World ex-US ETF), and stop futzing. The US is roughly half the world market cap so this is like a total world equity index. Very low costs. VTI Expense ratio is 0.04% as of 04/27/2017. I don't know what you mean by RSG, but it could be either a waste processor or a gold miner. Either way it seems kind of speculative to hold even 10% of your wealth. |
Home sale: No right to terminate? | The most likely reason for this is that the relocation company wants to have a guaranteed sale so as to get a new mortgage in the new location. Understand that the relocation company generally works for a prospective employer. So they are trying to make the process as painless as possible for the homeowner (who is probably getting hired as a professional, either a manager or someone like an engineer or accountant). If the sale is guaranteed to go through regardless of any problems, then it is easy for them to arrange a new mortgage. In fact, they may bridge the gap by securing the initial financing and making the downpayment, then use the payout from the house you are buying to buy out their position. That puts them on the hook for a bunch of money (a downpayment on a house) while they're waiting on the house you're purchasing to close. This does not necessarily mean that there is anything wrong with the house. The relocation company would only know about something wrong if the owner had disclosed it. They don't really care about the house they're selling. Their job is to make the transition easy. With a relocation company, it is more likely that they are simply in a hurry and want to avoid a busted purchase. If this sale fails to go through for any reason, they have to start over. That could make the employment change fall through. This is a variation of a no contingencies sale. Sellers like no contingencies sales because they are easier. Buyers dislike them because their protections are weaker. But some buyers will offer them because they get better prices that way. In particular, house flippers will do this frequently so as to get the house for less money than they might otherwise pay. This is better than a pure no contingencies sale, as they are agreeing to the repairs. This is a reasonable excuse to not proceed with the transaction. If this makes you so uncomfortable that you'd rather continue looking, that's fine. However, it also gives you a bit of leverage, as it means that they are motivated to close this transaction quickly. You can consider any of the following: Or you can do some combination of those or something else entirely that makes you fell more secure. If you do decide to move forward with any version of this provision, get a real estate lawyer to draft the agreement. Also, insist on disclosure of any previous failed sales and the reason for the failure before signing the agreement. The lawyer can make that request in such a way as to get a truthful response. And again, in case you missed it when I said this earlier. You can say no and simply refuse to move forward with such a provision. You may not get the house, but you'll save a certain amount of worry. If you do move forward, you should be sure that you are getting a good deal. They're asking for special provisions; they should bear the cost of that. Either your current deal is already good (and it may be) or you should make them adjust until it is. |
In Australia, how to battle credit card debt? | JoeTaxpayer mentioned a budget. Staying on top of your spending will be the result of getting out from under this debt. You may have Excel on your PC now, if not Open Office is free which has a program that handles finance applications. There is budgeting software for free out there. Youneedabudget.com is a lot better but cost a little. It keeps me from spending money I don't necessarily have as I can see a result month to month from having outflow of cash. As Joe mentioned - no more lattes in the near future which will help you pay off this debt which will be a bigger relief than a fashion statement. Having used budgeting software and attempted to stay in budget has been useful. I still over spend a little on food and can see the ramifications immediately. In short, try creating and sticking to a budget no matter the urge. As far as insolvency is concerned I'd struggle with paying it down before I do that. The thought passed my mind but I bit the bullet. DO NOT walk away from the debt however. That isn't a good idea Either. Budget and bite. |
Investing/business with other people's money: How does it work? | You can either borrow money... credit card, line of credit, re-finance your home, home equity line of credit, loan, mortgage, etc. Or you have other invest in your company as equity. They will contribute $X to get Y% of your company and get Z% of the profits. Note amount of profits does not necessarily have to equate to percentage owned. This makes sense if they are a passive investor, where they just come up with the money and you do all the work. Also voting rights in a company does not have to equate to percentage owned either. You can also have a combination of equity and debt. If you have investors, you would need to figure out whether the investor will personally guarantee the debt of your company - recourse vs non-recourse. If they have more risk, they will want more of a return. One last way to do it is crowdfunding, similar to what people do on Kickstarter. Supporters/customers come up with the money, then you deliver the product. Consulting practices do something similar with the concept of retainers. Best of luck. |
How to spend more? (AKA, how to avoid being a miser) | Maybe minimalism is an option for you. Make your self clear what you really want You only buy what you really need and for that you spend the money. Then there is no point of saving money, i.e. I for example like to invite friends and cook them some fancy diner with expensive products, but the value I get from that exceeds any money I spend. On the other hand most present are the opposite, they have less value to recipient than what they originally have costs. |
Price movement behaviour before earnings announcements | In principle, the stock price should see no change in the days leading up to an earnings announcement, and then at the moment of the announcement, the stock price should move in the direction of the earnings surprise (relative to the market's belief of what earnings were going to be). In practice, stock prices tend to drift a little in the direction of the surprise shortly before the announcement and the associated price jump. This could be because smart investors were able to replicate the computations to predict the announcement or because information gets illegally leaked ahead of the announcement. So I guess your bullet point B is a likely scenario. Note that hedging activity in the options market will not affect stock price one way or another. Options transfer risk from one party to another but net to zero. Intense hedging activity may be able to push up the price of options (increasing the implied volatility), but it shouldn't affect the price of a stock one way or the other. For this reason, bullet point A is not the case. Note that price behavior after the announcement is also interesting: it seems to take some time to reach the correct price instead of jumping directly to it as economists would predict. This phenomenon is known as post earnings announcement drift. |
Recourse with Credit Card company after victimized by fraud? | Concealing parts of a document in order to obtain a signature is illegal. The company committed signature forgery because they effectively modified the document after you signed it (i.e. unfolded the parts that were previously folded). I suggest that you go to your local police department to file a report, citing "signature forgery". Once you have the police report, call your bank's fraud department (not the general billing dispute line) and cite the police report right away, specifically calling out "signature forgery". I would be surprised if you don't get a favorable outcome. |
Simple and safe way to manage a lot of cash | Overall I think your idea is sound. The key here is to choose that 401k provider wisely and have a specific asset allocation plan (like Joe mentioned) Summary of this approach: Pluses: Minuses: I'd consider Vanguard for simple, no frills investing. If you're looking to get into choosing stocks, check out the Motley Fool. |
In today's low interest environment, is it generally more economical to buy or lease a new car in the US? | There are two reasons leases are generally a worse deal than buying. First, inherent in the lease is the concept of trading in the car at the end of the lease term. As we all know, cars depreciate the most in the first year or two. By repeatedly leasing cars on short time frames, you own the vehicles during those most expensive years. Of course there's nothing stopping you from doing the same thing when buying (be it via cash or loan), but leasing builds in a schedule and encourages you to stick to it. Second, it is easier for the dealer salesperson to hide things from the consumer in a lease contract. Most salespeople will try to get a car purchaser to focus on the monthly payment, or they'll four-box the purchaser, but even then there's only 4 numbers, and most consumers have a rough idea what they are and what they mean. But in a lease the numbers in question are renamed and obscured. "Price" becomes "capitalized cost". "Interest rate" becomes "money factor" and is divided by 2400, making it look really small and not easily translatable without a calculator or pencil and paper. "Down payment" becomes a capitalized cost reduction. There's a new concept "residual value." Neither of those reasons change when interest rate is lower. |
Investing in a offshore bank account | when investing in index funds Index fund as the name suggests invests in the same proportion of the stocks that make up the index. You can choose a Index Fund that tracks NYSE or S&P etc. You cannot select individual companies. Generally these are passively managed, i.e. just follow the index composition via automated algorithms resulting in lower Fund Manager costs. is it possible to establish an offshore company Yes it is possible and most large organization or High Net-worth individuals do this. Its expensive and complicated for ordinary individuals. One needs and army of International Tax Consultants / International Lawyers / etc but do I have to pay taxes from the capital gains at the end of the year? Yes Canada taxes on world wide income and you would have to pay taxes on gains in Canada. Note depending on your tax residency status in US, you may have to pay tax in US as well. |
For how long is a draft check valid, and where do the funds sit? | A bank check is drawn on the bank itself. You gave the bank the funds backing that check at the time you purchased it. You can not get that money back except by returning the check to them. So, yes, effectively that check behaves like cash; the money us already gone from your account, and once you hand it over you can't claim it was forged or otherwise try to cancel the payment. |
Why do people buy new cars they can not afford? | If everyone bought used cars, who would buy the new cars so that everyone else could buy them used? Rental car companies? Your rant expresses a misunderstanding of fundamental economics (as demand for used cars increases, so will prices) but economics is off-topic here, so let me explain why I bought a new car—that I am now in the 10th year of driving. When I bought the car I currently drive, I was single, I was working full-time, and I was going to school full-time. I bought a 2007 Toyota Corolla for about $16,500 cash out the door. I wanted a reliable car that was clean and attractive enough that I wouldn't be embarrassed in it if I took a girl out for dinner. I could have bought a much more expensive car, but I wanted to be real about myself and not give the wrong impression about my views on money. I've done all the maintenance, and the car is still very nice even after 105K miles. It will handle at least that many more miles barring any crashes. Could I have purchased a nice used car for less? Certainly, but because it was the last model year before a redesign, the dealer was clearly motivated to give me a good deal, so I didn't lose too much driving it off the lot. There are a lot of reasons why people buy new cars. I didn't want to look like a chump when out on a date. Real-estate agents often like to make a good impression as they are driving clients to see new homes. Some people can simply afford it and don't want to worry about what abuse a prior owner may have done. I don't feel defensive about my decision to buy a new car those years ago. The other car I've purchased in the last 10 years was a four year old used car, and it certainly does a good job for my wife who doesn't put too many miles on it. I will not rule out buying another new car in the future either. Some times the difference in price isn't significant enough that used is always the best choice. |
Where should I park my rainy-day / emergency fund? | Something with an FDIC guarentee, so a bank. With an emergency fund, I think the 'return of capital' is more important than the 'return on the capital', so I'm fine with putting it in a standard savings account in a local bank(not an internet account) even if it pays next to nothing. The beauty is that since the bank is local, you can walk in and withdraw it all during any weekday. |
SBI term deposit versus SBI bonds | I wrote one to check against the N3 to N6 bonds: http://capitalmind.in/2011/03/sbi-bond-yield-calculator/ Things to note: |
Buying my first car out of college | I know I came a little late to this discussion but let me give you my opinion. I think that purchasing the BMW is a terrible investment for obvious reasons. Once you drive the car off the dealer's lot the car loses anywhere from 5-10k in value immediately. Its a terrible investment and something that you will regret in the future. However, whether you buy it now or you hold off we all know you are eventually still going to get it. I graduated college and was in a similar situation as the one you are now. I started making 60k after college and leased a brand new BMW. Like I said it was a terrible investment, but I do not regret it for one day. Ive had so much fun in that car that I can't even begin to explain. We only live once and you don't want to be one of those guys that looks back and says I should've this I should've that, JUST DO IT. We all know it won't be possible when you have a wife and kids so just splurge now and be responsible later LOL. |
What could be the cause of a extreme high/low price in after hours market? | Many of the above comments are correct about illiquidity. If someone needs to trade at a time of low liquidity, for instance when the markets are closed, the bid/ask spread can often be large to induce someone to trade at odd times. Especially as the broker/bank on the other side of the trade can't immediately go to the market to close out the risk as they often prefer to do. In this case the jump is actually is large but not that large (~4%). Note this trade price is near the close price on the day before. The system I use shows a trade that evening for 5 shares near the price on the graph. If you called me after I was done with work and tried to buy 5 shares I'd quote you a bad price too. |
Money Structuring | Structuring, as noted in another answer, involves breaking up cash transactions to avoid the required reporting limits. There are a couple of important things to note. And, the biggest caveat - there have been many cases of perfectly legitimate transactions that have fallen foul of the reporting requirements. One case springs to mind of a small business that routinely deposited the previous day's receipts as cash, and due to the size of the business, those deposits typically fell in the $9,000-$9,500 range. This business ended up going through a lot of headaches and barely survived. Some don't. A single batch of transactions, if it is only 2 or 3 parts and they are separated by reasonable intervals, is not likely in and of itself to be suspicious. However, any set of such transactions does run the risk of being flagged. In your case, you also run afoul of the Know Your Customer rules, because it's not even you depositing the cash - it's your friend. (Why can your friend not simply write you a check? What is your friend doing with $5k of cash at a time? How do you know he's not generating illegal income and using you to launder it for him?) Were I your bank, you can be very certain I'd be reporting these transactions. Just from this description, this seems questionable to me. IRS seizes millions from law-abiding businesses |
How do dividend reinvestment purchases work? | As far as I know, it has the same price, and effects on the market, as any other transaction... |
How should residents of smaller economies allocate their portfolio between domestic and foreign assets? | why should I have any bias in favour of my local economy? The main reason is because your expenses are in the local currency. If you are planning on spending most of your money on foreign travel, that's one thing. But for most of us, the bulk of our expenses are incurred locally. So it makes sense for us to invest in things where the investment return is local. You might argue that you can always exchange foreign results into local currency, and that's true. But then you have two risks. One risk you'll have anywhere: your investments may go down. The other risk with a foreign investment is that the currency may lose value relative to your currency. If that happens, even a good performing investment can go down in terms of what it can return to you. That fund denominated in your currency is really doing these conversions behind the scenes. Unless the bulk of your purchases are from imports and have prices that fluctuate with your currency, you will probably be better off in local investments. As a rough rule of thumb, your country's import percentage is a good estimate of how much you should invest globally. That looks to be about 20% for Australia. So consider something like 50% local stocks, 20% local bonds, 15% foreign stocks, 5% foreign bonds, and 10% local cash. That will insulate you a bit from a weak local currency while not leaving you out to dry with a strong local currency. It's possible that your particular expenses might be more (or less) vulnerable to foreign price fluctuations than the typical. But hopefully this gives you a starting point until you can come up with a way of estimating your personal vulnerability. |
Are there any Social Responsibility Index funds or ETFs? | There is the iShares Jantzi Social Index Fund. |
Does the expense ratio of a fund-of-funds include the expense ratios of its holdings? | I just looked at a fund for my client, the fund is T Rowe Price Retirement 2015 (TRRGX). As stated in the prospectus, it has an annual expense ratio of 0.63%. In the fine print below the funds expenses, it says "While the fund itself charges no management fee, it will indirectly bear its pro-rata share of the expenses of the underlying T. Rowe Price funds in which it invests (acquired funds). The acquired funds are expected to bear the operating expenses of the fund." One of it's acquired funds is TROSX which has an expense ratio of 0.86%. So the total cost of the fund is the weighted average of the "acquired funds" expense ratio's plus the listed expense ratio of the fund. You can see this at http://doc.morningstar.com/docdetail.aspx?clientid=schwab&key=84b36f1bf3830e07&cusip=74149P796 and its all listed in "Fees and Expenses of the Fund" |
Foreign currency conversion for international visitors to ecommerce web site? | For manual conversion you can use many sites, starting from google (type 30 USD in yuan) to sites like xe.com mentioned here. For programmatic conversion, you could use Google Calculator API or many other currency exchange APIs that are available. Beware however that if you do it on the real site, the exchange rate is different from actual rates used by banks and payment processing companies - while they use market-based rates, they usually charge some premium on currency conversion, meaning that if you have something for 30 dollars, according to current rate it may bet 198 yuan, but if he uses a credit card for purchase, it may cost him, for example, 204 yuan. You should be very careful about making difference between snapshot market rates and actual rates used in specific transaction. |
Is IRS Form 8938 asking me to double-count foreign assets? | Yes, you effectively need to "double count" when shifting balances between foreign accounts. |
Lost credit card replaced with new card and new numbers. Credit score affected? | The true answer is it depends because it is up to the credit card issuer to follow the right path when issuing a replacement credit card. http://www.bankrate.com/finance/credit-cards/will-replacement-card-hurt-my-score.aspx Typically, issuers will transfer the account history to the new trade line, says Barry Paperno, the consumer operations manager at FICO, the creator of the FICO scoring formula. The new account should have the old open date, so you should retain your payment history, he says. The credit limit and balance should also stay the same. http://blog.credit.com/2014/02/lost-or-stolen-credit-card-hurt-your-credit-scores-76724/ How Issuers Report Replacement Cards We asked the major card issuers how they report replacement cards to credit reporting agencies: American Express: The new card has the same open date and “Member Since” year as the previous card. The balance on the old account number is transferred to the new account number. All payment history transfers over. Bank of America: All transactions and account history are transferred to the new account number when there is a card replacement or renewal. Capital One: The new account number with all the original account data (original open date, etc.) is reported along with a notification to the bureaus that the new account number is replacing the old. The two tradelines can then be ‘merged’ into one, so that all the applicable payment history, balance, etc. is now under the new account number. Chase: The original tradeline does not change. The history on the account remains, just the account number field is updated with the new account number. There is no “new” tradeline in this scenario. |
Starting with Stocks or Forex? | I would advise against both, at least in the way you are discussing it. You seem to be talking about day-trading (speculating) in either stock or currency markets. This seems ill-advised. In each trade, one of three things will happen. You will end up ahead and the person you buy from/sell to will end up behind. You will lose and the counterparty will win. Or you both will lose due to trading fees. That said, if you must do one, stick with stocks. They have a reason to have positive returns overall, while currency trade is net-zero. Additionally, as you said, if it sounds like you can gain more with less money, that means that there are many more losers than winners. How do you know you will be a winner? A lot of the reason for this idea that you can gain a lot with less is leverage; make sure you understand it well. On the other hand, it may make sense to learn this lesson now while you have little to lose. |
Creating S-Corp: Should I Name My Wife as a Director/Shareholder? | There are many aspects to consider in deciding what sort of company you want to form. Instead of an S-corporation, you should determine whether it would be better to form a Limited Liability Company (LLC), Limited Partnership (LP) or even a professional company (PC). Littleadv is correct: There is minimal benefit in forming an S-corp with you and your wife as the shareholders, if you will be the only contributor-worker. There are costs associated with an S-corporation, or any corporation, that might outweigh benefits from more favorable tax treatment, or personal protection from liability: Filing fees and disclosure rules vary from state to state. For example, my father was a cardiologist who had no employees, other than my grandmother (she worked for free), in a state with income taxes (NM). He was advised that a PC was best in New Mexico, while an S-Corp was better in Florida (there are no personal income taxes in Florida). The only way to know what to do requires that you consult an accountant, a good one, for guidance. |
Why don't some places require a credit card receipt signature, and some do? | Merchants apply in advance for the program, and the amount is limited to less than $25. |
Conservative ways to save for retirement? | It has been hinted at in some other answers, but I want to say it explicitly: Volatility is not risk. Volatility is how much an investment goes up and down, risk is the chance that you will lose money. For example, stocks have relatively high volatility, but the risk that you will lose money over a 40 year period is virtually zero (in particular if you invest in index funds). Bonds, on the other hand, have basically no volatility (their cash flow is totally predictable if you trust the future of your government), but there is a significant risk that they will perform worse than stocks over a longer period. So, volatility equals risk only if you are day trading. A 401(k) is literally the opposite of that. For further reading: Never confuse risk and volatility Also, investing is not gambling. Gambling is bad because the odds are stacked against you. You need more than average luck to actually win and the longer you play, the more you will lose. Investing means buying productive capital that will produce further value. The odds are in your favor. Even if you do a moderately bad job at investing, the longer you stay, the more you will win. |
what are the downsides of rolling credit card debt in this fashion | Awesome, you are a math guy. Very good for you. In theory, what you are proposing, should work out great as the math works out great. However have you taken a economics or finance coursework? The math that they do in these class will leave a most math guys uncomfortable with the imprecision even when one is comfortable with chaos theory. Personal finance is worse. If it were about math things like reverse mortgages, payday lenders, and advances on one income tax returns would not exist. The risk derived from the situation you describe is one born out of behavior. Sometimes it is beyond control of the person attempting your scheme. Suppose one of these happen: In my opinion the market is risky enough without borrowing money in order to invest. Its one thing to not pay extra principle to a mortgage in order to put that money in play in the market, it is another thing to do what you are suggesting. While their may be late fees associated with a mortgage payment, a fixed rate mortgage will not change if you late on payment(s). On these balance transfer CC schemes they will jack your rate up for any excuse possible. I read an article that the most common way to end up with a 23%+ credit card was to start out with a 0% balance transfer. One thing that is often overlooked is that the transfer fee paid jacks up the stated rate of the card. In the end, get out of consumer debt, have an emergency fund, then start investing. Building a firm financial foundation is the best way to go about it. Without one it will be difficult to make headway. With one your net worth will increase faster then you imagined possible. |
If I believe a stock is going to fall, what options do I have to invest on this? | Aganju has mentioned put options, which are one good possibility. I would suggest considering an even easier strategy: short selling. Technically you are borrowing the stock from someone and selling it. At some point you repurchase the stock to return to the lender ("covering your short"). If the stock price has fallen, then when you repurchase it, it will be cheaper and you keep the profit. Short selling sounds complicated but it's actually very easy--your broker takes care of all the details. Just go to your brokerage and click "sell" or "sell short." You can use a market or limit order just like you were selling something you own. When it sells, you are done. The money gets credited to your account. At some point (after the price falls) you should repurchase it so you don't have a negative position any more, but your brokerage isn't going to hassle you for this unless you bought a lot and the stock price starts rising. There will be limits on how much you can short, depending on how much money is in your account. Some stocks (distressed and small stocks) may sometimes be hard to short, meaning your broker will charge you a kind of interest and/or may not be able to complete your transaction. You will need a margin account (a type of brokerage account) to either use options or short sell. They are easy to come by, though. Note that for a given amount of starting money in your account, puts can give you a much more dramatic gain if the stock price falls. But they can (and often do) expire worthless, causing you to lose all money you have spent on them. If you want to maximize how much you make, use puts. Otherwise I'd short sell. About IPOs, it depends on what you mean. If the IPO has just completed and you want to bet that the share price will fall, either puts or short selling will work. Before an IPO you can't short sell and I doubt you would be able to buy an option either. Foreign stocks? Depends on whether there is an ADR for them that trades on the domestic market and on the details of your brokerage account. Let me put it this way, if you can buy it, you can short sell it. |
When people say 'Interest rates are at all time low!" … Which interest rate are they actually referring to? | As Sean pointed out they usually mean LIBOR or the FFR (or for other countries the equivalent risk free rate of interest). I will just like to add on to what everyone has said here and will like to explain how various interest rates you mentioned work out when the risk free rate moves: For brevity, let's denote the risk free rate by Rf, the savings account interest rate as Rs, a mortgage interest rate as Rmort, and a term deposit rate with the bank as Rterm. Savings account interest rate: When a central bank revises the overnight lending rate (or the prime rate, repo rate etc.), in some countries banks are not obliged to increase the savings account interest rate. Usually a downward revision will force them to lower it (because they net they will be paying out = Rf - Rs). On the other hand, if Rf goes up and if one of the banks increases the Rs then other banks may be forced to do so too under competitive pressure. In some countries the central bank has the authority to revise Rs without revising the overnight lending rate. Term deposits with the bank (or certificates of deposit): Usually movements in these rates are more in sync with Rf than Rs is. The chief difference is that savings account offer more liquidity than term deposits and hence banks can offer lower rates and still get deposits under them --consider the higher interest rate offered by the term deposit as a liquidity risk premium. Generally, interest rates paid by instruments of similar risk profile that offer similar liquidity will move in parallel (otherwise there can be arbitrage). Sometimes these rates can move to anticipate a future change in Rf. Mortgage loan rates or other interests that you pay to the bank: If the risk free rate goes up, banks will increase these rates to keep the net interest they earn over risk free (= Δr = Rmort - Rf) the same. If Rf drops and if banks are not obliged to decrease loan rates then they will only do so if one of the banks does it first. P.S:- Wherever I have said they will do so when one of the banks does it first, I am not referring to a recursion but merely to the competitive market theory. Under such a theory, the first one to cut down the profit margin usually has a strong business incentive to do so (e.g., gain market share, or eliminate competition by lowering profit margins etc.). Others are forced to follow the trend. |
Highest market cap for a company from historical data | In common with many companies, Microsoft has been engaging in share buyback programmes, where it buys its own shares in the market and then cancels them. It's often a more tax-efficient way to distribute profits to the shareholders than paying a dividend. So there were more Microsoft shares in circulation in 1999 than there are now. See here for information. |
Is gold subject to inflation? [duplicate] | Gold isn't constant in value. If you look at the high price of $800 in January of 1980 and the low of $291 in 2001, you lost a lot of purchasing power, especially since money in 2001 was worth less than in 1980. People claim gold is a stable store of value but it isn't. |
Postbank (Germany) - transferring money to the US - what are the best options? | For those who are interested, I am answering my own question: We used Postbank and transferred 6000 Euro, we chose to Transfer in US$, and selected Shared Fees. There were three fees in total: All in all, I paid ~37$; this is about half of what I expected; and I got a perfect exchange rate. Postbank might have its downsides, but it seems they are still a good deal. |
Is there anything comparable to/resembling CNN's Fear and Greed Index? | Lipper publishes data on the flow of funds in / out of stock and bond funds: http://www.lipperusfundflows.com Robert Shiller works on stock market confidence indices that are published by Yale: http://som.yale.edu/faculty-research/our-centers-initiatives/international-center-finance/data/stock-market-confidence |
Why should one only contribute up to the employer's match in a 401(k)? | If you exceed the income limit for deducting a traditional IRA (which is very low if you are covered by a 401(k) ), then your IRA options are basically limited to a Roth IRA. The Cramer person probably meant to compare 401(k) and IRA from the same pre-/post-tax-ness, so i.e. Traditional 401(k) vs. Traditional IRA, or Roth 401(k) vs. Roth IRA. Comparing a Roth investment against a Traditional investment goes into a whole other topic that only confuses what is being discussed here. So if deducting a traditional IRA is ruled out, then I don't think Cramer's advice can be as simply applied regarding a Traditional 401(k). (However, by that logic, and since most people on 401(k) have Traditional 401(k), and if you are covered by a 401(k) then you cannot deduct a Traditional IRA unless you are super low income, that would mean Cramer's advice is not applicable in most situations. So I don't really know what to think here.) |
Could someone explain this scenario about Google's involvement in the wireless spectrum auction? | If history is any guide, Page’s idealistic impulses could result in a vaster, more sprawling company. The following is an example of one of Page’s idealistic impulses (wanting people to share spectrum) which could result in a vaster, more sprawling company (if they hadn't been outbid, Google would have expanded by buying a business asset i.e. spectrum which they didn't need). I've no experience with bidding. I don't understand what's happening at all An 'auction' is a way to sell something. Instead of offering it for sale at a fixed price, you offer it 'to the highest bidder'. Someone (e.g. Google) says, "I'll offer you [some amount: e.g. a million dollars] for it." If no-one else exceeds that bid, then you say 'sold' and Google has bought it. Alternatively someone else comes along with a higher bid, "I'll offer you two million dollars for it," in which case they're the new high bidder, and you'll sell it to them unless the process repeats itself with anyone counter-offering an even higher bid. See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auction and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrum_auction The "Disadvantages" section of this article alleges (currently without a citation) that: Despite the apparent success of spectrum auctions, an important disadvantage limiting both efficiency and revenues is demand reduction and collusive bidding. The information and flexibility in the process of auction can be used to reduce auction prices by tacit collusion. When bidder competition is weak and one bidder holds an apparent advantage to win the auction for specific licenses, other bidders will often choose not to the bid for higher prices, hence reducing the final revenue generated by the auction.[citation needed] In this case, the auction is best thought of as a negotiation among the bidders, who agree on who should win the auction for each discrete bit of spectrum. Google's bid made that impossible (or, at least, ensured that the winning bid would be at least as high as the minimum which was set by Google's bid). |
Does investing in a company support it? | As said by others, buying shares of a company will not support it directly. But let's think about two example companies: Company A, which has 90 % stocks owned by supporters, and Company B, which has only 1 % of stocks owned by supporters. Both companies release bad news, for example profits have decreased. In Company B, most investors might want to sell their stock quickly and the price will plummet. In Company A, the supporters continue believing in the company and will not want to sell it. The price will drop less (usually, but it can drop even more if the sellers of Company A are very desperate to get rid of the stock). So, why is it important for the company to have a high stock price? In the short-term, it's not important. One example is that the company can release more stocks and receive more financing by doing that. Other reasons are listed here: http://www.investopedia.com/articles/basics/03/020703.asp |
How is money actually made from the buying or selling of options? | Not all call options that have value at expiration, exercise by purchasing the security (or attempting to, with funds in your account). On ETNs, they often (always?) settle in cash. As an example of an option I'm currently looking at, AVSPY, it settles in cash (please confirm by reading the documentation on this set of options at http://www.nasdaqomxtrader.com/Micro.aspx?id=Alpha, but it is an example of this). There's nothing it can settle into (as you can't purchase the AVSPY index, only options on it). You may quickly look (wikipedia) at the difference between "American Style" options and "European Style" options, for more understanding here. Interestingly I just spoke to my broker about this subject for a trade execution. Before I go into that, let me also quickly refer to Joe's answer: what you buy, you can sell. That's one of the jobs of a market maker, to provide liquidity in a market. So, when you buy a stock, you can sell it. When you buy an option, you can sell it. That's at any time before expiration (although how close you do it before the closing bell on expiration Friday/Saturday is your discretion). When a market maker lists an option price, they list a bid and an ask. If you are willing to sell at the bid price, they need to purchase it (generally speaking). That's why they put a spread between the bid and ask price, but that's another topic not related to your question -- just note the point of them buying at the bid price, and selling at the ask price -- that's what they're saying they'll do. Now, one major difference with options vs. stocks is that options are contracts. So, therefore, we can note just as easily that YOU can sell the option on something (particularly if you own either the underlying, or an option deeper in the money). If you own the underlying instrument/stock, and you sell a CALL option on it, this is a strategy typically referred to as a covered call, considered a "risk reduction" strategy. You forfeit (potential) gains on the upside, for money you receive in selling the option. The point of this discussion is, is simply: what one buys one can sell; what one sells one can buy -- that's how a "market" is supposed to work. And also, not to think that making money in options is buying first, then selling. It may be selling, and either buying back or ideally that option expiring worthless. -- Now, a final example. Let's say you buy a deep in the money call on a stock trading at $150, and you own the $100 calls. At expiration, these have a value of $50. But let's say, you don't have any money in your account, to take ownership of the underlying security (you have to come up with the additional $100 per share you are missing). In that case, need to call your broker and see how they handle it, and it will depend on the type of account you have (e.g. margin or not, IRA, etc). Generally speaking though, the "margin department" makes these decisions, and they look through folks that have options on things that have value, and are expiring, and whether they have the funds in their account to absorb the security they are going to need to own. Exchange-wise, options that have value at expiration, are exercised. But what if the person who has the option, doesn't have the funds to own the whole stock? Well, ideally on Monday they'll buy all the shares with the options you have at the current price, and immediately liquidate the amount you can't afford to own, but they don't have to. I'm mentioning this detail so that it helps you see what's going or needs to go on with exchanges and brokerages and individuals, so you have a broader picture. |
Is it wise to invest in bond fund when interest rates are low? | This is just a pedestrian (my) opinion: Yes, It is wise to invest in bond funds even in a low interest environment. Check out the lazy man's portfolio on bogleheads. The reason is: |
Buy home and leverage roommates, or split rent? | Mixing friendship and money, whether that's loans or landlording, is risky. Often things work out, but sometimes the unexpected happens, and it doesn't. If things go wrong, are you prepared to walk away from either the friendship or the money? After you've considered that, the next question is how your roommates feel about the deal. You're looking to charge your friends $2000 to rent part of a property that, from the sound of it, they could rent much cheaper from a stranger. Maybe the market is different in Cleveland, but in my area, I'd expect to pay $2000 in rent for a place worth closer to $300,000 than $100,000. Have your roommates expressed interest in the idea, and have you discussed dollar values with them? Are you still interested if they ended up paying $1600 in rent? $1000? |
Start a Holding Company? | If you are trying to invest in closely held / private companies (things that don't trade on the stock market), you will run into a variety of regulatory problems. For various reasons, most private companies only raise funds with accredited investors. To be an accredited investor you basically have to have $1,000,000 in net worth - NOT including your primary residence, OR you have to make over $200,000 a year for the last two years and expect to keep making that much. This is a class distinction the Federal government created, you will see different but similar wealth and investment classes worldwide. So your best most organized opportunities are left out, unless you do qualify as an accredited investor. There are tons of other companies, things you will find locally, that will let you invest in their smaller time operations. (Think like a local yoga studio looking for $20,000 and willing to split the profits with you). But the problem here is lack of accountability, where partners skip town or just stop answering your calls, and the legal remedies cost you more than your claim. That being said there are people that provide capital to smaller publicly traded companies on the bulletin boards and pink sheets. They have opportunities do much better than the actual stock market investors in these companies, because you can negotiate contracts that let you cash out in their inevitable financing death spirals with very little risk to you. You can do these things as an individual or as a holding company, but the holding company will limit your liability to the amount your holding company invested, instead of your personal assets, in case your financing starts to incur liability with the company. |
What is a reasonable salary for the owner and sole member of a small S-Corp? | Generally if you're a sole S-Corp employee - it is hard to explain how the S-Corp earned more money than your work is worth. So it is reasonable that all the S-Corp profits would be pouring into your salary. Especially when the amounts are below the FICA SS limits when separating salary and distributions are a clear sign of FICA tax evasion. So while it is hard to say if you're going to be subject to audit, my bet is that if you are - the IRS will claim that you underpaid yourself. One of the more recent cases dealing with this issue is Watson v Commissioner. In this case, Watson (through his S-Corp which he solely owned) received distributions from a company in the amounts of ~400K. He drew 24K as salary, and the rest as distributions. The IRS forced re-characterizing distributions into salary up to 93K (the then-SS portion of the FICA limit), and the courts affirmed. Worth noting, that Watson didn't do all the work himself, and that was the reason that some of the income was allowed to be considered distribution. That wouldn't hold in a case where the sole shareholder was the only revenue producer, and that is exactly my point. I feel that it is important to add another paragraph about Nolo, newspaper articles, and charlatans on the Internet. YOU CANNOT RELY ON THEM. You cannot defend your position against IRS by saying "But the article on Nolo said I can not pay SE taxes on my earnings!", you cannot say "Some guy called littleadv lost an argument with some other guy called Ben Miller because Ben Miller was saying what everyone wants to hear", and you can definitely not say "But I don't want to pay taxes!". There's law, there are legal precedents. When some guy on the Internet tells you exactly what you want to hear - beware. Many times when it is too good to be true - it is in fact not true. Many these articles are written by people who are interested in clients/business. By the time you get to them - you're already in deep trouble and will pay them to fix it. They don't care that their own "advice" got you into that trouble, because it is always written in generic enough terms that they can say "Oh, but it doesn't apply to your specific situation". That's the main problem with these free advice - they are worth exactly what you paid for them. When you actually pay your CPA/Attorney - they'll have to take responsibility over their advice. Then suddenly they become cautious. Suddenly they start mentioning precedents and rulings telling you to not do things. Or not, and try and play the audit roulette, but these types are long gone when you get caught. |
Are COBRA premiums deductible when self-employed? | Here is a quote from the IRS website on this topic: You may be able to deduct premiums paid for medical and dental insurance and qualified long-term care insurance for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents. The insurance can also cover your child who was under age 27 at the end of 2011, even if the child was not your dependent. A child includes your son, daughter, stepchild, adopted child, or foster child. A foster child is any child placed with you by an authorized placement agency or by judgment, decree, or other order of any court of competent jurisdiction. One of the following statements must be true. You were self-employed and had a net profit for the year reported on Schedule C (Form 1040), Profit or Loss From Business; Schedule C-EZ (Form 1040), Net Profit From Business; or Schedule F (Form 1040), Profit or Loss From Farming. You were a partner with net earnings from self-employment for the year reported on Schedule K-1 (Form 1065), Partner's Share of Income, Deductions, Credits, etc., box 14, code A. You used one of the optional methods to figure your net earnings from self-employment on Schedule SE. You received wages in 2011 from an S corporation in which you were a more-than-2% shareholder. Health insurance premiums paid or reimbursed by the S corporation are shown as wages on Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement. The insurance plan must be established, or considered to be established as discussed in the following bullets, under your business. For self-employed individuals filing a Schedule C, C-EZ, or F, a policy can be either in the name of the business or in the name of the individual. For partners, a policy can be either in the name of the partnership or in the name of the partner. You can either pay the premiums yourself or your partnership can pay them and report the premium amounts on Schedule K-1 (Form 1065) as guaranteed payments to be included in your gross income. However, if the policy is in your name and you pay the premiums yourself, the partnership must reimburse you and report the premium amounts on Schedule K-1 (Form 1065) as guaranteed payments to be included in your gross income. Otherwise, the insurance plan will not be considered to be established under your business. For more-than-2% shareholders, a policy can be either in the name of the S corporation or in the name of the shareholder. You can either pay the premiums yourself or your S corporation can pay them and report the premium amounts on Form W-2 as wages to be included in your gross income. However, if the policy is in your name and you pay the premiums yourself, the S corporation must reimburse you and report the premium amounts on Form W-2 as wages to be included in your gross income. Otherwise, the insurance plan will not be considered to be established under your business. Medicare premiums you voluntarily pay to obtain insurance in your name that is similar to qualifying private health insurance can be used to figure the deduction. If you previously filed returns without using Medicare premiums to figure the deduction, you can file timely amended returns to refigure the deduction. For more information, see Form 1040X, Amended U.S. Individual Income Tax Return. Amounts paid for health insurance coverage from retirement plan distributions that were nontaxable because you are a retired public safety officer cannot be used to figure the deduction. Take the deduction on Form 1040, line 29. |
Why are there many small banks and more banks in the U.S.? | First, is population density. You didn't say where exactly, but for example here in Tampa, Wells Fargo has 25 branches in the area (though that is a bit larger then what I would think of the Tampa area as a local) Second, we can mix in service expectation. I expect that in addition to "good" online service, "great" phone service, "great" email service, that when I have a problem, don't understand something, or want to talk about my options for investing or choosing account types, that I am able to go into a branch. That I can "walk in" and see someone quickly, or schedule an appointment and see some one right away (at my appointment time). Together, these two options means that on a busy day, the nearest Wells Fargo Branch to me has at any one time, 50 - 60 people in it. Smaller branches, of course have less, and larger branches exist. So it just takes that many branches to address the number of people and their expected needs. As to why there are so many different brands/banks Well that's just the USA. We believe in capitalism. We have believed in it much stronger in the past, but banks are the central to capitalism so why shouldn't they serve as an example. At it's core (a very simplistic look) Capitalism and a free market means that we as customers are better served by having lots of different brands fighting for our business. It should drive more consumer desired features (like lower prices, higher interest rates, better fee schedules, etc.) while forcing those brands to operate "better". (Just ignore the bail out, that's a loaded topic) So for some of us, we want a big bank like Wells Fargo, because we want the rates, structure, and service they can provide as a "big bank". For others they want the more personal touch of a "small bank". There are benefits both ways. For example there may be a bank that only allows people with excellent credit to open accounts. That allows they to have lower over all mortgage rates, but means their checking accounts have higher minimums. While the next bank may be more inclusive, and have smaller minimum balances, but as a result charge more for loans. We like our options, and rest assured all those "brands" offer products that have differences that attract customers. |
How are stock buybacks not considered insider trading? | Companies already have to protect themselves against employees trading the company's shares with insider information. They typically do that in a number of ways: Taken together, this tends to mostly mitigate the risk of employees trading with insider information, though it's probably not perfect. In practice, the company itself's knowledge of insider information is the same as that of its senior management. So it makes sense for a company to be allowed to trade under the same conditions as its senior management. From https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2013/03/14/questions-surrounding-share-repurchases/ : If the company is repurchasing outside of a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan, it should limit its purchases to open window periods when officers and directors are able to buy and sell securities of the company. In addition, the company also can choose to disclose any material non-public information prior to any share repurchase if it is in possession of material non-public information at a time when it is seeking to make a share repurchase outside of a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. As mentioned in the quote, a company can also set up a trading plan in advance (at a time when it doesn't have inside information) to be executed unconditionally in the future. Then even if the company comes into possession of inside information, it won't be using this knowledge to direct trades. |
High credit utilization, some high interest - but credit score not overly bad. How to attack debt in this situation? | The bottom line is you have an income problem. Your car payment seems very high relative to your income and your income is very low relative to your debt. Can you work extra jobs or start a small business to get that income up? In the US it would be fairly easy to work some part time jobs to get that income up about 1000 per month. With that kind of difference you could have this all knocked out (except for the car) in about a year. Then, six months later you could be done with your car. Most of the credit repair places are ripoffs in the US and I suspect it is similar around the world. |
US tax for a resident NRI | If you are tax-resident in the US, then you must report income from sources within and without the United States. Your foreign income generally must be reported to the IRS. You will generally be eligible for a credit for foreign income taxes paid, via Form 1116. The question of the stock transfer is more complicated, but revolves around the beneficial owner. If the stocks are yours but held by your brother, it is possible that you are the beneficial owner and you will have to report any income. There is no tax for bringing the money into the US. As a US tax resident, you are already subject to income tax on the gain from the sale in India. However, if the investment is held by a separate entity in India, which is not a US domestic entity or tax resident, then there is a separate analysis. Paying a dividend to you of the sale proceeds (or part of the proceeds) would be taxable. Your sale of the entity containing the investments would be taxable. There are look-through provisions if the entity is insufficiently foreign (de facto US, such as a Subpart-F CFC). There are ways to structure that transaction that are not taxable, such as making it a bona fide loan (which is enforceable and you must pay back on reasonable terms). But if you are holding property directly, not through a foreign separate entity, then the sale triggers US tax; the transfer into the US is not meaningful for your taxes, except for reporting foreign accounts. Please review Publication 519 for general information on taxation of resident aliens. |
Do other countries have the equivalent of Australia's Negative Gearing? | In India, where I live, you can: In addition, housing loans are given priority status as well - bank capital requirements on housing loans is lower than for, say, a corporate loan or a loan against other kinds of collateral. That makes housing loans cheaper as well - you get a home loan at around 10% in India versus 15% against most other assets, and since you can deduct it against tax, the effective interest rate is even lower. Housing in India is unaffordable too, if you're wondering. In a suburb 40 Km away from Delhi, a 2000 sq. foot apartment, about 1500 sq. ft. of carpet area, with no appliances costs about USD 250,000. |
How to donate to charity that will make a difference? | OP wants to do something very honourable, applause for that. Being a Greek I have insider knowledge about the impact of various organisations. Fact is, for people from abroad what is the most highly recommended action would be to support organisations of an international network (red cross, doctors w/out borders etc), because the health system is suffering seriously nowadays -or access to it-, and providing redundancy in that respect can certainly make a difference, via global health efforts. The next best thing you can do, to yourself and others, is basically to take a vacation in Greece and visit both a big city (here's where the problems will be visible) and an island (here's where you'll realise that you are in a place of stunning natural beauty). By taking this action you achieve two things: you put the economy in motion - a small vote, yet it counts - and you actually are a first-person observer. Enough is enough with victimisation via the news coming from inside or outside Greece! People need get the whole respective. |
How to distinguish gift from payment for the service? | Generally, a one time thing is considered a gift. For the donor this is obviously not a deductible expense, except for some specific cases (for example promotional gifts under $25 to vendors can be deducted, if you're a business, or charitable contributions to a recognized charity). However, if this is a regular practice - that would not be considered as a gift, but rather as a tax fraud, a criminal offense. Being attentive I would like to make a little gift or give some little (<100$) amount of money (cash/wire/online) for that Why? Generally, gift is exempt from income if no services were provided and the gift was made in good faith. In the situation you describe this doesn't hold. When the gift is exempt from income to the receiver - the donor pays the tax (in this case, below exemption the tax is zero). If the gift is not exempt from income to the receiver - it is no longer a gift and the receiver is paying income taxes, not the donor. The situation you describe is a classic tax evasion scheme. If someone does it consistently and regularly (as a receiver, donor, or both) - he would likely end up in jail. |
First time investing in real-estate, looks decent? | Congratulations, you are in great shape financially at a very young age. Great income, nice equity in a home, and mostly debt free. It seems like you are looking at taking out a loan of 400K, and to do so you will have to put your own home at risk as you do not have the 80K cash for a down payment. Correct? It also looks like after 2.1K per year without regard to taxes, maintenance, bad tenants, or vacancies. As such this will likely be a negative cash flow situation. I would say you should plan on a 912/month cost. Are you okay with that? While your income can probably cover this, no problem, is that your objective to have this property have a negative return for the next 10-15 years or so? For me, this is a no. Way too much risk for a negative cash flow. It is hard to talk to the upside as you did not give any profit predictions and I am unsure of the market. Why would you risk jeopardizing your great financial situation with a "hail mary" attempt to make money? Slow down, you will get there. Save for a few years so there is no need to tap your home's equity to make a down payment. It would really bother me to owe 600K on a 121K salary (75K+20K+26K). |
Do my kids need to file a tax return? | If the gift was stock that they have owned for years there can be one hitch: The basis of the stock doesn't reset when it is gifted. For example if grandparents have owned stock that is currently worth $10,000 today, but they bought it decades ago when it only cost them $1,000; then if the new owner sells it today they will have a gain of $9,000. The clock to determine short term/long term also doesn't reset; which is good. The basis needs to be determined now so that the gain can be accurately calculated in the future. This information should be stored in a safe place. Gains for dividends are investment income and the rules regarding the kiddie tax need to be followed. |
For a mortgage down-payment, what percentage is sensible? | In Australia, you will typically be required to pay for mortgage insurance if you borrow more than 80% of the value of the property. Basically this means another ~1% on top of the regular interest rate. So it's in your interests to save until you can at least reach that point. If you can't rent and save at the same time, it suggests your finances may be too stretched for buying now to be a good idea. |
What are good games to play to teach young children about saving money? | I found this great resource at MarketWatch.com - a listing on online games that help parents teach kids about saving and finance, set up by age group. Here's an example of some of the content: For children six to nine: www.fleetkids.com, sponsored by the Fleet Bank, has great games -- like "Buy lo, Sell hi" and "Chunka Change" -- that teach kids about spending and saving. Kids can compete for prizes such as computers and backpacks for their schools. |
How can people have such high credit card debts? | In the United States, when applying for credit cards, proof of income is on an honor system. You can make $15k a year and write on your application that you make $150k a year. They don't check that value other than to have their computer systems figure out risk and you get a yes or no. It was traditionally easy to attain credit, but that got tightened in 2008/2009 with the housing crisis. This is starting to change again and credit is flowing much more easily. |
Income in zero-interest environment | Dividends. There are blue chip companies that have paid and raised their dividends for 20 or more years. As an example: Altria (MO). There are also ETFs that specialize in such stocks such as SDY. |
What are non-qualified stock options? | Non-qualified stock options are like regular incentive stock options but without the preferential treatments that ISOs get: Companies like to give NQSOs because they can claim a tax deduction (i.e. a loss) for that difference between exercise price and market price (that you have to report as income). |
Is it worth incorporating, when working in Canada as a contractor for an employer in the US? | Interesting as I am in the exact same situations as yourself. I, in fact, just incorporated. You will be able "save" more in taxes in the end. The reason I put "save" in quotes, is that you don't necessarily save on taxes, but you can defer taxes. The driving factor behind this is that you specify your own fiscal calendar/year. Incorporating allows you to defer income for up to 6 months. Meaning that if you make your fiscal year starting in August or September, for example, you can claim that income on the following year (August + 6 months = February). It allows you to keep the current year taxes down. Also, any income left over at year end, is taxed at 15% (the Corporation rate) rather than the 30-40% personal rate you get with a sole-proprietorship. In a nutshell, with sole-proprietorship, all income is taxable (after write-offs)... in a corporation, you can take some of that income and keep it in the corporation (gives your company a "value"), and is only taxed at 15% - big saving there. I primarily work with US businesses. I am, however, a dual-citizen, US and Canadian, which allowed me as a sole-proprietor, to easily work with US companies. However, as a sole-proprietor or a Corporation, you simply need to get an EIN from the IRS and any US company will report earnings to that number, with no deductions. At year end, it is your responsibility to file the necessary tax forms and pay the necessary taxes to both countries. Therefore you can solicit new US business if you choose, but this is not restricted to corporations. The real benefit in incorporating is what I mentioned above. My suggestion to you is to speak with you CA, who can outline all benefits. Revenue Canada's website had some good information on this topic as well. Please let me know if you need anything else explained. |
What should I do with $4,000 cash and High Interest Debt? | Every $1,000 you use to pay off a 26% interest rate card saves you $260 / year. Every $1,000 you use to pay off a 23% interest rate card saves you $230 / year. Every $1,000 you put in a savings account earning ~0.5% interest earns you $5 / year. Having cash on hand is good in case of emergencies, but typically if your debt is on high interest credit cards, you should consider paying off as much of it as possible. In your case you may want to keep only some small amount (maybe $500, maybe $1000, maybe $100) in cash for emergencies. Paying off your high interest debt should be a top priority for you. You may want to look on this site for help with budgeting, also. Typically, being in debt to credit card companies is a sign of living beyond your means. It costs you a lot of money in the long run. |
Are the stocks of competitor companies negatively correlated? | It is important to first understand that true causation of share price may not relate to historical correlation. Just like with scientific experiments, correlation does not imply causation. But we use stock price correlation to attempt to infer causation, where it is reasonable to do so. And to do that you need to understand that prices change for many reasons; some company specific, some industry specific, some market specific. Companies in the same industry may correlate when that industry goes up or down; companies with the same market may correlate when that market goes up or down. In general, in most industries, it is reasonable to assume that competitor companies have stocks which strongly correlate (positively) with each-other to the extent that they do the same thing. For a simple example, consider three resource companies: "Oil Ltd." [100% of its assets relate to Oil]; "Oil and Iron Inc." [50% of its value relates to Oil, 50% to Iron]; and "Iron and Copper Ltd." [50% of its value relates to Iron, 50% to Copper]. For each of these companies, there are many things which affect value, but one could naively simplify things by saying "value of a resource company is defined by the expected future volume of goods mined/drilled * the expected resource price, less all fixed and variable costs". So, one major thing that impacts resource companies is simply the current & projected price of those resources. This means that if the price of Oil goes up or down, it will partially affect the value of the two Oil companies above - but how much it affects each company will depend on the volume of Oil it drills, and the timeline that it expects to get that Oil. For example, maybe Oil and Iron Ltd. has no currently producing Oil rigs, but it has just made massive investments which expect to drill Oil in 2 years - and the market expects Oil prices to return to a high value in 2 years. In that case, a drop in Oil would impact Oil Inc. severely, but perhaps it wouldn't impact Oil and Iron Ltd. as much. In this case, for the particular share price movement related to the price of Oil, the two companies would not be correlated. Iron and Copper Ltd. would be unaffected by the price of Oil [this is a simplification; Oil prices impact many areas of the economy], and therefore there would be no correlation at all between this company's shares. It is also likely that competitors face similar markets. If consumer spending goes down, then perhaps the stock of most consumer product companies would go down as well. There would be outliers, because specific companies may still succeed in a falling market, but in generally, there would be a lot of correlation between two companies with the same market. In the case that you list, Sony vs Samsung, there would be some factors that correlate positively, and some that correlate negatively. A clean example would be Blackberry stock vs Apple stock - because Apple's success had specifically negative ramifications for Blackberry. And yet, other tech company competitors also succeeded in the same time period, meaning they did not correlate negatively with Apple. |
How can I diversify investments across currencies in ISA? | You have to check if the investment vehicle you are planning to buy is acceptable for ISA on a case by case. Then if it is allowed by HMRC you have to check that your ISA provider offers those products (the mainstream providers might offer a more limited range of products and you might have to go to change your provider) |
ESPP in the UK - worth it? Disqualifying / qualifying sales? | ESPP is common among US companies, often with a framework similar to your outline. In the US, some ESPPs allow sales of shares to be considered qualifying (subject to capital gains rather than ordinary income tax) if they are sold at least 2 years after the enrollment date and at least 1 year after the purchase date. These details can vary from one plan to another and will be stated in the company's ESPP enrollment documents. Do look at the high and low values of the stock over the last year. If it swings up and down more than 15% (or whatever the discount is), then that risk should be a factor in your decision. If the stock is trending upward over the long term and you are confident in the durability of the company, then you might favor holding. |
How to reduce mortgage rate with low income but high assets | The bit I don't quite understand is why you are thinking about staying in debt in the first place - you're basically thinking about shuffling around assets and liabilities in order to stay in debt? I think what I would do in your situation is to liquidate enough of the investments you have and pay off the mortgage. This doesn't change your net worth position less the fees etc that you might incur, but it'll save you the interest for the mortgage over the remaining term of your mortgage. |
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). |
How to change a large quantity of U.S. dollars into Euros? | Be careful of transferring through the large banks. They may say no/low fees, but they hide their cut in the spread, or worsen the exchange rate, to their favor. Try: - http://fxglobaltransfer.oanda.com/ |
Why would you ever turn down a raise in salary? | If you have children in a university institution, then your annual salary is reported via financial aid forms. The small raise could be the difference between full tuition covered and only half tuition covered. |
Where can I invest for the Short Term and protect against Inflation? | Emergency funds, car funds etc tend to have to be accessible quickly (which tends to rule out CDs unless you have the patience to work something like a monthly CD ladder, an I don't) and you'll want your principal protected. The latter pretty much rules out any proper investment (ETFs, mutual funds, stock market directly, Elbonian dirt futures etc). It's basically a risk-vs-return calculation. Not much risk, not much return but at least you're not losing from a nominal standpoint). Another consideration is that you normally aren't able to decide freely if and when you want to pull money out of an emergency fund. If it is an emergency, waiting three weeks to see if the stock market goes up a little further isn't an option so you might end up having to take a hit that would be irrelevant if you were investing long term but might hurt badly because you're left with no choice. I'd stick that sort of money into a money market account and either add to it if necessary to keep up with inflation or make sure that my non-retirement investments over and above these funds are performing well, as those will and should become a far bigger part of your wealth in the longer run. |
First concrete steps for retirement planning when one partner is resistant | I'd try to (gently) point out to your husband that what he thinks he wants to do now and what he might want to do in 20 or 30 years are not necessarily the same thing. When I was 40 I was thinking that I would work until I died. Now I'm 58 and have health problems and I'm counting down the days until I can retire. Even if your husband is absolutely certain that he will not change his mind about retiring in the next 20+ years, maybe something will happen that puts things beyond his control. Like medical problems, or simply getting too old to be able to work. Is he sure that he will be able to continue to put in 40 hour weeks when he's 80? 90? 100? Just because you put money away for retirement doesn't mean that you are required to retire. If you put money away, and when the time comes you don't want to retire, great! Now you can collect the profits on your investments in addition to collecting your salary and live very well. Or have a nice nest egg to leave to your children. Putting money away for retirement gives you options. Retirement doesn't necessarily mean sitting around the house doing nothing until you waste away and die of boredom. My parents were busier after they retired then when they were working. They spent a lot of time on charity work, visiting people in the hospital, working with their church, that sort of thing. Some people start businesses. As they have retirement income coming in, they don't have to worry about the business earning enough to provide a living, so they can do something they want to do because they think it's fun or contributes to society or whatever. Etc. |
In a house with shared ownership, if one person moves out and the other assumes mortgage, how do we determine who owns what share in the end? | This is typically an issue for local law and regulation. Once one person moves out, I would recommend one of the following options: Generally speaking, if there are clear records of all of the payments made by both parties, all of the costs associated with the maintenance and who made what use of the place, the final ownership can be resolved fairly even in the absence of a clear agreement. The pain and hassle to do it, though, is generally not worth the effort - even if it's an amicable relationship between the two owners. Your best bet is to agree as early as possible on what you plan to do, and to write it down - if you didn't have a contract before moving in together, write one up now. |
What is a negotiable security and how are they related to derivatives? | negotiability is a legal concept that permits free transfer of a security without the requirement of prior consent of the issuer. that means the issuer must pay the current holder of the security, irrespective of who he is. negotiability also protects a good faith buyer of the instrument from adverse ownership claims of purported prior holders of the instrument. it is not related to "negotiating" the price or whatnot. A negotiable security means the current owner does not have to be concerned about acquiring the asset via a bad chain of title b/c he can always assert that he is a "holder in due course" defense against such claims, and have absolute security in his ownership right over the asset. securities and derivatives are different. securities are transferrable instruments representing a direct claim on the issuer for the value of the security, whether debt or equity ownership. derivatives are bilateral contracts, which can only be entered into with the consent of both parties, and can only be transferred by such consent. derivatives represent a claim against the parties of to the derivative that depends on some economic reference which is outside of the financial condition of the two parties to the contract, such as interest rates, FX rates, commodity prices, etc. |
Why invest for the long-term rather than buy and sell for quick, big gains? | Every time you buy or sell a share for some price, somebody must have thought that that was exactly the right moment to sell or buy that share at that price (and to trade with you). Every time a trade is made, both sides think they are doing the smart thing. Most of the time, one will turn out to be wrong, the other right. Nothing in your proposed method of trading explains why you would be the side that was right more often. So they'll probably even out. Or maybe there are people in the market who actually do have a slightly better than average method, and you'll be wrong somewhat more often than right. Each trade has transaction costs. If you simply hang on to your shares, that's more or less the same as evening out good trades and bad trades, but without the transaction costs. |
Why can low volume move a stock price drastically? | In a sense, yes. There's a view in Yahoo Finance that looks like this For this particular stock, a market order for 3000 shares (not even $4000, this is a reasonably small figure) will move the stock past $1.34, more than a 3% move. Say, on the Ask side there are 100,000 shares, all with $10 ask. It would take a lot of orders to purchase all these shares, so for a while, the price may stay right at $10, or a bit lower if there are those willing to sell lower. But, say that side showed $10 1000, $10.25 500, $10.50 1000. Now, the volume is so low that if I decided I wanted shares at any price, my order, a market order will actually drive the market price right up to $10.50 if I buy 2500 shares "market". You see, however, even though I'm a small trader, I drove the price up. But now that the price is $10.50 when I go to sell all 2500 at $10.50, there are no bids to pay that much, so the price the next trade will occur at isn't known yet. There may be bids at $10, with asking (me) at $10.50. No trades will happen until a seller takes the $10 bid or other buyers and sellers come in. |
How to know which companies enter the stock market? | NASDAQ provides a very good IPO calendar as well for US listings. |
Employer reported ESPP ordinary income on wrong year's W-2 | Based on the statement in your question you think it should have been on the 2014 W-2 but it was included on the 2015 W-2. If you are correct, then you are asking them to correct two w-2 forms: the 2014 form and the 2015 form. You will also have to file form 1040-x for 2014 to correct last years tax forms. You will have to pay additional tax with that filing, and there could be penalties and interest. But if you directed them on the last day of the year, it is likely that the transaction actually took place the next year. You will have to look at the paperwork for the account to see what is the expected delay. You should also be able to see from the account history when it actually took place, and when the funds were credited to your account. or you could just pay the tax this year. This might be the best if there is no real difference in the result. Now if you added the sale to your taxes lat year without a corresponding tax statement from your account, that is a much more complex situation. The IRS could eventually flag the discrepancy, so you may have to adjust last year filing anyway. |
Is it possible as a non-Indian citizen to create an Indian bank account (denominated in rupees) that can exchange & repatriate its funds? | No, in your situation it is not possible. Mostly, only three types of accounts are available to individuals: So, a complete foreigner can open account in India, only if he is working in India, a type of Savings account, and that account too will be linked to his resident status. If he leaves work, he needs to close this account. Edit: There are business accounts, and current accounts, but those are available only to businesses. Further read at SBI gives a good snapshot |
Oil Price forcasting | If past is prologue, I'd say $20, give or take, inflation adjusted of course. http://www.antagoniste.net/WP-Uploads/2007/01/oil_prices_1861_2006.jpg If supplies are at nightmare oversupply, say, as an absurd unlikely scenario, 82 year high in US oil supplies or an all time record in EIA weekly inventories, it looks like the oil price could be capped at the cost of oil sands: This one's just plain scary. Unless if there were some changes refinery laws or technology that I'm not aware of, refineries cutting 50% of the retail gasoline volumes looks bad: |
MasterCard won't disclose who leaked my credit card details | Others have already commented on the impact of anything which dissuades merchants from raising possible breaches, so I won't dwell on that. Maybe we need stronger legislation, maybe we don't, but it doesn't change today's answer. Often it works the other way around to what you might expect - rather than the merchant noticing and notifying Visa/MC/others, Visa/MC/others spot patterns of suspicious activity (example 1). I don't have any data on the relative numbers of who is being notified/notifying between merchants and payment processors, but at the point when your card is identified as compromised there's no reason to suppose that an individual merchant in the traditional sense has been compromised, let alone identified. In fact because there's a fast moving investigation it could even be a false alarm that led to your card getting cancelled. Conversely it could be a hugely complex multinational investigation which would be jeopardised. It's simply not safe to assume that simply "brand X" has been compromised, therefore everything "brand X" knows about you is also compromised: Furthermore there's no reason to assume the merchant has even admitted to, or discovered the root cause. MC/Visa/Banks, at the point at which they're cancelling cards simply can't say (at least not in a way that might expensively backfire involving lots of lawyers) because the standard of proof needed to go on record blaming someone is simply not yet met. So: yes it's common that you aren't told anything for all of the above reasons. And of course if you really want to find out more you may have some success with your local data protection legislation and formally make a subject access request (or local equivalent) to see what that brings back. Be sure to do it in writing, to the official address of both mastercard and your bank. |
How does the currency between countries relate | It's called correlation. I found this: http://www.forexrazor.com/en-us/school/tabid/426/ID/437424/currency-pair-correlations it looks a good place to start Similar types of political economies will correlate together, opposite types won't. Also there are geographic correlations (climate, language etc) |
Why don't banks give access to all your transaction activity? | Although if you count only your data, it would be quite less 10 MB, multiply this by 1 million customers and you can see how quickly the data grows. Banks do retain data for longer period, as governed by country laws, typically in the range of 7 to 10 years. The online data storage cost is quite high 5 to 10 times more than offline storage. There are other aspects, Disaster recover time, the more the data the more the time. Hence after a period of time Banks move the data into Archive that are cheaper to store but are not available to online query, plus the storage is not optimized for search. Hence retrieval of this data often takes few days if the regulator demands or court or any other genuine request for data retrieval. |
Non-qualified Savings Plan vs. 401(k) for Highly Compensated Employee | 401k plans are required to not discriminate against the non-HCE participants, and one way they achieve this is by limiting the percentage of wages that HCEs can contribute to the plan to the average annual percentage contribution by the non-HCE participants or 3% whichever is higher. If most non-HCE employees contribute only 3% (usually to capture the employer match but no more), then the HCEs are stuck with 3%. However, be aware that in companies that award year-end bonuses to all employees, many non-HCEs contribute part of their bonuses to their 401k plans, and so the average annual percentage can rise above 3% at the end of year. Some payroll offices have been known to ask all those who have not already maxed out their 401k contribution for the year (yes, it is possible to do this even while contributing only 3% if you are not just a HCE but a VHCE) whether they want to contribute the usual 3%, or a higher percentage, or to contribute the maximum possible under the nondiscrimination rules. So, you might be able to contribute more than 3% if the non-HCEs put in more money at the end of the year. With regard to NQSPs, you pretty much have their properties pegged correctly. That money is considered to be deferred compensation and so you pay taxes on it only when you receive it upon leaving employment. The company also gets to deduct it as a business expense when the money is paid out, and as you said, it is not money that is segregated as a 401k plan is. On the other hand, you have earned the money already: it is just that the company is "holding" it for you. Is it paying you interest on the money (accumulating in the NQSP, not paid out in cash or taxable income to you)? Would it be better to just take the money right now, pay taxes on it, and invest it yourself? Some deferred compensation plans work as follows. The deferred compensation is given to you as a loan in the year it is earned, and you pay only interest on the principal each year. Since the money is a loan, there is no tax of any kind due on the money when you receive it. Now you can invest the proceeds of this loan and hopefully earn enough to cover the interest payments due. (The interest you pay is deductible on Schedule A as an Investment Interest Expense). When employment ceases, you repay the loan to the company as a lump sum or in five or ten annual installments, whatever was agreed to, while the company pays you your deferred compensation less taxes withheld. The net effect is that you pay the company the taxes due on the money, and the company sends this on to the various tax authorities as money withheld from wages paid. The advantage is that you do not need to worry about what happens to your money if the company fails; you have received it up front. Yes, you have to pay the loan principal to the company but the company also owes you exactly that much money as unpaid wages. In the best of all worlds, things will proceed smoothly, but if not, it is better to be in this Mexican standoff rather than standing in line in bankruptcy court and hoping to get pennies on the dollar for your work. |
How to measure the cost/value of an Asset in the Financial Statement | Does the friend fix your electrical wiring and the engine of your car? If you need a professional advice - ask a professional. In this case - an accountant (not necessarily a CPA, but at least an experienced bookkeeper). Financial Statements (official documents, that is) must be signed by a public accountant (CPA in the US) or the principle (you). I wouldn't take chances and would definitely have an accountant do that. You need to consider the asset useful life, and the depreciation. The fact that you use it for non-business purposes may be recorded in various ways. One that comes to mind is accounting as a supplement for depreciation: You depreciate the percentage that is used for business, and record as a distribution to owner the rest (which is accounting for the personal use). This way it would also match the tax reporting (in the US, at least). Bottom line: if you're preparing an official financial statement (that you're going to submit to anyone other than yourself) - get a professional advice. |
Should I change 401k investment options to prepare for rising interest rates? | As others have pointed out your bond funds should have short durations, preferably not more than about 2 years. If you are in a bond fund for the long haul meaning you do not have to draw on your bond fund a short time after interest rates have gone up, it is not a big issue. The fund's holdings will eventually turn over into higher interest bearing paper. If bonds do go down, you might want to add more to the fund(s) (see my comment on age-specific asset allocation below). Keep in mind that some stocks are interest sensitive, for example utility stocks which are used as an income source and their dividends compete with rates on CDs which are much safer. Right now CD rates are very low. This could change. It's possible that we may be in an unusually sensitive interest rate period that might have large effects on the stock market, yet to be determined. The reason is that rates have been so low for such a long time that folks that normally would have obtained income streams from bonds have turned to dividend bearing stocks. Some believe that recent market rises are due to such people seeking dividends to enhance cash inflows. If, and emphasis on if, this is true, we could see a sharp drop in the market as sell offs occur as those who want cash streams move from stocks to ultra safe, government insured CDs. Only time will tell if this is going to play out. If retirement for you is 15+ years in the future and the market goes down (bonds or equities), good stuff - it's a buying opportunity in whatever category has dropped. Most important is to keep an eye on your asset allocation and make sure it is appropriate to your age. You did not state the percentages in each category, so further discussion is impossible on that topic. With more than 15 years to go, I personally would be heavily weighted on the equity side, mostly mid-cap and some small equity funds or ETFs in both domestic and international markets. As you age, shuffle some equities into fixed income (bonds, CDs and the like). Work up an asset allocation plan - start thinking about it now. Don't wait. |
Credit rating in Germany | The SCHUFA in Germany works a bit different from the FICO score in the US. My background: I am a German currently living in the US. The information others want to see from the SCHUFA are a bit different. If you want to example rent a house or an apartment, the landlord often wants to see a SCHUFA statement which only shows that there are no negative entries. This statement you can get easily from online and they don't mention your credit score there. If you apply for a real credit or want to lease a car, they want to look deeper in your SCHUFA profile. However, very important is: They need signed permission to do this. Every participating company can submit entries to your profile where the score is calculated from. For example mobile phone plans, leasing a car, applying for a loan. Some lenders decide on the score itself, some on the overall profile and some also take your income into account. Since there is no hire & fire in Germany you are often asked to show your last 3 paychecks. This, in combination with your SCHUFA score is used for determination if you are eligible for a loan or not. However, they check through every entry which is made there and as long as it is reasonable and fits to your income (car for 800 EUR/month with a 1000 EUR salary does not!) you should not have a problem establishing a good score. The, in my eyes, unfair part about Schufa is that they take your zip code and your neighborhood into account when calculating their score. Also moving often affects the score negatively. To finally answer your question: Credit history is also built by mobile phone plans etc. in Germany. As long as you pay everything on time you should be fine. A bad score can definitely hurt you, but it is not as important to have a score as it is in the US because the banks also determine your creditworthiness based on your monthly income and your spending behavior. |
Shares Canceled after Merger | It seems like this was a "stock for stock" transaction. That is, your company was acquired, not for cash, but for the stock of Company X in a deal that your company's board of directors "signed off" on. Your company no longer exists, and that's why your stock was cancelled. The acquirer will be sending you an equivalent amount of stock in their Company, X. You don't need to worry about taxes, only accounting, because this is a "non-cash" transaction. What this means that your cost basis in the stock of Company X will be what you paid for the original company's stock (not its value on the day of the merger, which may be higher or lower than what you paid). |
Invest in (say, index funds) vs spending all money on home? | Rules of thumb? Sure - Put down 20% to pay no PMI. The mortgage payment (including property tax) should be no more than 28% of your gross monthly income. These two rules will certainly put a cap on the home price. If you have more than the 20% to put down on the house you like, stop right here. Don't put more down and don't buy a bigger house. Set that money aside for long term investing (i.e. retirement savings) or your emergency fund. You can always make extra payments and shorten the length of the mortgage, you just can't easily get it back. In my opinion, one is better off getting a home that's too small and paying the transaction costs to upsize 5-10 years later than to buy too big, and pay all the costs associated with the home for the time you are living there. The mortgage, property tax, maintenance, etc. The too-big house can really take it toll on your wallet. |
United States Treasury Not Endorsing Checks | Welcome to the 21st century, the New Order. Forget all that legal mumbo jumbo you may have read back in law school in the 1960s about commercial code. Its all gone now. Now we have Check 21 and the Patriot Act !!! Basically what this means is that because some Arab fanatics burned down the World Trade Center, the US government and its allied civilian banking company henchmen now have total control and dictatorship over "your" money, which is no longer really money, but more like a "credit" to your account with THEM which they can do with what they want. Here are some of the many consequences of the two aforementioned acts: (1) You can no longer sue a bank for mishandling your money (2) All your banking transaction information is the joint property of the bank, its "affiliates" and the US Treasury (3) You can no longer conduct private monetary transactions with other people using a bank as your agent; you can only request that a bank execute an unsecured transaction on your behalf and the bank has total control over that transaction and the terms on which occurs; you have no say over these terms and you cannot sue a bank over any financial tort on you for any reason. (4) All banks are required to spy on you, report any "suspicious" actions on your part, develop and run special software to detect these "suspicious actions", and send their employees to government-run educational courses where they are taught to spy on customers, how to report suspicious customers and how to seize money and safe deposit boxes from customers when the government orders them to do so. (5) All banks are required to positively identify everyone who has a bank account or safe deposit box and report all their accounts to the government. (6) No transactions can be done anonymously. All parties to every banking transaction must be identified and recorded. So, from the above it should be clear to (if you are a lawyer) why no endorsement is present. That is because your check is not a negotiable instrument anymore, it is merely a request to the bank to transfer funds to the Treasury. The Treasury does not need to "endorse" anything. In fact, legally speaking, the Treasury could simply order your bank to empty your account into theirs, and they actually do this all the time to people they are "investigating" for supposed crimes. You don't need to endorse checks you receive either because, as I said above, the check is no longer a negotiable instrument. Banks still have people do it, but it is just a pro forma habit from the old days. Since you can't sue the bank, the endorsement is pretty meaningless because it cannot be challenged in court anyway. You could probably just write "X" there and they would deposit it. |
I am looking for software to scan and read receipts | Try the following apps/services: Receipt Bank (paid service, gathers paper receipts, scans them and processes the data), I've tested it, and it recognizing receipts very well, taking picture is very quick and easy, then you can upload the expenses into your accounting software by a click or automatically (e.g. FreeAgent), however the service it's a bit expensive. They've apps for Android and iPhone. Expentory (app and cloud-based service for capturing expense receipts on the move), |
Stock trading after a crash | If the stock has dropped from $10 to $2 and now is range trading between $2 and $3, and you were not able to sell your shares earlier, then I would no be holding on to them now. As soon as the price hit $3 sell them. After you have sold them and you noticed the stock still range trading one strategy you could apply is to go long after the price bounces off the $2 support placing a stop just below $2, then as the price moves up you trail your stop up with the price. As it starts getting close to $3 tighten your stop. If it keeps range trading and bounces off the resistance at $3 and you get stopped out, you can either go short and reverse the process or wait for it to bounce off the support at $2 again. One word of warning though, the longer a stock range trades, the bigger the outbreak out of the rage (either up or down) will be, that is the reason why you should first wait for confirmation that the price has bounced off support/resistance before opening a position, and secondly why you should use a stop loss to get you out instead of just selling when it hits $3, because if it breaks through $3 you can continue profiting as it moves up. |
Why doesn't change in accounts receivable on balance sheet match cash flow statement? | I'm not an expert, but here is my best hypothesis. On Microsoft's (and most other company's) cash flow statements, they use the so-called "indirect method" of accounting for cash flow from operations. How that works, is they start with net income at the top, and then adjust it with line items for the various non-cash activities that contributed to net income. The key phrase is that these are accounting for the non-cash activities that contribute to net income. If the accounts receivable amount changes from something other than operating activity (e.g., if they have to write off some receivables because they won't be paid), the change didn't contribute to net income in the first place, so doesn't need to be reconciled on the cash flow statement. |
Can I sell a stock immediately? | You can always trade at bid or ask price (depending if you are selling or buying). Market price is the price the last transaction was executed at so you may not be able to get that. If your order is large then you may not even be able to get bid/ask but should look at the depth of the order book (ie what prices are other market participants asking for and what is the size of their order). Usually only fast traders will trade at bid/ask, those who believe the price move is imminent. If you are a long term trader you can often get better than bid or ask by placing a limit order and waiting until a market participant takes your offer. |
Should you always max out contributions to your 401k? | While tax deferral is a nice feature, the 401k is not the Holy Grail. I've seen plenty of 401k's where the investment options are horrible: sub-par performance, high fees, limited options. That's great that you've maxed out your Roth IRA. I commend you for that. As long as the investment options in your 401k are good, then I would stick with it. |
What does HMRC (the UK tax agency) view as valid expenses for travel? | Food is almost never a valid expense. Reason for it is simple - if you were not conducting business you would have to eat too. Ad 1. I don't see why travel in that case would not be a valid expense, as the only reason for you to travel there is for business reasons. Ad 2. Unlikely as there is a duality of purpose. So while part of it may be business, you are also getting personal benefit from the visit (coffee/cakes etc) so that generally is a no. Ad 3. No, while you can claim for entertainment of employees (to sensible extends), that doesn't work when entertaining clients. Ad 4. If any part of the trip is for leisure then you cannot claim it as business expense, sorry! If there is any duality of use then it's not a business expense. And food, as always, is a no go. |
What investments are positively related to the housing market decline? | During the actual decline, there's very little money to be made and a lot to lose. When housing prices tank, everybody loses; the banks are exposed to higher risk of mortgage defaults, insurers start having to pay out more for "gas leaks" claiming over-leveraged homes, realtors starve because their commissions go down (even as foreclosures put more homes on the market) and people faced with financial uncertainty will stay put in their current homes instead of moving elsewhere. And homebuilders and contractors go broke because nobody wants to spend cash on a new home or major reno that looks like a losing investment. There can be some bright spots. Smaller hardware stores will make money as people do relatively small DIY projects to improve the condition of their current home. The larger stores get this business too, but it tends to be more than offset by the loss of contractor business (FAR more lucrative, and something the ACEs and True-Values don't really get in on). Of course the "grave-robbers" do well; gold buyers, auctioneers, pawn shops, repo firms; these guys eat well when other people are defaulting on loans or have to sell their stuff for fast cash. Most of these businesses are not publicly traded. One thing that was seen was increased revenues at discount retailers like Wal-Mart, Dollar General etc. When things are bad, people in the middle class who had avoided these stores for image or morality reasons learn to swallow their pride and buy discount store brands for half the price of national brand names. That lessens the blow felt by the discount retailers as overall consumer spending decreases; the pie shrinks, but the discount retailers get a bigger slice of the mandatory spending on food, clothing, etc (and the higher-level retailers get it in the shorts). When the pie starts to grow again as consumer spending picks back up, the discount retailers retain their percentage for a while, as the fickle middle class can afford to buy more from the discount retailer but can't yet afford to take their business back to the shopping mall stores. This produces a flatter, "offset" price graph for discount retailers through the business cycle; they don't lose as early or as much as everyone else in a major downturn, and they turn it around sooner while everyone else may still be on the way down, but as everything gets better for everyone on the upswing it's less great for the discount guys, as they start losing customers and their dollars to competitors with better stuff, even as the ones they keep spend more. This doesn't generally manifest as a true negative correlation, but it can be a good hedge. The number one money-making investment in a tanking economy is gold. When things go down the crapper, everyone wants gold, so if you see the train wreck coming far enough in advance, you can make a big move to gold and really make some money off that investment. For instance, when the first whispers about ARM adjustments and mass defaults reached the public consciousness in mid-2005, gold bullion jumped from about $400 to over $700 in a nine-month period. It cooled off again in 06-07 but only to about $600/oz, and then in late 07 it steadily climbed to peak at $1000/oz; even if you got in late, an investment of $1000 in July '07 in "bulk" gold would have netted you $650 in one year; that's a 65% APY. Then the economy hit bottom and a lot of investors ditched gold for investments they thought would pull back out of their holes quickly; For just a little while in '08 gold was down to $700 again. Then came all the government reports; unemployment not budging, home prices still declining, a lot of banks still hiding just how bad their position was. If you had seen that it was going to be bad, bad, bad, like a lot of now-billionaire hedge fund investors did, a $1000 investment in gold in July 05, and then cashing out at the tops of the peaks and buying back in at the major troughs, would be worth almost $4000 today. That's a 400% return over 7 years, or an annual average yield of 57%. There simply hasn't been anything like that in the last 7 years. |
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