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Can't the account information on my checks be easily used for fraud? | That's accurate. Here is another risk with the current checking system, which many people are not aware of: Anyone who knows your checking account number can learn what your balance in that account is. (This is bank-specific, but it is possible at the major banks I've checked.) How does that work? Many banks have a phone line where you can dial up and interact with an automated voice response system, for various customer service tasks. One of the options is something like "merchant check verification". That option is intended to help a merchant who receives a check to verify whether the person writing the check has enough money in their account for the check to clear. If you select that option in the phone tree, it will prompt you to enter in the account number on the check and the amount of the check, and then it will respond by telling you either "there are currently sufficient funds in the account to cash this check" or "there are not sufficient funds; this check would bounce". Here's how you can abuse this system to learn how much someone has in their bank account, if you know their account number. You call up and check whether they've enough money to cash a $10,000 check (note that you don't actually have to have a check for $10,000 in your hands; you just need to know the account number). If the system says "nope, it'd bounce", then you call again and try $5,000. If the system says "yup, sufficient funds for a $5,000 check", then you try $7,500. If it says "nope, not enough for that", you try $6,250. Etcetera. At each step, you narrow the range of possible account balances by a factor of two. Consequently, after about a dozen or so steps, you will likely know their balance to within a few dollars. (Computer scientists know this procedure by the name "binary search". The rest of us may recognize it as akin to a game of "20 questions".) If this bothers you, you may be able to protect your self by calling up your bank and asking them how to prevent it. When I talked to my bank (Bank of America), they told me they could put a fraud alert flag on your account, which would disable the merchant check verification service for my account. It does mean that I have to provide a 3-digit PIN any time I phone up my bank, but that's fine with me. I realize many folks may terribly not be concerned about revealing their bank account balance, so in the grand scheme of things, this risk may be relatively minor. However, I thought I'd document it here for others to be aware of. |
Is Pension Benefit Information (aboutmyletter.com) legitimate? | To boil down what mgkrebbs said: Yes, you should send back the form, provided that it doesn't ask for any more information than address, current telephone number, and email address. Don't ever, ever provide any bank account information. Nor social security number unless you're absolutely positive of the validity of the requestor. Phishing via regular mail is very rare. It's way expensive compared to email, which is basically free, plus the U.S. Postal Service takes mail fraud fairly seriously (and has the legal statutes to prosecute). So: don't obsess; send the form back. |
Reducing taxable income in US in December | My first question to you is if you itemize? If not the charitable contributions will not do any good. Along these lines, donating unused items to Goodwill or similar can help boost your charitable giving. The bottom line is that the 401K is one of the few real deductions high earners have. If you anticipate earning similarly next year, you could both contribute the max. You still have some time before the end of the year, can you get more in your wife's account? Does your state have income tax? You might be able to deduct sales tax for larger purchases if you made any. However, I would not justify a large purchase just to write off the sales tax. Conventional wisdom will tell you that you should have a large mortgage in order to deduct the interests. However, it does not make sense to pay the bank 10K so you can get 3K back from the government. That seems pretty dumb. If you did not do additional withholding, you probably will have to pay a significant amount plus penalty if you owe more than $1000. You still have time to make one more quarterly payment, so you may want to do so by January 15th. For next year I would recommend the following: The funny thing about giving is that it rarely helps the recipient, it does so much more for the giver. It helps you build wealth. For myself I like to give to charities that have a bent to helping people out of poverty or homelessness. We have two excellent ones here in Orlando, FL: Orlando Rescue Mission and Christian Help. Both have significant job training and budgeting programs. |
What happens to 401(k) money that isn't used by the time the account holder dies? | A 401k plan will ask you to name a beneficiary who will receive the funds if you don't withdraw them all before death. Usually, a primary beneficiary and a secondary beneficiary is requested. If you don't specify a beneficiary, your estate is the beneficiary by default. Note that the name supplied to the 401k plan is who will get the money, and you cannot change this by bequeathing the money in your will. For example, if you neglected to change the beneficiary upon divorce, it is useless to say in your will that the money in the 401k plan goes to your new wife; the 401k plan will give it to your ex-wife who still remains the beneficiary of your 401k Money in a 401k plan is what is called income with respect to a decedent (IRD) on which income tax is levied, and it is also is part of your estate and thus liable to be subject to estate tax. The latter is true even if the 401k plan assets are not mentioned anywhere in your will, and even if the assets got sent to your ex-wife which is not what you wanted to have happen. There are various estate tax exceptions for spouse beneficiaries (no estate tax due now, but will be charged when the spouse passes away). With regard to income tax, the beneficiaries of a 401k plan (similarly IRAs, 403b plans etc) generally get to take the whole amount and pay the income tax themselves. Edit in response to littleadv's comments: Each 401k plan is different, and some plans, especially the smaller ones, may prefer to distribute the 401k assets as a lump sum rather than allow the beneficiaries to withdraw the money over several years (and pay income tax on the amount withdrawn each year). This is because there are far too many rules and regulations to trip over when making withdrawals over several years. The lump sum distribution can be transferred into a newly established Inherited IRA (see the Nolo article linked to in @littleadv's answer for some details and some pitfalls to avoid) and the income tax is thus deferred until withdrawals occur. Spouse beneficiaries are entitled to more generous rules than non-spouse beneficiaries. If your heirs are otherwise well provided for and you are in a philanthropic mood (or you don't want to give 'em a dime, the ungrateful... who never call, not even on Father's Day!), one way of avoiding a lot of tax is to make the beneficiary of your 401k be one or more of your favorite charities. In fact, if your testamentary inclination is to make some charitable bequests as part of your will, it is much more advantageous to give money from a tax-deferred account to the charity (size of estate is reduced, no income tax paid by anyone on amount given), and bequeath assets in non-retirement accounts to one's heirs (bequests are not taxable income, and heirs get a step up in basis for assets that have appreciated) rather than the other way around (heirs pay income tax as they withdraw the money from tax-deferred account) Estate planning is a complicated business, and you really should talk to a professional about such matters and not rely on advice from an Internet forum. |
Does high frequency trading provide economic value? | You pointed out that HFT does not create ipods are mine minerals. Neither does human trading. HFT is a proxy for human trading. Although the computer is executing trades automatically based on an algorithm, it is still using money from a human being's account so the trading is still being done with someone's money. Fast execution of trades is desirable in exchanges. Imagine two exchanges: One only executes trades once a month, the other executes trades once a week. Which exchange would be more desirable? The exchange that trades once a week. Why? Because if I'm holding a stock that I would like to sell, I want to sell it now - not a month from now. Same reason for buying. This concept works all the way down to seconds and fractions of seconds. The issue with HFT, however, is there are cases where the market goes against the HFT algorithm and the algorithm continues to execute trades driving prices up or down by large amounts in the matter of minutes or even seconds. The exchange frequently cancels these trades which only encourages more aggressive HFT trading since HFT traders can have their losses cancelled. This is a privilege that LFTs (low frequency traders) do not receive. This is a valid criticism of HFTs. A short list of such cancelled trades: 8/26/2010: Nasdaq cancels trades of CORE stock 10/4/2010: Nasdaq cancels trades of CENX stock 10/15/2010: NYSE cancels trades of PAY stock 10/18/2010: NYSE cancels $500 million worth of SPY trades 5/18/2011: NYSE cancels 15,900 trades of BEE.PR.C 6/21/2011: Nasdaq cancels CNTY trades 12/2/2011: London Metals Exchange cancel trades of copper |
Why did the stock chart for Facebook's first trading day show an initial price of $42 when the IPO price was $38? | I'd add, this is actually the way any stock opens every day, i.e. the closing price of the prior day is what it is, but the opening price will reflect whatever news there was prior to the day's open. If you watch the business news, you'll often see that some stock has an order imbalance and has not opened yet, at the normal time. So, as Geo stated, those who were sold shares at the IPO price paid $38, but then the stock could open at whatever price was the point where bid and ask balanced. I snapped a screen capture of this chart on the first day of trading, the daily charts aren't archived where I can find them. This is from Yahoo Finance. You can see the $42 open from those who simply wanted in but couldn't wait, the willingness of sellers to grab their profit right back to what they paid, and then another wave of buying, but then a sell-off. It closed virtually unchanged from the IPO price. |
What part of buying a house would make my net worth go down? | Cosigning a loan for someone else will make net worth decrease, whether backed by security or not. |
How might trading volume affect future share price? | There is no direct relationship between volume and stock price. High volume indicates how much stock is changing hands. That can be because people are enthusiastically buying OR enthusiastically selling... and their reasons for doing so may not agree with your own sense of the future value of the stock. Higher volume may mean that the price is more likely to change during the day, but it can be in either direction -- or in no direction at all if there isn't a general agreement on how to react to some piece of news. It's a possibly interesting datum, but it means nothing in isolation. |
How to calculate how much a large stock position is really worth? | Something like cost = a × avg_spreadb + c × volatilityd × (order_size/avg_volume)e. Different brokers have different formulas, and different trading patterns will have different coefficients. |
Options liquidity and trading positions larger than the daily volume? | You definitely cannot be guaranteed to get the bid or ask if you are selling more than are available/desired at those prices. What prices you do get depends on who is watching that contract and how willing they are to trade with you. This question is not much different from the question of whether you can easily get into or out of a large position in an illiquid small stock easily. You can get out quickly if you are willing to take pennies on the dollar, or you may get a reasonable price if you take a long time to get out of (or into) your position. You can't normally do both. In general taking large positions in illiquid assets is not something people want to do without lining up a buyer/seller beforehand. Instead see if you can achieve your objective with liquid investments. |
What are the options for a 19-year-old college student who only has about $1000? | Kid, you need to start thinking in thresholds. There are several monetary thresholds that separate your class from a more well funded class. 1) You cannot use margin with less than $2000 dollars Brokers require that you have at least $2000 before they will lend to you 2) In 2010, Congress banned under 21 year olds from getting access to credit. UNLESS they get cosigned. This means that even if you have $2000, no broker will give you margin unless you have a (good) credit history already. There was a good reason for this, but its based on the assumption that everyone is stupid, not the assumption that some people are objective thinkers. 3) The brokers that will open an account for you have high commissions. The commissions are so high that it will destroy any capital gains you may make with your $1000. For the most part. 4) The pattern day trader rule. You cannot employ sophisticated risk management while being subject to the pattern day trader rule. It basically limits you from trading 3 times a day (its more complicated than that read it yourself) if you have less than $25,000 in one account. 5) Non-trade or stock related investments: Buy municipal or treasury bonds. They will give you more than a savings account would, and municipals are tax free. This isn't exactly what I would call liquid though - ie. if you wanted to access your money to invest in something else on a whim. 6) What are you studying? If its anything technical then you might get a good idea that you could risk your money on to create value. But I would stick to high growth stocks before blowing your $1000 on an idea. Thats not exactly what I would call "access to capital". 7) Arbitrage. Lets say you know a friend that buys the trendy collectors shoes at discount and sells them for a profit. He might do this with one $200 pair of tennis shoes, and then use the $60 profit different to go buy video games for himself. If he wanted to scale up, he couldn't because he never has more than $200 to play with. In comparison, you could do 5 pairs ($200 x 5) and immediately have a larger operation than him, making a larger profit ($60 x 5 = $300, now you have $1300 and could do it again with 6 pairs to make an even great er profit) not because you are better or worked at it, but solely because you have more capital to start with. Keep an eye out for arbitrage opportunities, usually there is a good reason they exist if you notice it: the market is too small and illiquid to scale up with, or the entire market will be saturated the next day. (Efficient Market Theory, learn about it) 8) Take everything I just taught you, and make a "small investor newsletter" website with subscribers. Online sites have low overhead costs. |
I cosigned for a friend who is not paying the payment | You promised to pay the loan if he didn't. That was a commitment, and I recommend "owning" your choice and following it through to its conclusion, even if you never do that again. TLDR: You made a mistake: own it, keep your word, and embrace the lesson. Why? Because you keep your promises. (Nevermind that this is a rare time where your answer will be directly recorded, in your credit report.) This isn't moralism. I see this as a "defining moment" in a long game: 10 years down the road I'd like you to be wise, confident and unafraid in financial matters, with a healthy (if distant) relationship with our somewhat corrupt financial system. I know austerity stinks, but having a strong financial life will bring you a lot more money in the long run. Many are leaping to the conclusions that this is an "EX-friend" who did this deliberately. Don't assume this. For instance, it's quite possible your friend sold the (car?) at a dealer, who failed to pay off this note, or did and the lender botched the paperwork. And when the collector called, he told them that, thinking the collector would fix it, which they don't do. The point is, you don't know: your friend may be an innocent party here. Creditors generally don't report late payments to the credit bureaus until they're 30 days late. But as a co-signer, you're in a bad spot: you're liable for the payments, but they don't send you a bill. So when you hear about it, it's already nearly 30 days late. You don't get any extra grace period as a co-signer. So you need to make a payment right away to keep that from going 30 late, or if it's already 30 late, to keep it from going any later. If it is later determined that it was not necessary for you to make those payments, the lender should give them back to you. A less reputable lender may resist, and you may have to threaten small claims court, which is a great expense to them. Cheaper to pay you. They say France is the nation of love. They say America is the nation of commerce. So it's not surprising that here, people are quick to burn a lasting friendship over a temporary financial issue. Just saying, that isn't necessarily the right answer. I don't know about you, but my friends all have warts. Nobody's perfect. Financial issues are just another kind of wart. And financial life in America is hard, because we let commerce run amok. And because our obsession with it makes it a "loaded" issue and thus hard to talk about. Perhaps your friend is in trouble but the actual villain is a predatory lender. Point is, the friendship may be more important than this temporary adversity. The right answer may be to come together and figure out how to make it work. Yes, it's also possible he's a human leech who hops from person to person, charming them into cosigning for him. But to assume that right out of the gate is a bit silly. The first question I'd ask is "where's the car?" (If it's a car). Many lenders, especially those who loan to poor credit risks, put trackers in the car. They can tell you where it is, or at least, where it was last seen when the tracker stopped working. If that is a car dealer's lot, for instance, that would be very informative. Simply reaching out to the lender may get things moving, if there's just a paperwork issue behind this. Many people deal with life troubles by fleeing: they dread picking up the phone, they fearfully throw summons in the trash. This is a terrifying and miserable way to deal with such a situation. They learn nothing, and it's pure suffering. I prefer and recommend the opposite: turn into it, deal with it head-on, get ahead of it. Ask questions, google things, read, become an expert on the thing. Be the one calling the lender, not the other way round. This way it becomes a technical learning experience that's interesting and fun for you, and the lender is dreading your calls instead of the other way 'round. I've been sued. It sucked. But I took it on boldly, and and actually led the fight and strategy (albeit with counsel). And turned it around so he wound up paying my legal bills. HA! With that precious experience, I know exactly what to do... I don't fear being sued, or if absolutely necessary, suing. You might as well get the best financial education. You're paying the tuition! |
Why do financial institutions charge so much to convert currency? | Banks do of course incur costs on currency transactions. But they're not as high as the fee charged to the customer. Most banks in most places lose a lot of money on operating bank accounts for customers, and make the money back by charging more than their costs for services like currency exchange. If you don't choose to pay those fees, use an online service instead. But bear in mind that if everyone does so then banks will be forced to charge higher fees for current accounts. |
Where can one find intraday prices for mutual funds? | Like others have said, mutual funds don't have an intraday NAV, but their ETF equivalents do. Use something like Yahoo Finance and search for the ETF.IV. For example VOO.IV. This will give you not the ETF price (which may be at a premium or discount), but the value of the underlying securities updated every 15 seconds. |
Is ScholarShare a legitimate entity for a 529 plan in California? | For a parent deciding on contributing to a 529 plan the first consideration is the plan run by the state government that will trigger a state income tax deduction. You do have to at least look at the annual fees for the program before jumping into the state program, but for many people the state program offers the best deal because of the state tax deduction. Unfortunately for you California does not offer a state tax deduction for 529 plan contributions. Which means that you can pick another states program if the fees are more reasonable or if the investing options are better. You can even select a nationwide plan unaffiliated with a state. Scholarshare is run by TIAA-CREF. TIAA-CREF is a large company that runs pension and 403(b) funds for many state and local governments. Many teacher unions use them. They are legitimately authorized by the state of California: The ScholarShare Investment Board sets investment policies and oversees all activities of ScholarShare, the state’s 529 college investment plan. The program enables Californians to save for college by putting money in tax-advantaged investments. After-tax contributions allow earnings to grow tax-deferred, and disbursements, when used for tuition and other qualified expenses, are federal and state tax-free. The ScholarShare Plan is managed by TIAA-CREF Tuition Financing, Inc. The ScholarShare Investment Board also oversees the Governor’s Scholarship Programs and California Memorial Scholarship Program. note: before picking a plan from another state make sure that they allow outside contributions. |
Should I cancel an existing credit card so I can open another that has rewards? | Cancelled cards don't fall off the system for a long time, up to ten years. Card terms change, with notice of course, but it can happen at any time. I had a card with a crazy perk, 5% back in Apple Gift cards. This was pre-iPod days, but it was great to get a new computer every two years for free. But it was short lived. Three years into it, the cards were changed, a no-perk card from the bank. That is now my oldest account, and it goes unused. Instead of holding cards like this, I wish I had flipped it to a different card years ago. Ideally, your mix of cards should provide value to you, and if they all do, then when one perk goes away, it's time to refresh that card. This is a snapshot from my report at CreditKarma. (Disclosure, I like these guys, I've met their PR folk. I have no business relationship with them) Elsewhere on the page it's noted that average card age is a 'medium impact' item. I am 50, but I use the strategy above to keep the cards working for me. My current score is 784, so this B on the report isn't hurting too much. The tens of thousands I've saved in mortgage interest by being a serial refinancer was worth the hit on account age, as was the credit card with a 10% rebate for 90 days, the 'newest account' you see in the snapshot. In the end, the score manipulation is a bit of a game. And some of it is counter-intuitive. Your score can take a minor hit for actions that would seem responsible, but your goal should be to have the right mix of cards, and the lowest interest (long term) loans. |
Does dollar cost averaging apply when moving investments between fund families? | As mentioned by others, dollar cost averaging is just a fancy term for how many shares your individual purchases get when you are initially adding money to your investment accounts. Once the money is invested, annual or quarterly rebalancing serves the purpose of taking advantage of higher rates of growth in particular market sectors. You define the asset allocation based on your risk profile, time to retirement, etc., then you periodically sell the shares of the investments that have grown faster than the rest and buy more shares of the investments that are relatively cheaper. |
What college degree should I pursue to learn about stock and forex markets? | There are several paths of study you could undertake. If you want to learn the fundamentals of the stock market and become a financial analyst, then finance, economics, and accounting (yes, accounting) are all good to study either on your own or in an institution. Furthermore, if you want to study a specific industry, it can't hurt to know a fair amount of the science behind that particular industry. For example, if you want to understand the pharmaceutical or biotechnology industries, knowledge of clinical trials, the FDA's approval process (in the US, at least), off-label uses for drugs, genetic engineering, etc. are all good to know. You don't have to become an expert, but having a firm grasp on the science is extremely useful when evaluating a company's prospects. If you're interested in becoming an algorithmic trader or a quant, then physics, certain fields of engineering, signals processing, applied math, computer science, or econometrics will get you much farther than a standard finance or accounting degree. Most people can learn the basics of finance; not everyone can learn advanced mathematics. A lot of the above applies to learning about the forex market as well. Economics is certainly helpful, especially central bank policy, but since the forex market is so massive and liquid, many mathematical tools are necessary because algorithms play a key role as well. Per littleadv's suggestion, an MBA with a concentration in finance may be an option for someone who already has a degree. Also, an MSF (Master of Science in Finance) or a degree in financial engineering (called an MFE, or ORFE, for Operations Research and Financial Engineering) are other, potentially better options for someone pursuing a more technical career. A high-octane trading firm may not care that you've taken marketing and management classes; they want to hire someone who can understand complex algorithms and design and implement new ones quickly. Some MSF programs are pre-experience programs, which means that in exchange for taking more time to complete, they don't expect you to have significant work experience in the financial industry. An MBA might require such experience, however. |
Can saving/investing 15% of your income starting age 25, likely make you a millionaire? | Yes, quite easily, in fact. You left a lot of numbers out, so lets start with some assumptions. If you are at the median of middle income families in the US that might mean $70,000/year. 15% of that is an investment of $875 per month. If you invest that amount monthly and assume a 6% return, then you will have a million dollars at approximately 57 years old. 6% is a very conservative number, and as Ben Miller points out, the S&P 500 has historically returned closer to 11%. If you assumed an aggressive 9% return, and continued with that $875/month for 40 years until you turn 65, that becomes $4 million. Start with a much more conservative $9/hr for $18,720 per year (40 hours * 52 weeks, no overtime). If that person saved 14% of his/her income or about $219 per month from 25 to 65 years old with the same 9%, they would still achieve $1 million for retirement. Is it much harder for a poor person? Certainly, but hopefully these numbers illustrate that it is better to save and invest even a small amount if that's all that can be done. High income earners have the most to gain if they save and the most to lose if they don't. Let's just assume an even $100,000/year salary and modest 401(k) match of 3%. Even married filing jointly a good portion of that salary is going to be taxed at the 25% rate. If single you'll be hitting the 28% income tax rate. If you can max out the $18,000 (2017) contribution limit and get an additional $3,000 from an employer match (for a total monthly contribution of $1750) 40 years of contributions would become $8.2 million with the 9% rate of return. If you withdrew that money at 4% per year you would have a residual income of $300k throughout your retirement. |
Is there a bank account that allows ACH deposits but not ACH withdrawals? | Nowadays, all checks you write will not be send to your bank anymore, but instead the bank where they get deposited does an ACH from your bank. That implies that not allowing this to happen, your bank would not be able to honor any checks you wrote (without enforcing paper check delivery in the mail, but the Check21 bill does not allow such enforcing anymore). Basically, your bank would not be able to do business with anyone. The obvious conclusion is that no such bank exists. |
What's a reliable way for a non-permanent resident alien in the USA to get an auto loan? | From personal experience (I financed a new car from the dealer/manufacturer within weeks of graduating, still on an F1-OPT): |
I have about 20 000 usd. How can invest them to do good in the world? | Vanguard has a Vanguard FTSE Social Index Fund. Their web page says "Some individuals choose investments based on social and personal beliefs. For this type of investor, we have offered Vanguard FTSE Social Index Fund since 2000. This low-cost fund seeks to track a benchmark of large- and mid-capitalization stocks that have been screened for certain social, human rights, and environmental criteria. In addition to stock market volatility, one of the fund’s other key risks is that this socially conscious approach may produce returns that diverge from those of the broad market." It looks like it would meet the qualifications you require, plus Vanguard funds usually have very low fees. |
Is gold really an investment or just a hedge against inflation? | Gold is a commodity. It has a tracked price and can be bought and sold as such. In its physical form it represents something real of signifigant value that can be traded for currency or barted. A single pound of gold is worth about 27000 dollars. It is very valuable and it is easily transported as opposed to a car which loses value while you transport it. There are other metals that also hold value (Platinum, Silver, Copper, etc) as well as other commodities. Platinum has a higher Value to weight ratio than gold but there is less of a global quantity and the demand is not as high. A gold mine is an investement where you hope to take out more in gold than it cost to get it out. Just like any other business. High gold prices simply lower your break even point. TIPS protects you from inflation but does not protect you from devaluation. It also only pays the inflation rate recoginized by the Treasury. There are experts who believe that the fed has understated inflation. If these are correct then TIPS is not protecting its investors from inflation as promised. You can also think of treasury bonds as an investment in your government. Your return will be effectively determined by how they run their business of governing. If you believe that the government is doing the right things to help promote the economy then investing in their bonds will help them to be able to continue to do so. And if consumers buy the bonds then the treasury does not have to buy any more of its own. |
Why is routing number called ABA/ABN number? | The ABA number you speak of is more accurately called the Routing Transit Number. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Routing_transit_number A routing transit number (RTN) is a nine digit bank code, used in the United States, which appears on the bottom of negotiable instruments such as checks identifying the financial institution on which it was drawn. This code was designed to facilitate the sorting, bundling, and shipment of paper checks back to the drawer's (check writer's) account. The RTN is also used by Federal Reserve Banks to process Fedwire funds transfers, and by the Automated Clearing House to process direct deposits, bill payments, and other such automated transfers. The RTN number is derived from the bank's transit number originated by the American Bankers Association, which designed it in 1910.[1] I am going to assume that the euphemistic ABA Number has been shortened by whoever told you about it and called it the ABN. Perhaps American Bank Number. Either way, the technical term is RTN. Perhaps a comment or editor can straighten me out about the ABN. There is an international number known as the SWIFT number that serves the same purpose worldwide. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_9362 ISO 9362 (also known as SWIFT-BIC, BIC code, SWIFT ID or SWIFT code) defines a standard format of Business Identifier Codes approved by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). It is a unique identification code for both financial and non-financial institutions.[1] The acronym SWIFT stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication. When assigned to a non-financial institution, the code may also be known as a Business Entity Identifier or BEI. These codes are used when transferring money between banks, particularly for international wire transfers, and also for the exchange of other messages between banks. The codes can sometimes be found on account statements. |
Can I use my Roth IRA to start a business? | Read the Forbes article titled IRA Adventures. While it's not the detailed regulations you certainly need, the article gives some great detail and caution. You may be able to do what you wish, but it must be structured to adhere to specific rules to avoid self dealing. Those rules would be known by the custodians who would help you set up the right structure, it's well buried within IRS regs, I'm sure. Last, in general, using IRA funds to invest in the non-traditional assets adds that other layer of risk, that the investment will be deemed non-allowed and/or self-dealing. So, even if you have the best business idea going, be sure you get proper council on this. |
What are the reasons to get more than one credit card? | Many reasons mentioned already. The reason why I have multiple is missing: I have a personal card for my private use and a company card for company use. |
Why does my bank suddenly need to know where my money comes from? | Banks have a financial, and regulational duty called "Know your customer", established to avoid a number of historical problems occurring again, such as money laundering, terrorism financing, fraud, etc. Thanks to the scale, and scope of the problem (millions of customers, billions of transactions a day), the way they're handling this usually involves fuzzy logics matching, looking for irregular patterns, problem escalation, and other warning signs. When exceeding some pre-set limit, these signal clues are then filtered, and passed on for human inspection. Needless to say, these algorithms are not perfect, although, thanks to financial pressure, they are improving. In order to understand why your trading account has been suspended, it's useful to look at the incentives: false positives -suspending your trade, and assuming you guilty until proven otherwise- could cost them merely your LTV (lifetime value of customer -how much your business brings in as profit); while false negatives -not catching you while engaging in activities listed above- might cost them multi-month investigations, penalties, and court. Ultimately, this isn't against you. I've been with the bank for 15 years and the money in the accounts has been very slowly accumulated via direct-deposit paychecks over that time. From this I gather the most likely explanation, is that you've hit somekind of account threshold, that the average credit-happy customers usually do not exceed, which triggered a routine checkup. How do you deal with it? Practice puppetry! There is only one way to survive angry customers emotionally: you have to realize that they’re not angry at you; they’re angry at your business, and you just happen to be a convenient representative of that business. And since they’re treating you like a puppet, an iconic stand-in for the real business, you need to treat yourself as a puppet, too. Pretend you’re a puppeteer. The customer is yelling at the puppet. They’re not yelling at you. They’re angry with the puppet. Your job is to figure out, “gosh, what can I make the puppet say that will make this person a happy customer?” In an investigation case, go with boredom: The puppet doesn't care, have no feelings, and is eternally patient. Figure out what are the most likely words that will have the matter "mentally resolved" from the investigator's point of view, tell them what they have to hear, and you'll have case closed in no time. Hope this helps. |
What are some good ways to control costs for groceries? | You may use an app called Flipp (or one that serves your area) to check fliers while in the store. If your preferred store has a price match policy, this can save you a few bucks every trip. Just look up at the app what you are buying and price match it over the cashier. It may or may not work on your store, always ask first. Try to learn some of the products you always buy regular prices. That way you can tell a real special from a fake one, like I write here about the 2/$5 specials. Buy generic brands for things you don't care that much, like bleach and other cleaning products that does not have a real quality difference from the branded ones. Try different cheaper brands until you find one that is ok for you. There are lots of ways to save money on groceries, you just need the will to do so ;) Good luck! |
how do I calculate rate of return on call options that are spread | You don't necessarily have to use a LEAP to do a spread. Since you are doing a covered call, I'm assuming that you would be comfortable with having that call exercised and you are bullish on the stock. So doing a spread trade with the short call option would essentially be capping your maximum profit without risking the obligation to sell the stock below market value. An example for the payoff from a bull call spread: long lower strike call, short higher (covered) strike call can be found here |
Is giving my girlfriend money for her mortgage closing costs and down payment considered fraud? | you have 2 concerns: the lender and the irs. either way you should be fine the lender just wants to know that you have no legal claim to the property or other compensation. simply signing a gift declaration should clear that up, making this a "gift" from their perspective. they probably have some standard form you can sign. otherwise, just a simple note that says "i, so-and-so, gave whats-er-name x$ on the y of june, 20## as a gift, with no expectation of repayment". then, only way you could get charged with "fraud" is if you seek compensation for this "gift" in the future. even then, the bank would probably have to find out about the compensation and complain pretty strongly to get a prosecutor interested in a small dollar misrepresentation case with little or no provable intent. a bigger concern is the bank being uncomfortable with the future renter also giving a gift. that just "smells weird". and bankers hate anything weird. it probably won't prevent the mortgage from getting approved, but it might delay the underwriters a few days while the wring their hands about it. the irs is a bit more complicated. they tend to be the "heads we win, tails you lose" types. assuming they consider this a gift, then you are fine, since it is under the annual gift exclusion (~14k$ these days); you don't even have to tell them about it. however, if she gives you a large financial gift in the near future, they may decide to interpret those two events as a single transaction turning this into a no interest loan. even then, you should be fine since the irs generally doesn't care about loans under 100k$ with "missing" interest under 1k$/yr. since this is a small loan and interest rates are so low, you have no worries. further irs reading on gift loans: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/7872 |
Why would a bank take a lower all cash offer versus a higher offer via conventional lending? | It's because financing can fall through, and then the time between offer and closing is wasted. Often buyers will include preapprovals and other evidence of financing eligibility with their offer for this reason. |
Want to buy above market price? | Buy and sell orders always include the price at which you buy/sell. That's how the market prices for stocks are determines. So if you want to place a buy order at 106, you can do that. When that order was fulfilled and you have the stock, you can place a sell order at 107. It will be processed as soon as someone places a buy order at 107. Theoretically you can even place sell orders for stocks you haven't even bought yet. That's called short selling. You do that when you expect a stock to go down in the future. But this is a very risky operation, because when you mispredict the market you might end up owing more money than you invested. No responsible banker will even discuss this with you when you can not prove you know what you are doing. |
Can a US bank prevent you from making early payments to the principal on a home mortgage? | Many mortgages penalize early payment, and I assume it's possible to disallow it altogether. It makes sense why they don't want early payment. If you pay off the loan early, it is usually because you re-financed it to a loan with a lower rate. You would do this when the interest rate is low (lower than when you got your original loan). If you pay it off early, that means they will have to re-invest the money again, or they will lose money if they just have it sitting around. However, recall above that people pay it off early when the interest rate is low; that is the worst time for them to re-invest this into another mortgage, because the rate will not be as good for them as the one you were originally going to keep paying. |
Does gold's value decrease over time due to the fact that it is being continuously mined? | Does gold's value decrease over time due to the fact that it is being continuously mined? Remember that demand increases and decreases - we've had seven years or so of strong demand increase and the corresponding price increase suggests there is a lack of gold coming into the market rather than too much. Also, bear in mind that mining the stuff on any scale is hazardous and requires massive investment in infrastructure and time. Large mines frequently take seven to ten years to come on-stream - hardly an elastic enterprise. |
In a competitive market, why is movie theater popcorn expensive? | John R. Lott, Jr. and Russell D. Roberts argue that popcorn in movie theaters has a price commensurate with its much higher cost. See also Lott's criticism of the Gil and Hartmann paper. |
Most important skills needed to select profitable stocks | You need to have 3 things if you are considering short-term trading (which I absolutely do not recommend): The ability to completely disconnect your emotions from your gains and losses (yes, even your gains but especially your losses). The winning/losing on a daily basis will cause you to start taking unnecessary risk in order to win again. If you can't disconnect your emotions, then this isn't the game for you. The lowest possible trading costs to enter and exit a position. People will talk about 1% trading costs; that rule-of-thumb doesn't apply anymore. Personally, my trading costs are a total 13.9 basis points to enter and exit a $10,000 position and I think it's still too high (that's just a hair above one-eighth of 1% for you non-traders). The ability to "gut-check" and exit a losing position FAST. Don't hesitate and don't hope for it to go up. GTFO. If you are serious about short-term trading then you must close all positions on a daily basis. Don't do margin in today's market as many valuations are high and some industries are not trending as they have in the past. The leverage will kill you. It's not a question of "if", it's a when. You're new. Don't trade anything larger than a $5,000 position, no matter what. Don't hold more than 10% of your portfolio in the same industry. Don't be afraid to sit on 50% cash or more for months at a time. Use money market funds to park cash because they are T+1 settlement and most firms will let you trade the stock without cash as long as you effect the money market trade on the same day since stock settlement is T+3. |
What is high trading volume in a stock indicative of? Is high liquidity a good thing or a bad thing? | High liquidity doesn't necessarily mean that "everybody is getting rid of the stock", since somebody is obviously buying whatever stock that is being sold. Also, as mentioned, low liquidity may mean that you would have trouble selling the stock in the future. |
Has anyone compared an in-person Tax Advisor to software like Turbo Tax? | I have fairly simple tax returns and my experience was that TurboTax software produced roughly the same result as human accountant and costs much less. The accountant was never able to find any deductions that the program couldn't find. Of course, if you have business, etc. you probably need an accountant to help you navigate all the rules, requirements, etc. But for simple enough cases I found that the additional pay is not justified. |
What will happen when a bid price is higher than an ask price? | It depends on the sequence in which the order [bid and ask] were placed. Please read the below question to understand how the order are matched. How do exchanges match limit orders? |
What's the difference, if any, between stock appreciation and compound interest? | If you mean, If I invest, say, $1000 in a stock that is growing at 5% per year, versus investing $1000 in an account that pays compound interest of 5% per year, how does the amount I have after 5 years compare? Then the answer is, They would be exactly the same. As Kent Anderson says, "compound interest" simply means that as you accumulate interest, that for the next interest cycle, the amount that they pay interest on is based on the previous cycle balance PLUS the interest. For example, suppose you invest $1000 at 5% interest compounded annually. After one year you get 5% of $1000, or $50. You now have $1050. At the end of the second year, you get 5% of $1050 -- not 5% of the original $1000 -- or $52.50, so you now have $1102.50. Etc. Stocks tend to grow in the same way. But here's the big difference: If you get an interest-bearing account, the bank or investment company guarantees the interest rate. Unless they go bankrupt, you WILL get that percentage interest. But there is absolutely no guarantee when you buy stock. It may go up 5% this year, up 4% next year, and down 3% the year after. The company makes no promises about how much growth the stock will show. It may show a loss. It all depends on how well the company does. |
Difference between a mortgage and buy-to-let in UK | Residential mortgages normally explicitly state that the property cannot be let without explicit permission, whereas BTL mortgages typically require that the property be let. There are other differences. Residential mortgages are regulated, which means that consumers have a degree of protection from mis-selling; most BTLs are not, as landlords are expected to know what they're doing. Affordability of residential mortgages are based on your income, since that is how you are going to pay for them. BTLs are (mostly) assessed based on the property's rental income, since it's that that will fund the mortgage. Finally, residential mortgages are typically done on a repayment basis, so that at the end of the term, you've paid off the entire loan, whereas BTLs are typically interest-only, on the assumption that you'll either sell the property, or remortgage, at the end of the term. (I've used words like "typically" a lot to give an overall picture of the differences. Obviously it's a bit more complicated than that, and there are exceptions to a lot of the above descriptions.) |
Technical Analysis not working | You cannot just read one book and some articles on Technical Analysis and some indicators and expect to be an expert and everything to just start falling into place and give you signals that will tell you when to buy and sell with precision and massive profits all the time. It is like someone reading a book on how to drive a car and then expecting to drive flawlessly the first time they sit in the driver's seat, or someone reading a book on brain surgery and expecting to be able to operate on a live patient the next day. It looks like you are using 3 or 4 indicators to get daily buy and sell signals on a daily chart for an EFT you're looking to hold for decades. So firstly you are using short term indicators for a long term outlook. You need to decide what timeframe you plan to hold your investments for and use chart periods and indicators that suit that timeframe. Secondly, each indicator can be used in a number of ways and the settings you use for each indicator can determine whether you get earlier or later signals. Also, you need to work out which indicators work well together and are complementary, compared to those that don't work well together and give conflicting signals. All this information will come together for you the more you read about and practice the art of Technical Analysis. If your timeframe is very long-term (decades) I would be using mainly a weekly chart, with a longer period MA, the ROC indicator and possibly some trend lines. Keep it simple. The price itself is very important too. You can determine when a trend is starting or has ended purely using the price. The definition of an uptrend is higher highs and higher lows, so on the weekly chart if there is a lower high followed by a lower low - this could be the end of the uptrend. If we get a lower low followed by a lower high - this again could be the end of the uptrend. These could be a good time to start getting cautious and maybe looking to sell. If you are using stop losses (which I recommend) this may be a good time to tighten your stops. Similarly, a downtrend is defined as lower lows and lower highs. If we get a higher low followed by a higher high it could be the end of the downtrend and maybe the start of an uptrend. This could be a good time to start getting ready to buy. You need to learn about how and where to set your buy and sell orders (including stops) and whether you wait for confirmation when you get a signal. All this takes some time, but the more you read, the more you attend live events and the more you practice the more they will become second nature. In order to get the best out of Technical Analysis you will need to learn, plan, practice and execute. A good book to help you prepare your trading plan is "Smart Trading Plans" by Justine Pollard. One of my favourite books is "The Complete Trading Course - Price Patterns, Strategies, Setups, and Execution Tactics" by Corey Rosenbloom. And another good book is "Trade your Way to Financial Freedom" by Van Tharp. |
Why are credit cards preferred in the US? | The real reason credit cards are so popular in the US is that Americans are lazy and broke, and the credit card companies know how to market to that. Have you ever heard of the $30k millionaires? These were individuals that purchased as if they were some of the wealthy elite, but had no real money to back it up. American society has pushed the idea of "living on credit" for quite some time now. An idea that is even furthered by watching the US government operate solely on credit. (Raise the debt ceiling much?) Live in America for more than six months and you will be bombarded with "Pre-Approved Deals" with low introductory rates that are designed to sucker the average consumer into opening multiple accounts that they don't need. Then, they try and get you to carry a balance by allowing low minimum payments that could take in the neighborhood of 20 years to pay off, depending on carried balance. This in turn pads the credit companies' pockets with all of the interest you now pay on the account. The few truly wealthy Americans do not purchase on credit. |
How to pay myself as a single person corporation in Ontario? Should I get an accountant? | Get an accountant. Now. There are many subtle things that you do not know especially if you are just starting with your own corporation. There is also an issue of corporate tax return that you will have to face pretty soon. You should be looking for accountant that does accounting for corporations, there are companies specializing in small business. I do not think you can "just" transfer money to your personal account. They have to be treated as dividends and treated as such for income tax purposes. Or, as you described, you may pay yourself a salary, but then you have to pay CPP and EI on top of that. When you pay yourself dividends your corporation will need to issue T5 slip for you (accountant will do that) that you will need to use when preparing personal tax return. If you pay yourself salary, corporation will need to give you T4 In terms of tax treatment, if we do not take RRSP contributions dividend tax treatment will leave little bit more money in your hands. I'd say if you have RRSP room and/or TFSA room, pay yourself dividends and then do contributions as you see fit, if you need RRSP room, pay yourself salary. TFSA room does not depend on the type of income, so if you have room there, consider filling it first. |
Can I open a Demat account in India from abroad? | To trade stocks in India, you need a copy of your pan card, address proof(passport or driving license/electricity bill), income tax return (if you are trading futures & options and currencies), and a cancelled cheque from the bank. You will also need to sign across your recent photographs, and require various other forms from a brokerage house which need to be signed in the brokers presence. If your stock broker trusts you, and you have all these documents, then you CAN open a DEMAT account in India by signing and sending him all these documents. Otherwise you CANNOT, as every single form states that "this particular document was signed in my presence", and the stock broker needs to sign under that clause. Chances are, if you live abroad, no broker will ever trust you with any kind of margin, and therefore cannot make profits from you, so they will not agree to open your account. |
Why does FlagStar Bank harass you about payments within grace period? | They call you because that is their business rules. They want their money, so their system calls you starting on the 5th. Now you have to decide what you should do to stop this. The most obvious is to move the payment date to before the 5th. Yes that does put you at risk if the tenant is late. But since it is only one of the 4 properties you own, it shouldn't be that big of a risk. |
Identity theft? | Assuming you live in the US, it is quite normal when you are applying for a loan that the application will ask you to confirm your identity. One of these methods is to ask you which of the following addresses you have lived at, with some of them being very similar (i.e. same city, or maybe even the same street). Sometimes they will ask questions and your answer would be "None of the above." This is done to prevent fraudsters from applying for a loan under your identity. If you see no signs of unauthorized accounts or activities on your credit reports, and you initiated the car loan application, then you should be fine. |
Will I be paid dividends if I own shares? | gnasher729, was able to see my problem here. It was a silly oversight. It's not 50p a share, its 0.5p a share. @Bezzzo: The dividend is not 50p per share, it is 0.50p per share - half a penny per share. Thanks! |
Should I Have Received a 1099-G? | If you don't itemize your deductions, your state tax refund is not considered income to you. Even if you didn't receive the actual 1099-G, you know how much refund you got, so you can calculate if you need to add it back to your income this year using the worksheet on page 23 of the instructions. |
Are Shiller real-estate futures and options catching on with investors? | In my experience, Shiller is always way before his time with his predictions and often it comes at too early a point for anyone actually making some money to care about. His view is very long term - and I trust his predictions, because he so accurately predicted so many of the homepocalypse, and the measures that would follow. He even predicted that there would be bailouts in his book "Irrational Exuberance". His opinons were poo-poo'd as doom and gloom and manipulative until every piece started falling apart in the specific order of events (give or take) that they did. I personally think people like Dr. Shiller make bold predictions that are hard to swallow. The derivatives market is a bit skittish about rolling into bull territory with any kind of housing index, but Warren Buffet's old adage to "buy when everyone is selling and sell when everyone is buying." (paraphrase). I see this as a good long-term investment because I trust Shiller's judgement, he stuck to his guns when the doubts were lobbed at him incessantly (and Krugman, et. al. to some extent), and he turned out to be more than vindicated. To me, these kinds of sources are usually pretty sound. The man knows what he's talking about, and I wouldn't mind picking up a piece of that action, especially if the market just doesn't trust any real estate investments. It's pretty easy to realize that right now housing will be undervalued and now that mortgage applications are (supposedly) stricter, I think there's a good argument to be made that this economist should continue to exceed expectations. |
For SSI, is “authorized user” status on a bank account the same as “ownership”? | Having dealt with with Social Security, state agencies, and banks more than I'd care to, I would urge you to do the following: 1) Get a 100% clear answer on whether or not you are listed as "joint" or "authorized user/signer" for an account. This will probably require a call to the bank, but for less than an hour of you and your friend's time you will save yourself a whole lot of hassle. The difference is like this: if you worked at a business that added you as an authorized user for a credit or debit card, this would allow you to use the card to buy things. But that doesn't make the money in the bank yours! On the other hand if you are listed as "joint", this regards ownership, and it could become tricky to establish whether its your money or not to any governmental satisfaction. 2) You are completely correct in being honest with the agency, but that's not enough - if you don't know what the facts are, you can't really be honest with them. If the form is unclear it's ok to ask, "on having a bank account, does being listed as an authorized user on someone else's account count if it isn't my money or bank account?" But if you are listed as holding the account jointly, that changes the question to: "I am listed as joint on someone else's checking account, but it isn't my money - how is that considered?" To Social Security it might mean generating an extra form, or it might mean you need to have the status on the account changed, or they might not care. But if you don't get the facts first, they won't give you the right answers or help you need. And from personal experience, it's a heck of a lot easier to get a straight and clear answer from a bank than it is from a federal government agency. Have the facts with you when you contact them and you'll be ok - but trust me, you don't want them guessing! |
Do people tend to spend less when using cash than credit cards? | Psychology Today had an interesting article from July 11, 2016, in which they go through the psychological aspects of using cash vs. a credit card. This article cites a 2008 paper in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied that found: “the more transparent the payment outflow, the greater the aversion to spending or higher the ‘pain of paying’ …leading to less transparent payment modes such as credit cards and gift cards (vs. cash) being more easily spent or treated as play or ‘monopoly money.’” The article cites a number of other studies that are of interest on this topic as well. |
Do I have to pay a capital gains tax if I rebuy different stocks? | Yes (most likely). If you are exchanging investments for cash, you will have to pay tax on that - disregarding capital losses, capital loss carryovers, AGI thresholds, and other special rules (which there is no indication of in your question). You will have to calculate the gain on Schedule D, and report that as income on your 1040. This is the case whether you buy different or same stocks. |
Why does selling and then rebuying stock not lead to free money? | There are a few people that do this for a living. They are called "market makers" or "specialists" in a particular stock. First of all, this requires a lot of capital. You can get burned on a few trades, a process known as "gambler's ruin," but if you have enough capital to weather the storm, you can make money. Second, you have to be "licensed" by the stock market authorities, because you need to have stock market trading experience and other credentials. Third, you are not allowed to buy and sell at will. In order to do your job, you have to "balance the boat," that is buy, when others are selling, and sell, when others are buying, in order to keep the market moving in two directions. It's a tough job that requires a lot of experience, plus a license, but a few people can make a living doing this. |
How does “taking over payments” work? | The phrase doesn't mean anything specifically. Your SO could start paying the payments, but the title and lien would remain in your name. If you wanted to change the title or lien to be in her name, you would have to sell the car to her (sales tax would be involved but the process would be relatively painless). You could sell her the car for a pretty cheap price, but not $1. (unless the depreciated value of the car was less than the rest of the loan amount). You could draft up an agreement that if you break up or something, she agrees to buy the car from you for $x dollars minus all the payments she has made on the car. |
Has anyone created a documentary about folks who fail to save enough for retirement? | To answer your question, Retirement Revolution may fit the bill to some extent. I'd also like to address some of the indirect assumptions that were made in your bullet points. I'm convinced that the best way to overcome this is not simply to hold down a good job with COLAs every year, max out your IRA accounts and 401(k)s, invest another 10-20% on top, and live off of the savings and whatever Social Security decides to pay you. Instead, the trick is to not retire -- to make a transition into an income-producing activity that can be done in the typical retirement years, hopefully one that is closer to one's calling (i.e., more fulfilling). This takes time, not money. If people just shut off the TV and spent the time building up a side business that has a high passive component, they'd stand a much better chance of not outliving their money. |
privacy concerns when receiving money from paypal from strangers? | You'll need to check PayPal's terms of service for that first question. I would imagine you could, as my wife and I both have personal PayPal accounts listed at the same address. When you receive money, the senders will only see the (full) name on your account, the amount, and the transaction ID. If you set up a business account, the name on your account will be replaced with the company name. Your mailing address will not be made visible. Yes, PayPal provides an export option of your transaction history. For reference: If your volume greater than $20,000 across 200 or more transactions, then they'll be issuing a 1099-K form, anyway. That depends on the payment method. Bank transfers are instant, where cards require a settlement delay. PayPal provides buyer protection, so I'd be very dutiful in logging all of your work done to provide proof of completion, in case someone disputes a payment. Disputes can take place up to 45 days from the date of the transaction. Chargebacks can take place 120 days or more after the transaction (depends on the card network). |
Is freelance income earned by a U.S. citizen while living abroad subject to state income tax? | New York will want to you to pay taxes on income from "New York sources". I'm not sure what this means to a freelance web developer. If your wife is doing freelance web development under the same business entity as she did in New York (ie. a New York sole proprietor, corporation, etc), you probably do need to file. From nonresident tax form manual: http://tax.ny.gov/pdf/2011/inc/it203i_2011.pdf If you were a nonresident of New York State, you are subject to New York State tax on income you received from New York State sources in 2011. If you were a resident of New York State for only part of 2011, you are subject to New York State tax on all income you received while you were a resident of the state and on income you received from New York State sources while you were a nonresident. To compute the amount of tax due, use Form IT-203, Nonresident and Part-Year Resident Income Tax Return. You will compute a base tax as if you were a full-year resident, then determine the percentage of your income that is subject to New York State tax and the amount of tax apportioned to New York State. |
Sale of jointly owned stock | It depends on when she became the shareholder of record. When your wife received the stock, was ownership clearly transferred to her? If it was, then she should have the right to sell it if she wants. The gross amount of the sale will be reported to the IRS, and then it will be up to you (and/or your tax advisers) to determine its tax basis so that you pay tax only on the appropriate gain. If she hasn't become the shareholder of record yet, then it can be a bit of a mess. Your wife's father saying "Merry Christmas; I'm giving you 500 shares of AAPL" doesn't transfer ownership to you. Him calling up the brokerage and transferring them into an account with her name (or her name and his name) does. Is your wife's father's estate settled yet? If not, then sorting all of this out is part of the fun. If it is, and this asset was left dangling out there, then that's beyond anything I know about. |
Why would a central bank or country not want their currency to appreciate against other currencies? | It would essentially make goods from other countries more cheaper than goods from US. And it would make imports from these countries to China more expensive. The below illustration is just with 2 major currencies and is more illustrative to show the effect. It does not actually mean the goods from these countries would be cheaper. 1 GBP = 1.60 USD 1 EUR = 1.40 USD 1 CNY = 0.15 USD Lets say the above are the rates for GBP, EUR, CNY. The cost of a particular goods (assume Pencils) in international market is 2 USD. This means for the cost of manufacturing this should be less than GBP 1.25 in UK, less than 1.43 in Euro Countires, less than 13.33 CNY in China. Only then export would make sense. If the real cost of manufacturing is say 1.4 GBP in UK, 1.5 EUR in Euro countires, clearly they cannot compete and would loose. Now lets say the USD has appreciated by 20% against other currencies. The CNY is at same rate. 1 GBP = 1.28 USD 1 EUR = 1.12 USD 1 CNY = 0.15 USD Now at this rate the cost of manufacturing should be less than GBP 1.56 GBP, less than 1.78 EUR in Euro Countires. In effect this is more than the cost of manufacturing. So in effect the goods from other countires have become cheaper/compatative and goods from China have become expensive. Similarly the imports from these countires to China would be more expensive. |
How to interpret stock performance charts “vs S&P 500” | tl;dr: The CNN Money and Yahoo Finance charts are wildly inaccurate. The TD Ameritrade chart appears to be accurate and shows returns with reinvested dividends. Ignoring buggy data, CNN most likely shows reinvested dividends for quoted securities but not for the S&P 500 index. Yahoo most likely shows all returns without reinvested dividends. Thanks to a tip from Grade Eh Bacon, I was able to determine that TD Ameritrade reports returns with reinvested dividends (as it claims to do). Eyeballing the chart, it appears that S&P 500 grew by ~90% over the five year period the chart covers. Meanwhile, according to this S&P 500 return estimator, the five year return of S&P 500, with reinvested dividends, was 97.1% between July 2012 to July 2017 (vs. 78.4% raw returns). I have no idea what numbers CNN Money is working from, because it claims S&P 500 only grew about 35% over the last five years, which is less than half of the raw return. Ditto for Yahoo, which claims 45% growth. Even stranger still, the CNN chart for VFINX (an S&P 500 index fund) clearly shows the correct market growth (without reinvesting dividends from the S&P 500 index), so whatever problem exists is inconsistent: Yahoo also agrees with itself for VFINX, but comes in a bit low even if your assume no reinvestment of dividends (68% vs. 78% expected); I'm not sure if it's ever right. By way of comparison, TD's chart for VFINX seems to be consistent with its ABALX chart and with reality: As a final sanity check, I pulled historical ^GSPC prices from Yahoo Finance. It closed at $1406.58 on 27 Aug 2012 and $2477.55 on 28 Aug 2017, or 76.1% growth overall. That agrees with TD and the return calculator above, and disagrees with CNN Money (on ABALX). Worse, Yahoo's own charts (both ABALX and VFINX) disagree with Yahoo's own historical data. |
Need to change cash to cashier's check without bank account (Just arrived to the US) | A cashier's check costs money to get and is not connected to an account. You have cash. You should be able to get a bank to sell you one, even without an account. Find a bank where you would like to open an account and explain the situation. I can't guarantee that that will work, but I would expect it to do so. If not, the bank can probably suggest an alternative. You might also ask the landlord if you can do it with postal money orders. I am positive that you can buy those with cash. You might have to buy a bunch to reach your desired amount. Or perhaps a Western Union money order might be better. You also might be able to open an account with your passport and Social Security Number (SSN). |
Family suggests my first real estate. Advice? | You say My work is steady; even if I lost my job it'd be easy to get another. Location has been static for a few years now, but I'm not sure that'll extrapolate to the future; I'm lazy, so I don't want to move, but for a significantly better job opportunity I wouldn't mind. The general rule of thumb is that you'll come out ahead if you buy a house (with a mortgage) and live there for five years. What you lose in interest, you make up in rent. And living there for five years, you make back your closing costs in equity. If you're there less than five years though, you don't make back the closing costs. You'd have been better off renting. Historically (up to about twenty years ago), your mortgage payment and rent payment for the same basic property would be about the same. I.e. if your current landlord sold you what you are renting, your mortgage payment would be roughly the same as your rent. Maybe a little lower or a little higher but about the same. More recently, it hasn't been strange to see a divergence in those. Now it is not uncommon for a mortgage payment to be 50% higher than rent on the same property. This has some consequences. First, your $1000 rent probably won't stretch as far as a $1000 mortgage payment. So you'll be buying something that you'd only pay $650 or $700 rent. Second, if you move and can't sell immediately, you'll get less in rent than you'd pay in mortgage. Rather than contributing to your income, the property will require subsidy just to maintain the mortgage. And in the early years of the mortgage, this means that you're paying all of the principal (equity) and some of the interest. Buying a duplex makes this worse. You have your side and their side. You can substitute your $1000 rent for half of the mortgage payment. Meanwhile, they are paying $700 in rent. You have to subsidize the mortgage by $300. Plus, you are talking about hiring a property management company to do things like lawn maintenance. There goes another $100 a month. So you are subsidizing the mortgage by $400. I don't know real estate prices in Utah, but a quick search finds a median house price over $200,000. So it seems unlikely that you are buying new construction with new appliances. More likely you are buying an existing duplex with existing appliances. What happens when they fail? The renter doesn't pay for that. The property management company doesn't pay for that (although they'll likely arrange for it to happen). You pay for it. Also, it often takes a bit of time to clean up the apartment after one tenant leaves before the new tenant starts paying rent. That's a dead weight loss. If this happens during a local recession, you could be carrying the mortgage on a property with no offsetting rental income for months. There are some countervailing forces. For example, if house prices in your area are increasing, the rent will increase with them (not necessarily at the same pace). But your mortgage payment stays the same. So eventually the rent may catch up with the mortgage payment. If you wait long enough in a strong enough market, the rent on the other half of the duplex may cover the entire mortgage payment. If you currently have an urban apartment within walking distance of work and switch to a suburban apartment with a commute, you have a better chance of finding a duplex where the entire mortgage payment is only the $1000 that you pay in rent. Your half of the duplex won't be as nice as your apartment is, and you'll have a half hour or hour long commute every morning (and the same to get home in the evening). But on strictly fiscal terms you'll be doing about as well. Plus you have the income from the other half. So even if your mortgage payment is more than your rent payment, you can still break even if the rent covers it. Consider a $1400 mortgage and $400 in rent from the other half (after property management fees). So long as nothing goes wrong, you break even. Perhaps the agreement is that your parents take care of things going wrong (broken appliances, troublesome tenants, time between tenants). Or perhaps you drain your emergency fund and adjust your 401(k) payment down to the minimum when that happens. Once your emergency fund is replenished, restore the 401(k). If you're willing to live in what's essentially a $500 apartment, you can do better this way. Of course, you can also do better by living in a $500 apartment and banking the other $500 that you spend on rent. Plus you now have the expenses of a commute and five hours less free time a week. You describe yourself as essentially living paycheck to paycheck. You have adequate savings but no building excess. Whatever you get paid, you immediately turn around and spend. Your parents may view you as profligate. Your apartment is nicer than their early apartments were. You go out more often. You're not putting anything aside for later (except retirement). It didn't use to be at all strange for people to move out of the city because they needed more space. For the same rent they were paying in the city, they could buy a house in the suburbs. Then they'd build up equity. So long as they stayed in roughly the same work location, they didn't need to move until they were ready to upgrade their house. The duplex plan leads to one of two things. Either you sell the duplex and use the equity to buy a nicer regular house, or you move out of the duplex and rent your half. Now you have a rental property providing income. And if you saved enough for a down payment, you can still buy a regular house. From your parents' perspective, encouraging you to buy a duplex may be the equivalent of asking you to cut back on spending. Rather than reducing your 401(k) deposits, they may be envisioning you trading in your car for a cheaper one and trading in your nice but expensive apartment for something more reasonable in a cheaper neighborhood. Rather than working with a property management company, you'll be out doing yardwork rather than cavorting with your friends. And maybe the new place would have more space to share when you meet someone--you aren't going to provide many grandkids alone. If you get a mortgage on a duplex, you are responsible for paying the mortgage. You are responsible even if something happens to the house. For example, if a fire burns it down or a tornado takes it away. Or you just find that the house isn't solid enough to support that party where all of your friends are jumping up and down to the latest pop sensation. So beyond losing whatever you invest in the property, you may also lose what you borrowed. Now consider what happens if you invest the same amount of money in General Motors as in the house. Let's call that $10,000 and give the house a value of $200,000. With General Motors, even if they go bankrupt tomorrow, you're only out $10,000. With the house, you're out $200,000. Admittedly it's much hard to lose the entire $200,000 value of the house. But even if the house loses $80,000 in value, you are still $70,000 in the hole. You don't need a disaster for the house to lose $80,000 in value. That's pretty much what happened in the 2006-2010 period. People were losing all of what they invested in houses plus having to declare bankruptcy to get out of the excess debt. Of course, if they had been able to hold on until 2015 markets mostly recovered. But if you lost your job in 2008, they wouldn't let you not make mortgage payments until you got a new one in 2012. When you declare bankruptcy, you don't just lose the house. You also lose all your emergency savings and may lose some of your belongings. There are some pretty prosaic disasters too. For example, you and your tenant both go away for a weekend. It rains heavily and your roof starts to leak due to weak maintenance (so not covered by insurance). The house floods, destroying all the electronics and damaging various other things. Bad enough if it's just you, but you're also responsible for the tenant's belongings. They sue you for $20,000 and they move out. So no rent and big expenses. To get the house livable again is going to take $160,000. Plus you have a $190,000 mortgage on a property that is only worth about $40,000. That's at the extreme end. |
Is there any instance where less leverage will get you a better return on a rental property? | leverage amplifies gains and losses, when returns are positive leverage makes them more positive, but when returns are negative leverage makes them more negative. since most investments have a positive return in "the long run", leverage is generally considered a good idea for long term illiquid investments like real estate. that said, to quote keynes: in the long run we are all dead. in the case of real estate specifically, negative returns generally happen when house prices drop. assuming you have no intention of ever selling the properties, you can still end up with negative returns if rents fall, mortgage rates increase or tax rates rise (all of which tend to correlate with falling property values). also, if cash flow becomes negative, you may be forced to sell during a down market, thereby amplifying the loss. besides loss scenarios, leverage can turn a small gain into a loss because leverage has a price (interest) that is subtracted from any amplified gains (and added to any amplified losses). to give a specific example: if you realize a 0.1% gain on x$ when unleveraged, you could end up with a 17% loss if leveraged 90% at 2% interest. (gains-interest)/investment=(0.001*x-0.02*0.9*x)/(x/10)=-0.017*10=-0.17=17% loss one reason leveraged investments are popular (particularly with real estate), is that the investor can file bankruptcy to "erase" a large negative net worth. this means the down side of a leveraged investment is limited for the highly leveraged investor. this leads to a "get rich or start over" mentality common among the self-made millionaire (and failed entrepreneurs). unfortunately, this dynamic also leads to serious problems for the banking sector in the event of a large nation-wide devaluation of real estate prices. |
How do you determine the dividend payout date for Mutual Funds? | Mutual funds generally make distributions once a year in December with the exact date (and the estimated amount) usually being made public in late October or November. Generally, the estimated amounts can get updated as time goes on, but the date does not change. Some funds (money market, bond funds, GNMA funds etc) distribute dividends on the last business day of each month, and the amounts are rarely made available beforehand. Capital gains are usually distributed once a year as per the general statement above. Some funds (e.g. S&P 500 index funds) distribute dividends towards the end of each quarter or on the last business day of the quarter, and capital gains once a year as per the general statement above. Some funds make semi-annual distributions but not necessarily at six-month intervals. Vanguard's Health Care Fund has distributed dividends and capital gains in March and December for as long as I have held it. VDIGX claims to make semi-annual distributions but made distributions three times in 2014 (March, June, December) and has made/will make two distributions this year already (March is done, June is pending -- the fund has gone ex-dividend with re-investment today and payment on 22nd). You can, as Chris Rea suggests, call the fund company directly, but in my experience, they are reluctant to divulge the date of the distribution ("The fund manager has not made the date public as yet") let alone an estimated amount. Even getting a "Yes, the fund intends to make a distribution later this month" was difficult to get from my "Personal Representative" in early March, and he had to put me on hold to talk to someone at the fund before he was willing to say so. |
Multi-Account Budgeting Tools/Accounts/Services | IngDirect has this concept of sub accounts inside a main account - that might be perfect for what you are looking for. To clarify, you basically have one physical account with logical sub account groupings. |
Investment in mutual fund in India for long term goals | Buy only 'Direct' Plans, not regular. - Demat providers won't sell Direct plans, that you can do it through https://www.mfuindia.com Make sure expense ratio < 2.5% (With direct plans it will be much lesser) I hope these points will help you to take a better decision. |
I can make a budget, but how can I get myself to consistently follow my budget? | Lazy man's budget. Four separate accounts for timing of expenses: short (monthly; utilities etc.), medium (quarterly+; property taxes), long (yearly+; house improvements) and retirement. Set target levels for each account, to cover 1 full cycle. The short target is smallest; it should comfortably cover a month. For me each target is about 10x larger than the last. (Cycles & targets for a homeowner w/ family; YMMV). All income goes in short term. When an account gets above target level, the excess gets swept up to the next longer term account. That's all I keep firm track of; takes just a few minutes a month. Watching the account balances vs. their targets (and how short some of them are of target) keeps me focused on spending, and thinking about how much I can sweep (or can't) next paycheck. |
How would bonds fare if interest rates rose? | When interest rates rise, the price of bonds fall because bonds have a fixed coupon rate, and since the interest rate has risen, the bond's rate is now lower than what you can get on the market, so it's price falls because it's now less valuable. Bonds diversify your portfolio as they are considered safer than stocks and less volatile. However, they also provide less potential for gains. Although diversification is a good idea, for the individual investor it is far too complicated and incurs too much transaction costs, not to mention that rebalancing would have to be done on a regular basis. In your case where you have mutual funds already, it is probably a good idea to keep investing in mutual funds with a theme which you understand the industry's role in the economy today rather than investing in some special bonds which you cannot relate to. The benefit of having a mutual fund is to have a professional manage your money, and that includes diversification as well so that you don't have to do that. |
How is it possible that a preauth sticks to a credit card for 30 days, even though the goods have already been delivered? | The answer to your question is very simple: The preauth and the shipment of the goods have no connection within the credit card system. It is possible to process a payment that does not cancel a preauthorization. This is needed for the case where you place two orders and the one you placed second ships first. A preauth can remain active for some time unless it is captured or cancelled. So in your case a preauth was placed and remained active. That you were shipped and billed for some goods had no effect on the preauth because one side or the other failed to attach them. |
Does reading financial statements (quarterly or annual reports) really help investing? | Yes, especially if you are a value investor. The importance and relevance of financial statements depends on the company. IMO, the statements of a troubled "too big to fail" bank like Citibank or Bank of America are meaningless. In other industries, the statements will help you distinguish the best performers -- if you understand the industry. A great retail example was Bed, Bath and Beyond vs. Linens and Things. Externally, the stores appeared identical -- they carried the same product and even offered the same discounts. Looking at the books would have revealed that Linens and Things carried an enormous amount of debt that fueled rapid growth... debt that killed the company. |
Is there a good forum where I can discuss individual US stocks? | The motley fool is one of the best places. Other good communities are Yahoo Finance, Seeking Alpha, and Investors Place. I also recently created a chat room connected to this site to discuss stocks/funds/etc. with other money.stackexchange users. http://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/263/investing |
Which US market indexes (Dow/DJIA, S&P500, NASDAQ) include reinvested dividends? | .INX (the S&P 500 index itself) does not include reinvested dividens. You can figure total return by going to Yahoo finance, historical data. Choose the start year, and end year. You should find that data for SPY (going back to 1993) will show an adjusted close, and takes dividends into account. This isn't perfect as SPY has a .09% expense ratio, but it's better than just the S&P index. One of the more popular Dow ETF is DIA, this will let you similarly track the Dow while accounting for dividends. |
Pros and cons of using a personal assistant service to manage your personal finances? | Years ago I hired someone part time (not virtual however) to help me with all sorts of things. Yes it helps free up some time. However particularly with finances, it does take a leap of faith. If you have high value accounts that this person will be dealing with you can always get them bonded. Getting an individual with a clean credit history and no criminal background bonded usually costs < $600 a year (depending on $ risk exposure). I would start out small with tasks that do not directly put that person in control of your money. In my case I didn't have an official business, I worked a normal 9-5 job, but I owned several rental units, and an interest in a bar. My assistant also had a normal 9-5 job and worked 5-10 hours a week for me on various things. Small stuff at first like managing my calendar, reminding me when bills were due, shipping packages, even calling to set up a hair cut. At some point she moved to contacting tenants, meeting with contractors, showing apartments, etc... I paid her a fixed about each week plus expenses. I would pay her extra if I needed her more (say showing an apartment on a Saturday, or meeting a plumber). She would handled all sorts of stuff for me, and I gave her the flexibility when needed to fit things in with her schedule. After about a month I did get her a credit card for expenses. Obviously a virtual assistant would not be able to do some of these things but I think you get the point. Eventually when the trust had been built up I put her on most of my accounts and gave her some fiduciary responsibilities as well. I'm not sure that this level of trust would be possible to get to with a virtual assistant. However, with a virtual assistant you might be able to avoid one really big danger of hiring an assistant.... You see, several years later when I sold off my apartment buildings I no longer needed an assistant, so I married her. Now one good thing about that is I don't have to pay her now. ;) |
Clothing Store Credit Card Account closed but not deleted | You have little chance of getting it deleted. I have the same situation, I closed mine in 2006, and the login still works. Keep the paperwork that you closed it (or print a PDF of the site showing so), and forget about it. If someone is trying to cheat, re-opening it should be the same difficulty as making a new one in your name, so it is not really an additional risk. You could also set the username and password both to a long random string, and not keep them. That soft-forces you to never login again. Note that it will also stay on your credit record for some years (but that's not a bad thing, as it is not in default; in the contrary). The only negative is that if you apply for credit, you might be ashamed of people seeing you ever having had a Sears or Macy's card or so. |
What happens when a calendar spread is assigned in a non-margin account? | I can't speak for all brokerages but the one I use requires cash accounts to have cash available to purchase the stock in this situation. With the cash available you would be able to purchase the stock if the option was exercised. Hope this helps |
Priced out of London property market. What are my accommodation investment options? | Be radical! (I assume you are not working for a city bank getting paid “city wages” – e.g. you are one of the 99% of people in London or more “normal” income.) House prices and rents in London and anywhere within reasonable commuting distances are now so high that couples in reasonable jobs often have to rent rooms in shared houses (HMOs). This is due to so many people wishing to live/work in London and there not being enough new homes built. If you are looking at buying a property to rent out, you need the rent to be about double the interest payments on the mortgage – otherwise you will not be able to afford repairs, or cope when interest rates increase – (you could also get a tax bill that is more the your profit). Finding such a property is very hard in London, as the prices of homes have gone up a lot more in London then rents have. There are still some flats where the rent will cover the landlord’s costs, but not many. (Any landlord that brought more than a few years ago, is making a very nice profit in London, as the rents have gone up a lot since they brought – but are you willing to bet your life on the rents going up even more?) Moving a short distance out of London, does not help much. So look at somewhere like Manchester or Birmingham |
Why are auto leases stubbornly strict about visa status and how to work around that? | In the U.S., most car dealers provide lease financing through one company (usually a subsidiary of the auto manufacturer). Whereas they provide loan financing through a variety of companies, some of whom offer very high interest rate loans and sell the loans as collateralized debt obligations (CDOs). Have you checked whether Chase or First Tech Credit Union offers a suitable car lease? |
Is it possible to create a self-managed superannuation fund to act as a mortage offset? (Australia) | If you're under age 55 and in good health generally you cannot withdraw your funds from super and your super fund cannot provide you with any financial assistance eg lend you money. However, for a very small percentage of people with unrestricted non preserved superannuation components ( check your statement most people's superannuation is 'preserved'which means they cannot access it until they meet a 'condition of release')they may withdraw their super benefits upto the unrestricted non preserved amount. For healthy (& able) persons aged 55 and over they may access their super under the following conditions: I can understand your frustration of having your money compulsory tied up in superannuation especially given the poor investment returns of the past 5 years. However, superannuation may be more flexible than you realize, I am an adviser at Grant Thornton and I am constantly telling clients that superannuation is not an invest but it the most tax effective long term savings vehicle available to Australians for their investment savings eg max 15% tax on income and capital gains if held for a year are taxed at 10%. If you're not happy with your investment returns you may like to seek some advice or,set up your own super fund - a self managed super fund where you can invest a wide variety of assets; shares, managed funds,cash, term deposits, property( your super fund can even borrow to help acquire the property) I hope this helps |
How to convert coins into paper money or deposit coins into bank account, without your bank in local? | We have machines in several grocery store chains that will take your coins, sort them, and give you two ways to get your money back: I've seen these many places, but, of course, I cannot say for sure if there are any near you. |
First time home buyer. How to negotiate price? | In this case, trust the real estate agent; negotiating experience is one of the things you selected them for. Especially if they're suggesting a lower number than you expected, since they get paid on commission and so may be biased the other way. Part of their job is to look for hints about how motivated this seller is and what price they might accept, as opposed to what price they hope to get. And remember that the default assumption is that the two parties will meet in the middle somewhere, which means it's customary to offer 10% less to signal that you could probably be talked into it if they drop the price about 5%. This is like bridge-hand bidding: it's a semi-formalized system of hints about levels of interest, except with fewer conventions and less rationality. As far as the seller paying the closing costs: that's really part of the same negotiation, and doing it that way makes the discussion more complicated for the seller since they need to figure out how much more to charge you to cover this cost. If they offer, great, factor that into what you are willing to pay... but I wouldn't assume it or ask for it. Edit: Yes, unless you have engaged a Buyer's Agent (which I recommend for first-time buyers and maybe all huyers), their fiduciary duty is to the seller. But part of that duty is to make the sale happen. If the price goes too high and you walk away, neither the agent nor the seller make money. A bad agent can be as bad as a bad car salesman, sure. But if you don't like and mostly trust your agent, you are working with the wrong agent. That doesn't mean you give them every bit of information the seller might want, but it does mean you probably want to listen to their input and understand their rationalle before deciding what your own strategy will be. |
What is today's price of 15 000 Euro given 15 years ago? | With no written agreement in place, the "right" rate is whatever both parties can agree to. I could argue that I could have invested the money in S&P 500 index funds and made about 9% annually over the last 15 years and the 15,000 would have been over 40,000. The "fair" rate would be whatever rate of return could have been expected from whatever your father would have done with the money otherwise - keep it in a bank account, pay off debt, invest in the market, start a business, whatever. Your father has the benefit of hindsight to know what would have been a good use of the funds over 15 years. Using the rate of inflation results in effectively a zero-percent loan in real interest terms (meaning no profit was made, just accounting for the time value of money). Both parties need to either decide on an amount or equivalent rate, or decide if squeezing the other for a few thousand Euros is worth the strife. |
Are option contracts subject to mark to market rules | If I sell a covered call, on stock I own 100%, there is no risk of a margin call. The stock goes to zero, I'm still not ask to send in more money. But, if bought on margin, margin rules apply. A naked put would require you to be able to buy the stock if put to you. As the price of the stock drops, you still need to be able to buy it at the put strike price. Mark to market is just an expression describing how your positions are considered each day. |
Including the region where you live in your investment portfolio? | Diversification is a risk-mitigation strategy. When you invest in equities, you generally get a higher rate of return than a fixed income investment. But you have risks... a single company's market value can decline for all sorts of reasons, including factors outside of the control of management. Diversification lets you spread risk and concentrate on sectors that you feel offer the best value. Investing outside of your currency zone allows you to diversify more, but also introduces currency risks, which require a whole other level of understanding. Today, investing in emerging markets is very popular for US investors because these economies are booming and US monetary policy has been weakening the dollar for some time. A major bank failure in China or a flip to a strong dollar policy could literally implode those investments overnight. At the end of the day, invest in what you understand. Know the factors that can lower your investment value. |
Given current market conditions, how / when should I invest a $200k inheritance? | E) Spend a small amount of that money on getting advice from a paid financial planner. (Not a broker or someone offering you "free" advice; their recommendations may be biased toward what makes them the most money). A good financial planner will talk to you about your plans and expectations both short and long term, and about your risk tolerance (would a drop in value panic you even if you know it's likely to recover and average out in the long run, that sort of thing), and about how much time and effort you want to put into actively managing your portfolio. From those answers, they will generate an initial proposed plan, which will be tested against simulations of the stock market to make sure it holds up. Typically they'll do about 100 passes over the plan to get a sense of its probable risk versus growth-potential versus volatility, and tweak the plan until the normal volatility is within the range you've said you're comfortable with while trying to produce the best return with the least risk. This may not be a perfect plan for you -- but at the very least it will be an excellent starting point until you decide (if you ever do decide) that you've learned enough about investing that you want to do something different with the money. It's likely to be better advice than you'll get here simply because they can and will take the time to understand your specific needs rather than offering generalities because we're trying to write something that applies to many people, all of whom have different goals and time horizons and financial intestinal fortitude. As far as a house goes: Making the mistake of thinking of a house as an investment is a large part of the mindset that caused the Great Recession. Property can be an investment (or a business) or it can be something you're living in; never make the mistake of putting it in both categories at once. The time to buy a house is when you want a house, find a house you like in a neighborhood you like, expect not to move out of it for at least five years, can afford to put at least 20% down payment, and can afford the ongoing costs. Owning your home is not more grown-up, or necessarily financially advantageous even with the tax break, or in any other way required until and unless you will enjoy owning your home. (I bought at age 50ish, because I wanted a place around the corner from some of my best friends, because I wanted better noise isolation from my neighbors, because I wanted a garden, because I wanted to do some things that almost any landlord would object to, and because I'm handy enough that I can do a lot of the routine maintenance myself and enjoy doing it -- buy a house, get a free set of hobbies if you're into that. And part of the reason I could afford this house, and the changes that I've made to it, was that renting had allowed me to put more money into investments. My only regret is that I didn't realise how dumb it was not to max out my 401(k) match until I'd been with the company for a decade ... that's free money I left on the table.) |
Are personal finance / money management classes taught in high school, anywhere? | We had a "civics" class when I was a freshman in high school. This was in the Ann Arbor, MI public schools. It covered the very basics (how to balance your checkbook, what are stocks, how do income taxes work, what is interest, etc.) of money management along with an overview of politics and the legal system. It was a really light class, though, and didn't go deeply into personal finance and money management. I agree that such a class would be very valuable, as would cooking, nutrition, and basic home and car repair. |
How come we can find stocks with a Price-to-Book ratio less than 1? | Note that the formula for Price to Book ratio is: Stock Price / {[Total Assets - (Intangible Assets + Liabilities)] / Stock Outstanding} http://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/price-to-bookratio.asp http://www.investopedia.com/articles/fundamental/03/112603.asp There's a number of factors that could lead to a lower than 1. The primary reason, imho, could be the company is in a state of retiring stock with debt. The company is selling penny stocks (only to get people more interested in it's later development) which are inherently undervalued. There may be other reasons, but definitely check out both articles. |
Stocks: do Good Till Cancelled orders get executed during after hours? | When I place an order with Scottrade I also have to specify if I am wanting to trade outside of normal hours. |
Is there a benefit, long term, to life insurance for a youngish, debt, and dependent free person? | If there are no dependents, there is no need for life insurance. You mention getting insurance when it is not needed, to protect you against some future risk. If you have a policy and a disease crops up that would normally make you un-insurable, you can keep your insurance for the rest of the term. The cost for this would be very high. You would have to have a term that would last decades to cover you until some future child is out of college. If you never have somebody that depends on you for income, there never is a need for life insurance. |
Where do stock traders get realtime updates on Fed announcements? Is there a feed I could scrape? | Bloomberg terminal is a pretty standard way nowadays to get this information (and a lot more) pretty much in real time. |
How to calculate my real earnings from hourly temp-to-hire moving to salaried employee? | I would not assume they would pay for any benefits. You will be responsible for paying entirely for health insurance and social security and Medicare. This move is most likely not in your best interests. At a minimum, I would charge double your current hourly rate and would charge for all hours worked including time and half for overtime. 3 times is actually probably a better choice if you want to cover holidays (which they will not pay you for), vacation time, etc. I know when I did project bids, we always priced at 2-3 times the salary we paid the employees. |
What is a good rental yield? | The rule of thumb I have always heard and what we rent our rental house at is 1% per month at the minimum (in the US). The rent has to cover the mortgage, the property taxes, the homeowners insurance, your income taxes (on the rent), the maintenance of the property and the times when the property is vacant. Even at 1% per month that doesn't leave a whole lot of profit compared to what you put in. I have no idea why anybody would buy a rental property in Australia if all they could get is 5% per year before expenses. They couldn't possibly be making money in that investment, not to mention the aggravations of getting late night phone calls because something broke in the rental house. No way I would make that investment. |
How much should a new graduate with new job put towards a car? | most of the people who lurk in money.se will probably tell you to spend as little as possible on a car, but that is a really personal decision. since you live with your parents, you can probably afford to waste a lot of money on a car. on the other hand, you already have a large income so you don't really have the normal graduate excuses for deferring student loans and retirement savings. for the sake of other people in a less comfortable position, here is a more general algorithm for making the decision: |
Why are fund managers' average/minimum purchase price from form 13F the same? | The GuruFocus Link is just reporting the high and low price of the quarter. Price Range (Average) – The estimated trade prices. The average price is calculated from the time weighted average during the period. If no price range is shown, the trade prices are estimated trade prices, which are more accurate estimates. AAPL: $420.05 - $549.03 ($467.26) The numbers for the high and low match what I found for AAPL on Yahoo Finance. Keep in mind their definition uses estimate 3 times. |
Typical discount for cash purchase on $1+ million homes? | First, I assume you understand that 'Cash Offer' doesn't mean you really show up with cash (in a duffel bag...), but is an expression that designates that you don't need a mortgage approval, but have the money in your accounts. The advantages for the seller are With both cases depending on the seller's situation, there can't be a generic answer, and the 'discount' will be all over the place between zero and several percent. |
What prevents interest rates from rising? | There do not appear to be any specific legal measures to prevent bankruptcies. In fact, they seems to be part of the means for which rates are raised, for the consequent aim of lowering inflation. See: The Budgetary Implications of Higher Federal Reserve Board Interest Rates by Dean Baker, Center for Economic and Policy Research. The Federal Reserve Board (Fed) is widely expected to start raising interest rates some time in 2015. The purpose of higher interest rates is to slow the economy and prevent inflation. This is done by reducing the rate of job creation and thereby reducing the ability of workers to achieve wage gains. |
Where I can find the exact time when a certain company's stock will be available in the secondary market? | Very often, the word secondary market is used synonymously with the stock market as we all know it. In this case, the primary market would be the "closed" world of VCs, business angels, etc to which stock market investors do not have access, e.g. the securities are not trading on a public stock market. |
What is a negotiable security and how are they related to derivatives? | As Dheer pointed out, Wikipedia has a good definition of what a negotiable instrument is. A security is an instrument or certificate that signifies an ownership interest in something tangible. 1 share of IBM represents some small fraction of a company. You always have the ability to choose a price you are willing to pay -- which may or may not be the price that you get. A derivative is a level of abstraction linked by a contract to a security... if you purchase a "Put" contract on IBM stock, you have a contractural right to sell IBM shares at a specific price on a specific date. When you "own" a derivative, you own a contract -- not the actual security. |
Is it legal if I'm managing my family's entire wealth? | Aside from the fact that there are massive problems with taxes, liability, fiduciary responsibility, and (assuming you're accepting any sort of compensation at all) licensing. The mere fact that you're asking this question indicates that you're probably not suitably qualified to handle this for others. Why not have someone qualified handle this? |
Are prepayment penalties for mortgages normal? | It's not uncommon to have a small penalty if you pre-pay the mortgage in a short time. After all, making the loan isn't free for the bank. But as Nathan says, if a bank is planning to try very hard to stop you from giving them money, there is probably a reason. Try to convince your wife: there is nothing inherently wrong with debt. Like anything, too much can be bad for you, but when debt is deployed wisely -- that is almost always, when it is used to finance a capital asset (an asset that produces value) -- it can be a very good thing. |
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