Question stringlengths 14 166 | Answer stringlengths 3 17k |
|---|---|
Avoiding timing traps with long term index investing | 1) The risks are that you investing in financial markets and therefore should be prepared for volatility in the value of your holdings. 2) You should only ever invest in financial markets with capital that you can reasonably afford to put aside and not touch for 5-10 years (as an investor not a trader). Even then you should be prepared to write this capital off completely. No one can offer you a guarantee of what will happen in the future, only speculation from what has happened in the past. 3) Don't invest. It is simple. Keep your money in cash. However this is not without its risks. Interest rates rarely keep up with inflation so the spending power of cash investments quickly diminishes in real terms over time. So what to do? Extended your time horizon as you have mentioned to say 30 years, reinvest all dividends as these have been proven to make up the bulk of long term returns and drip feed your money into these markets over time. This will benefit you from what is known in as 'dollar cost averaging' and will negate the need for you to time the market. |
How would I use Google Finance to find financial data about LinkedIn & its stock? | When fundamentals such as P/E make a stock look overpriced, analysts often point to other metrics. The PEG ratio, for example, can be applied to cast growth companies in a better light. Fundamental analysis is highly subjective. For further discussion on the pitfalls of fundamentals, I suggest A Random Walk Down Wall Street by Burton Malkiel. |
First job: Renting vs get my parents to buy me a house | Rent. You have no idea whether you will still be in the same part of the country five years from now; you may not even be in the same country. A house is a boat anchor you really do not need or want at this time. It's also a set of obligations you may not want to take on yet. And buying is not automatically more financially advantageous than renting, when you remember that money not going into the house can go into your retirement plan or other investments. |
Basic mutual fund investment questions | You asked 3 questions here. It's best to keep them separate as these are pretty distinct, different answers, and each might already have a good detailed answer and so might be subject to "closed as duplicate of..." That said, I'll address the JAGLX question (1). It's not an apples to apples comparison. This is a Life Sciences fund, i.e. a very specialized fund, investing in one narrow sector of the market. If you study market returns over time, it's easy to find sectors that have had a decade or even two that have beat the S&P by a wide margin. The 5 year comparison makes this pretty clear. For sake of comparison, Apple had twice the return of JAGLX during the past 5 years. The advisor charging 2% who was heavy in Apple might look brilliant, but the returns are not positively correlated to the expense involved. A 10 or 20 year lookback will always uncover funds or individual stocks that beat the indexes, but the law of averages suggests that the next 10 or 20 years will still appear random. |
Do I need to file taxes jointly with my girlfriend if we live together? | If you pay her rent, how do you differ from a tenant in the eyes of the law? I ask this to show that you are in a business relationship first and foremost. If you don't want to file jointly, there is nothing compelling about your situation to force it. (Grant you, in most countries, there is a benefit to filing jointly) but here, I would argue it would be difficult to make the case. There are, to the best of my knowledge, no laws barring opposite sex landlord-tenant rental situations. Furthermore, there are no laws barring romantic relationships amongst landlords and tenants. Indeed, you would need to prove your relationship in some fashion for it to even be considered. In establishing a date of separation from my soon-to-be-ex-wife, for example, I merely needed to prove that we were not "presenting ourselves as husband and wife." Once I showed that we didn't sit together at church and that she was attending parties I wasn't, that was sufficient. Proving you are in a relationship is actually a lot harder than proving you're not. |
I carelessly invested in a stock on a spike near the peak price. How can I salvage my investment? | If you know you have picked a bad stock, the sooner you sell the better. There is a tendency to hold a bad stock in the hope that it will pick up again. Most of us fall into this trap. The best way one needs to look at things are; |
Is it wise to sell company stock to pay down a mortgage? | If by "Company Stock" you mean "stock in the company I work for" then absolutely sell your stock. It is too big a risk to have your investments tied into the same company that is also providing your salary. If you mean stock as in general investments, I like to look at it this way. If you have $25,000 stock and a $100,000 mortgage you ask this question: If I had a $75,000 mortgage would I borrow an additional $25,000 against my house to invest in the stock market? If the answer is yes, then you are taking a risk consistent with your tolerance for risk. If you answer no, then your tolerance for risk says you'd be happier paying down your mortgage. |
How to account for personal baby sitter? | You should check several things: How your business can deduct your child care expenses is beyond me. If your mother-in-law starts a business as a neighborhood babysitter, she might get some deductions for her related expenses though. |
Personal finance management: precise or approximately? | Here is what we do. We use YNAB to do our budgeting and track our expenses. Anything that gets paid electronically is tracked to the penny. It really needs to be, because you want your transaction records to match your bank's transaction records. However, for cash spending, we only count the paper money, not the coins. Here is how it works: If I want a Coke out of a vending machine for 75 cents, and I put a dollar bill in and get a quarter back as change, I record that as a $1.00 expense. If, instead, I put 3 quarters in to get the Coke, I don't record that expense at all. Spending coins is "free money." We do this mainly because it is just easier to keep track of. I can quickly count the cash in my wallet and verify that it matches the amount that YNAB thinks I have in my wallet, and I don't need to worry about the coins. Coins that are in my car to pay for parking meters or coins in the dish on my dresser don't need to be counted. This works for us mainly because we don't do a whole lot of cash spending, so the amount we are off just doesn't add up to a significant portion of our spending. And, again, bank balances are exact to the penny. |
Why does Charles Schwab have a Mandatory Settlement Period after selling stocks? | That is the standard set by most securities exchanges: T+3 : trades complete three days after the bargain has been struck. |
How is not paying off mortgage better in normal circumstances? | One way of looking at it is that your equity in your house is an investment in a particular class of asset, and investing further in that asset class may drive you away from, rather than towards, your preferred asset mix. It's pretty common here in New Zealand for people's only investments to be their homes and rental properties. I wish those people luck when our current property boom ends. |
In a house with shared ownership, if one person moves out and the other assumes mortgage, how do we determine who owns what share in the end? | This is typically an issue for local law and regulation. Once one person moves out, I would recommend one of the following options: Generally speaking, if there are clear records of all of the payments made by both parties, all of the costs associated with the maintenance and who made what use of the place, the final ownership can be resolved fairly even in the absence of a clear agreement. The pain and hassle to do it, though, is generally not worth the effort - even if it's an amicable relationship between the two owners. Your best bet is to agree as early as possible on what you plan to do, and to write it down - if you didn't have a contract before moving in together, write one up now. |
What are the pitfalls of loaning money to friends or family? Is there a right way to do it? | There are two levels to consider here: That said, before loaning/giving anyone money ask yourself if it is good for them. If they have problems managing their money, or holding down a job, and you give them money, they are just going to come back for more later. In this type of situation, you shouldn't give/loan them money. But on the other hand, if a friend or family member has hit a rough patch and you know they are the kind of person that will be on their feet again soon, and you have nothing to lose, give them the money. |
Taxable income on full-time job + business earnings | In Australia, any income you earn is taxable despite where it came from. Using your example your taxable income is $70,000. Keep in mind that with a business even as a sole trader any business expenses that contribute to the earning of your business income is deductible, reducing the final amount of tax you'll have to pay. The ATO website has lots of good information and examples to look at including tax rates. If your total income is pushing into a higher tax bracket over 30c tax per $1 earned, it may be worth looking at shifting your business to operate under a company structure that just has a fixed tax rate around 30c per $1. That said, for me, I don't want the paperwork overhead of a company yet so I'm running my side business as a sole trader too. I'd rather do that and keep it easy for now while my business gets profitable that waste time on admin structures for tax reasons even if in the shortterm it may mean slightly higher tax. In the end, you only pay tax on profit (income minus expenses) as opposed to raw/gross income. For more info there are good books in the bookshops or local library (to read free) on starting a business on the side while still working. They discuss these issues too. |
Buy US ETF as foreigner — a bad idea? | A quick update for people finding this thread through Google. With the help of a few awesome Bogleheads, I compiled all the relevant research done into two Wiki articles: This includes comparing US to Irish domiciled ETFs, how to calculate tax withholding leakage and estate tax concerns. Hope you find this useful. |
“Business day” and “due date” for bills | I don't believe Saturday is a business day either. When I deposit a check at a bank's drive-in after 4pm Friday, the receipt tells me it will credit as if I deposited on Monday. If a business' computer doesn't adjust their billing to have a weekday due date, they are supposed to accept the payment on the next business day, else, as you discovered, a Sunday due date is really the prior Friday. In which case they may be running afoul of the rules that require X number of days from the time they mail a bill to the time it's due. The flip side to all of this, is to pick and choose your battles in life. Just pay the bill 2 days early. The interest on a few hundred dollars is a few cents per week. You save that by not using a stamp, just charge it on their site on the Friday. Keep in mind, you can be right, but their computer still dings you. So you call and spend your valuable time when ever the due date is over a weekend, getting an agent to reverse the late fee. The cost of 'right' is wasting ten minutes, which is worth far more than just avoiding the issue altogether. But - if you are in the US (you didn't give your country), we have regulations for everything. HR 627, aka The CARD act of 2009, offers - ‘‘(2) WEEKEND OR HOLIDAY DUE DATES.—If the payment due date for a credit card account under an open end consumer credit plan is a day on which the creditor does not receive or accept payments by mail (including weekends and holidays), the creditor may not treat a payment received on the next business day as late for any purpose.’’. So, if you really want to pursue this, you have the power of our illustrious congress on your side. |
What kinds of information do financial workers typically check on a daily basis? | I think it depends where you live in the world, but I guess the most common would be: Major Equity Indices I would say major currency exchange rate: And have a look at the Libors for USD and EUR. I guess the intent of the question is more to see how implicated you are in the daily market analysis, not really to see if you managed to learn everything by heart in the morning. |
How are bonds affected by the Federal Funds Rate? | The federal funds rate is one of the risk-free short-term rates in the economy. We often think of fixed income securities as paying this rate plus some premia associated with risk. For a treasury security, we can think this way: (interest rate) = (fed funds rate) + (term premium) The term premium is a bit extra the bond pays because if you hold a long term bond, you are exposed to interest rate risk, which is the risk that rates will generally rise after you buy, making your bond worth less. The relation is more complex if people have expectations of future rate moves, but this is the general idea. Anyway, generally speaking, longer term bonds are exposed to more interest rate risk, so they pay more, on average. For a corporate bond, we think this way: (interest rate) = (fed funds rate) + (term premium) + (default premium) where the default premium is some extra that the bond must pay to compensate the holder for default risk, which is the risk that the bond defaults or loses value as the company's prospects fall. You can see that corporate and government bonds are affected the same way (approximately, this is all hand-waving) by changes in the fed funds rate. Now, that all refers to the rates on new bonds. After a bond is issued, its value falls if rates rise because new bonds are relatively more attractive. Its value rises if rates on new bonds falls. So if there is an unexpected rise in the fed funds rate and you are holding a bond, you will be sad, especially if it is a long term bond (doesn't matter if it's corporate or government). Ask yourself, though, whether an increase in fed funds will be unexpected at this point. If the increase was expected, it will already be priced in. Are you more of an expert than the folks on wall-street at predicting interest rate changes? If not, it might not make sense to make decisions based on your belief about where rates are going. Just saying. Brick points out that treasuries are tax advantaged. That is, you don't have to pay state income tax on them (but you do pay federal). If you live in a state where this is true, this may matter to you a little bit. They also pay unnaturally little because they are convenient for use as a cash substitute in transactions and margining ("convenience yield"). In general, treasuries just don't pay much. Young folk like you tend to buy corporate bonds instead, so they can make money on the default and term premia. |
Should I deduct or capitalize the cost to replace a water heater in my rental property? (details Below) | Pub 527 my friend. It gets depreciated. Table 1-1 on page 5. |
Why can't 401(k) statements be delivered electronically? | Glad my question got bumped. I took it as a sign to get a solid answer out of Schwab. First the rep gave me the same line that it was impossible to provide paperless statements for a 401(k) plan because of "regulations". I pressed the issue and got this from the rep: I just spoke with our dedicated small business plan team. They told me that there are regulations that state that a Qualified Plan, such as this, require to have a statement sent. It is a Schwab policy that we have decided to only allow paper statements for this account type. So to clarify, it is a Schwab business decision to have the statements available only by mail. Hope someone from Schwab with some authority sees this post and is pushed toward helping change their policy. I can't imagine what a colossal waste of paper, postage, and hassle it is for everyone involved. |
My employer is switching 401k plan providers. How might this work in practice? | A few years ago our company switched from Fidelity to a different 401k provider. During the blackout transition, nearly every employee lost a considerable amount of money. The "Trustee" advised us that during the blackout he had a right to invest the funds and that the investments lost money. |
1099 Misc for taking care of foreign exchange students | According to Intuit, you cannot claim the $50 charitable contribution, so the entire $2000 / month will be taxable instead of $1900. That's only an extra $35 if your combined tax rate is 35%. As TTT mentioned, do this for the experience, not for the money. My wife and I have been hosting international students for 10 years now. https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/3152069-i-received-a-1099-misc-employee-compensation-for-hosting-a-foreign-exchange-student-can-i-complete-a-schedule-c-for-the-expenses |
What to do with your savings in Japan | As an alternative to investing you'll find at least some banks eg. Rakuten that will give you preferential interest rates(still 0.1% though) just for opening a free brokering account. As this is still your individual savings account your money is as safe as it was before opening your account. I certainly wouldn't buy to hold any stock or fund that is linked to the Nikkei right now. Income stocks outside of the 225 may be safer, but you'd still need to buy enough of them that their individual results don't affect your bottom line. |
How should I pay off my private student loans that have a lot of restrictions? | The one thing that I saw in here that raised a big red flag is that you said you "overpaid" on your interest. ALWAYS make sure you tell them that any extra money should be applied to principal only, not to interest. You accrue interest based on your outstanding principal amount, so getting that lower reduces the overall amount of interest you end up paying. Paying the interest ahead saves you nothing. However, make sure you pay the current interest owed that month. They can capitalize past due interest - in affect, change that to be considered an addition to the loan principal amount and you end up paying interest on the interest. |
Mortgage vs. Cash for U.S. home buy now | If you are investing in a mortgage strictly to avoid taxes, the answer is "pay cash now." A mortgage buys you flexibility, but at the cost of long term security, and in most cases, an overall decrease in wealth too. At a very basic level, I have to ask anyone why they would pay a bank a dollar in order to avoid paying the government 28 - 36 cents depending on your tax rate. After all, one can only deduct interest- not principal. Interest is like rent, it accrues strictly to the lender, not equity. In theory the recipient should be irrelevant. If you have a need to stiff the government, go ahead. Just realize you making a banker three times as happy. Additionally the peace of mind that comes from having a house that no banker can take away from you is, at least for me, compelling. If I have a $300,000 house with no mortgage, no payments, etc. I feel quite safe. Even if my money is tied up in equity, if a serious situation came along (say a huge doctors bill) I always have the option of a reverse mortgage later on. So, to directly counter other claims, yes, I'd rather have $300k in equity then $50k in equity and $225k in liquid assets. (Did you notice that the total net worth is $25k less? And that's even before one considers the cash flow implication of a continuing mortgage. I have no mortgage, and I'm 41. I have a lot of net worth, but the thing that I really like is that I have a roof over my head that no on e can take away from me, and sufficient savings to weather most crises). That said, a mortgage is not about total cost. It is about cash flow. To the extent that a mortgage makes your cash flow situation better, it provides a benefit- just not one that is quantifiable in dollars and cents. Rather, it is a risk/reward situation. By taking a mortgage even when you have the cash, you pay a premium (the interest rate) in order to have your funds available when you need it. A very simple strategy to calculate and/or minimize this risk would be to invest the funds in another investment. If your rate of return exceeds the interest rate minus any tax preference (e.g. 4% minus say a 25% deduction = 3%), your money is better off there, obviously. And, indeed, when interest rates are only 4%, it may may be possible to find that. That said, in most instances, a CD or an inflation protected bond or so won't give you that rate of return. There, you'd need to look at stocks- slightly more risky. When interest rates are back to normal- say 5 or 6%, it gets even harder. If you could, however, find a better return than the effective interest rate, it makes the most sense to do that investment, hold it as a hedge to pay off the mortgage (see, you get your security back if you decide not to work!), and pocket the difference. If you can't do that, your only real reason to hold the cash should be the cash flow situation. |
After consulting HR Block, are you actually obligated to file your taxes with them, if they've found ways to save you money? | The obligation is contractual, so you need to read the contract to answer your question. However, since you paid for the service provided, I see no way they can force you buy any other service from them. They cannot file your tax returns without your explicit consent (on a form dedicated to that, dated and having the numbers matching the return filed - not something you can sign before the actual return is ready). Worst case they can claim you owe them more money, but since you paid for the services provided, I can't see how they can have that stand in court as well. Bottom line - even if the contract has such an obligation, I cannot see how it can be enforced. As to the mistake they noted... I wouldn't rely on H&R Block advice in any matter. Very likely, the person you were talking to was not even licensed to provide tax advice. You're lucky if the person has passed CRTP exams (in California they're legally required), but I seriously doubt their clerks are EAs or CPAs (the only designations other than a lawyer legally allowed to provide tax advice). Tax preparers (CRTPs included) are only allowed to provide advice pertaining to the preparation of the tax return they're currently engaged to prepare. Claiming income is sourced or not sourced in NY is borderline, IMHO. If they got it wrong (and to me it sounds as they did) you can sue them for damages. If your situation is tricky and it is too late to get an appointment with a proper adviser - file an extension (form 4868) and deal with it after the April busy season. |
Potential pitfalls of this volume trading strategy | People are trying ideas like this, actually. Though they generally aren't very public about it. While keshlam ventures into hyperbole when mentioning Watson, he is certainly correct human language parsing is a extremely hard problem. While it is not always true that the big players will know before the news (sometimes that would qualify as insider trading). The volume spike that you mention generally comes as the news arrives to the major (and minor) players. So, if you have an algorithm run after the volume spike the price will likely have adjusted significantly already. You can try to avoid this by constantly scanning for news on a set of stocks however this becomes an even harder problem. Or maybe by becoming more specific and parsing known important and specific news sources (farm report for instance) and trying to do so faster than anyone else. These are some methods people use to not be too late. |
Saving $1,000+ per month…what should I do with it? | In your situation I suggest: In terms of what to spend it on, one tax preparer I knew said he would ask his wealthy clients (ones with real net worth) what they spent their money on, and it was almost always travel. We agree, memories from our trips are ones that last a lifetime. I can't say much else you buy gives you the same long term payback in your personal life. |
Why is a stock dividend considered a dividend? What makes it different from a stock split? | A stock dividend isn't exactly a split. Example: You have 100 shares of stock worth $5 a share (total value $500). The company wants to distribute a dividend worth 1%. You could expect a check for $5. But If they wanted to do a stock dividend they could send you 0.01 shares for every share you own, in your case you will be given a single share worth $5. Now you own 101 shares. Why a share dividend? It doesn't take cash to give the dividend. It keeps the money invested in the company. Some investors re-invest a cash dividend, some don't. A cash dividend is generally taxable income for the investor; a stock dividend isn't. Some investors prefer one over the other, but it depends on their specific financial picture. Neither a stock dividend, a cash dividend or split changes anything. The split changes the price to meet a goal. The cash dividend lowers the price by sending excess cash to the investors. The stock dividend lowers the price by creating new shares and retaining cash. It company picks the message and the method. depending on their goals and situation. Remember that a company may want to give a dividend because they have a history of doing so, but not have the cash to do so. It is like a split because the number of shares you own will go up, and the price per share will go down. But a split is generally done to bring the price of a share to within a specific range. The company sees a benefit to having a stock mid priced, instead of very high or very low. |
How do I add my income to my personal finance balance? | Create an account called, say, "Paycheck". When you get paid, create an entry with your gross income as a deposit. For each deduction in your paycheck, create a minus (or expense) entry. After doing that, what will be left in the Paycheck account will be your net income. Simply transfer this amount to the real account your paycheck goes into (your checking account, probably). Almost all the time, the value of your Paycheck account will be 0. It will be nonzero only for a moment every two weeks (or however often you get paid). I don't know if this is the standard way of doing it (in the professional accounting world). It's a way I developed on my own and it works well, I think. I think it's better than just adding a deposit entry in your checking account for your net income as it lets you keep track of all your deductions. (I use Quicken for the Mac. Before they added a Paycheck feature, I used this method. Then they removed the Paycheck feature from the latest version of Quicken for the Mac and I now use this method again.) |
Why would this FHA refinance cause my mortgage insurance payment to increase so much? | In the spring of this year FHA increased their rates for Mortgage Protection insurance. (I am looking for a good refernceon the government website) Non Government reference Annual MIP For an FHA Streamline Refinance that replaces a FHA loan endorsed on, or after, June 1, 2009, the annual MIP varies based on loan type and loan-to-value. The annual MIP schedule, for loans with case numbers assigned on, of after, June 1, 2009 : For your example the monthly payment would be: $184,192*(1.2/100)*(1/12) = ~ $184.19 You were quoted 179.57 a month |
Finding stocks following performance of certain investor, like BRK.B for Warren Buffet | Since nobody seems to have an answer here is the list I've came up so far: I'll keep adding to the list - also feel free to edit or comment if can add to the list. |
Why does gold have value? | Most of the answers here reflect a misunderstanding of what gold actually is from a financial perspective. I'll answer your question by asking two questions, and I do challenge you to stop and think about what we mean when we say "cash" or "unit of exchange" because without understanding those, you will completely miss this answer. In 1971, the DXY was 110. For people who don't know, the DXY is the US Dollar Index - it weighs the strength of the US Dollar relative to other currencies. Hey look, it's a pretty graph of the DXY's history. In 1971, gold was $35 an ounce. The DXY is 97 today. Gold is $1170 an ounce today. Now the questions: If shares of Company A in 1971 were $10 a share, but now are $100 a share and some of this is because the company has grown, but some of it is because of inflation and the DXY losing value, what would the value of the company be if it was held in grams of gold and not dollars? Benjamin Graham, who influenced Warren Buffett, is a "supposed" critic of gold, yet what percent of his life were we not on a gold standard? In his day, the dollar was backed by gold - why would you buy gold if every dollar represented gold. Finally, consider how many US Dollars exist, and how few metric tonnes of gold exist (165,000). Even Paul Volcker admitted that a new gold standard would be impossible because the value of gold, if we did it today, would put gold in the $5000-$10000 range - which is absurd: To get on a gold standard technically now, an old fashioned gold standard, and you had to replace all the dollars out there in foreign hands with gold, God the price, you buy gold, because the price of gold would have to be enormous. So, you're all left hoping the Federal Reserve figures how to get us all out of this mess without causing trouble, otherwise, let me just kindly say, you WILL realize the value of gold then. As the old saying goes, "A fool and his money are soon parted." I could be wrong, but I'd say that those who've been buying gold since 1971 for their "cash holdings" (not index funds) aren't the suckers. |
Should I pay half a large balance this month before I get my CC statement? | It will reduce the credit ding you will take but why does it matter? Next cycle when it's paid off your credit score will go back to where it was. Unless you're looking for a loan right now and your credit is marginal why worry about it? |
What options do I have at 26 years old, with 1.2 million USD? | Wow, everyone tells you different investment strategies. You have all your life ahead of you. Your main focus should not be getting the best return rate, but ensuring your existence. Who cares if you get 7% if you'll lose all in the next market crash and stand on the street with no education, no job and nothing to fall back on? I would go a completely different route in your place: The best advise given above was to not consider this as an option to never work again. It's not enough money for that, unless you want to live poorly and always be afraid that the next financial crises wipes you out completely. |
Short Selling Specific to India | In India the only way to short a stock is using F&O which I personally find to be sufficient for any shorting needs. However, Futures can be generally sold for upto 3 months but options have more choices which are even upto 5 years you can buy a put of a longer duration and when you want to do buy-back, you can directly sell the same option by squaring-off the trade before expiry date. You generally get approximately the same profit as shorting but you get to limit your risk. |
Why does the stock market index get affected when a terrorist attack takes place? | While JB King says some useful things, I think there is another fundamental reason why stock markets go down after disasters, either natural or man-made. There is a real impact on the markets - in the case of something like 9/11 due to closed airport, higher security costs, closer inspections on trade goods, tighter restrictions on visas, real payments for the rebuilding of destroyed buildings and insurance payouts for killed people, and eventually the cost of a war. But almost as important is the uncertainty and risk. Nobody knew what was going to happen in the days and weeks after an attack like that. Is there going to be another one a week later, or every week for the next year? Will air travel become essentially impractical? Will international trade be severely restricted? All those would have a huge, massive effect on the economy. You may argue that those things are very unlikely, even after something like 9/11. But even a small increase in the likelihood of a catastrophic economic crash is enough to start people selling. There is another thing that drives the market down. Even if most people are sure that there won't be a catastrophic economic crash, they know that other people think there might be and so will sell. That will drive the market down. If they know the market is going down, then sensible traders will start to sell, even if they think there is zero risk of a crash. This makes the effect worse. Eventually prices will drop so far that the people who don't think there is a crash will start to buy, so they can make a profit on the recovery. But that usually doesn't happen until there has been a substantial drop. |
Is there a good rule of thumb for how much I should have set aside as emergency cash? | The main factor should be what sorts of emergencies you are trying and also need to protect yourself against. Overall I'd say at least 6-9 months of expenses, adjusted for the above factors. More might be better but I'd probably keep that in a different type of investment vehicle, mainly because it doesn't really need to be accessible instantaneously like your normal emergency fund would need to be. |
Does dollar cost averaging really work? | If you know with 100% certainty what the market will do, then invest it all at the best time. If not, spread it out over time to avoid investing it all at the worst possible time. |
What percent of a company are you buying when you purchase stock? | Your question has already been answered, you divide the amount of shares you own * 100% by the total amount of shares. However, I feel it is somewhat misleading to talk about owning a percentage of the company by owning shares. Strictly speaking, shares do not entitle you to a part of the company but instead give you a proportional amount of votes at shareholder meetings (assuming no funky share classes). What this means is that someone who owns 30% of a company's shares can't just grab 30% of the company's assets (factories, offices and whatever) and say that they are entitled to own this. What they actually own is 30% of the voting rights in this company, this means that they control 30% of all available votes when the company calls a vote on corporate actions, choosing a new director etc. which is how shareholders exert their influence on a company. |
Should I open a credit card when I turn 18 just to start a credit score? | Yes, it is a very good idea to start your credit history early. It sounds like you have a good understanding of the appropriate use of credit, as a substitute for cash rather than a supplement to income. As long as you keep your expenses under control and pay off your card each month, I see no problems with the idea. Try to find a card with no annual fees, a low interest rate if possible (which will be difficult at your age), and with some form of rewards such as cash back. Look for a reputable issuing bank, and keep the account open even after you get a new card down the road. Your credit score is positively correlated with having an account open for a long time, having a good credit usage to credit limit ratio, and having accounts in good standing and paid on time. |
How do I estimate my taxes when I have only 1099 income? | As long as you paid 100% of your last year's tax liability (overall tax liability, the total tax to pay on your 1040) or 90% of the total tax liability this year, or your underpayment is no more than $1000, you won't be penalized as long as you pay the difference by April 15th. That's per the IRS. I don't know where the "10% of my income" came from, I'm not aware of any such rule. |
Do I need to pay Income Tax if i am running a escrow service in India | This may be closed as not quite PF, but really "startup" as it's a business question. In general, you should talk to a professional if you have this type of question, specifics like this regarding your tax code. I would expect that as a business, you will use a proper paper trail to show that money, say 1000 units of currency, came in and 900 went out. This is a service, no goods involved. The transaction nets you 100, and you track all of this. In the end you have the gross profit, and then business expenses. The gross amount, 1000, should not be the amount taxed, only the final profit. |
Should I buy a house with a friend? | Unlike others who have answered the question - I have done this. Here is my experience - your mileage and friendship may vary: I bought a condo years ago with a longtime childhood friend. We did it for all the reasons you mentioned - sick of renting and not building equity, were both young, single professionals who had the money. The market crashed we have both since married and moved on to own other properties with our spouses. Now we rent out the condo as selling in the current market is not doable.. It's not an ideal situation but that is because of the real estate market - not who I bought with. You need to discuss very openly all of the following scenarios, as well as others I can't think of right now I am sure: If you aren't both 100% in sync with these questions then do not do it. I never understand why some people would buy with a girlfriend/boyfriend but not a good personal friend. You're more likely to have a falling out with your significant other then a long time close friend. My advice, have honest, open conversations, about all possible scenarios. If you feel necessary put somethings down into some sort of legal agreement - with us it was not, and still isn't necessary. |
When following a buy and hold investment strategy, on what conditions should one sell? | Here's an easy test... Look at the investments in your portfolio and ask yourself whether if you had the cash value, would you buy those same investments today, because effectively that is what you are doing when you continue to hold. If the answer is no, sell and pick something else. Above all else, don't react to market swings, in most cases you are going to get it wrong and wind up losing more by making emotional decisions. |
Buying a small amount (e.g. $50) of stock via eToro “Social Trading Network” using a “CFD”? | There are some useful answers here, but I don't think any of them are quite sufficient. Yes, there are some risks involved in CFD trading, but I will try and give you information so you can make your own decision. Firstly, Cyprus is part of the EU, which gives it a level of credibility. I'm not saying it's the safest or most well regulated market in the world, but that in itself would not particularly scare me away. The far more important issue here is the risk of using CFDs and of eToro themselves. A Contract for Difference is really just a specialization of an Equity Swap. It is in no way like owning a real stock. When you purchase shares of a company you own a real Asset and are usually entitled to dividends and voting rights. With a CFD, what you own is one side of a Swap contract. You have a legal agreement between yourself and eToro to "swap" the return earned on the underlying stock for whatever fees eToro decide to charge. As already mentioned, CFDs are not available to US citizens. Equity swaps have many benefits in financial markets. They can allow access to restricted markets by entering into swaps with banks that have the necessary licenses to trade in places like China. Many "synthetic" ETFs use them in Europe as a way to minimize tracking error as the return is guaranteed by the swap counterparty (for a charge). They also come with one signficant risk: counterparty credit risk. When trading with eToro, for as long as your position is open, you are at risk of eToro going bankrupt. If eToro failed, you do not actually own any stocks, you only own swap contracts which are going to be worthless if eToro ceased to exist. CFDs also have an ongoing cost to maintain the open position. This makes them less suitable for buy and hold strategies as those ongoing costs will eat into your returns. It's also not clear whether you would receive any dividends paid by the stock, which make up a significant proportion of returns for buy and hold investors. eToro's website is fairly non-committal: eToro intends to offer a financial compensation representing the dividends which will be allocated on stocks, to the extent such dividends shall be available to eToro. All of these points expose what CFDs are really for - speculating on the stock market, or as I like to call it: gambling. If you want to invest in stocks for the long term, CFDs are a bad idea - they have high ongoing costs and the counterparty risk becomes significant. Wait until you have enough money and then buy the real thing. Alternatively, consider mutual funds which will allow you to purchase partial shares and will ensure your investment is better diversified across a large number of stocks. If however, you want to gamble and only keep your position open for a short time, these issues may not be of concern to you. There's nothing wrong with gambling, it can be fun, many people gamble in casinos or on football matches - but bear in mind that's what CFDs are for. CFDs were in fact originally created for the UK market as a way to avoid paying capital gains tax when making short term speculative trades. However, if you are going to gamble, make sure you're not putting any more than 1% of your net worth at risk (0.1% may be a better target). There are a few other ways to take a position on stocks using less money than the share price: Fortunately, eToro do not allow leveraged purchase of stocks so you're reasonably safe on this point. They claim this is because of their 'responsible trading policy', although I find that somewhat questionable coming from a broker that offers 400:1 leverage on FX pairs. One final word on eToro's "social trading" feature. A few years ago I was in a casino playing Blackjack. I know nothing about Blackjack, but through sheer luck of the draw I managed to treble my money in a very small amount of time. Seeing this, a person behind me started "following" me by putting his chips down on my seat. Needless to say, I lost everything, but amazingly the person behind me got quite annoyed and started criticizing my strategy. The idea of following other people's trades just because they've been lucky in the past sounds entirely foolish to me. Remember the warning on every mutual fund: Past performance does not guarantee future returns |
What did John Templeton mean when he said that the four most dangerous words in investing are: ‘this time it’s different'? | It's a statement that seems to be true about our tendency to believe we won't make the same mistake twice, even though we do, and that somehow what's occurring in the present is completely different, even when the underlying fundamentals of the situation may be nearly identical. It's a form of self-delusion and, sometimes, mass-delusion, and it has been a major contributing factor to many of our worst financial disasters. If you look at every housing bubble, for instance, we examine the aftermath, put new regulations and procedures into place, theoretically to prevent it from happening again, and then move forward. When the cycle starts to repeat itself, we ignore the signals, telling ourselves, "oh, that can't happen again -- this time it's different." When investors begin to ignore the warning signs because they think the current situation is somehow totally different and therefore there will be a different outcome than the last disaster, that's when things actually do go bad. The 2008 housing crisis was caused by the same essential forces that brought about similar (albeit smaller scale) housing disasters in the 80's and 90's -- greed caused banks and other participants in the housing sector to make loans they knew were no good (an oversimplification to be sure, but apt nonetheless), and eventually the roof caved in on the market. In 2008, the essential dynamics were the same, but everyone had convinced themselves that the markets were more sophisticated and could never allow things like that to happen again. So, everyone told themselves this was different, and they dove into the markets headlong, ignoring all of the warning signs along the way that clearly told the story of what was coming had anyone bothered to notice. |
Looking for a stock market simulation that's as close to the real thing as possible | Stock market is like poker: you don't take the same risks when it is fake money and thus you don't learn the same lessons from your mistakes. I would recommend instead to play with real market and real money (rule #0: use only money that you don't need). Start with safe products and go to the bath progressively. It took me about ten years and I am still learning. |
Stock portfolio value & profit in foreign currency | I think this will do the trick: |
Can I get a mortgage from a foreign bank? | Simple answer YES you can, there are loads here are some links : world first , Baydon Hill , IPF Just googling "foreign currency mortgage", "international mortgage", or "overseas mortgage" gets you loads of starting points. I believe its an established and well used process, and they would be "classified" as a "normal" mortgage. The process even has its own wiki page Incidentally I considered doing it myself. I looked into it briefly, but the cost of fee's seemed to outweigh the possible future benefits of lower interest rates and currency fluctuations. |
Can I do periodic rollovers from my low-perfoming 401k to an IRA? | There are certain allowable reasons to withdraw money from a 401K. The desire to free your money from a "bad" plan is not one of them. A rollover is a special type of withdrawal that is only available after one leaves their current employer. So as long as you stay with your current company, you cannot rollover. [Exception: if you are over age 59.5] One option is to talk to HR, see if they can get a expansion of offerings. You might have some suggestions for mutual funds that you would like to see. The smaller the company the more likely you will have success here. That being said, there is some research to support having few choices. Too many choices intimidates people. It's quite popular to have "target funds" That is funds that target a certain retirement year. Being that I will be 50 in 2016, I should invest in either a 2030 or 2035 fund. These are a collection of funds that rebalances the investment as they age. The closer one gets to retirement the more goes into bonds and less into stocks. However, I think such rebalancing is not as smart as the experts say. IMHO is almost always better off heavily invested in equity funds. So this becomes a second option. Invest in a Target fund that is meant for younger people. In my case I would put into a 2060 or even 2065 target. As JoeTaxpayer pointed out, even in a plan that has high fees and poor choices one is often better off contributing up to the match. Then one would go outside and contribute to an individual ROTH or IRA (income restrictions may apply), then back into the 401K until the desired amount is invested. You could always move on to a different employer and ask some really good questions about their 401K. Which leads me back to talking with HR. With the current technology shortage, making a few tweaks to the 401K, is a very cheap way to make their employees happy. If you can score a 1099 contracting gig, you can do a SEP which allows up to a whopping 53K per year. No match but with typically higher pay, sometimes overtime, and a high contribution limit you can easily make up for it. |
Do I make money in the stock market from other people losing money? | The stock market is no different in this respect to anything that's bought or sold. The price of a stock like many other things reflects what the seller is prepared to sell it at and what the buyer is prepared to offer for it. If those things match then a transaction can take place. The seller loses money but gains stocks they feel represent equivalent value, the reverse happens for the buyer. Take buying a house for example, did the buyer lose money when they bought a house, sure they did but they gained a house. The seller gained money but lost a house. New money is created in the sense that companies can and do make profits, those profits, together with the expected profits from future years increase the value that is put on the company. If we take something simple like a mining company then its value represents a lot of things: and numerous other lesser things too. The value of shares in the mining company will reflect all of these things. It likely rises and falls in line with the price of the raw materials it mines and those change based on the overall supply and demand for those raw materials. Stocks do have an inherent value, they are ownership of a part of a company. You own part of the asset value, profits and losses made by that company. Betting on things is different in that you've no ownership of the thing you bet on, you're only dependent on the outcome of the bet. |
What are the best software tools for personal finance? | KMyMoney Pros: Cons: |
How to calculate how far a shorted stock's price can rise before broker issues a margin call? | When margin is calculated as the equity percentage of an account, the point at which a broker will forcibly liquidate is typically called "maintenance margin". In the US, this is 25% for equities. To calculate the price at which this will occur, the initial and maintenance margin must be known. The formula for a long with margin is: and for a short where P_m is the maintenance margin price, P_i is the initial margin price, m_i is the initial margin rate, and m_m is the maintenance margin rate. At an initial margin of 50% and a maintenance margin of 25%, a long equity may fall by 1/3 before forced liquidation, a short one may rise by 50%. This calculation can become very complex with different asset classes with differing maintenance margins because the margin debt is applied to all securities collectively. |
Retirement Options for Income | I can think of one major income source you didn't mention, dividends. Rather than withdrawing from your pension pot, you can roll it over to a SIPP, invest it in quality dividend growth stocks, then (depending on your pension size) withdraw only the dividends to live on. The goal here is that you buy quality dividend growth stocks. This will mean you rarely have to sell your investments, and can weather the ups and downs of the market in relative comfort, while using the dividends as your income to live off of. The growth aspect comes into play when considering keeping up with inflation, or simply growing your income. In effect, companies grow the size of their dividend payments and you use that to beat the effects of inflation. Meanwhile, you do get the benefit of principle growth in the companies you've invested in. I don't know the history of the UK stock market, but the US market has averaged over 7% total return (including dividends) over the long term. A typical dividend payout is not much better than your annuity option though -- 3% to 4% is probably achievable. Although, looking at the list of UK Dividend Champion list (companies that have grown their dividend for 25 years continuous), some of them have higher yields than that right now. Though that might be a warning sign... BTW, given all the legal changes around buy-to-lets recently (increases stamp duty on purchase, reduction in mortgage interest deduction, increased paperwork burden due to "right to rent" laws, etc.) you want to check this carefully to make sure you're safe on forecasting your return. |
Are Index Funds really as good as “experts” claim? | Comparing index funds to long-term investments in individual companies? A counterintuitive study by Jeremy Siegel addressed a similar question: Would you be better off sticking with the original 500 stocks in the S&P 500, or like an index fund, changing your investments as the index is changed? The study: "Long-Term Returns on the Original S&P 500 Companies" Siegel found that the original 500 (including spinoffs, mergers, etc.) would do slightly better than a changing index. This is likely because the original 500 companies take on a value (rather than growth) aspect as the decades pass, and value stocks outperform growth stocks. Index funds' main strength may be in the behavior change they induce in some investors. To the extent that investors genuinely set-and-forget their index fund investments, they far outperform the average investor who mis-times the market. The average investor enters and leaves the market at the worst times, underperforming by a few percentage points each year on average. This buying-high and selling-low timing behavior damages long-term returns. Paying active management fees (e.g. 1% per year) makes returns worse. Returns compound on themselves, a great benefit to the investor. Fees also compound, to the benefit of someone other than the investor. Paying 1% annually to a financial advisor may further dent long-term returns. But Robert Shiller notes that advisors can dissuade investors from market timing. For clients who will always follow advice, the 1% advisory fee is worth it. |
Pros, cons, and taxation of Per Diem compensation? | Beware if injured on the job they will not add per diem to your wages meaning you make less and your wc benefits will be less !! |
What to do if my aging father is sustaining a hobby that is losing several thousand dollars every month? | How about opening a Coffee shop section in the bookshop to generate some cash flow per month to offset some of the expenses ? Off course success of this venture will depend on where the location of shop is, how big it is and whether people are coffee enthusiast in that region. Since the rent/mortgage ( the major expense) is already taken care of all you have to do is invest in one time expenses for : Interior (hip these days - rustic expose brick walls, nostalgic filament light, chalk board menu, etc ) Seating (big communal table, lounge couch, some regular table chairs,some out door seats if weather is good) ...and the ugly licencing and approval. Throw in some social media marketing, SEO, yelp,urbanspoon, tripadvisor, etc If the bookstore is old, I am assuming it might have the old world charm & character which could attract lot of coffee enthusiast. The unique and competitive edge of this coffee shop could be its historic charm , which no other competitor can achieve. Would definitely beat the staryuks. Even if no one shows up , only recurring additional expense will be barrista wages. The interior , seating and coffee m/c costs can be minimized by savvily shopping stuff on community sites like craigslist, gumtree etc. I beleive if you are in US , everything could be set up under 6K. Later on premade food items like bananacake, raw cacao balls, toasted panini sandwich etc. can be added. If one has 3 key ingredients in food industry - Location, Vibe and taste, then there is high probability that they will succeed. At the same time one should be cognizant that 95 % of business fail in first 3 years and therefore they should have an exit plan. Unfortunately if your business does not work, then you exit cost would be just getting rid of the equipment & furniture. Just to put in perspective, some Dunkin Donut shops that I was researching in North East were clearing between 1/2 to 1 mil per year. As it is the current damage per month is 10k, if this business offsets even some of the damage it would be worth while. So the cost of keeping the pride of 91 yo dad can potentially reduce from 10k to 2-3 k. Who knows if it takes off , one day it could be a good sustainable business and might turn into a win-win situation for you and your father. I have made lot of assumption without knowing the facts like- you are located in US, you have risk appetite, bookshop is not in industrial area but some prime retail area like this : ... etc. While I am at it { giving unsolicited advise that is}.. Currently the books in the bookshop are very old books that it published by itself. Nobody is interested in reading these books. Due to his previous excitement of getting editors and publishing books, there are thousands of books that need to be kept in storerooms. They don’t move because people hardly buy any books from this bookshop. To help the old published book sales why not convert the old books to ebooks using providers like 'Blueleaf-book-scanning' and publish the books on amazon kindle,itunes & play store. The books will be available online forever and they might get exposure to tons of book enthusiast around the world. I heard at one of our client's MDS ( mass digitization system ) project , they had in-house robot scanning machine like Treventus Pardon me if none of the above gibberish applies to your situation , but hpefully SE community might have some fun reading this for kicks and giggles . Cheers and good luck. Source: I am US person in Australia, operated restaurant / bar in US , visited 100's of coffee shops, consulting for living, ...and a dreamer { :-) hard not to imagine from the short post}. |
Why would this FHA refinance cause my mortgage insurance payment to increase so much? | The PMI premium you pay is dependent on a very large number of variables in the finance market. Mortgage insurance, at the higher inter-bank levels, is handled with credit default swaps (the ones you've been hearing about on the news for the past 4 years), where the lender bundles a block of mortgages, takes them to a guarantor like AIG or Freddie Mac, and says "We bet you that these mortgages will default this month, because the homeowners have little or no equity to deter them; if we win, you agree to swap these debts for their current face value". The lender examines the mortgages, calculates the odds of a default severe enough that the bank would come to collect, using complex environmental heuristics, multiplies by the value of the potential payout, adds a little for their trouble, and says "well, we'll take that bet if you pay us $X". The bank takes the deal, then divvies up that cost among the mortgages and bills the homeowner for their share. The amount you pay for PMI can therefore depend on pretty much anything in this entire process; the exact outstanding amount and equity status of your loan, the similar status of other mortgages your loan will be bundled with for assessment, who the guarantor is, what exact heuristic they use to come up with an amount, the weighting the bank uses to divvy it up, and how much they actually pass on to you. Most of these same variables are at play when you shop for actual insurance for your car or home, which is why your premiums will go up or down with the same insurer and why someone else always seems to have a better deal (pretty much every insurer can say that "drivers who switched saved an average of $X"; of course they did, otherwise they wouldn't have switched). Thinking of it in those terms, it's easy to see how this number can vary widely based on numbers you can't see. You're free to say no, and it will cost you nothing right up until you sign something that says you agree to be penalized for saying no. While the overall amount of the payments does decrease, the PMI has gone up, and that's money you'll never see again just like interest (except you can deduct interest; not PMI). I would do the tax math; find out how much you could deduct over the next year in interest on your current loan, then on their proposed terms, and what the resulting tax bills will be from both. You may save monthly only to pay more than you saved to Uncle Sam at the end of the year. You're also free to negotiate. The worst they can do is stay firm on their offer, but they may take a second look and say "you're right, that PMI is rather high, we'll try again and see if we can do better". They can either negotiate with their insurer, or they can eat some of the PMI cost that they're currently passing on to you. |
Why is being “upside down” on a mortgage so bad? | The problem comes when the borrower cannot afford his home. If a borrower buys more home than they can afford, as long as he can sell the house for more than he owes, he's not in a disastrous situation. He can sell the house, pay off the mortgage, and choose more affordable housing instead. If he is upside-down on his home, he doesn't have that option. He's stuck in his home. If he sells it, he will have to come up with extra money to pay off the mortgage (which he doesn't have, because he is in a home he can't afford). It used to be commonplace for banks to issue mortgages for 100% of the value of the home. As long as the home keeps appreciating, everybody is happy. But if the house drops in value and the homeowner finds himself unable to make house payments, both the homeowner and the bank are at risk. Recent regulations in the U.S. have made no-down-payment mortgages less common. |
Helping my family sell their oil stocks. What to buy? | *("Fee-only" meaning the only money they make is the fee your folks pay directly; no kickbacks from financial products they're selling.) The answer to this is: for God's sake, leave it alone! I commend you on wanting to help your family avoid more losses. You are right, that having most of one's retirement in one stock or sector is just silly. And again yes, if they're retired, they probably need some bonds. But here's the thing, if they follow your advise and it doesn't work out, it will be a SERIOUS strain on your relationship. Of course you'll still be a family and they'll still love you, but emotionally, you are the reason they lost the money, and that will an elephant in between you. This is especially the case since we're talking about a lot of money here (presumably), and retirement money to boot. You must understand the risk you're taking with your relationships. If you/they lose, at best it'll make things awkward, and you'll feel guilty about their impoverished retirement. At worst it can destroy your relationship with your folks. What about if you win? Won't you be feted and appreciated by your folks for saving them from themselves? Yes, for a short while. Then life moves on. Everything returns to normal. But here's the thing. You won't win. You can't. Because even if you're right here, and they win, that means both they and you will be eager for you to do it again. And at some point they'll take a hit based on your advise. Can I be blunt here? You didn't even know that you can't avoid capital gains taxes by reinvesting stock gains. You don't know enough, and worse, you're not experienced enough. I deduce you're either a college student, or a recent grad. Which means you don't have experience investing your own money. You don't know how the market moves, you just know the theory. You know who you are? You're me, 20 years ago. And thank God my grandparents ignored my advise. I was right about their utilities stocks back then, too. But I know from what I learned in the years afterwards, investing on my own account, that at some point I would have hurt them. And I would have had a very hard time living with that. So, tell your folks to go visit a fee-only financial adviser to create a retirement plan. Perhaps I'm reading into your post, but it seems like you're enthusiastic about investing; stocks, bonds, building wealth, etc. I love that. My advise -- go for it! Pull some money together, and open your own stock account. Do some trading! As much as people grouse about it, the market really is glorious. It's like playing Monopoly, but for keeps. I mean that in the best way possible. It's fun, you can build wealth doing it, and it provides a very useful social purpose. In the spirit of that, check out these ideas (just for you, not for your folks!), based on ideas in your post: Good luck. |
Is the stock market a zero-sum game? | While this seems overall a macroeconomics question and not really personal finance, let me give it a shot: The question of why corporations form in a free or efficient market is why Ronald Coase received the 1991 Nobel Prize in Economics, for his work developing the theory of the firm Corporations organize when there are transaction costs in the free market; corporations form when it is in fact more efficient for a corporation to exist than a number of small producers contracting with one another. To the extent that corporations add efficiency to a total market, they are not "zero sum" at all; the net production is increased over what would exist in a market of sole proprietors who would have costs (such as researching the trust levels in counterparts, regulatory compliance, etc) that they cannot bear to engage in the same level of transactions. |
Options for the intelligent but inexperienced | Realize this is almost a year old, but I just wanted to comment on something in Dynas' answer above... "Whenever you trade always think about what the other guys is thinking. Sometimes we forget their is someone else on the other side of my trade that thinks essentially the exact opposite of me. Its a zero sum game." From a market maker's perspective, their primary goal is not necessarily to make money by you being wrong, it is to make money on the bid-offer spread and hedging their book (and potentially interalize). That being said, the market maker would likely be quoting one side of the market away from top of the book if they don't want to take exposure in that direction (i.e. their bid will be lower than the highest bid available or their offer higher than the lowest offer available). This isn't really going to change anything if you're trading on an exchange, but important to consider if you can only see the prices your broker/dealer provides to you and they are your counterparty in the trade. |
My account's been labeled as “day trader” and I got a big margin call. What should I do? What trades can I place in the blocked period? | The SEC considers a day trade to be any trade that is opened and closed within the same trading day, and considers a day trader to be any trader that completes 4 or more day trades within 5 business days. If so they would label you day trader and in the US you are required to have at least $25K in your account. Maybe that's why they require you to add more money to your account? See more at Day trading restriction on US stocks and Wikipedia - Pattern day trader. |
Price difference among shares in Hong Kong and Shang Hai | Wikipedia talks about the Chinese currency: Scholarly studies suggest that the yuan is undervalued on the basis of purchasing power parity analysis. so despite it appearing cheaper due to the official exchange rate, the price in China might actually be fair. There are also restrictions on foreign exchange (purportedly "to prevent inflows of hot money"), which, in concert with any other legal obstacles to owning or trading on the Chinese exchange, may also explain why the high-frequency traders aren't tripping over each other to arbitrage away the difference. |
Can a company block a specific person from buying its stock? | A more serious problem: how do you know who's really buying your stock? "Shell companies" are an increasingly obvious problem in corporate and tax accountability. There are jurisdictions where companies can be created with secret lists of directors and shareholders. If stock is bought by one of these companies, it is very hard to trace it to a particular individual. |
Why buy insurance? | Regarding auto insurance, you have to look at the different parts. In the United Sates most states do require a level of specific coverage for all drivers. That is to make sure that if you are at fault there is money available to pay the victims. That payment may be for damage to their car or other property, but it also covers medical costs. Many policies also cover you if the other driver doesn't have insurance. The policy that covers the loss of the vehicle is required if you have a loan or are leasing the car. Somebody else owns it while there is a loan, so they can and do require you to pay to protect the vehicle. If there i no loan you don't have to have that portion of a policy. Other parts such as towing, roadside assistance, and rental cars replacement may be required by the insurance standards for your state, or might be almost impossible to drop because all insurance companies include it to stay competitive with their competition. Dropping the non-required parts of the coverage is acceptable when you don't have a loan. Some people do drop it to save money. But that does mean you are self insuring. If you can afford to self insure a new car, great. The interesting thing is that some people have more than enough assets to self inure the non-required part of auto insurance. But then they realize that they do need to up their umbrella liability insurance. This is to protect them from somebody deciding that their resources make them a tempting target when they are involved in a collision. |
Why would you ever turn down a raise in salary? | In Australia there are cases for the argument. 1) We have laws against unfair dismissal that do not apply above certain thresholds. Your position is more secure with the lower salary. 2) Tax benefits for families are unfairly structured such that take home pay may actually be less, again due to a threshold. This tends to benefit charities as people need to shed the taxable income if a repayment of benefits would otherwise be triggered. 3) You do not want to "just cross" a tax bracket in a year where levies are being raised for natural disasters or budget shortfall. In this case a raise could be deferred ? |
Can a CEO short his own company? | If we take only the title of the question "can the CEO short the stock": It was probably different before Enron, but nowadays a CEO can only make planned trades, that is trades that are registered a very long time before, and that cannot be avoided once registered. So the CEO can say "I sell 100,000 shares in exactly six months time". Then in six months time, the CEO can and must sell the shares. Anything else will get him into trouble with the SEC quite automatically. I don't know if shorting a stock or buying options can be done that way at all. So it's possible only in the sense of "it's possible, but you'll be in deep trouble". Selling shares or exercising share options may indicate that the company's business is in trouble. If the sale makes that impression and everyone else starts selling because the CEO sold his shares, then the CEO may be in trouble with the board of directors. Such a sale would be totally legal (if announced long time ahead), but just a bad move if it makes the company look bad. Shorting sales is much worse in that respect. If the CEO wants to buy a new car, he may have to sell some shares (there are people paid almost only in share options), no matter where the share price is going. But shorting shares means that you most definitely think the share price is going to drop. You're betting your money on it. That would tend to get a CEO fired, even if it was legal. |
Is being a landlord a good idea? Is there a lot of risk? | If you are able to buy a 150K home for 50K now that would be a good deal! However, you can't you have to borrow 100K in order to make this deal happen. This dramatically increases the risk of any investment, and I would no longer classify it as passive income. The mortgage on a 150K place would be about 710/month (30 year fixed). Reasonably I would expect no more than 1200/month in rent, or 14,400. A good rule of thumb is to assume that half of rental revenue can be counted as profit before debt service. So in your case 7200, but you would have a mortgage payment of 473/month. Leaving you a profit of 1524 after debt service. This is suspiciously like 2K per year. Things, in the financial world, tend to move toward an equilibrium. The benefit of rental property you can make a lot more than the numbers suggest. For example the home could increase in value, and you can have fewer than expected repairs. So you have two ways to profit: rental revenue and asset appreciation. However, you said that you needed passive income. What happens if you have a vacancy or the tenant does not pay? What happens if you have greater than expected repairs? What happens if you get a fine from the HOA or a special assessment? Not only will you have dip into your pocket to cover the payment, you might also have to dip into your pocket to cover the actual event! In a way this would be no different than if you borrowed 100K to buy dividend paying stocks. If the fund/company does not pay out that month you would still have to make the loan payment. Where does the money come from? Your pocket. At least dividend paying companies don't collect money from their shareholders. Yes you can make more money, but you can also lose more. Leverage is a two edged sword and rental properties can be great if you are financial able to absorb the shocks that are normal with ownership. |
Stock valuation - Volkswagen | (I live in the UK and along with my wife we both drive Volkswagen cars.) A few factors: VW is widely acknowledged as having some of the best diesel car engines. -Now lot of people are questioning if diesel car will be outlawed. VM management has just said they don’t know what their workers are doing! The USA has made it clear they will create pollution law in a way that benefit their own car makers. (E.g. they don’t care about CO2.) If not diesel cars, then it needs hybrid or electric cars to get good MPG – VM is not seen as a leader in these. Hybrid cars tend to be gas as diesel engines cost too much. VW is no longer looking like a nice safe investment! I think VW will recover, but it may get worse for them before it gets better - trying to call the bottom of a stock is high risk. |
Pay off mortgage or invest in high value saving account | Basically, the easiest way to do this is to chart out the "what-ifs". Applying the amortization formula (see here) using the numbers you supplied and a little guesswork, I calculated an interest rate of 3.75% (which is good) and that you've already made 17 semi-monthly payments (8 and a half months' worth) of $680.04, out of a 30-year, 720-payment loan term. These are the numbers I will use. Let's now suppose that tomorrow, you found $100 extra every two weeks in your budget, and decided to put it toward your mortgage starting with the next payment. That makes the semi-monthly payments $780 each. You would pay off the mortgage in 23 years (making 557 more payments instead of 703 more). Your total payments will be $434,460, down from $478.040, so your interest costs on the loan were reduced by $43,580 (but, my mistake, we can't count this amount as money in the bank; it's included in the next amount of money to come in). Now, after the mortgage is paid off, you have $780 semi-monthly for the remaining 73 months of your original 30-year loan (a total of $113,880) which you can now do something else with. If you stuffed it in your mattress, you'd earn 0% and so that's the worst-case scenario. For anything else to be worth it, you must be getting a rate of return such that $100 payments, 24 times a year for a total of 703 payments must equal $113,880. We use the future value annuity formula (here): v = p*((i+1)n-1)/i, plugging in v ($113880, our FV goal), $100 for P (the monthly payment) and 703 for n (total number of payments. We're looking for i, the interest rate. We're making 24 payments per year, so the value of i we find will be 1/24 of the stated annual interest rate of any account you put it into. We find that in order to make the same amount of money on an annuity that you save by paying off the loan, the interest rate on the account must average 3.07%. However, you're probably not going to stuff the savings from the mortgage in your mattress and sleep on it for 6 years. What if you invest it, in the same security you're considering now? That would be 146 payments of $780 into an interest-bearing account, plus the interest savings. Now, the interest rate on the security must be greater, because you're not only saving money on the mortgage, you're making money on the savings. Assuming the annuity APR stays the same now vs later, we find that the APR on the annuity must equal, surprise, 3.75% in order to end up with the same amount of money. Why is that? Well, the interest growing on your $100 semi-monthly exactly offsets the interest you would save on the mortgage by reducing the principal by $100. Both the loan balance you would remove and the annuity balance you increase would accrue the same interest over the same time if they had the same rate. The main difference, to you, is that by paying into the annuity now, you have cash now; by paying into the mortgage now, you don't have money now, but you have WAY more money later. The actual real time-values of the money, however, are the same; the future value of $200/mo for 30 years is equal to $0/mo for 24 years and then $1560/mo for 6 years, but the real money paid in over 30 years is $72,000 vs $112,320. That kind of math is why analysts encourage people to start retirement saving early. One more thing. If you live in the United States, the interest charges on your mortgage are tax-deductible. So, that $43,580 you saved by paying down the mortgage? Take 25% of it and throw it away as taxes (assuming you're in the most common wage-earner tax bracket). That's $10895 in potential tax savings that you don't get over the life of the loan. If you penalize the "pay-off-early" track by subtracting those extra taxes, you find that the break-even APR on the annuity account is about 3.095%. |
What happens if a company I have stock in is bought out? | I've seen many buyouts in my own portfolio, including the company I worked for. There have been several different scenarios: The terms of the deal are subject to the deal -- frankly whatever makes sense to the buyer and that is accepted by the seller. So sometimes brokers charge reorganization fees. check into those for your broker. I've not seen one in a while, but my brokerage account is substantial, and often that's a perk they offer higher-value accounts. Also watch out for taxes. The transaction where my employer was bought by another publicly traded company -- we got bit because the IRS treated it as a taxable transaction, and all our RSUs were effectively sold and then repurchased. So we ended up with a big tax bill (capital gains) without any cash to offset the big tax bill. I suspect its because my old employer was a US based company, whereas the new company is not. |
How is it possible that a preauth sticks to a credit card for 30 days, even though the goods have already been delivered? | It is barely possible that this is Citi's fault, but it sounds more like it is on the Costco end. The way that this is supposed to work is that they preauthorize your card for the necessary amount. That reserves the payment, removing the money from your credit line. On delivery, they are supposed to capture the preauthorization. That causes the money to transfer to them. Until that point, they've reserved your payment but not actually received it. If you cancel, then they don't have to pay processing fees. The capture should allow for a larger sale so as to provide for tips, upsells, and unanticipated taxes and fees. In this case, instead of capturing the preauthorization, they seem to have simply generated a new transaction. Citi could be doing something wrong and processing the capture incorrectly. Or Costco could be doing a purchase when they should be doing a capture. From outside, we can't really say. The thirty days would seem to be how long Costco can schedule in advance. So the preauthorization can last that long for them. Costco should also have the ability to cancel a preauthorization. However, they may not know how to trigger that. With smaller merchants, they usually have an interface where they can view preauthorizations and capture or cancel them. Costco may have those messages sent automatically from their system. Note that a common use for this pattern is with things like gasoline or delivery purchases. If this has been Citi/Costco both times, I'd try ordering a pizza or some other delivery food and see if they do it correctly. If it was Citi both times and a different merchant the other time, then it's probably a Citi problem rather than a merchant problem. |
Assessing risk, and Identifying scams in Alternative Investments | 10 to 20% return on investment annually. "When I hear that an investment has a 10%+ return on it I avoid it because...". In my opinion, and based on my experience, 10% annually is not an exageration. I start to ask questions only if one talks about return of 30% annually or more. These kind of returns are possible, but very rare. What sort of things do we need to look out for with alternative investment? First the quality of the website and the documentation provided. Then the resume of the founders. Who are those guys? I check their LinkedIn profile. If they have none, I am out. A LinkedIn profile is a minimum if you manage an investment company. I also look for diversification and this is the case with Yieldstreet. How do we assess the risks associated with alternative investments? I would never put more than 10% of my capital in any investment, alternative ones included. I also try to find financial information on the promoter itself. In Yieldstreet case check the legal advisor. I remember an international fraud case I analyse. The promoter I investigated had seven small trust involved: in British Virgin Islands, in Panama, in Holland, in Portugal, in the United States and Canada plus a banking account in Switzerland and the biggest shareholding company in the Isle of Man. No need to talk about what happened after. The investors were all non residents in the juridictions involved and no legal recourse were possible. They lost everything. These promoters regularly change juridictions to avoid detection. As far as Yieldstreet is concerned, what I read and checked seems interesting. Thanks for your question. I will check it out myself more. I am also a very cautious investor. To evaluate alternative investments is difficult , but no need to be afraid or to avoid them. We are accredited investors after all. |
Do I need a new EIN since I am hiring employees for my LLC? | I called the IRS (click here for IRS contact info) and they said I do not need to get a new EIN. I could have just filed the appropriate employer federal tax return (940/941) and then the filing requirements would have been updated. But while I was on the phone, they just updated the filing requirements for my LLC so I am all good now (I still need to file the correct form and make the correct payments, etc. but I can use this same EIN going forward). Disclaimer: Don't trust me (or this answer) for tax advice (your situation may be different). The IRS person on the phone was very helpful so I recommend calling them if you are in a similar situation. FYI, I have found calling the IRS to always be very helpful. |
Is buying a home a good idea? | It certainly seems like you are focusing on the emotional factors. That's your blind spot, and it's the surest path to a situation where your husband gets to say "I told you so". I recommend you steer straight into that blind spot, and focus your studies on the business aspects of buying and owning homes. You should be able to do spreadsheets 6 ways from Sunday, be able to recite every tax deduction you'll get as a homeowner, know the resale impacts of 1 bathroom vs 2, tell a dirty house from a broken house, etc. Everybody's got their favorites, mine are a bit dated but I like Robert Irwin and Robert Allen's books. For instance: a philosophy of Allen's that I really like: never sell. This avoids several problems, like the considerable costs of money, time and nerves of actually selling a house, stress about house prices, mistaking your house's equity for an ATM machine, and byzantine rules for capital gains tax mainly if you rent out the house, which vary dramatically by nation. In fact the whole area of taxes needs careful study. There's another side to the business of home ownership, and that's renting to others. There's a whole set of economics there - and that is a factor in what you buy. Now AirBNB adds a new wrinkle because there's some real money there. Come to understand that market well enough to gauge whether a duplex or triplex will be a money maker. Many regular folk like you have retired early and live off the rental income from their properties. JoeTaxpayer has an interesting way of looking at the finances of housing: if a house doesn't make sense as a a rental unit, maybe it doesn't make sense as a live-in either. So learn how to identify those fundamentals - the numbers. And get in the habit of evaluating houses. Work it regularly until it's second nature. Then, yes, you'll see houses you fall in love with, partly because the numbers work. It also helps to be handy. It really, really changes the economics if you can do your own quality work, because you don't need to spend any money on labor to convert a dirty house into a clean house. And lots of people do, and there's a whole SE just for that. There is a huge difference between going down to the local building supply and getting the water pipe you need, vs. having to call a plumber. And please deal with local businesses, please don't go to the Big Box stores, their service is abominable, they will cheerfully sell you a gadget salad of junk that doesn't work together, and I can't imagine a colder and less inviting scene to come up as a handy person. |
How can I spend less? | One things about psychology - people spend more money when its an abstract concept instead of having cold, hard cash. What does this mean? People spend more money when they use credit cards for day to day purchases. While I still use a credit card for day to day purchases, there's a big difference between bringing $200 to costco to pay for groceries and laying out 10 $20 bills vs swiping a card when you see a number flash on the screen. If you're truly looking to reduce expenses, keep this in mind. |
How to acquire assets without buying them? | There are a number of ways someone acquires assets without buying it. People could have inherited assets. They could have been gifted assets. They might have won assets in a lawsuit (unlikely to be a mall, but not impossible). They could have married into the assets. So there's other ways of acquiring assets without purchasing them. |
Effect of Quantitative Easing on Price of Bonds | The classic definition of inflation is "too much money chasing too few goods." Low rates and QE were intended to help revive a stalled economy, but unfortunately, demand has not risen, but rather, the velocity of money has dropped like a rock. At some point, we will see the economy recover and the excess money in the system will need to be removed to avoid the inflation you suggest may occur. Of course, as rates rise to a more normal level, the price of all debt will adjust. This question may not be on topic for this board, but if we avoid politics, and keep it close to PF, it might remain. |
Price Earnings Ratio | Your question asks us to explain why a false statement is true. From the point of view of an investor, a high price to earnings ratio is not necessarily desirable. From the point of view of an investor, a desirable stock is one that is likely to provide future dividends or price increases that more than compensates for the risk of the stock. This information cannot be inferred from the P/E ratio. So what does the P/E ratio tell us? The P/E ratio measures a stock's current price (i.e., the market's belief about its future earnings) divided by its recent past earnings. A high ratio means the market thinks earnings in the future will be higher than they are now and have therefore bid the price up. These can thought of as expensive stocks, and are often called "growth" stocks because their price is driven by the market's belief in future growth. Some individual high P/E stocks do live up to or exceed the market's expectation, but there's no evidence that this happens enough that they are more desirable as a group than low P/E stocks. If anything, the empirical evidence goes the other way. |
1.4 million cash. What do I do? | You can get an investment manager through firms like Fidelity or E*Trade to manage your account. It won't be someone dedicated exclusively to you, but you're in the range where they'd take you as a managed account customer. Another option would be to get a financial planner (CFP or something) help you to identify your needs and figure out what your investments portfolio should look like. This is not a whole lot of money, but is definitely enough to have an early retirement if managed and invested properly. |
Best way to pay off debt? | The key phrase in your post is that the options are "in a good position now". They may be worthless in three months or a year. If I was you I would cash in the options and pay off the debt. Cash in enough to also cover taxes. You may want to cash them all in. |
Are there extra fees for a PayPal Premier account? | If you are using paypal to sell items online, you need a Premier (or better) account rather than personal. Paypal states: Our fees are the same for Personal, Premier, and Business accounts. [...] If you use your PayPal account to request money from someone, you'll be charged a fee when you receive the payment. |
Buying a more expensive house as a tax shelter (larger interest deduction)? | No. This logic is dangerous. The apples to apples comparison between renting and buying should be between similar living arrangements. One can't (legitimately) compare living in a 600 sq ft studio to a 3500 sq ft house. With the proposal you offer, one should get the largest mortgage they qualify for, but that can result in a house far too big for their needs. Borrowing to buy just what you need makes sense. Borrowing to buy a house with rooms you may never visit, not a great idea. By the way, do the numbers. The 30 year rate is 4%. You'd need a $250,000 mortgage to get $10,000 in interest the first year, that's a $312,000 house given an 80% loan. On a median income, do you think it makes sense to buy a house twice the US median? Last, a portion of the tax savings is 'lost' to the fact that you have a standard deduction of nearly $6,000 in 2012. So that huge mortgage gets you an extra $4000 in write-off, and $600 back in taxes. Don't ever let the Tax Tail wag the Investing Dog, or in this case the House Dog. Edit - the investment return on real estate is a hot topic. I think it's fair to say that long term one must include the rental value of the house in calculating returns. In the case of buying of way-too-big house, you are not getting the return, it's the same as renting a four bedroom, but leaving three empty. If I can go on a bit - I own a rental, it's worth $200K and after condo fee and property tax, I get $10K/yr. A 5% return, plus whatever appreciation. Now, if I lived there, I'd correctly claim that part of my return is the rental value, the rent I don't pay elsewhere, so the return to me is the potential growth as well as saved rent. But if the condo rents for $1200, and I'd otherwise live in a $600 apartment with less space, the return to me is lost. In my personal case, in fact, I bought a too big house. Not too big for our paycheck, the cost and therefore the mortgage were well below what the bank qualified us for. Too big for the need. I paid for two rooms we really don't use. |
Prepaying a loan: Shouldn't the interest be recalculated like a shorter loan? | Your thinking is unfortunately incorrect; an amortising loan (as opposed to interest only loans) pay down, or amortise, the principal with each payment. This means that the amount that is owed at prepayment will always be less than the total borrowed, and is also why some providers make a charge for prepayment. The "fairness" arguments that you make predicated on that misunderstanding are, therefore, incorrect. |
Search index futures in Yahoo Finance or Google Finance | Neither site offers index futures or options pricing. Your best best is likely to get the quote from a broker who supports trading those vehicles. Free sites usually limit themselves to stocks and sometimes to options chains -- the exception is Reuters where just about any security for which you have the reuters formatted trading symbol can be quoted. |
What is a trust? What are the different types of trusts? | A trust is a financial arrangement to put aside money over a period of time (typically years), for a specific purpose to benefit someone. Two purposes of trusts are 1) providing for retirement and 2) providing for a child or minor. There are three parties to a trust: 1) A grantor, the person who establishes and funds a trust. 2) A beneficiary, a person who receives the benefits. 3) a trustee, someone who acts in a fiduciary capacity between the grantor and beneficiary. No one person can be all three parties. A single person can be two of out those three parties. A RETIREMENT trust is something like an IRA (individual retirement account). Here, a person can be both the grantor (contributor) to the IRA, and the beneficiary (a withdrawer after retirement). But you need a bank or a broker to act as a fiduciary, and to handle the reporting to the IRS (Internal Revenue Service). Pension plans have employers as grantors, employees as beneficiaries, and (usually) a third party as trustee. A MINORS' trust can be established under a Gift to the Minors' Act, or other trust mechanisms, such as a Generation Skipping Trust. Here, a parent may be both grantor and trustee (although usually a third party is a trustee). A sum of money is put aside over a period of years for the benefit of a minor, for a college education, or for the minor's attaining a certain age: a minimum of 18, sometimes 21, possibly 25 or even older, depending on when the grantor feels that the minor is responsible enough to handle the money. |
Why do card processing companies discourage “cash advance” activities | Square charges a 2.75% fee (which the merchant pays), so you would be losing money if you only got a 1.5% cashback bonus. I would guess that the real reason Square prohibits you from getting cash is because of Visa/MC, state and federal regulations. Visa/MC probably prohibit it for regular merchants due primarily to laws that are designed to prevent money-laundering. Certain merchants (like casinos) are allowed to give you cash advances against a credit card, but regular merchants are not allowed to do this. It is much more difficult to get Visa/MC to approve merchants to handle cash advances and they are subject to many additional regulations. Services like Western Union will let you send cash with a regular credit card, but they are classified as "money transmitters" and must comply with additional state and federal regulations. If Square were to allow cash advances, this would likely subject them to a bunch of additional regulations. It would cost them more to comply with these regulations and is outside their business model, so they simply prohibit it. |
Freelancing Tax implication | If you have income in the US, you will owe US income tax on it, unless there is a treaty with your country that says otherwise. |
Is refinancing my auto loan just to avoid dealing with the lender that issued it a crazy idea? | I’d say No, it’s not crazy. I did that even for a mortgage, because the bank tended to lose my checks or let them sit for some days, and then claim I paid late. They were known on the internet for their poor processing department, so I decided to avoid that monthly hassle with calling and arguing, and refinanced. Compare the pain with the cost for refinancing, and if you think it’s worth it, change. You might even get a cheaper credit, and save on it. |
Why have U.S. bank interest rates been so low for the past few years? | These rates are so low because the cost of money is so low. Specifically, two rates are near zero. The Federal Reserve discount rate, which is "the interest rate charged to commercial banks and other depository institutions on loans they receive from their regional Federal Reserve Bank's lending facility--the discount window." The effective federal funds rate, which is the rate banks pay when they trade balances with each other through the Federal Reserve. Banks want to profit on the loans they make, like mortgage loans. To do so, they try to maximize the difference between the rates they charge on mortgages and other loans (revenue), and the rates they pay savings account holders, the Federal Reserve or other banks to obtain funds (expenses). This means that the rates they offer to pay are as close to these rates as possible. As the charts shows, both rates have been cut significantly since the start of the recession, either through open market operations (the federal funds rate) or directly (the discount rate). The discount rate is set directly by the regional Federal Reserve banks every 14 days. In most cases, the federal funds rate is lower than the discount rate, in order to encourage banks to lend money to each other instead of borrowing it from the Fed. In the past, however, there have been rare instances where the federal funds rate has exceeded the discount rate, and it's been cheaper for banks to borrow money directly from the Fed than from each other. |
Purpose of having good credit when you are well-off? | People just love becoming more well-off than they currently are, and one of the ways they do it is with leverage. Leverage requires credit. That desire is not exclusive to people who are not already well-off. For a well-off person who wants to become more well-off by expanding their real estate ventures, paying cash for property is a terrible way to go about it. The same goes for other types of business or market investment. Credit benefits the well-off even more greatly than it benefits the poor or the middle-class. |
why do I need an emergency fund if I already have investments? | It all depends on the liquidity of your investments some examples: You can mitigate only the risk that you can control. It is always good to have: |
What ways are there for us to earn a little extra side money? | Congratulations to you and good luck and good health with the baby. I had a friend in a similar situation, and I told him that he could do quite well by putting out the word to an upper-middle-class neighborhood that he was available to setup routers, home networks, etc. I suggested that he could start at a low enough wage that people would see the beneficial tradeoff to having him come over for a few hours versus doing it themselves. After a few months, he hired someone to take the extra work he was receiving, and directed the more routine requests his employee. He had a full-time job plus all the extra work he wanted. Most people who hire him simply want someone they would trust in their home, and his service spread by word-of-mouth. He also got to meet many people who liked him and were impressed by his work ethic, resulting in many good connections if he ever wanted to pursue other employment. My friend was an IT professional, the best support person at our tech-heavy firm, so he wasn't giving his time away. He did enjoy doing it, and he did enjoy the extra money. On an hourly basis, especially once he added the assistant, he was making more on the side than he did at his job. However, I believe he did start lower than that. Good luck! |
How can I spend less? | Try the Envelope Budgeting System. It is a pretty good system for managing your discretionary outflows. Also, be sure to pay yourself first. That means treat savings like an expense (mortgage, utilities, etc.) not an account you put money in when you have some left over. The problem is you NEVER seem to have anything leftover because most people's lifestyle adjusts to fit their income. The best way to do this is have the money automatically drafted each month without any action required on your part. An employer sponsored 401K is a great way to do this. |
How to start investing/thinking about money as a young person? | I think "Rich Dad Poor Dad" is a good read for understanding the basics of personal finance in a non-technical format before actually starting investing. |
Is a naked put really that risky | So, yes, you may be having the inevitable epiphany where you realize that options can synthetically replicate the same risk profile of owning stock outright. Allowing you to manipulate risk and circumvent margin requirement differences amongst asset classes. Naked short puts are analogous to a covered call, but may have different (lesser) margin requirements. This allows you to increase your risk, and the broker has to account for that. The broker's clientele might not understand all the risks associated with that much leverage and so may simply consider it risky "for your protection" |
Can a buy market order be matched with a sell market order in Forex trading? | If there are no limit orders on the opposite side of the book when your market order gets its turn for execution, it should be rejected by the market. A market order should generally not "sit on the book" like your question suggests waiting for another order to arrive. Thus, the situation that you describe should not happen in an ordinary market that is operating in an orderly fashion. This is not to say that your order cannot "sit" for a while in a queue - If there is heavy volume, orders will be executed in order, so your your market order may have to wait for orders entered ahead of it to be processed. But once its turn comes up, that's it. There are some related points to consider: I should caution that my answer is biased a bit to US stock markets, whereas you asked about currency markets. I believe the same basic principles apply, but I'd be swayed by someone with evidence to the contrary. I'd also note that currency tends to be more liquid than stock, so I think it's less likely that this situation would come up. Maybe possible for a "weak" currency or a currency that experiences a sudden crisis of some sort. |
Can a custodian refuse prior-year IRA/HSA deposit postmarked April 15? | I had a situation like this also. A client deposited an IRA check to his local P.O. prior to collection p/up, thinking this meant it would be postmarked April 15. It may have been picked up, but wasn't postmarked until the next day, and my firm refused to consider it as timely. I do remember discussing it w/my Retirement Services Dept. Maybe they made an exception for me and my client, but maybe not. I don't remember. Good luck. |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.