Investing General Discussion

Sanrith Descartes

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How much does one need to have to get a bro to manage this investing nonsense to get a non moron?

like basic stuff like moving around my retirement account funds etc
It's a crapshoot getting a good investment rep. Honestly, and say this will little joking at all, there are people in this thread who outperform "paid professional investors" on the regular and for years at a stretch.

If it's just a 401k do this. Post a list of all your investing options available in the 401k and your age. Most likely you will get better advice here and it won't cost you 1% of AUM a year.
 
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Captain Suave

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Honestly, and say this will little joking at all, there are people in this thread who outperform "paid professional investors" on the regular and for years at a stretch.

Once upon a time I had an advisor charging me 1% to significantly underperform the S&P. Fixing that shit early in life was one of my best decisions ever.

How much does one need to have to get a bro to manage this investing nonsense to get a non moron?

like basic stuff like moving around my retirement account funds etc

Quite honestly, it's worth figuring how how to manage it on your own. For retirement goals you can pretty much just fire and forget into broad index funds. As Sanrith says, you'll get plenty of good suggestions here if you give us the list of funds.

The significant majority of activity described in this thread is unnecessary for standard investors looking for retirement, and would in fact be counterproductive to try emulate unless you make this your job/hobby. You really shouldn't have to interact with your investment portfolio more than a couple times a year, and it only takes a few minutes to do whatever rebalancing is necessary to match your plan.
 
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Siliconemelons

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Yeah most things here have been over performing the general. I used to read this thread a lot…. But things whew… escalate quickly.

I have 3 retirement accounts, one very small was a TIAA account I had when I first started working part time. It has like not much.

the other is Florida Retirement System investment account… I should have kept it as a pension but, well I am dumb.

the 3rd is my current one that is a different type because I work for a non profit.

All of them are in the green this year, even after their collective hit they took in q1/2 but have recovered and gained.
 

Sanrith Descartes

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Yeah most things here have been over performing the general. I used to read this thread a lot…. But things whew… escalate quickly.

I have 3 retirement accounts, one very small was a TIAA account I had when I first started working part time. It has like not much.

the other is Florida Retirement System investment account… I should have kept it as a pension but, well I am dumb.

the 3rd is my current one that is a different type because I work for a non profit.

All of them are in the green this year, even after their collective hit they took in q1/2 but have recovered and gained.
Look for an option that is a version of the S&P 500 index. It can have lots of names (big cap, large cap etc) in the description. Most likely it will be a mutual fund and hopefully it has a very small net fee. Choose that. For example the last 401k I had included the Vanguard Admiral Large cap. Net fee was almost zero and it was the S&P 500 index fund.
 

The_Black_Log Foler

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How much does one need to have to get a bro to manage this investing nonsense to get a non moron?

like basic stuff like moving around my retirement account funds etc
As someone who has been under professional management a decade, and only because I’m related to someone who fits my advisors super high net worth bracket and he lumps me into their fee so I get charged less, I can tell you it depends. Like Sanrith Descartes Sanrith Descartes said, from my novice observations it seems pretty easy to manage yourself.

On the other hand you need to be mindful on your overall money management. For example someone who tends to spend more may have a higher allocation of assets in bonds. At least, so I am told.

There’s also other perks to having a financial advisor but I don’t think you’d see them unless you end up with someone who manages people worth 10+ million as a baseline. For example the individual I’m related to doesn’t even pay their own bills, my advisors firm does that. They have zero budget because their spending is predictable and I’m not sure they even know how much money they have because it’s plenty. Theres other random perks too, some aimed at niche clients like athletes etc.

Anecdotal. Mine has opened up a lot of unique opportunities and experiences for me. I’m doing some of my own investments on the side recently and enjoying it.
 

Kithani

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For example the individual I’m related to doesn’t even pay their own bills, my advisors firm does that. They have zero budget because their spending is predictable and I’m not sure they even know how much money they have because it’s plenty.
I’m sure there are plenty of legit groups out there but this paragraph reads like the beginning of an episode of American Greed lol
 

Siliconemelons

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Lol

Thanks for all the advice, I do not have any allusions that I have any sort of wealth, hence why I was seeking what really would be the bottom to even be somewhat useful.. I know they make money by your money so small accounts are useless to them generally.

Each of my plans have advisors, I talked to one at FRS, or well Eli something who does it for them. When they calculated investment va pension. Essentially they used some calculators, bad market it was slightly less, flat market it was essentially flat and good market it was a good chunk higher. I was at an odd time in years for this as they said usually the calculations are much more variable than mine that was quite even. Generally it’s way better one way or the other.

I suppose I should give them a call just to make sure all things are aligned, yes it’s all basic retirement.


Just seems everything I do is bad investment, if I buy land, the market will explode the next week and the boog will start, that’s my history.
 

The_Black_Log Foler

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Lol

Thanks for all the advice, I do not have any allusions that I have any sort of wealth, hence why I was seeking what really would be the bottom to even be somewhat useful.. I know they make money by your money so small accounts are useless to them generally.

Each of my plans have advisors, I talked to one at FRS, or well Eli something who does it for them. When they calculated investment va pension. Essentially they used some calculators, bad market it was slightly less, flat market it was essentially flat and good market it was a good chunk higher. I was at an odd time in years for this as they said usually the calculations are much more variable than mine that was quite even. Generally it’s way better one way or the other.

I suppose I should give them a call just to make sure all things are aligned, yes it’s all basic retirement.


Just seems everything I do is bad investment, if I buy land, the market will explode the next week and the boog will start, that’s my history.
Stick around this thread, ask questions, take baby steps. Sanrith, blazin and others have been nice enough to help me. I did my own research too. I now have my own portfolio I started last month that’s 80% FXAIX and 20% QQQM. There doesn’t seem to be any stupid questions here - you gotta start somewhere
 

The_Black_Log Foler

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Been talking with my financial advisor more on my asset allocation for the portfolio I have them manage. They sent me a slide deck with some interesting stuff. I don’t want to screenshot as to not dox.

One thing they have here is all the firms like Morningstar, BNY Mellon, black rock, vanguard, Morgan Stanley etc (with voya, vanguard, and northern trust being the exceptions) all are projecting that EM will be the highest-returning region over the next five to 15 years. However, they rarely allocate according to their return projections because they view risk primarily as deviating from U.S. stocks.

Isn’t the common theme around here that EM are bullshit?

Now looking at the firm’s 10 year forecast they have EM, Asia, international and Europe equities projected to exceed US equities on average between 4-8% with each forecasted average having about a 4% spread of potential outcomes (i.e. EM has forecasted average of about 9% with a range of potential outcomes being +/- 3%). I thought that was kind of interesting.

To be frank a lot of stuff here I’m not sure I fully understand at first glance. They seem to put a heavy emphasis on valuation. It looks like they think highest growth opportunities are in countries with stable currency, growing economies, favorable demographics and reasonable valuations. Again here EM countries come out on top with a forecasted higher GDP growth over next five years, significantly less government debt as % of GDP, and a lower normalized price to earnings ratio. This is compared against developed and US markets.

Curious to hear anyone’s thoughts.
 

Gravel

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If you absolutely feel like you need an advisor, find a fee based one. Anyone doing AUM is a huckster. But either way the reality is you can manage your own portfolio in a super lazy way that outperforms any advisor or manager.
 
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Sanrith Descartes

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Been talking with my financial advisor more on my asset allocation for the portfolio I have them manage. They sent me a slide deck with some interesting stuff. I don’t want to screenshot as to not dox.

One thing they have here is all the firms like Morningstar, BNY Mellon, black rock, vanguard, Morgan Stanley etc (with voya, vanguard, and northern trust being the exceptions) all are projecting that EM will be the highest-returning region over the next five to 15 years. However, they rarely allocate according to their return projections because they view risk primarily as deviating from U.S. stocks.

Isn’t the common theme around here that EM are bullshit?

Now looking at the firm’s 10 year forecast they have EM, Asia, international and Europe equities projected to exceed US equities on average between 4-8% with each forecasted average having about a 4% spread of potential outcomes (i.e. EM has forecasted average of about 9% with a range of potential outcomes being +/- 3%). I thought that was kind of interesting.

To be frank a lot of stuff here I’m not sure I fully understand at first glance. They seem to put a heavy emphasis on valuation. It looks like they think highest growth opportunities are in countries with stable currency, growing economies, favorable demographics and reasonable valuations. Again here EM countries come out on top with a forecasted higher GDP growth over next five years, significantly less government debt as % of GDP, and a lower normalized price to earnings ratio. This is compared against developed and US markets.

Curious to hear anyone’s thoughts.
EMs are great. Until they aren't. EMs were the shit in the early 2000's. And then they hit 2007. The real question is do you trust the accounting of companies in Botswana and China to be telling you the truth about their books? There are some documentaries that cover the accounting issues in China during the teens. Even American companies have been known to cook the books but at least you can have a small amount of faith that the American companies are semi-legit. Unless they are SPACS ;)

tldr: EMs are a gamble and in my opinion the return doesnt cover the risk.
 
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Jysin

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The thing you REALLY need to consider is that compounding works both ways. That 1% AUM fee each year also compounds against you (some are as high as 2-3%). Fees are the bane of long term investing accounts. Real talk, 98%+ in this thread should just be DCA into the S&P500 and forgetting the login to your brokerage account until retirement. For those that want to dabble in timing and stock picking, take a very small portion of your account and play with that (maybe 5% total acct). If you lose that, game over, leave the rest to just ride until retirement.

Those managed accounts will far often fail to keep up with the S&P returns, especially when adding in the fees.

From Investopedia:

The Impact of 401(k) Fees

The difference in these percentage points doesn't sound like much, but it can really add up over the years. Take these three hypothetical friends: Joe, Tyler and David each invest $100,000 in a mutual fund at age 35. Each account earns an annualized return of 8%, but the accounts charge annual fees of 1%, 2% and 3%. David paid 3% and has $432,194 in assets at age 65. Tyler paid 2% and has $574,349 for retirement. Joe paid 1% and is the big winner, with $761,225 saved for retirement.
 
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Sanrith Descartes

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If you absolutely feel like you need an advisor, find a fee based one. Anyone doing AUM is a huckster. But either way the reality is you can manage your own portfolio in a super lazy way that outperforms any advisor or manager.
This. Find one you can pay by the hour. This is actually one of my new business models (once I finish my series 65). If you pay the advisor by the hour, they "should" have no conflict of interest (from companies who might be offering them kickbacks to push specific financial instruments) and their only fiduciary duty is to the client paying them by the hour.
 
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Sanrith Descartes

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The thing you REALLY need to consider is that compounding works both ways. That 1% AUM fee each year also compounds against you (some are as high as 2-3%). Fees are the bane of long term investing accounts. Real talk, 98%+ in this thread should just be DCA into the S&P500 and forgetting the login to your brokerage account until retirement. For those that want to dabble in timing and stock picking, take a very small portion of your account and play with that (maybe 5% total acct). If you lose that, game over, leave the rest to just ride until retirement.

Those managed accounts will far often fail to keep up with the S&P returns, especially when adding in the fees.

From Investopedia:

This. Charles Ellis does the data breakdown in one of his books (The Little Book of Investing I think it was) of the overhead combo of investing fee, trade fees and taxes that need to be overcome just to match the S&P. I am a huge proponent of 99% of investors are best off sitting their cash in the index funds on dividend reinvestment. Let time work its magic. Even skilled investors should be carrying a large chunk of their investments in the indexes (I put myself in this category) and using individual stocks to provide coverage to something lacking in the indexes or if they want to be overweight in specific stocks.

And yeah no more than 1 or 2% should be in the "I'm Gordon Gecko bitches" account. And stay the fuck away from margin trading. And options.
 
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Sanrith Descartes

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1702392886225.png


Nervous Key And Peele GIF
 
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The_Black_Log Foler

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This. Charles Ellis does the data breakdown in one of his books (The Little Book of Investing I think it was) of the overhead combo of investing fee, trade fees and taxes that need to be overcome just to match the S&P. I am a huge proponent of 99% of investors are best off sitting their cash in the index funds on dividend reinvestment. Let time work its magic. Even skilled investors should be carrying a large chunk of their investments in the indexes (I put myself in this category) and using individual stocks to provide coverage to something lacking in the indexes or if they want to be overweight in specific stocks.

And yeah no more than 1 or 2% should be in the "I'm Gordon Gecko bitches" account. And stay the fuck away from margin trading. And options.
I bought QQQM and IXUS (ya I know). Why do people make such a big deal about having to manually invest dividends from ETFs? Am I missing something or do they just prefer mutual funds reinvesting it for max lazy?
 

Rangoth

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I’m not sure what you mean, “manually”. For fidelity there is a settings page where you can control(I believe, it’s been a while) whether you take dividends in cash or reinvestment. I think you can even control it at the individual ticker level if memory serves.
 

The_Black_Log Foler

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I’m not sure what you mean, “manually”. For fidelity there is a settings page where you can control(I believe, it’s been a while) whether you take dividends in cash or reinvestment. I think you can even control it at the individual ticker level if memory serves.
Nice, you’re right. Maybe I was reading old forum/reddit posts. Thanks