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Can used books bought off Amazon be claimed as a tax deduction in Australia?
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Yes, you can. That the books were purchased from abroad is irrelevant: you incurred an expense in the course of earning your income. If the books are expensive (>$300 per set iirc) you will need to deprecate them over a reasonable life time rather than claiming the entire amount up front. It doesn't matter whether what you got was a VAT Invoice; as long as you have some reasonable documentation of the expense you're ok.
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Would an ESOP issue physical shares or stock options (call options) to participating employees?
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Not necessarily. The abbreviation "ESOP" is ambiguous. There are at least 8 variations I know of: You'll find references on Google to each of those, some more than others. For fun you can even substitute the word "Executive" for "Employee" and I'm sure you'll find more. Really. So you may be mistaken about the "O" referring to "options" and thereby implying it must be about options. Or, you may be right. If you participate in such a plan (or program) then check the documentation and then you'll know what it stands for, and how it works. That being said: companies can have either kind of incentive plan: one that issues stock, or one that issues options, with the intent to eventually issue stock in exchange for the option exercise price. When options are issued, they usually do have an expiration date by which you need to exercise if you want to buy the shares. There may be other conditions attached. For instance, whether the plan is about stocks or options, often there is a vesting schedule that determines when you become eligible to buy or exercise. When you buy the shares, they may be registered directly in your name (you might get a fancy certificate), or they may be deposited in an account in your name. If the company is small and private, the former may be the case, and if public, the latter may be the case. Details vary. Check the plan's documentation and/or with its administrators.
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What are some sources of information on dividend schedules and amounts?
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I have 3 favorite sites that I use. http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/mcd/dividend-history - lists the entire history of dividends and what dates they were paid so you can predict when future dividends will be paid. http://www.dividend.com/dividend-stocks/services/restaurants/mcd-mcdonalds/ - this site lists key stats like dividend yield, and number of years dividend has increased. If the next dividend is announced, it shows the number of days until the ex-dividend date, the next ex-div and payment date and amount. If you just want to research good dividend stocks to get into, I would highly recommend the site seekingalpha.com. Spend some time reading the articles on that site under the dividends section. Make sure you read the comments on each article to make sure the author is not way off base. Finally, my favorite tool for researching good dividend stocks is the CCC Lists produced by Seeking Alpha's David Fish. It is a giant spreadsheet of stocks that have been increasing dividends every year for 5+, 10+, or 25+ years. The link to that spreadsheet is here: http://dripinvesting.org/tools/tools.asp under "U.S. Dividend Champions".
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Is there any downside snapping a picture (or scanning a copy) of every check one writes vs. using a duplicate check?
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For me, the main benefit of using duplicate checks is that the copy is created automatically. If I had to take an extra step, whether taking a photo or writing on a stub, I would probably not always remember to do it. There is also the issue that you might need to write a check when you don't have your smartphone with you, or it is broken or has a dead battery, etc. There are various pros and cons of having an electronic record versus a paper record. A paper copy of a check is more vulnerable to physical loss or intrusion, but an electronic record is more vulnerable to hacking. You also have to keep the images organized somehow, and take care of data security and backups for the images. You'll have to evaluate which is the greater concern for you. A minor side point is that check duplicates often omit the account number and obscure your signature. A photo of the original check would include both of these. As far as "evidence", it seems to me they're both equally good evidence that you wrote the check - but that's not really that useful. In most sorts of disputes, what you would need to prove is that you actually delivered the check to the intended recipient, and neither the photo nor the paper copy is evidence of that. You could have written the check, taken your photo / copy, and then torn it up.
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Algorithmic trading in linux using python
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I don't think any open source trading project is going to offer trial or demo accounts. In fact, I'm not clear on what you mean by this. Are you looking for some example data sets so you can see how your algorithm would perform historically? If you contact whatever specific brokers that you'd like to interface with, they can provide things like connection tests, etc., but no one is going to let you do live trades on a trial or demo basis. For more information about setting this sort of thing up at home, here's a good link: < http://www.stat.cmu.edu/~abrock/algotrading/index.html >. It's not Python specific, but should give you a good idea of what to do.
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How can I lookup the business associated with a FEIN?
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If the organization is a non-profit. You can search by EIN on Charity Navigator's website FOR FREE. https://www.charitynavigator.org/
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Why do some people say a house “not an investment”?
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I invested in single family homes and made ok. Houses can be an investment. (though the OP seems to equate "house" with primary residence) Just like any other investment buying houses has risks. I would not treat your primary residence or a vacation home as an investment. That is asking for trouble, but for many many years it was safe to assume that you would make a good return on it, and many people did. If you evaluate the numbers for purchase price, rental market, etc and find that rentals or flipping is worth your exposure then by all means, do it. But treating your primary residence as an investment apparently is what that comment means. Just like the stock market, many people have gotten wealthy on homes and there are lots of people who lost their shirts.
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What to do with an expensive, upside-down car loan?
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the best thing to do is file bankrupt. your credit will be shot for 7 to 10 years. however usually 3 years after the bankrupt people will give you small lines of credit. then you rebuild on the small credit lines. and never get into a bad loan again you learn from mistakes. there is no shame in a mistake if you learned from it. I rebuilt my credit by using fingerhut. small credit limit on a cap 1 credit card 300 dollars unsecured card. personal loan of 1500 dollars to buy a old clunk for a car as I did not want to have five years of car payments. you can also get a secured credit card. and build credit with that. the bank will explain how to build credit using your own money. also you should know a lot of banks like your bankrupt stat. because they no you cant file for several more years. meaning if you don't pay your loan they can garnish you and you cant file bankrupt. you can get a new car loan with good interest rate. by taking 5000 dollars of your 15000 dollars savings down on the new loan. making your new car loan have better payments cheaper and better interest. and get a secured credit card of 2000 to build towards a unsecured credit card. keep all your new credit tabs small and pay on time.i would not use all your nest egg savings. that is not smart. get a lawyer and file. stay in school you will have a fresh start and you learned about upside down loans. don't listen to people trying to tell you bankruptsy is bad. it in a lot of ways gives you the upper hand in a no win debt or debts.
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Can you explain why these items are considered negatives on my credit report?
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Creditworthiness is proven over time. The longer your track record of making payments on time, the more probable you will stick to credit agreements in future (or so the reasoning goes). Conversely, someone who has only just started applying for credit could be someone whose finances were previously stable but have now started to get into difficulty. Obviously this is not necessarily the case but it is one possible inference. This inference is strengthened when same person applies for further credit in a short space of time. Ultimately, what is considered positive is a stable credit record over a reasonable period of time, because it indicates you stick to payment schedules and don't suddenly need credit due to money problems. Credit card accounts are considered a good indicator of credit status because they imply what kind of borrower you are. Whereas many credit arrangements present a straightforward case of arrears / no arrears (e.g. think of a mobile phone account – either you pay your bill or you don't), with credit cards there is an element of flexibility in how much you borrow, and how much of that you repay. If you run up four figure monthly balances but clear them in full each month without fail, that is a good sign. If your average balance is increasing and you are paying on time but just the minimum amount, that is a potential flag. In other words, credit cards are of particular interest because they paint a more nuanced picture. Provided you use one responsibly, getting and using a credit card may improve your status with credit reference agencies.
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How much accounting knowledge is needed to read financial statements of publicly traded companies?
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From my experience you don't need knowledge of accounting to pick good stocks. The type of investing you are referring to is fundamental. This is finding out about the company, this websites should help you start off: http://en.tradehero.mobi/how-to-choose-a-stock-fundamental-analysis/ Investopedia will also be a useful website in techniques. A bit of knowledge in economics will be helpful in understanding how current affairs will affect a market, which will affect stock prices. However you need neither economics or accounting knowledge if you were to learn technical analysis, many doubt the workings of this technique, but in my experience it is easier to learn and practise. For example looking at charts from previous years it shows the last time there was a huge recession the dollar did well and commodities didn't. In this recession we are entering you can see the same thing happening. Read about the different techniques before limiting yourself to just looking at financial statements you may find a better technique suited to you, like these technical analysts: http://etfhq.com/blog/2013/03/02/top-technical-analysts/ Hope this helps.
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Good/Bad idea to have an ETF that encompasses another
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Let's simplify things by assuming you only own 2 stocks. By owning VOO and VTI, you're overweight on large- and mid-cap stocks relative to the market composition. Likewise, by owning VTI and VT, you're overweight on U.S. stocks; conversely, by owning VXUS and VT, you're overweight on non-U.S. stocks. These are all perfectly fine positions to take if that's what you intend and have justification for. For example, if you're in the U.S., it may be a good idea to hold more U.S. stocks than VT because of currency risk. But 4 equity index ETFs is probably overcomplicating things. It is perfectly fine to hold only VTI and VXUS because these funds comprise thousands of stocks and thus give you sufficient diversification. I would recommend holding those 2 ETFs based on a domestic/international allocation that makes sense to you (Vanguard recommends 40% of your stock allocation to be international), and if for some reason you want to be overweight in large- and mid-cap companies, throw in VOO. You can use Morningstar X-Ray to look at your proposed portfolio and find your optimal mix of geographic and stock style allocation.
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Why do some symbols not have an Options chain for specific expiration dates?
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All openly traded securities must be registered with the SEC and setup with clearing agents. This is a costly process. The cost to provide an electronic market for a specific security is negligible. That is why the exchange fees per electronic trade are so small per security. It is so small in fact that exchanges compensate price makers partially at the expense of price takers, that exchanges partially give some portion of the overall fee to those that can help provide liquidity. The cost to provide an open outcry market for a specific security are somewhat onerous, but they are initiated before a security has any continual liquidity to provide a market for large trades, especially for futures. Every individual option contract must be registered and setup for clearing. Aside from the cost to setup each contract, expiration and strike intervals are limited by regulation. For an extremely liquid security like SPY, contracts could be offered for daily expiration and penny strike intervals, but they are currently forbidden.
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How are startup shares worth more than the total investment funding?
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The net worth is based on an estimate of how much he would get if he relinquished his stake. The total funding is based on how much he has relinquished thus far. Suppose I have a candy jar with 100 candies. I'm not sure how much these candies are worth, so I start off by selling 10% of the jar for $10. Now I have 90 candies and $10, a total value of $100. Then someone comes along offering $100 for another 10% (of the original jar, or 10 candies), which I accept. Now I have 80 candies and $110. Since I value each candy at $10 now, I calculate my worth as $910. Then I do another deal selling 10% for $1000. Now I have $1110 in cash and 70 candies valued at $100 each. My total worth is now $8110 (cash + remaining candies), while the candy jar has only received $1110 in funding. Replace candies with equity in The Facebook, Inc. and you get the idea.
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How does anyone make significant money on very low volume stocks?
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Because swing trading isn't the only reason to buy a stock, and it's not the only way to make money on a stock. I do not have the expertise to make advice one way or the other, but I personally I feel swing trading is one of the worse ways to invest in the stock market. To answer your specific questions: In the previous post, I outlined a naive trade intended to make $1,000 off a $10k buy, but it was shown this would likely fail, even if the stock price would have increased by 10% had I not placed the trade. Another way to state this is that my trade would disrupt the stock price, and not in my favor at all. So, that means I'd have to settle for a smaller trade. If I bought $100 worth of the stock, that size of a buy wouldn't be too disruptive. I might succeed and get $10 out of the trade (10% of $100). But my trade fee was $8 or so... To summarize, you are completely correct that even hoping for gains of 10% on a consistent basis (in other words, after every single trade!) is totally unrealistic. You already seem to understand that swing trading on low-volume stocks is pointless. But your last question was... So how do people make any significant money trading low volume stocks--if they even do? I assume money is made, since the stocks are bought and sold. I have some guesses, but I'd like to hear from the experts. ... and in a comment: Then if no one does make significant money trading these stocks...what are they doing there on the market? The answer is that the buying and selling is mostly likely not by swing traders. It's by investors that believe in the company. The company is on the market because the company believes public trading to be an advantageous position for them to receive capital investments, and there are people out there who think that transaction makes sense. In other words, real investing.
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How do I account for 100 percent vendor discounts in GnuCash 2.6.5
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The answer was provided to me at the Gnucash chat by "warlord". The procedure is as follows: After doing this you will have:
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Does VSMAX invest in smaller companies than FSEVX?
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You are comparing apples and oranges: the charts show the capital appreciation excluding dividends. If you include dividends and calculate a total return over that period you see VSMAX up 132% vs. FSEVX up 129%, i.e. quite close. That residual difference is possibly due to a performance difference between the two benchmarks.
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Should I set a stop loss for long term investments?
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This is the exactly wrong thing to do especially in the age of algorithmic trading. Consider this event from 2010: Chart Source Another similar event occurred in 2015 and there was also a currency flash crash in that year. As you can see the S&P 500 (and basically the entire market) dropped nearly 7% in a matter of minutes. It regained most of that value within 15 minutes. If you are tempted to think that 7% isn't that big of a deal, you need to understand that specific securities will have a much bigger drop during such events. For example the PowerShares S&P 500 Low Volatility ETF (SPLV) was down 45% at one point on Aug 24, 2015 but closed less than 6% down. Consider what effect a stop loss order would have on your portfolio in that circumstance. You would not be able to react fast enough to buy at the bottom. The advantage of long-term investing is that you are immune to such aberrations. Additionally, as asked by others, what do you do once you've pulled out your money. Do you wait for a big jump in the market and hop back in? The risk here is that you are on the sidelines for the gains. By missing out on just a small number of big days, you can really hurt your long-term returns.
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Small withdrawals from IRA
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You have several questions in your post so I'll deal with them individually: Is taking small sums from your IRA really that detrimental? I mean as far as tax is concerned? Percentage wise, you pay the tax on the amount plus a 10% penalty, plus the opportunity cost of the gains that the money would have gotten. At 6% growth annually, in 5 years that's more than a 34% loss. There are much cheaper ways to get funds than tapping your IRA. Isn't the 10% "penalty" really to cover SS and the medicare tax that you did not pay before putting money into your retirement? No - you still pay SS and medicare on your gross income - 401(k) contributions just reduce how much you pay in income tax. The 10% penalty is to dissuade you from using retirement money before you retire. If I ... contributed that to my IRA before taxes (including SS and medicare tax) that money would gain 6% interest. Again, you would still pay SS and Medicare, and like you say there's no guarantee that you'll earn 6% on your money. I don't think you can pay taxes up front when making an early withdrawal from an IRA can you? This one you got right. When you file your taxes, your IRA contributions for the year are totaled up and are deducted from your gross income for tax purposes. There's no tax effect when you make the contribution. Would it not be better to contribute that $5500 to my IRA and if I didn't need it, great, let it grow but if I did need it toward the end of the year, do an early withdrawal? So what do you plan your tax withholdings against? Do you plan on keeping it there (reducing your withholdings) and pay a big tax bill (plus possibly penalties) if you "need it"? Or do you plan to take it out and have a big refund when you file your taxes? You might be better off saving that up in a savings account during the year, and if at the end of the year you didn't use it, then make an IRA contribution, which will lower the taxes you pay. Don't use your IRA as a "hopeful" savings account. So if I needed to withdrawal $5500 and I am in the 25% tax bracket, I would owe the government $1925 in taxes+ 10% penalty. So if I withdrew $7425 to cover the tax and penalty, I would then be taxed $2600 (an additional $675). Sounds like a cat chasing it's tail trying to cover the tax. Yes if you take a withdrawal to pay the taxes. If you pay the tax with non-retirement money then the cycle stops. how can I make a withdrawal from an IRA without having to pay tax on tax. Pay cash for the tax and penalty rather then taking another withdrawal to pay the tax. If you can't afford the tax and penalty in cash, then don't withdraw at all. based on this year's W-2 form, I had an accountant do my taxes and the $27K loan was added as earned income then in another block there was the $2700 amount for the penalty. So you paid 25% in income tax for the earned income and an additional 10% penalty. So in your case it was a 35% overall "tax" instead of the 40% rule of thumb (since many people are in 28% and 35% tax brackets) The bottom line is it sounds like you are completely unorganized and have absolutely no margin to cover any unexpected expenses. I would stop contributing to retirement today until you can get control of your spending, get on a budget, and stop trying to use your IRA as a piggy bank. If you don't plan on using the money for retirement then don't put it in an IRA. Stop borrowing from it and getting into further binds that force you to make bad financial decisions. You don't go into detail about any other aspects (mortgage? car loans? consumer debt?) to even begin to know where the real problem is. So you need to write everything down that you own and you owe, write out your monthly expenses and income, and figure out what you can cut if needed in order to build up some cash savings. Until then, you're driving across country in a car with no tires, worrying about which highway will give you the best gas mileage.
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What does “interest rates”, without any further context, generically refer to?
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In the United States, if someone refers to the "interest rate", especially if heard on news or talk radio in particular, they are almost always referring to the federal funds rate, a rate set forth and maintained by the United States Federal Reserve (the "fed" for short). If the fed opts to raise or lower this rate, it subsequently effects all interest rates, whether by being directly connected in a chain of loans or by market demand through the efficiency of financial markets in the case of bond auctions. The FOMC meets eight times each year to determine the target for the federal funds rate. The federal funds rate effects all interest rates because it is the originating rate of interest on all loans in the chain of loans. Because of this significance as a benchmark for all interest rates, it is the rate most commonly referred to as "interest rate" when used alone. That is why other rates are specified by what they actually are; e.g., mortgage rates; 10 year & 30 year (for 10 year treasury and 30 year treasury bond yields respectively); savings rate, auto rate, credit card rate, CD rate—all rates of interest effected by the originating loan that is the federal funds rate. This is true in the United States but will vary for other countries. In general though, it will almost always refer to the originating rate for all loans in a given country, institution, etc. Note that bonds have yields that are based on market demand that is, in turn, based on the federal funds rate. It is because of the efficiency of financial markets that the demand, and thus the yields, are correlated to the federal funds rate.
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Separate bank account for security deposit from tenant
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Per Md. REAL PROPERTY Code Ann. § 8-203: (d) (1) (i) The landlord shall maintain all security deposits in federally insured financial institutions, as defined in § 1-101 of the Financial Institutions Article, which do business in the State. (ii) Security deposit accounts shall be maintained in branches of the financial institutions which are located within the State and the accounts shall be devoted exclusively to security deposits and bear interest. (iii) A security deposit shall be deposited in an account within 30 days after the landlord receives it. (iv) The aggregate amount of the accounts shall be sufficient in amount to equal all security deposits for which the landlord is liable. (2) (i) In lieu of the accounts described in paragraph (1) of this subsection, the landlord may hold the security deposits in insured certificates of deposit at branches of federally insured financial institutions, as defined in § 1-101 of the Financial Institutions Article, located in the State or in securities issued by the federal government or the State of Maryland. (ii) In the aggregate certificates of deposit or securities shall be sufficient in amount to equal all security deposits for which the landlord is liable. As such, one or more accounts at your preference; it's up to the bank how to treat the account, so it may be a personal account or it may be a 'commercial' account depending on how they treat it (but it must be separate from your personal funds). A CD is perhaps the easiest way to go, as it's not a separate account exactly but it's easily separable from your own funds (and has better interest). You should also note (further down on that page) that you must pay 3% interest, once per six months; so try to get an account that pays as close as possible to that. You likely won't get 3% right now even in a CD, so consider this as an expense (and you'll probably find many people won't take security deposits in many situations as a result).
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What factors you have do you count on to speculate effectively?
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Strategy would be my top factor. While this may be implied, I do think it helps to have an idea of what is causing the buy and sell signals in speculating as I'd rather follow a strategy than try to figure things out completely from scratch that doesn't quite make sense to me. There are generally a couple of different schools of analysis that may be worth passing along: Fundamental Analysis:Fundamental analysis of a business involves analyzing its financial statements and health, its management and competitive advantages, and its competitors and markets. When applied to futures and forex, it focuses on the overall state of the economy, interest rates, production, earnings, and management. When analyzing a stock, futures contract, or currency using fundamental analysis there are two basic approaches one can use; bottom up analysis and top down analysis. The term is used to distinguish such analysis from other types of investment analysis, such as quantitative analysis and technical analysis. Technical Analysis:In finance, technical analysis is a security analysis methodology for forecasting the direction of prices through the study of past market data, primarily price and volume. Behavioral economics and quantitative analysis use many of the same tools of technical analysis, which, being an aspect of active management, stands in contradiction to much of modern portfolio theory. The efficacy of both technical and fundamental analysis is disputed by the efficient-market hypothesis which states that stock market prices are essentially unpredictable. There are tools like "Stock Screeners" that will let you filter based on various criteria to use each analysis in a mix. There are various strategies one could use. Wikipedia under Stock Speculator lists: "Several different types of stock trading strategies or approaches exist including day trading, trend following, market making, scalping (trading), momentum trading, trading the news, and arbitrage." Thus, I'd advise research what approach are you wanting to use as the "Make it up as we go along losing real money all the way" wouldn't be my suggested approach. There is something to be said for there being numerous columnists and newsletter peddlers if you want other ideas but I would suggest having a strategy before putting one's toe in the water.
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How to find out the amount of preferred stock of Coca Cola Company?
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Coca Cola doesn't seem to have any preferred shares outstanding. From the annual report, it does say that the number of common shares outstanding was 2,294,316,831 as of February 22, 2011. (cover page, right before the horizontal break) But normally, you can find it either toward the beginning of the document or in the statement of shareholder's equity.
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What things should I consider when getting a joint-mortgage?
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The first and most important thing to consider is that this is a BUSINESS TRANSACTION, and needs to be treated as such. Nail down Absolutely All The Details, specifically including what happens if either of you decides it's time to move and wants to sell off your share of the property. Get at least one lawyer involved in drawing up that contract, perhaps two so there's no risk of conflict of interest. What's your recourse, or his, if the other stops making their share of the payments? Who's responsible for repairs and upkeep? If you make renovations, how does that affect the ownership percentage, and what kind of approval do you need from him first, and how do you get it, and how quickly does he have to respond? If he wants to do something to maintain his investment, such as reroofing, how does he negotiate that with you -- especially if it's something that requires access to the inside of the house? Who is the insurance paid by, or will each of you be insuring it separately? What are the tax implications? Consider EVERY possible outcome; the fact that you're friends now doesn't matter, and in fact arguments over money are one of the classic things that kill friendships. I'd be careful making this deal with a relative (though in fact I did loan my brother a sizable chunk of change to help him bridge between his old house and new house, and that's registered as a mortgage to formalize it). I'd insist on formalizing who owns what even with a spouse, since marriages don't always last. With someone who's just a co-worker and casual friend, it's business and only business, and needs to be both evaluated and contracted as such to protect both of you. If you can't make an agreement that you'd be reasonably comfortable signing with a stranger, think long and hard about whether you want to sign it at all. I'll also point out that nobody is completely safe from long-term unemployment. The odds may be low, but people do get blindsided. The wave of foreclosures during and after the recent depression is direct evidence of that.
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In Canada, how bad must your credit be for a denial of a Secured Credit Card?
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Although now there are "welcome" banking packages when I landed in 2008 I couldn't find any and Vancity gave me a secured visa nonetheless. Let me emphasize: I didn't have a credit history, score at all. I doubt this changed much. The bank has zero risk.
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Pros and cons of using a personal assistant service to manage your personal finances?
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Not knowing anything about your situation or what makes it so complex, I would have to agree with the other commenters. If your accountant screws up your business goes under, but at least your personal finances are safe from that and you'll recover (unless all your wealth is tied up in your business). If your virtual assistant uses your personal information to take all your money, ruin your credit, or any number of other things, you're going to spend a loooong time trying to get things "back to normal". If the few hours per month spent managing your finances is starting to add up, I might suggest looking into other ways to automate and manage them. For instance, are all of your bills (or as many as you can) e-bills that can be issued electronically to your bank? Have you set up online bill pay with your bank, so that you can automatically pay all the bills when they arrive? Have you tried using any number of online services (Mint, Thrive, your bank's "virtual wallet/portfolio") to help with budget, expense tracking, etc.? Again, I don't know your exact situation, but hopefully some of these suggestions help. Once I started automating my savings and a lot of my bill paying, it gave me a lot of peace of mind.
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Should I get cash from credit card at 0% for 8 months and put it on loans?
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There are two issues here: arithmetic and psychology. Scenario 1: You are presently paying an extra $500 per month on your student loan, above the minimum payments. Your credit card company offers a $4000 cash advance at 0% for 8 months. So you take the cash advance, pay it toward the student loan, and then instead of paying the extra $500 per month toward the student loan you use that $500 for 8 months to repay the cash advance. Net result: You pay 0% interest on the loan, and save roughly 8 months times $4000 times the interest on the student loan divided by two. (I say "divided by two" because it's not the difference between $4000 and zero, but between $4000 and the $500 you would have been paying off each month.) Clearly you are better off. If you are NOT presently paying an extra $500 on the student loan -- or even if you are but it is a struggle to come up with the money -- then the question becomes, can you reasonably expect to be able to pay off the credit card before the grace period runs out? Interest rates on credit cards are normally much higher than interest rates on student loans. If you get the cash advance and then can't repay it, after 8 months you are paying a very steep interest rate, and anything you saved on the student loan will quickly be lost. What I mean by "psychological" is that you have to have the discipline to really repay the credit card within the grace period. If you're not very confidant that you can do that, this plan could go bad very quickly. Personally, I've thought about doing things like this many times -- cash advances against credit cards, home equity loans, etc, all give low-interest money that could be used to pay off a higher-interest debt. But it's easy to get into trouble doing things like this. It's easy to say to yourself, Well, I don't need to put ALL the money toward that other debt, I could keep a thousand or so to buy that big screen TV I really need. Or to fail to pay back the low-interest loan on schedule because other things keep coming up that you spend your money on instead, whether frivolous luxuries or true emergencies. And there's always the possibility that something will happen to mess up your finances, from a big car repair bill to losing your job. You don't want to paint yourself into a corner. Finally, maxing out your credit cards hurts your credit rating. The formulas are secret, but I understand that if you use more than half your available credit, that's a minus. How much it hurts you depends on lots of factors.
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Can dividends be exploited?
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The moment the dividend is announced, especially from a company that doesn't normally pay dividends, the dividend is factored into everybody's analysis. In the absence of any other news the price of apple would be expected to drop once the dividend in locked in. Why would I buy shares from you at full price one day after the dividend is paid, if I will have to wait for the next dividend? Also keep in mind the dividend was announced on July 24th, and is given to shareholders of record on August 13th. You are way behind the curve.
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Why is the breakdown of a loan repayment into principal and interest of any importance?
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The reason it's broken out is very specific: this is showing you how much interest accrued during the month. It is the only place that's shown, typically. Each month's (minimum) payment is the sum of [the interest accrued during that month] and [some principal], say M=I+P, and B is your total loan balance. That I is fixed at the amount of interest that accrued that month - you always must pay off the accrued interest. It changes each month as some of the principal is reduced; if you have a 3% daily interest rate, you owe (0.03*B*31) approximately (plus a bit as the interest on the interest accrues) each month (or *30 or *28). Since B is going down constantly as principal is paid off, I is also going down. The P is most commonly calculated based on an amortization table, such that you have a fixed payment amount each month and pay the loan off after a certain period of time. That's why P changes each month - because it's easier for people to have a constant monthly payment M, than to have a fixed P and variable I for a variable M. As such, it's important to show you the I amount, both so you can verify that the loan is being correctly charged/paid, and for your tax purposes.
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Do stocks give you more control over your finances than mutual funds?
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In my opinion, the ability to set a sell or buy price is the least of my concerns. Your question of whether to choose individual stocks vs funds prompts a different issue for me to bring to light. Choosing stocks that beat the market is not simple. In fact, a case can be made for the fact that the average fund lags the market by more and more over time. In the end, conceding that fact and going with the lowest cost funds or ETFs will beat 90% of investors over time.
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Is there any drawback in putting all my 401K into a money market fund?
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The drawback is not knowing when prices have reached a level where you are comfortable getting back in. Someone who got out at S&P 1500 before the crash of '08 was very happy. But did they get back in at 666 or just watch the market come back 3X from that level? The S&P returned 10.46% from Jan '87 till Dec '14. I wonder how many traders got in and out just right to beat that number? Bottom line is that even the pro's acknowledge that timing the market is basically impossible, so why try?
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How an ETF pays dividend to shareholders if a holding company issues dividend
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Dividends are not paid immediately upon reception from the companies owned by an ETF. In the case of SPY, they have been paid inconsistently but now presumably quarterly.
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Previous owner of my home wants to buy it back but the property's value is less than my loan… what to do?
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It's a short sale. See these for good overviews: http://www.realtor.org/library/library/fg335 http://homebuying.about.com/od/4closureshortsales/a/shortsalebasics.htm You'll want input from your lawyer and accountant (assuming the lender says they would accept such a sale). Best of luck - sounds like this could be a great opportunity for you if it all comes together. DO NOT talk to a realtor.
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What's the minimum revenue an LLC must make in Florida or NY states?
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Depends on the State. In California, for example, you pay a franchise tax of $800 every year just for having LLC, and in addition to that - income tax on gross revenue. But in other States (like Wyoming, for example) there's no taxes at all, only registration fees (which may still amount to ~$100-300 a year). IRS doesn't care about LLC's at all (unless you chose to treat is as a corporation). You need to understand that in the US we have the "Federal Government" (IRS is part of that) and the "State Government" that deals with business entities, in each of the 50 States. Since you're talking about Italy, and not EU, you should similarly be talking about the relevant State, and not US.
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What is a good price to “Roll” a Covered Call?
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An expiration 2 years out will have Sqr(2) (yes the square root of 2!) times the premium of the 1 year expiration. So if the option a year out sell for $1.00, two is only $1.41. And if the stock trades for $10, but the strike is $12, why aren't you just waiting for expiration to write the next one?
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What can I do with “stale” checks? Can I deposit/cash them?
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Check is an obligation to pay, and is unconditional. In the US, checks don't expire (there are countries where they do). Endorsements such as "void after X days" are meaningless and don't affect the obligation to pay. The bank is under no obligation to honor a check that is more than 6 months old (based on the date on the check, of course). This is from the Unified Commercial Code 4-404. However, this refers to the bank, not to the person who gave you the check. The bank may pay, if the check is deposited in good faith and there's nothing wrong with it or with the account. So the first thing you can do is deposit the check. If asked - you can say that the person just wrote the wrong date, which is true. Worst case the check bounces. If the check bounces - you can start with demand letters and small claim courts. The obligation to pay doesn't go away unless satisfied, i.e.: paid.
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What is the most common and profitable investment for a good retirement in Australia?
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I don't look to Super or Pension, I am working on self funding. My method is work in Sydney and buy a house in Sydney (I bought 6 years ago). Let my property rise on this stupidly insane Sydney growth (my place has risen by 76% in the last 6 years and thats in a "bad" economic climate). Each time the equity hits a certain point get an investment property on an interest only home loan and rent it out. Build this portfolio up as much and as quickly as you can. Repeat over and over until I decide to retire. Sell up investment properties and buy NOT IN SYDNEY where it is much cheaper and move there, keep the main house I always lived in as by this time I will own it outright, rent it out for an income that will more than sustain me in my retirement. Although there is also merit in the idea of sell the one you lived in and use the money to pay of one of the investments, this way you avoid capital gains tax. This idea came to me last night :)
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Simple and safe way to manage a lot of cash
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As your question appears in the second half, so will my answer. Like you, I will provide some background. I remember buying gasoline for $1.759 per gallon. I am so old that I remember buying gasoline for $0.759 per gallon. I recently paid $2.759 per gallon. You claim that your relative is not getting a very good return. Some would suggest that, at $2.759 per gallon, I am not getting a very good price on gasoline. Rates, yields, returns and the price of gas are not what they once were. It is actually difficult to get a pretty bad return relative to the current market. I suspect your relative is no longer getting what he used to get but he is getting a fair return. About record keeping. Your Uncle Sam benefits at your expense when you keep poor records. There are substantial penalties for failing to report everything. Most high school graduates can manage one checking account, one savings account, several charge cards and about 20 CDs and stocks at different institutions with little more than the following: a) a wall calendar b) a shoe box and c) a stack of 3 by 5 cards. Don't misplace the shoe box. If you can use a spreadsheet, it is even easier. Backup your data. There are a several reasons why you shouldn't consolidate all his cash and put it in a single mutual fund account and then put together a mix of investments that work well for him. - you are doing it backwards 1st put together a mix of investments that work well for him 2nd consolidate the assets. Your phrasing suggests a general lack of understanding - most CDs have penalties for early withdrawal. - while you enjoy managing your 401K in a single online account, your older relative might not be as comfortable with a lack of paper statements (see shoe box above) Let me tell you a little about my 401K. x% blue chip, y% small cap, z% bonds, w% foreign stock. Once a quarter, I change my current contribution to re-balance current value towards my target percentages. Every 30 months or so, I consider changing my asset allocation. The allocation considers my age, my spouses age, our childrens ages, my risk tolerance and my intermediate view of the markets. Your mileage my vary. to recap
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Should a high-school student invest their (relative meager) savings?
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Between 1 and 2 G is actually pretty decent for a High School Student. Your best bet in my opinion is to wait the next (small) stock market crash, and then invest in an index fund. A fund that tracks the SP500 or the Russel 2000 would be a good choice. By stock market crash, I'm talking about a 20% to 30% drop from the highest point. The stock market is at an all time high, but nobody knows if it's going to keep going. I would avoid penny stocks, at least until you can read their annual report and understand most of what they're claiming, especially the cash flow statement. From the few that I've looked at, penny stock companies just keep issuing stock to raise money for their money loosing operations. I'd also avoid individual stocks for now. You can setup a practice account somewhere online, and try trading. Your classmates probably brag about how much they've made, but they won't tell you how much they lost. You are not misusing your money by "not doing anything with it". Your classmates are gambling with it, they might as well go to a casino. Echoing what others have said, investing in yourself is your best option at this point. Try to get into the best school that you can. Anything that gives you an edge over other people in terms of experience or education is good. So try to get some leadership and team experience. , and some online classes in a field that interests you.
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Are the guaranteed returns of regulated utilities really what they sound like?
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No. That return on equity number is a target that the regulators consider when approving price hikes. If PG&E tried to get a 20% RoE, the regulator would deny the request. Utilities are basically compelled to accept price regulation in return for a monopoly on utility business in a geographic area. There are obviously no guarantees that a utility will make money, but these good utilities are good stable investments that generally speaking will not make you rich, but appreciate nicely over time. Due to deregulation, however, they are a more complex investment than they once were. Basically, the utility builds and maintains a bunch of physical infrastructure, buys fuel and turns it into electricity. So they have fixed costs, regulated pricing, market-driven costs for fuel, and market-driven demand for electricity. Also consider that the marginal cost of adding capacity to the electric grid is incredibly high, so uneven demand growth or economic disruption in the utility service area can hurt the firms return on equity (and thus the stock price). Compare the stock performance of HE (the Hawaiian electric utlity) to ED (Consolidated Edison, the NYC utility) to SO (Southern Companies, the utility for much of the South). You can see that the severe impact of the recession on HE really damaged the stock -- location matters. Buying strategy is key as well -- during bad market conditions, money flows into these stocks (which are considered to be low-risk "defensive" investments) and inflates the price. You don't want to buy utilities at a peak... you need to dollar-cost average a position over a period of years and hold it. Focus on the high quality utilities or quality local utilities if you understand your local market. Look at Southern Co, Progress Energy, Duke Energy or American Electric Power as high-quality benchmarks to compare with other utilities.
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Should I put more money down on one property and pay it off sooner or hold on to the cash?
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I would go with the 2nd option (put down as little as possible) with a small caveat: avoid the mortgage insurance if you can and put down 20%. Holding your rental property(ies)'s mortgage has some benefits: You can write off the mortgage interest. In Canada you cannot write off the mortgage interest from your primary residence. You can write off stuff renovations and new appliances. You can use this to your advantage if you have both a primary residence and a rental property. Get my drift? P.S. I do not think it's a good time right now to buy a property and rent it out simply because the housing prices are over-priced. The rate of return of your investment is too low. P.S.2. I get the feeling from your question that you would like to purchase several properties in the long-term future. I would like to say that the key to good and low risk investing is diversification. Don't put all of your money into one basket. This includes real estate. Like any other investment, real estate goes down too. In the last 50 or so years real estate has only apprepriated around 2.5% per year. While, real estate is a good long term investment, don't make it 80% of your investment portfolio.
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Where should I park my money if I'm pessimistic about the economy and I think there will be high inflation?
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If you think your cash will buy fewer goods in the future due to inflation, are there goods you will want or need in the future that you can purchase now? I think the cost of storage would need to be less than the inflation in price for this to make sense. If you used commodity trading there may not actually be a storage cost but likely some fees involved that would need to be weighed against the expected inflation. Basically if "things" are going to cost more in the future, making your cash worth less, can you convert cash into "things" before prices escalate?
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Is it inadvisable to leave a Roth IRA to charity upon death?
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You need to keep in mind that there's an exemption amount of more than $5M (five million) dollars for estate tax. Unless you used all of it for gifts during your life time, it will more than cover all of your $70K estate, so there's no need in any additional planning. As to Roth vs Traditional IRA - if you want to leave something to your siblings, leave them the Roth. Why would you give the taxable income to your siblings when you can give them the nontaxable one? Charities are tax exempt anyway.
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What is the main purpose of FED increase and decrease interest rate?
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When inflation is high or is rising generally interest rates will be raised to reduce people spending their money and slow down the rate of inflation. As interest rates rise people will be less willing to borrow money and more willing to keep their money earning a good interest rate in the bank. People will reduce their spending and invest less into alternative assets but instead put more into their bank savings. When inflation is too low and the economy is starting to slow down generally interest rates will be raised to encourage more spending to restart the economy again. As interest rates drop more will take their saving out of their bank accounts as is starts to earn very little in interest rate and more will be willing to borrow as it becomes cheaper to borrow. People will start spending more and investing their money outside of bank savings.
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Can a broker refuse to place my limit-orders?
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Ethereum trades are not subject to the same rules as securities are. Thats the primary flaw in your assessment. Yes, cryptocurrency is a free trading arena where you can actually take advantage of market inefficiencies yourself 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, at massive profits. The equity securities markets are not like that, and can't be used as a comparison. If you have a preference for flexibility, then it is already clear which markets work better for you. Market makers can make stub quotes, brokers can easily block their retail customers from doing it themselves. Even the dubious market manipulation excuse is reference to a sanction exclusive to the equity markets. The idea that it went through a week earlier probably triggered the compliance review. Yes, a broker can refuse to place your limit order.
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Why do Americans have to file taxes, even if their only source of income is from a regular job?
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For two reasons: 1- People are entitled to deductions and credits that your employer cannot possibly know. Only you as an individual know about your personal situation and can therefore claim these deductions and credits by filing income tax returns. 2- Me telling you that you made $100,000 last year is not the same as telling you that you made $125,000 last year, but someone took $25,000 out of your pocket. Tax season is the one time of the year when citizens know exactly what chunk of their hard earned money was taken by the government, creating more collective awareness about taxation and giving politicians a harder time when they propose raising taxes.
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Deductible expenses paid with credit card: In which tax year would they fall?
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I'm a CPA and former IRS agent and manager. Whether you are a cash or accrual basis taxpayer, you get to deduct the expense when your card is charged. Think of it this way: You are borrowing from the credit card company or bank that issued the credit card. You take that money to make a purchase of a product or service. You now have an expense and a liability to a third party. When you pay off the liability, you do not get to take a deduction. Your deduction is when you pay for the expense. Depending on what you purchased, you may have to capitalize it.
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How do I calculate the actual dividend amount for a monthly dividend payout mutual fund?
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In the absence of a country designation where the mutual fund is registered, the question cannot be fully answered. For US mutual funds, the N.A.V per share is calculated each day after the close of the stock exchanges and all purchase and redemption requests received that day are transacted at this share price. So, the price of the mutual fund shares for April 2016 is not enough information: you need to specify the date more accurately. Your calculation of what you get from the mutual fund is incorrect because in the US, declared mutual fund dividends are net of the expense ratio. If the declared dividend is US$ 0.0451 per share, you get a cash payout of US$ 0.0451 for each share that you own: the expense ratio has already been subtracted before the declared dividend is calculated. The N.A.V. price of the mutual fund also falls by the amount of the per-share dividend (assuming that the price of all the fund assets (e.g. shares of stocks, bonds etc) does not change that day). Thus. if you have opted to re-invest your dividend in the same fund, your holding has the same value as before, but you own more shares of the mutual fund (which have a lower price per share). For exchange-traded funds, the rules are slightly different. In other jurisdictions, the rules might be different too.
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Am I still building a credit score if I use my credit card like a debit card?
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I strongly suggest you look at CreditKarma and see how each aspect of what you are doing impacts your score. Here's my take - There's an anti-credit approach that many have which, to me, is over the top. "Zero cards, zero credit" feels to me like one step shy of "off the grid." It's so far to the right that it actually is more of an effort than just playing the game a bit. You are depositing to the card frequently to do what you are doing. That takes time and effort. Why not just pay the bill in full each month, and just track purchases so you move the cash to the account in advance, whether that's physical or on paper? In your case, it's the same as charging one item every few months to keep the card active. If that's what you'd like to do, that's fine. I'd just avoid having the card take up too much of your time and thought. (Disclaimer - I've used and written about Credit Karma. I have no business relationship with them, my articles are to help readers, and not paid placement.) mhoran's response is in line with my thinking. His advice to use the card to build your score is what the zero-credit folk criticize as "a great debt score." Nonsense. If you use debt wisely, you'll never pay interest (except for a mortgage, perhaps) and you may gain rewards with no cost to you.
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First job: Renting vs get my parents to buy me a house
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Say the price is $200K. Would I, as a real estate investor, want to buy such a house? If the rent is $600, that's $7200/yr. "the local property tax rate is levied on the tax base, and the applicable tax rate ranges from 0.40% to 0.76%" so, I'll assume .5%, just $1,000. There are rules of thumb that say half the rent will go to maintenance and other costs, if that seems high, say just $2000. We're left with $4000/yr. Less than 2% on the $200K investment. Italian bonds are yielding 8%. As an investor, if I couldn't get more than $2000/mo gross rent, I would not buy the house for $200K. As a parent, I'd have the money invested, have $16K/yr of income and help support you without taking all the risk the real estate investor has. Note: your question and my answer are in dollars, but I acknowledge the Italy tag, and used Italy property tax. My tax is 1.6% of home value in my US city. Edit: per the comment below, the 8% is incorrect. The return on the house purchase doesn't change, of course, but the safe yields are not that high, currently, 1%.
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Is it bad etiquette to use a credit or debit card to pay for single figure amounts at the POS
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Generally, I consider it bad etiquette to inconvenience others. I would recommend cash for small purchases. Try to offer as close to the required amount as possible. Don't pay with several dollars worth of change if you can avoid it. You shouldn't need to carry a lot of cash. When you do don't make it obvious.
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What governs the shape of price history graphs?
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I agree with @Turukawa that the x-axes need to be the same to make a direct comparison. However, the graphs you linked make me think of introductory calculus: If you time averaged plots, speculative investments (gold, housing) seem to have many large concave up time periods and the dow jones has many concave down sections. Using the concavity test: If the first derivative tells you about the rate of change, the second derivative tells you about the rate of change of rate of change. Remember back to Physics 101: 1st derivative is velocity & second derivative is acceleration. It would be interesting to have the same time scales for your plots & compare these accelerations between the two. I suspect the more volatile investments would have larger (in magnitude) accelerations during boom/bust cycles than less speculative investments.
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401k with paltry match or SPY ETF?
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Switching to only 401k or only SPY? Both bad ideas. Read on. You need multiple savings vehicles. 401k, Roth IRA, emergency fund. You can/should add others for long term savings goals and wealth building. Though you could combine the non-tax-advantaged accounts and keep track of your minimum (representing the emergency fund). SPY is ETF version of SPDR index mutual fund tracking the S&P 500 index. Index funds buy weighted amounts of members of their index by an algorithm to ensure that the total holdings of the fund model the index that they track. They use market capitalization and share prices and other factors to automatically rebalance. Individual investors do not directly affect the composition or makeup of the S&P500, at least not visibly. Technically, very large trades might have a visible effect on the index makeup, but I suspect the size of the trade would be in the billions. An Electronically Traded Fund is sold by the share and represents one equal share of the underlying fund, as divided equally amongst all the shareholders. You put dollars into a fund, you buy shares of an ETF. In the case of an index ETF, it allows you to "buy" a fractional share of the underlying index such as the S&P 500. For SPY, 10 SPY shares represent one S&P basket. Targeted retirement plan funds combine asset allocation into one fund. They are a one stop shop for a diversified allocation. Beware the fees though. Always beware the fees. Fidelity offers a huge assortment of plans. You should look into what is available for you after you decide how you will proceed. More later. SPY is a ETF, think of it as a share of stock. You can go to a bank, broker, or what have you and set up an account and buy shares of it. Then you have x shares of SPY which is the ETF version of SPDR which is an index mutual fund. If the company is matching the first 10% of your income on a 1:1 basis, that would be the best I've heard of in the past two decades, even with the 10 year vesting requirement. If this is them matching 1 dollar in 10 that you contribute to 401k, it may be the worst I've ever heard of, especially with 10 year vesting. Typical is 3-5% match, 3-5 year vesting. Bottom line, that match is free money. And the tax advantage should not be ignored, even if there is no match. Research: I applaud your interest. The investments you make now will have the greatest impact on your retirement. Here's a scenario: If you can figure out how to live on 50% of your take home pay (100k * 0.90 * 0.60 * 0.5 / 12) (salary with first 10% in 401k at roughly 60% after taxes, social security, medicare, etc. halved and divided by 12 for a monthly amount), you'll have 2250 a month to live on. Since you're 28 and single, it's far easier for you to do than someone who is 50 and married with kids. That leaves you with 2250 a month to max out 401k and Roth and invest the rest in wealth building. After four or five years the amount your investments are earning will begin to be noticeable. After ten years or so, they will eclipse your contributions. At that point you could theoretically live of the income. This works with any percentage rate, and the higher your savings rate is, the lower your cost of living amount is, and the faster you'll hit an investment income rate that matches your cost of living amount. At least that's the early retirement concept. The key, as far as I can tell, is living frugally, identifying and negating wasteful spending, and getting the savings rate high without forcing yourself into cheap behavior. Reading financial independence blog posts tells me that once they learn to live frugally, they enjoy it. It's a lot of work, and planning, but if you want to be financially independent, you are definitely in a good position to consider it. Other notes:
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In what cases can a business refuse to take cash?
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The Federal Reserve website notes that creditors must accept cash for debts on services already rendered, but that businesses may refuse cash for services not yet rendered unless prohibited by local law. The Treasury website includes examples of businesses limiting what cash they will accept: For example, a bus line may prohibit payment of fares in pennies or dollar bills. In addition, movie theaters, convenience stores and gas stations may refuse to accept large denomination currency (usually notes above $20) as a matter of policy.
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Do you know of any online monetary systems?
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I'm the equivalent of the FED at ROBLOX. I run a virtual economy there worth millions of dollars. Even though we are in the business of printing our own money, we've seen much more stability in our currency than in the USD. It actually appreciates over time. I don't think it would make a good investment though, nor would any of the online virtual currencies that I am aware of.
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Is there any online personal finance software without online banking?
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MoneyStrands is a site very similar to Mint, but does not force you to link bank accounts. You can create manual accounts and use all features of the site without linking to banks.
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Does the stock market create any sort of value?
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You are right, it is a Ponzi scheme unless it pays all of the profits as dividends. Here's why: today's millenials are saving a lot less, and instead they choose to be spenders. It's just that their mentality is different. If the trend continues there will be more spenders and less savers. That means that in 20 years from now, a company might sell more and make more profits, but because there are less investors on the market it will worth less (judging by supply and demand this has to be true). Doesn't that seem like a disconnect to you guys? Doesn't that just prove that all those profits are not really yours, but instead you're just sitting on the side making bets about them? If I own a company from the point where it goes public and while the value goes up I hold on to it for 50 years. Let's say for 45 years it made tons of profits but never paid a cent in dividend, and then in 5 years it goes out of business. What happened to all the profits they made throughout the 45 years? If you owned a restaurant that made a profit for 45 years and then went bankrupt you are fine, you took your profits every year because why on earth would you reinvest 100% of the profit forever? But what if you could sell 49.9% of that restaurant on the stock market, get all of that IPO money and still keep all of the profits while claiming that you reinvest it forever? That's exactly what they do! They just buy expensive things for personal use, from fancy cars to private jets, they just write it down as an investment and you can't see what the money was spent on because you are not a majority stakeholder, you have no power. It was not like this forever, companies used to pay all of their profits in dividends and be valued according to that. Not anymore. Now they are just in it for the growth, it will keep growing as long as people keep buying into it, and that's the exact definition of a Ponzi scheme.
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Merchant dispute with airline over missed flight, and which credit cards offer protection?
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You have no grounds for a refund. The flight took off on time, and you chose not to be on board. The fact that the airline could not guarantee ahead of time that the flight would leave on time is not relevant. You can certainly try to dispute the charge with the airline, and it sounds like you have done so. The airline correctly indicates that your dispute is unfounded. You can call up your credit card company and explain the situation, and they may accept your dispute. However, I am not aware of any credit card that would reimburse you (that is, issue a chargeback) in this situation. I'm not trying to be unsympathetic. It sucks that you felt you could not rely on the airline, and are now out some money. Fundamentally, though, this was your choice. The airline would be obligated to reimburse you the cost of your flight, or book you on another flight, if the flight was cancelled due to bad weather or other issues, but they owe you nothing if the flight took off on schedule.
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Wash sale rules in India (NSE/BSE)
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I sold it at 609.25 and buy again at 608.75 in the same day If you Sold and bought the same day, it would be considered as intra-day trade. Profit will be due and would be taxed at normal tax brackets. Edits Best Consult a CA. This is covered under Indian Accounting Standard AG51 The following examples illustrate the application of the derecognition principles of this Standard. (e) Wash sale transaction. The repurchase of a financial asset shortly after it has been sold is sometimes referred to as a wash sale. Such a repurchase does not preclude derecognition provided that the original transaction met the derecognition requirements. However, if an agreement to sell a financial asset is entered into concurrently with an agreement to repurchase the same asset at a fixed price or the sale price plus a lender's return, then the asset is not derecognised. This is more relevant now for shares/stocks as Long Term Capital Gains are tax free, Long Term Capital Loss cannot be adjusted against anything. Short Term Gains are taxed differentially. Hence the transaction can be interpreted as tax evasion, professional advise is recommended. A simple way to avoid this situation; sell on a given day and buy it next or few days later.
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Question about car loan payment
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This depends on what the alternative is. Your loan of .99% is very favorable rate. If you have the 15,000 right now but only hold it in your checking account or cash then you might as well just pay it all off(assuming you have an adequate emergency fund). Paying the debt off sooner will save you on interest. Currently if you pay the minimum you will pay a total of $15,230 by the end of the loan, a $230 premium to $15,000. - Math credit goes to Joe If you have an investment vehicle you feel can successfully yield more then .99%, you might want to consider investing that money instead, while paying the minimum on your car loan. Also be sure to check the .99% is not an introductory rate which increases later on. It comes down to whether you can get a better return then .99% investing that money or whether you rather just pay off the debt and not worry about it. If you don't want to bother investing the money, than just pay it off... I also assumed you have no other revolving debt with a higher APR. If you do, first pay off the higher APR debt.
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Recourse with Credit Card company after victimized by fraud?
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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.
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How is yahoo finance P/E Ratio TTM calculated?
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P/E is Price divided by Earnings Per Share (EPS). P/E TTM is Price divided by the actual EPS earned over the previous 12 months - hence "Trailing Twelve Month". In Forward P/E is the "E" is the average of analyst expectations for the next year in EPS. Now, as to what's being displayed. Yahoo shows EPS to be 1.34. 493.90/1.34 = P/E of 368.58 Google shows EPS to be 0.85. 493.40/0.85 = P/E of 580.47 (Prices as displayed, respectively) So, by the info that they are themselves displaying, it's Google, not Yahoo, that's displaying the wrong P/E. Note that the P/E it is showing is 5.80 -- a decimal misplacement from 580 Note that CNBC shows the Earnings as 0.85 as well, and correctly show the P/E as 580 http://data.cnbc.com/quotes/BP.L A quick use of a currency calculator reveals a possible reason why EPS is listed differently at yahoo. 0.85 pounds is 1.3318 dollars, currently. So, I think the Yahoo EPS listing is in dollars. A look at the last 4 quarters on CNBC makes that seem reasonable: http://data.cnbc.com/quotes/BP.L/tab/5 those add up to $1.40.
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Mortgage refinancing
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Check the terms of your mortgage. If you are in a fixed-term mortgage, you can likely "over-pay" a fixed amount of the capital each year: typically 10%. Eg if you owe £300,000 on the mortgage, you can pay off an additional £30,000 this year. Next year you'd owe something like £260,000 so could pay off £26,000. You'd need to check the terms of your mortgage to see what this limit is. You can actually pay off more than this, but would become liable to pay an "early repayment fee" or similar, which is usually something like 3-5% of the mortgage amount. Note that this usually means you would need to re-finance the mortgage anyway If you are not on a fixed-term mortgage than, in the UK at least, you are pretty much free to over-pay as much as you would like or refinance the mortgage. If you are in a fixed-term mortgage, it is usually better to simply over-pay by that maximum allowed amount until the fixed period ends, at which point you can re-finance onto a mortgage that allows higher overpayments. This isn't always the case, though, depending on your interest rate, how high the early repayment charge is, and how much you are able to over-pay. At the very least, you're going to need to do some sums! If you do choose to over-pay up to the limit, then you'd want to over-pay as much as you can at the start of the year (ie don't divide the over-payment by 12, pay it all as early as you can) to reduce interest payments. Then once you hit the limit, put the rest into a savings account: once you are out of the fixed term you can then pay the rest as a lump sum when refinancing.
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What does Dividend 165% mean in stock market?
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Do not confuse the DIV (%) value and the dividend yield. As you can see from this page, the DIV (%) is, as you say, 165%. However, the dividend yield is 3.73% at the time of writing. As the Investopedia page referenced above says: The payout ratio is calculated as follows: Annual Dividends per Share / Earnings per Share. which means that the dividends being paid out are more than the earnings of the company: In extreme cases, dividend payout ratios exceed 100%, meaning more dividends were paid out than there were profits that year. Significantly high ratios are unsustainable.
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Is there strategy to qualify stock options with near expiry date for long term capital gain tax?
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According to page 56 of the 2015 IRS Publication 550 on Investment Income and Expenses: Wash sales. Your holding period for substantially identical stock or securities you acquire in a wash sale includes the period you held the old stock or securities. It looks like the rule applies to stocks and other securities, including options. It seems like the key is "substantially identical". For your brokerage / trading platform to handle these periods correctly for reporting to IRS, it seems best to trade the same security instead of trying to use something substantially identical.
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Is it common in the US not to pay medical bills?
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What you have here is an interesting argument. Right now, this is totally complicated by the state of "forced insurance" that is currently in such hot debate right now. As a general rule of thumb though, most Americans pay their medical bills in one way or another. Though It is also accurate to say that most Americans have avoided paying a medical bill at one point or another. I will give an example that will help clarify. My wife gets a Iron infusion shot one every year or so. We choose not to have insurance. The cost to us is around $275. We know this upfront and have always paid it up front. Except for one year. One year we had insurance. The facility that does the infusions charged us $23,500 to do the infusion that year. The insurance paid $275 to them. We refused to pay the remaining $23,225. This is a real example using real numbers. SO while we are more then able to pay the "normal" amount, and we could, in theory, pay the inflated amount, We out right refuse to. The medical facility tried to negotiated the amount down to $11,000 but we refused. They then tried to talk us into a credit plan. We refused. Then they negotiated the entire thing down to $500. We refused. Finally, after 2 years of fighting they agreed that the service had been pair for by the insurance. And sent us a $0 bill. The entire time, that facility was more then willing to keep doing this annual service for $275.At no time were we denied care. We did have a dent in our credit for a while, but honestly it didn't matter to us. Wrap Up It is fair to say that most Americans do pay their medical bills, but it is also fair to say that most Americans do not pay all their medical bills. The situation is complicated, and made more so by recent changes. Heath insurance is the U.S. is nearly criminal and while some changes have been made in recent years the same overriding truth exists. Sometimes, a medical bill, when going through insurance, is just plain silly, and the only recourse you have as a customer is to not pay it, for a while, till you get it sorted out.
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Is there a way to open a U.S. bank account for my LLC remotely?
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Yes, it is possible. Although there may be red tape for a business account, Alliant Credit Union offers completely online signup and their representatives are reachable by email. You'll probably need to send in the LLC articles this way http://www.alliantcu.com/checking-accounts.html (as pointed out by @littleadv this site defaults to "personal checking" accounts, there is a business checking tab which doesn't generate a direct link, some might miss that) And even if there are a ton of regulations that some pencil pushers at larger banks anecdotally cite (without citing), there will be enough banks that don't care. Good Luck
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Is avoiding fees commonly found with CFD trading possible?
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The fees with trading CFDs are usually lower than standard share trading. There is usually no joining fee to join a broker and start trading with them, you must be talking about the minimum required to fund your account to trade with. What country are you in? Because if you are in the USA I believe CFD trading is not allowed there. Also there is no margin fee associated with trading CFDs. The margin is what you put in to buy or sell the CFD when you open a position. For example if you were to open a position in a share CFD where the underlying share had a price of $10 and you were looking to buy 1000 units. To buy the shares outright your outlay would be $10000 plus brokerage. If the CFD provider had a 10% margin on these share, then your initial margin to open a CFD position would be 10% of $10000 or $1000. If the price of the shares went up to $11 and you sold the shares you would get $11000 ($1000 profit), if you sold the CFDs you would get $2000 ($1000 profit). If on the other hand the shares went down to $9 and you sold the shares you would get $9000 ($1000 loss), if you sold the CFDs you would get $0 ($1000 loss). You have to be careful with margin, it is a two edged sword - it can multiply your gains as well as multiply your losses. The only fees you should be charged with CFDs is brokerage (which should be less than for share trading), and overnight financing costs. This is charged for everyday you hold a long position overnight. You should not be charge any overnight financing cost for holding short positions overnight, and if interest rates were higher you might actually get paid an overnight financing for holding short positions overnight. You may have been closed out of your bitcoin position because you didn't have enough funds in your trading account to open the size trade that you opened. From your question it seems like you are not ready to trade CFDs, you should really learn more about CFDs and the trading platform/s you plan to use before trading with your valuable money. You could probably open up a simulation account whilst you are learning the ropes and become more familiar with the trading platform and with CFDs. And if you are not sure about something ask your broker, they usually have training videos and seminars.
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Why can't the Fed lower interest rates below zero?
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Because giving someone a loan and paying them to take it isn't a loan anymore. I'll grant you, some of the treasury bill auctions did slip below 0% -- people paid in slightly more than what the bill would pay out. In as much as this was done by actual investors (and not afore-mentioned helicopter Ben Bernanke keeping the printing presses running hot all night), it was major accounts fearful of the euro disintegrating and banks crashing, and so on, and needing a safe spot to stick their cash for a couple months. Where the Fed is concerned, that interest rate he's referring to is lending they do to banks. So, how much would you take if you ran a bank and the Fed offered to pay you to take their money? A billion? A trillion? As much as you could cram in your vaults, shove in your pockets, and stuff down your favorite teller's blouse? Yea, me too.
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Should I continue to invest in an S&P 500 index fund?
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You shouldn't. The Dow has gained 7% annually on average since October 1915(inflation-adjusted). It has also lost 73% of its inflation-adjusted value from 1966 to 1982 meaning that it would have lost you 4.5% annually for 16 years. Furthermore, past performance is not indicative of future results. If stock markets keep performing like they have for the past 100 years, you can expect there will be a point within the next 60-or-so years your stocks will be higher in value than they were when you bought them. With funds you are paying the people managing them which means you are guaranteed to have pyramiding losses that your gains will have to offset. In your case, you are betting with no fundamental knowledge that S&P will be higher than now whenever you need the money which is not even supported by the above assumption. Dollar averaging just means you will be placing many bets which will reduce your expected losses(and your expected gains) when compared to just buying $100K worth of S&P right now. Whatever you invest in, and whatever your time-frame, don't gamble. If you can't say this company(ies) will be $X more valuable than now in X months with probability > Y, then you shouldn't be investing in it. Nobody ever made money by losing money. There are also safer investments than the stock market, like treasury bonds, even if the returns are lousy.
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Shorting stocks: Indicators that a stock will drop?
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First utilize a security screener to identify the security profiles you are looking to identify for identifying your target securities for shorting. Most online brokers have stock screeners that you can utilize. At this point you may want to look at your target list of securities to find out those that are eligible for shorting. The SHO thresold list is also a good place to look for securities that are hard to borrow to eliminate potential target securities. http://regsho.finra.org/regsho-Index.html Also your broker can let you know the stocks that are available for borrowing. You can then take your target securities and then you can look at the corporate filings on the SEC's Edgar site to look for the key words you are looking for. I would suggest that you utilize XBRL so you can electronically run your key word searched in an automated manner. I would further suggest that you can run the key word XBRL daily for issuer filings of your target list of securities. Additional word searches you may want to consider are those that could indicate a dilution of the companies stock such as the issuance of convertible debt. Also the below link detailing real short interest may be helpful. Clearing firms are required to report short interest every two weeks. http://www.nasdaq.com/quotes/short-interest.aspx
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Equation to determine if a stock is oversold and by how much?
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What you are seeking is termed "Alpha", the mispricing in the market. Specifically, Alpha is the price error when compared to the market return and beta of the stock. Modern portfolio theory suggests that a portfolio with good Alpha will maximize profits for a given risk tolerance. The efficient market hypotheses suggests that Alpha is always zero. The EMH also suggests that taxes, human effort and information propagation delays don't exist (i.e. it is wrong). For someone who is right, the best specific answer to your question is presented Ben Graham's book "The Intelligent Investor" (starting on page 280). And even still, that book is better summarized by Warren Buffet (see Berkshire Hathaway Letters to Shareholders). In a great disservice to the geniuses above it can be summarized much further: closely follow the company to estimate its true earnings potential... and ignore the prices the market is quoting. ADDENDUM: And when you have earnings potential, calculate value with: NPV = sum(each income piece/(1+cost of capital)^time) Update: See http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2014/02/24/warren-buffett-berkshire-letter/ "When Charlie Munger and I buy stocks..." for these same ideas right from the horse's mouth
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How do you determine the dividend payout date for Mutual Funds?
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Mutual funds generally make distributions once a year in December with the exact date (and the estimated amount) usually being made public in late October or November. Generally, the estimated amounts can get updated as time goes on, but the date does not change. Some funds (money market, bond funds, GNMA funds etc) distribute dividends on the last business day of each month, and the amounts are rarely made available beforehand. Capital gains are usually distributed once a year as per the general statement above. Some funds (e.g. S&P 500 index funds) distribute dividends towards the end of each quarter or on the last business day of the quarter, and capital gains once a year as per the general statement above. Some funds make semi-annual distributions but not necessarily at six-month intervals. Vanguard's Health Care Fund has distributed dividends and capital gains in March and December for as long as I have held it. VDIGX claims to make semi-annual distributions but made distributions three times in 2014 (March, June, December) and has made/will make two distributions this year already (March is done, June is pending -- the fund has gone ex-dividend with re-investment today and payment on 22nd). You can, as Chris Rea suggests, call the fund company directly, but in my experience, they are reluctant to divulge the date of the distribution ("The fund manager has not made the date public as yet") let alone an estimated amount. Even getting a "Yes, the fund intends to make a distribution later this month" was difficult to get from my "Personal Representative" in early March, and he had to put me on hold to talk to someone at the fund before he was willing to say so.
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Does technical analysis work on small stock exchanges?
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Assuming that you accept the premise that technical analysis is legitimate and useful, it makes sense that it might not work for a small market, or at the very least that it wouldn't be the same for a small market as it is for a large market. The reason for this is that a large stock market like the U.S. stock market is as close to a perfect market as you will find: Compare this to a small market in a small country. Market information is harder to get, because there are not as many media outlets covering the news. There aren't as many participants. And possibly it might be more expensive to participate in, and there might be more regulatory intervention than with the large market. All of these things can affect the prices. The closer you get to a perfect market, the closer you get to a point where the prices of the stocks reflect the "true value" of the companies, without external forces affecting prices.
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My friend wants to put my name down for a house he's buying. What risks would I be taking?
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Something else to consider, even if your friend is on the up and up and never misses a payment: Until the house is paid off, any time you apply for credit banks will count the mortgage payment on your friends house against your ability to pay all your existing debts in addition to whatever new loan you're applying for. If you're renting a home now, this will likely mean that you'll be unable to buy one until your friends house is paid off.
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Why do employers require you to spread your 401(k) contributions throughout the year to get the maximum match?
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If one makes say, $10K/mo, and the company will match the first 5% dollar for dollar, a 10%/mo deposit of $1K/mo will see a $500/mo match. If the employee manages to request 90% get put into the 401(k), after 2 months, he's done. If the company wished, they could continue the $500/mo match, I agree. They typically don't and in fact, the 'true up' you mention isn't even required, one is fortunate to get it. Many companies that match are going the other way, matching only after the year is over. Why? Why does any company do anything? To save money. I used to make an attempt to divide my deposit over the year to max out the 401(k) in December and get the match real time, not a true up.
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Is it ok to use a check without a pre-printed check number?
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They are valid checks, but you're going to get hassled when you try to use them. There's a perception that people using starter checks are more likely to bounce or otherwise be troublesome. When more payments were made with checks, some vendors would not accept checks with low numbers either! Checks are very cheap to get printed these days, save yourself some trouble and get some printed.
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Payroll question
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That $200 extra that your employer withheld may already have been sent on to the IRS. Depending on the size of the employer, withholdings from payroll taxes (plus employer's share of Social Security and Medicare taxes) might be deposited in the US Treasury within days of being withheld. So, asking the employer to reimburse you, "out of petty cash" so to speak, might not work at all. As JoeTaxpayer says, you could ask that $200 less be withheld as income tax from your pay for the next pay period (is your Federal income tax withholding at least $200 per pay period?), and one way of "forcing" the employer to withhold less is to file a new W-4 form with Human Resources/Payroll, increasing the number of exemptions to more than you are entitled to, and then filing a new W-4 changing your exemptions back to what they are right now once when you have had $200 less withheld. But be careful. Claims for more exemptions than you are entitled to can be problematic, and the IRS might come looking if you suddenly "discover" several extra children for whom you are entitled to claim exemptions.
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How can Schwab afford to refund all my ATM fees?
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I am using my debit card regularly: in ATM's with a pin, in stores with my signature, and online. But later you say But from what I recall from starting my own business (a LONG time ago), for debit cards there's only a per-transaction fee of like $0.25, not a percentage cut. Only pin transactions have just a per-transaction fee paid by you to the merchant (and you are reimbursed by Schwab). If you use your card with just a signature or online without a pin, then it is a credit transaction from the merchant's perspective. The merchant pays a fee and Schwab gets its cut of that. So for two of the transaction types that you describe, the merchant pays Schwab (indirectly) out of your payment. Only when you enter your pin does it process as a debit transaction where Schwab pays the merchant. Because check cards withdraw the money from your account immediately, you don't even get the twenty to fifty day grace period. So those merchant fees are pure profit for Schwab, offsetting the loss from the ATM fees. You claim $4-5k in fees at $.25 each. That's sixteen to twenty thousand transactions. Assuming that several is four to five years, that's more than ten transactions a day. That seems like a lot. I can see three for meals, one for miscellaneous, and maybe some shopping. But if I go shopping one day, I don't normally go again for a while. I have trouble seeing a consistent average of five or more transactions a day. Even if we use just the higher ATM fees (e.g. $2), that's still more than a transaction a day. That's an extreme level of usage, particularly for someone who also makes frequent purchases via card. I haven't done any other business with them. I find this confusing. How does money get into your account? At some point, you must have deposited money into the account. You can't debit from an account without a positive balance. So you must have done or be doing some kind of business with them. If nothing else, they can invest the balance that you deposit. Note that they make a profit off such investments. They share some of that profit with you in the form of interest, but not that much really. Of course, Schwab may still be losing money on your transactions. We can't really tell without more information on how much of each transaction type you do and how much of a balance you maintain. Perhaps they are hoping that you will do other, more profitable, activities in the future. I doubt there are that many Schwab customers like you describe yourself. As best I've been able to see, they advertise their banking services just to investment customers. So it's unlikely that many customers who don't use their investment services use their banking services just for ATM reimbursements.
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Which practice to keep finances after getting married: joint, or separate?
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Echoing Justkt, different approaches will work for different couples. It also depends on your background, life experience, age, maturity.... Irrespective of the structure, any agreement must be based on a thorough understanding of the mechanism by which responsibility and accountability is apportioned. As in any financial relationship, when money is plentiful and covers all ends, then conflict hardly ever arises. Problems only turn up when money vanishes. Business contracts are written with a view to such conflicts and agreements within a marriage must be equatable and based on a shared understanding. So, don't worry too much about the structure. Think about thinkgs like the following: In other words, given that income between spouses is likely to be unbalanced, how do you manage this within a caring relationship so that neither feels like a charity case, a social worker, or dependent? There will not be one clear answer except that open and honest discussion on an ongoing bases can only serve to strengthen your relationship.
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What is the meaning of “writing put options”?
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Writing options means "selling" options and "put" options are contracts to sell a defined security (the underlying), at a specific date (expiration date) and at a specific price (strike price). So, writing put options simply mean selling to others contracts to sell. Your profit is limited to the premium but your loss may be unlimited in a falling market.
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Canadian in California - filing taxes as a non-resident
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What do you mean by "Canadian income"? Was it income paid to you as wages for the job you did in the US? Or rental/interest income in Canada? If the former - then it doesn't go to NEC, it goes to the main part of the return. If the latter - it doesn't appear on your NR return at all. Yes, it is to validate your residency status. It has no other effect on your taxes.
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How to reconcile a credit card that has an ongoing billing dispute?
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You could make an entry for the disputed charge as if you were going to lose the dispute, and a second entry that reverses the charge as if you were going to win the dispute. You could then reconcile the account by including the first charge in the reconciliation and excluding the reversal until the issue has been resolved.
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Are there any other considerations for bonus sacrifice into Pension (UK)
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The pension is indeed the clear winner and you haven't missed anything. It's easiest to just compare everything in current numbers as you've done and ignore investment opportunities. Given you expect to pay off your student loan in full, you should consider the repayment as a benefit for you too, so the balance is between £580 after tax and £1138 in your pension. As you say under the current tax regime you'd probably end up with £968 in your pocket from the pension. Some harder to value considerations: You might consider there's political risk associated with the pension, as laws may change over the years - but the government has so far not shown any inclination to penalise people who have already saved under one set of assumptions, so hopefully it's reasonably safe (I'm certainly taking that view with my own money!) Paying more towards your student loan or your mortgage is equivalent to investing at that interest rate (guaranteed). If you do the typical thing of investing your pension in the stock market, the investment returns are likely higher but more risky. In today's interest rate environment, you'd struggle to get a "safe" return that's anywhere near the mortgage rate. So if you're very risk averse, that would tilt the balance against the pension, but I doubt it would be enough to change the decision. Your pension might eventually hit the lifetime allowance of £1mn, after contributions and investment growth. If that's a possibility, you should think carefully about the plan for your contributions. If you do go over, the penalties are calibrated to cancel out the difference between higher-rate and basic-rate tax - i.e. cancelling out the tax benefits you outlined, but not the national insurance benefits. But if you do go over, the amount of money you'd have mean that you might also find yourself paying higher-rate tax on some of your pension income, at which point you could lose out. The lifetime allowance is really complicated, there's a Q+A about it here if you want to understand more.
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What investments are positively related to the housing market decline?
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A possibility could be real estate brokerage firms such as Realogy or Prudential. Although a brokerage commission is linked to the sale prices it is more directly impacted by sales volume. If volume is maintained or goes up a real estate brokerage firm can actually profit rather handsomely in an up market or a down market. If sales volume does go up another option would be other service markets for real estate such as real estate information and marketing websites and sources i.e. http://www.trulia.com. Furthermore one can go and make a broad generalization such as since real estate no longer requires the same quantity of construction material other industries sensitive to the price of those commodities should technically have a lower cost of doing business. But be careful in the US much of the wealth an average american has is in their home. In this case this means that the economy as a whole takes a dive due to consumer uncertainty. In which case safe havens could benefit, may be things like Proctor & Gamble, gold, or treasuries. Side Note: You can always short builders or someone who loses if the housing market declines, this will make your investment higher as a result of the security going lower.
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Insurance company sent me huge check instead of pharmacy. Now what?
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In one of your comments you say: Even if the pharmacy is not in the insurance provider network? This is why you got the check instead of your insurance company. I have Blue Cross/Blue Shield, and recently my wife underwent a procedure in the hospital, where one of the physicians involved was not in my providers network. I got a letter from the physicians office stating that since they are out of network, the standard practice was for BCBS to issue the check to me, rather than to the provider. I received the check and made the payment. The main contention is the difference in price, and that is what you need to discuss with both the pharmacy (actual billing) and your insurance company (paid benefits).
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What actions should I be taking to establish good credit scores for my children?
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You really can't. Credit rating is determined by financial history, and until your kids are old enough to legally sign a contract they have essentially no financial history. Interesting out-of-the-box thought, but not workable.
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What is the tax levied against stock portion cashed out of 401k?
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Withdrawals from a traditional 401(k) plan are always treated as cash income and the taxable portion is taxed at ordinary income tax rates, even if the money was held in stocks within the 401(k) plan and the amount withdrawn is equal to whatever capital gains you made by selling the stock within the 401(k) plan. If your plan permits you to take the distribution as stock shares (transferred to your taxable brokerage account), then, for tax purposes, it is treated as if you took a distribution of cash equal to the market price of the shares as of the day of the distribution and promptly bought the same number of shares in your brokerage account. And yes, if the 401(k) plan assets in your ex-employer's plan consists solely of pretax contributions and the earnings thereon, then the entire distribution is ordinary taxable income regardless of whether you sold the stock within the 401(k) plan or took a distribution of stock from the plan and promptly (or after a few days) sold it. The capital gains or losses (if any) from such a sale are, of course, outside the 401(k) plan and taxable accordingly. Finally, the 10% penalty for premature withdrawal from a traditional 401(k) will also apply if you are not 59.5 years of age or older (or maybe 55 since you are separated from service), and it will be computed on the entire distribution.
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Automatic transaction on credit card to stay active
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Putting money into your Amazon gift card balance is also a very convenient option, but I like these recurring Red Cross and Wikipedia ideas also.
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I have about 20 000 usd. How can invest them to do good in the world?
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In the UK, one quirky option in this area (OK, admittedly it's not a passive) is the "Battle Against Cancer Investment Trust" (BACIT). Launched in 2012, it's basically a fund-of-funds where the funds held charge zero management charges or performance fees to the trust, but the trust then donates 1% of NAV to charity each year (half to cancer research, investors decide the other half).
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Theoretically, if I bought more than 50% of a company's stocks, will I own the company?
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I almost agree. I am not completely sure about the ownership of stock, but to have the majority ownership of any company you must own more than 50% of a company's outstanding shares. Although a board in majority, could out vote a majority shareholder in most cases depending on the company policy regarding shareholders and the general law of the country, and to how the company is managed.
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How to pick a state to form an LLC in?
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There are very few circumstances where forming an out of state entity is beneficial, but a website is within these circumstances in certain instances. Businesses with no physical operations do not need to care what jurisdiction they are registered in: your home state, a better united state or non-united state. The "limited liability" does it's job. If you are storing inventory or purchasing offices to compliment your online business, you need to register in the state those are located in. An online business is an example of a business with no physical presence. All states want you to register your LLC in the state that you live in, but this is where you need to read that state's laws. What are the consequences of not registering? There might be none, there might be many. In New York, for example, there are no consequences for not registering (and registering in new york - especially the city - is likely the most expensive in the USA). If your LLC needs to represent itself in court, New York provides retroactive foreign registrations and business licenses. So basically, despite saying that you need to pay over $1000 to form your LLC "or else", the reality is that you get the local limited liability protection in courts whenever you actually need it. Check your local state laws, but more times than not it is analogous to asking a barber if you need a haircut, the representative is always going to say "yes, you do" while the law, and associated case law, reveals that you don't. The federal government doesn't care what state your form an LLC or partnership in. Banks don't care what state you form an LLC or partnership in. The United States post office doesn't care. Making an app? The Apple iTunes store doesn't care. So that covers all the applicable authorities you need to consider. Now just go with the cheapest. In the US alone there are 50 states and several territories, all with their own fee structures, so you just have to do your research. Despite conflicting with another answer, Wyoming is still relevant, because it is cheap and has a mature system and laws around business entity formation. http://www.incorp.com has agents in every state, but there are registered agents everywhere, you can even call the Secretary of State in each state for a list of registered agents. Get an employer ID number yourself after the business entity is formed, it takes less than 5 minutes. All of this is also contingent on how your LLC or partnership distributes funds. If your LLC is not acting like a pass through entity to you and your partner,but instead holding its own profits like a corporation, then again none of this matters. You need to form it within the state you live and do foreign registrations in states where it has any physical presence, as it has becomes its own tax person in those states. This is relevant because you said you were trying to do something with a friend.
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Why charge gross receipts taxes to the customer?
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It sounds like "gross receipt tax" is essentially the same thing most states call "sales tax", which is always handled this way -- prices displayed are pre-tax, tax is added when the final price is calculated. One reason for doing it that way is that most prices result in taxes that involve fractions of pennies, and calculating from the total produces a more accurate result than calculating tax on each item individually. It is theoretically possible to set prices so the numbers come out evenly when tax is added. But that requires that the prices be in fractional cents, potentially to many decimal places. And in fact in some places it is illegal to display (only) the with-tax price. Otherwise I'm sure some stores and restaurants would be willing to deal with the mils and micros, purely on principle or as a marketing gimmick. Since customers have learned to expect sales tax, it really isn't worth the effort to fight it. The closest I've seen has been occasional "we'll pay your sales tax" offers, or statewide sales-tax holidays once a year.
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Day trading definition
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If I buy 10 stocks on Monday and sell the same on Tuesday (different trading day) would I be considered a day trader? No. It is only counting if you buy something and then sell that same something during the same trading session. And that counter only lasts for 5 days, things that happened outside of that time period get removed from the counter. If the counter reaches a number (three to five, depending on the broker), then you are labelled as a pattern day trader, and will have your trading capabilities severely restricted unless you have an account size greater than $25,000
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Can't the account information on my checks be easily used for fraud?
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Yes this is a huge security loophole and many banks will do nothing to refund if you are scammed. For example for business accounts some Wells Fargo branches say you must notify within 24 hours of any check withdrawal or the loss is yours. Basically banks don't care - they are a monopoly system and you are stuck with them. When the losses and complaints get too great they will eventually implement the European system of electronic transfers - but the banks don't want to be bothered with that expense yet. Sure you can use paypal - another overpriced monopoly - or much better try Dwolla or bitcoin.
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What is the best way to invest in US stocks from India?
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Quite a few stock broker in India offer to trade in US markets via tie-up brokers in US. As an Indian citizen, there are limits as to how much FX you can buy, generally very large, should be an issue. The profits will be taxed in US as well as India [you can claim relief under DTAA]
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Boyfriend is coowner of a house with his sister, he wants to sell but she doesn't
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He doesn't have to follow through on this, but he could tell this sister that he will stop making mortgage payments, which will result in foreclosure and sale at lower price than might be realized by a voluntary sale. Translation: the house will sold, sis. Do you want to maximize your share of the proceeds? And, as I said in a comment above: I hope that he is keeping careful records of mortgage an utility payments, as he might (should) be entitled to a refund from the proceeds of an eventual sale (possibly adjusted by the fair rent value of the time which he spent living there)
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How long can I convert 401(k) to Roth 401(k)?
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Conversions must be done during the calendar year. This would apply to both IRA and 401(k) accounts. For IRAs, deposits may be made until 4/15, and the same holds for Solo 401(k) accounts. For conversions, the IRA permits a recharacterization, basically, a do-over, which reverses the conversion, any or all, in case you have any reason it should not have been done. That has a deadline of 10/15, i.e. 4/15 plus 6 month extension. The 401(k) conversion has no such provision. Simple answer 12/31 of the given year.
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What types of careers consistently make the most money entering with no background or social skills?
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You may think it sucks to have learned a crap ton of category theory, which is seemingly useless outside of academia, but have you considered picking up a "functional" programming language, e.g. Haskell? How about Java or, more recently, Scala? I would bet that you would love Haskell. And then you can make a fortune working at Jane Street Capital, which uses OCaml, another functional programming language. Time to get your hands dirty with some programming experience. Minimal social skills required, as you had wished for, plus maximal compensation, plus you get to keep using math that was sort of close to your research area. Good luck.
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0% APR first 12 months on new credit card. Can I exceed that 30% rule of thumb and not hurt my credit score?
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I cannot stress this enough, so I'll just repeat it: Don't plan your finances around your credit score. Don't even think about your credit score at all. Plan a budget an stick to it. Make sure you include short and long term savings in your budget. Pay your bills on time. Use credit responsibly. Do all of these things, and your credit rating will take care of itself. Don't try to plan your finances around raising it. On the subject of 0% financing specifically, my rule of thumb is to only ever use it when I have enough money saved up to buy the thing outright, and even then only if my budget will still balance with the added cost of repaying the loan. Other people have other rules, including not taking such loans at all, and you should develop a rule that works for you (but you should have a rule). One rule shouldn't have is "do whatever will optimize your credit score" because you shouldn't plan your finances around your credit score. All things considered, I think the most important thing in your situation is to make sure that you don't let the teaser rate tempt you into making purchases you wouldn't otherwise make. You're not really getting free money; you're just shifting around the time frame for payment, and only within a limited window at that. Also, be sure to read the fine print in the credit agreement; they can be filled with gotchas and pitfalls. In particular, if you don't clear the balance by the end of the introductory rate period, you can sometimes incur interest charges retroactively to the date of purchase. Make sure you know your terms and conditions cold. It sounds like you're just getting started, so best of luck, and remember that Rome wasn't built in a day. Patience can be the most effective tool in your personal finance arsenal. p.s. Don't plan your finances around your credit score.
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Should Emergency Funds be Used for Infrequent, but Likely, Expenses?
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I don't think there is a definite single answer for this. I think it largely depends on where you are on your financial journey. In the ideal world you'd have everything in bucket 2 built into your budget and be putting a little bit aside every paycheck to cover each of those things when they do come up but that takes a fair bit of discipline to do and experience (and data) to estimate reasonably. When you are just starting out in actually setting and keeping a budget or digging yourself out of CC debt/living paycheck to paycheck the odds are you aren't going to have the experience or disciple necessary to actually budget for those things in bucket 2 and even if you did the better option might well be to pay off that high interest debt you already have rather than saving up for an eventual expense. How ever as you start to improve your situation and pay off that debt, develop the disciple to set and follow a budget that is when you should start adding more of those things into your budget. How you track them doesn't really matter. A separate account at your bank. A total for a category in your budgeting software. An XLS file or even paper (ick). Ultimately it isn't about how you plan for and track things but more about actually doing that. So my question to the OP is where are you? If you already have a budget and do a good job of following it but don't have those items in it then consider that the next step in your financial journey.
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