Thanks for your advice, I've been reading that bogleheads site but what I'm getting from that site is that if you have money and no short term time frame within which you want to withdraw you basically can only win money with investing, that can't be correct can it ?

Basically the simple answer is that yes it's correct (historically at least) if you are indexing.

Passive, long-term investing ftw. Build a diversified portfolio of index funds or ETFs (can be as simple as 1 stock ETF and 1 bond ETF) and rebalance yearly or twice a year. Use a low-cost online broker (I recommend TD International in Luxembourg for fellow Europeans) and avoid all those nasty managed fund charges! I strongly recommend Andrew Hallam's two books. Simplifies matters incredibly. Literally changed my life.

It isn't correct, but you most likely won't be able to pick a strategy that is more +ev.

When you know that there is a strategy that works (just buy the market) and there are 20,485 strategies that you don't have the skills to know the ev of, pick the one that works.

So I have 65k just sitting in a locked in RRSP savings account. Canadian. I presume that my play is to open up an account at a discount trader (virtual trader or questtrade), transfer the RRSP over and get some ETFs going?

So I've been digging a bit deeper and there is a few things I have follow up questions about if thats ok.

After reading all the basic advice like age in bonds etc I feel like it may not all apply to me. As said I'm Dutch and we have a pretty neat pension system, I wouldn't need the money I'm investing at all for my pension. In fact I figured, if we assume that the stock market has a long term positive why not invest a bit more aggressively ?

I've had a talk with my bank and looked at their options, the return over the last ten years on an age in bonds kind of stock portfolio was 4.5%, why not invest in one of their more aggressive funds (their most aggressive fund did 6.5% in the last ten years) ? I don't need the money in the end, I make reasonable money which is including paying for my pension and all kinds of social benefits we have here in the Netherlands. Why not lock that 55k up in a 'super' aggressive fund and let it ride for 10/15 years ? I feel like I would have to switch over some of that money at a time my fund is doing well in those 15 years and transfer it to a more stable one if I feel like I will be needing the money at some point but I wouldn't know why I would need it in the first place for now.

I found out that I really cba to actually learn up on trading myself, I probably lack the self discipline and iron balls to ride it out myself but it did help me understand some basics which is helping me in picking a trader imo. If I can get a professional to manage my funds for 1.2% and the DIY investing starts around 0.5% which is excl. all the transfer costs and whatnot, maybe taking that hit is the right thing to do for me ? I just feel like I'm not cut out to handle it like a boss. Sorry for a messy train of thought like post.

Stay away from funds recommended by your bank. The rates they charge may appear low but you can find much cheaper online brokers. They also often have hidden and very confusing fees/charges.

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Also, it is quite easy to set up and manage your portfolio spending less than an hour/year of your time. Banks and other financial institutions/fund managers try to overcomplicate things and confuse customers.

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There are no hidden or confusing fees or charges, we have laws against that and they are very explicit.

The difference in fees that I would pay is somewhere around 0.5% max between self managing and letting the bank manage it. I'm interested in seeing whether people here think that its possible that my unwillingness to manage my own funds is reasonably priced at 0.5% and whether my argument is logical or I'm forgetting something. I have little discipline and I'm generally anxious and impatient which further strengthens me in my idea's that I'm not a good fit for managing myself.

I'm also interested in advice on whether to invest in aggressive funds or not as per my argument in the above post ("Why not lock it up for 15 years and let it ride").

Everything was very clear in my talks with the bank, for example they showed me what their spread was in the different funds they were offering (branch/geographically/stocksvsother). I'm highly skeptical of the less then 1 hour a year wrt managing a portfolio for someone who doesn't know a lot about it. Just reading the basic articles on the boggleheads site will be much more then that so it seems far from a realistic estimate.

I just did some calculations, 0.5% difference between self managing and bank managing means I'm paying them 300 a year over the course of 15 years for managing a possibly very aggressive fund.

1) Investing with an online broker can be just as simple and hands off as going through your bank. They provide all-in-1 portfolios where you can really just set it and forget about it. The "professional trader" at your bank is adding zero value.

2) How do you figure a maximum difference of 0.5%? Your bank will charge 1.2% total, whereas the first fund I looked at, the "aggressive" Think ETF from Binck - charges 0.44%. That's a difference of 0.76%, which adds up to $7k on your $55k investment over 15 years, and you can likely do better if you shop around a bit.

3) "I have little discipline and I'm generally anxious and impatient", combined with wanting to invest in "a possibly very aggressive fund" will likely not end well.

The best advice I can give you is open an account with an online broker (i use TD International but there are others that offer similarly priced services). You said you do not need to touch it for 15 yrs or so, which is perfect. Buy a global stock index ETF plus a short-term bond ETF. Fees will be between 0.2 and 0.4% for each. Depending on how aggressive u want to be, opt for say 30% bond ETF and 70% stock ETF. Increase stock % if ur not scared of a lil risk. You could invest the whole 55k in one lump sum or split it over several years if u like. Easy peasy!

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FWIW, I'm not trying to go against the grain just for the **** of it but I'm just trying to get to the bottom of it and I feel like the effort can sometime be made to seem minimal because most of the people here probably have a lot of knowledge/time from/put into the whole financial world/thing. I'm just your regular financial fish who has been in debt for 100% of my life pretty much.

Ill try and actually put some time into investigating this tonight.

Binck does still have transfer costs imo which has to be calculated into the total costs of the fund. I have arbitrarily put the transfer costs for such a broker at 0.2% (which seems to be correct) a year making it 0.12% - 0.7% = 0.5% for a bunch of professionals to manage my fund (this was my rationale). Now I could see the case for saying that you won't sell/buy with your whole portfolio practically diminishing that 0.2% to something very small.

Just checked the Binck think offensive fund which has;
€ 5 + 0,10% for each transfer that is done.

This is why I felt like I should just give my money to pro's. It would be easier for me to ride it out knowing that professionals are working hard right now to rearrange my portfolio during times of a crisis instead of me frantically thinking about what I should be doing right now as I know nothing about it at all, wasting my money on transfer funds and wrong buys or whatever. Its also easier to ride out when you simply don't have easy access.

Could someone chime in on this and confirm that it's really this simple ? I just have a hard time believing people are paying these guys shuffling around boat loads of money while everyone could do just as fine with an hour of work each year. There has to be some nuance to that statement somewhere.

Thanks to both of you for your answers btw, I really appreciate it.

I was once just as skeptical as you.
These financial advisers must know more than everyone else, right? NO
They are able to time the markets and stay ahead of the underlying index, right? NO...over the longterm a managed portfolio will almost always underform the underlying index, especially after taking into account the fees. Of course, a specific fund may outperform for a few years but this will not last. Seems like u have made up ur mind to go with ur bank. If ur comfortable with that then go with it. Your bank/fund manager will be delighted.

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Actually I've been looking at Binck tonight as proposed by several ITT and starting to sway towards something like that ThinkETF global thing n00b was talking about while buying in periodically over the next 2 years like you said. I'm getting some info on their site soon so interested to see what happens. I'm still not sure if I should hammer aggressively or go for the medium options though. It will probably take at least a month or so before I have my money in hand so I've got time left to figure it out a bit. Thanks again for everyone's posts so far.

I don't know anything about Binck but I would look around at others before deciding. You have a month so plenty of time to look into it. I might have some recommendations for you. Feel free to PM.

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Got a quick question, am looking to invest funds for my child, the state I live in doesn't have a 529 so there's not the same benefit in going that route so I'm just using a custodial brokerage account and investing funds for them. Are there any particular types of funds geared towards long-term college savings sort of things, or should I just put it in a 60 year Vanguard retirement fund and forget about it for 20 years?

There are still advantages to a 529 even if your state doesn't offer one. Even if you don't get a tax deduction now, you still get the tax free withdrawal on the growth at a minimum on the federal part. Many (most?) of the 529 plans allow out of state participants.

Vanguard will gladly open you a 529 account on their website through the Nevada state plan.

http://www.savingforcollege.com/intr...ancial-aid.php

Thanks guys. Was not aware I could use an out-of-state 529, just without some of benefits. Will follow up, much appreciated.

Hi everyone,
I am 28 years old from Europe, living and working in California (under H1B Visa). Earnings this year will be at $80-$90k, expecting this to increase to $100k+ next year. I currently contribute 5% of salary to 401k as matched by employer. I’ve got about $10k to invest at the moment and plan to increase that monthly. As said, my current visa status is under H1B and am expecting to receive company sponsorship for a greencard, however that is of course no guarantee. Do I merely increase my 401k, open a roth IRA account (Vanguard?), a taxable account or all of the above? Cheers

I max out my roth IRA each year, but I would like to invest some more money, but would like to pick up as many tax advantages and legal loopholes as possible.

I'm a poker pro.

I have no debt, and no dependents.

I would like to invest about 50k initially.

I would like to invest about 20k/year after the first year, on top of the 5.5k that goes in my roth.

I file my taxes through my side business, which is buying and selling Magic, the Gathering cards, both paper and online.


Basically, I want to invest, but I don't want to just dump in a brokerage account without getting any tax advantages. I'm willing to jump through some hoops if it means gaining a legal tax advantage.

Is there a vehicle open to self-employed people that allows them to invest tax-deferred? If so, do any of these apply to poker players, or would I need to scale up the size of my Magic card business and use that as a path?

SEP IRA or Solo 401k

Solo 401k probably way to go. Make sure you file poker as a professional...schedule C for both poker & magic business.

Thanks to everyone who responded to this back in August. It took a bit but I closed my accounts with FA and transferred my holdings over to Vanguard. Next step in the plan is to study up on boglehead and then get myself into index funds. My one concern is the warnings below:

I'm a bit nervous about the sell/buy process. A few comments mentioned working with an accountant. How would a one-time question like this be handled?