ITOT
iShares Core S&P Total U.S. Stock Market ETF
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What Dividend Stocks/Funds/ETFS Would You Invest in to Achieve $2,500 a Month Income?
Should I switch from my DIY ETF strategy to a financial advisor charging 1%?
Why do different total stock market indexes have different returns?
What would be the most tax efficient way distributing my savings?
What would be the most tax efficient way distributing my savings?
What would be the most tax efficient way distributing my savings?
Index Fund Strategy: 70% ITOT, 20% QQQ, 10% Cash, CDs, Bonds, Emergency Fund etc.
Fidelity sent an email encouraging people to invest in ITOT, the total stock market index fund from iShares. It is very good that Fidelity is promoting passive, low-cost index fund investing. However, I wonder why they are only promoting ITOT? VTI from Vanguard is the same.
My strategy has been "wrong" for the last decade (Intl vs US). Will I continue to be wrong in the next decade?
17 Years Old, Just opened custodial account
Hey, I’m 69 and looking into asset allocation for my long term buy and hold portfolio.
Wrong Group, But ROTH IRA and YLDs, Long Term IDEA
Can we be serious about something for a moment?
For the purposes of a wash sale can a ETF and a Mutual Fund be considered substantially identical?
Looking for critiques regarding my portfolio, as well as advice on how to best invest a lump sum. Looking at things long term and trying to get myself set up the best I can
Why does the stock market make significant moves in the last 5 minutes of trading?
How to decide between S&P 500 index fund and total market fund?
In theory, couldn't I use bonds in a Roth 401k to protect my earnings in a Roth IRA?
What's the catch with high performing blue chip growth funds?
Boggleheads 3 fund portfolio & separate QQQ (and others) portfolio
Mentions
It’s all good. There are a lot of tickers out there. I would bucket ITOT in the same category as VTI and VTSAX. The important thing is that if you’re looking at buying a broad market based ETF such as one of those or even the Russell 3000 for example, your portfolio will very very very likely end up at that the same place at the same point in time in the future. Sure, 0.01% - 0.10% total return difference over that time period but your balance will be roughly the same. Pick one. Stick to it. Trust the process. Buy more and invest often. Rinse and repeat. Use all that time you saved and go do something more fun with it lol
Didn't realize ITOT was broad market. My bad. I'll look into it. Thanks for the suggestion!
ITOT is composed of U.S. companies across all market capitalizations. It has 2,500 holdings. It is broad market exposure. Hence the response… If you’re looking for another 1,000 companies to get exposure to then how exactly do you plan on fitting them in there?? Those 1,000 hypothetical companies are very likely to all be unprofitable. And you want to tilt your portfolio towards companies that don’t make money? By all means please do!
Just buy ITOT. S&P has its own profitability filter. That fixes all of this for you… don’t overthink this
Here are a few popular ones (Different entry dates): - VT. Total world ETF. - VTI, SCHB, and ITOT. All total usa stock ETFs. - QQQ and QQQM. - SCHX. Large cap 700 ETF.
5 days after IPO lots of retirements will take SpaceX IPO and stupid valuation too. Which includes VTI, ITOT, and SCHB
-1.62% thanks to SCHD and MO. My ITOT position is down 2.71%
Will ITOT be forced to buy Spaceex?
It looks like they did change the rules for the S&P Total Market Index which is tracked by ITOT (and XTOT for Canadians).
Great to hear they aren't changing S&P 500. It looks like they are allowing an exception for their total market indices, which may affect ITOT (Blackrock's VTI equivalent). But it's all staying float adjusted so I am not bothered at all and certainly wouldn't take a tax hit to avoid it.
What about ACWI and ITOT from iShares Blackrock?
I would be delighted to have a portfolio as diversified as the SP500. At the moment just over 50% of my portfolio is a single stock that I bought back in the mid-1980s. There is not a huge improvement in diversification going from SP500 to a total US stock market index fund or ETF like VTI/ITOT/SCHB. That is because SP500 is 80 to 85% of the total US stock market capitalization. The next level is to add international stocks. The next level is to add fixed income securities. For many, further diversification means investing in real estate. Many diversify with commodities and previous metals. Then you start looking at alternative investments like venture capital funds, private equity or private debt funds, etc. I am moving towards simplicity so I no longer have any alternative investments,emts.
After an emergency fund (3 - 6 months of expenses), I have another bucket for things I plan to buy in the future. Whether it's home projects (i.e. replace a central air unit) or buy a next car, or something like that - and I sell stock to put into those buckets, so that the money is available when I need it (rather than keeping it in stocks and having a market correction right when I need the money. As others have said, I'm a boglehead - so the bulk of my holdings are in 3 funds (ITOT (Domestic Equities), IXUS (International Equities) and BND (Bonds). So I don't really worry about when to sell individual stocks. I just periodically rebalance to make sure that my overall portfolio allocation is what I intend it to be. For the other buckets (things I plan to buy in the next 5 years, I'll either use CD ladders or bond funds so that those are still earning money, but aren't subject to market downturns at the time I need the money. Boring, I know - but just the way I like it.
Sadly, no! Don't worry too much about it. Many of us holding any brand Total USA index mutual fund and Total USA ETF will get hit with SpaceX too in our top 10 holdings. Examples: VTI, ITOT, SCHB, FZROX, FKSAX, SWTSX, and VTSAX.
The SPY/VOO is not a clear cut case. The IRS has never made a statement about what is "substantially identical" with ETFs. Many claim that VOO and SPY, although they track the same index, do not have identical holdings and therefore will not create wash sales if selling one at a loss and immediately buying the other. This is an open question. There are many more that claim that you can swap between similar ETFs that track indexes from different index providers. There are 3 or 4 major index providers. So for example, there are VTI, ITOT, and SCHB that are in total US stock market index ETFs, but technically they follow different indexes. Companies like Betterment and Wealthfront have published white papers on how they use similar, but not substantially identical, ETFs like this to tax loss harvest. The IRS has not approved, but neither have they objected.
I'm pretty frustrated by this as someone that owns a chunk of index funds. I'm taking the following steps: 1) Rotated my 403B (teacher) to use funds that match the S&P, so that I at least have 6 months before it buys in. 2) Replacing VTI and ITOT with DFAU in my Roth and Reg IRA accounts. Sadly, I can't really touch my VTI in my taxable accounts without paying huge capital gains so that's not worth messing with. I don't mind own SpaceX eventually once the market determines a realistic price (altho will still be inflated due to Musk effect). I just have no desire to be part of an index that is buying in around the IPO.
QQQ (and its derivatives) is like the one ETF that's gosling to have significant SpaceX exposure. ITOT is going to be something like 0.05% SpaceX
You can sell one ETF and immediately buy a very similar one that tracks a different index without creating a wash sale, so adding in another step of puts on the second would make it even less likely to trigger a wash sale. The IRS has chosen not to provide explicit guidance in this area, but robo-advisors like Betterment and Wealthfront have been very public about doing this, complete with white papers listing the near equivalent ETFs they use. For example, the three total US stock market ETFs VTI, ITOT, and SCHB. They all track total US stock market indexes, but from different index providers. That is not a tax court case law or explicit IRS guidance, but IMO it is a safe real life precedent to follow.
From what I understand, S&P total market (tracked by ITOT or XTOT in Canada) and CRSP total market (tracked by VTI or VUN in Canada) indexes use free float cap weighting. If a company goes public with a low float like 5%, even if the total company has a huge market cap, the effective cap in the index funds will be much lower. Now this doesn't fully avoid the company, but it does lessen the weight significantly over using the full market cap. You can look up the index methodologies on the index providers homepages.
Neither. Pick a Total USA ETF and ride it to the 30 year goal. Below are 3 excellent picks based on trade volume. - VTI - ITOT - SCHB
OP tell your rep no and ask them to come up with a 3-index fund portfolio. Mine did without issue 60% ITOT, 25% IXUS and 15% AGG is my makeup.
Others have already pointed out that this is an absurd portfolio. Why? (1) Fees—you’re paying 1.5% on the portfolio and probably an additional 0.5-1% on the actual holdings, (2) complexity—this accomplishes with ~20 positions what can be achieved in 3 positions. If you go this route, you will be much worse off than if you did it yourself. You could replicate this portfolio almost exactly by buying: - 51.3% VTI (or ITOT if you prefer, basically the same)—this includes a very similar breakdown of large, medium, and small cap. - 22.5% VXUS (or IXUS if you prefer, basically the same)—this includes a very similar breakdown of developed and emerging markets. - 23.5% VTEB (or MUB if you prefer, basically the same)—this includes municipal bonds. Others have recommended BND, which is fine, but BND is not municipal bonds which have some tax advantages if you are in a high tax bracket. - 2.7% cash This entire portfolio represents the same investment mix that your idiot advisor recommended and will cost around 0.05%. 1.5-2% doesn’t sound like much, but if your expected return on your portfolio is about 7%, you give up about 1/4th of your gains to Fidelity. This sub will generally not consider anything other than a 3-4 fund portfolio mostly because it does actually make sense, but in reality, some people are scared of doing even that. If that is you, that’s okay! Just buy something like FFNOX—it bundles these funds together so you just have to buy one thing, at the cost of a very slightly higher price (but still WAY cheaper than what your advisor recommended). As for your advisor, he is not acting in your best interests. I would run.
It’s a great diversified portfolio by “glide path” but they broke it down to different market caps, developed vs emerging, etc.. (iShares has a marketing agreement with Fidelity .. the iShares “core” especially is competitive with Vanguard) … but you could simplify your life if DIY. U.S. stocks is 51% in total.. > Asset Class |Percentage Domestic Stock |51.3% Domestic Large Cap Stock |35.2% Domestic Mid Cap Stock |10.0% Domestic Small Cap Stock |6.1% - IShares ITOT has the large cap, medium cap, and over half the typical small cap; functionally very similar to Vanguard’s VTI that especially r/bogleheads loves. Just keep this one ETF af 51.3% unless wanting to change it with age .. or later going with just the S&P 500 for great returns mostly/less volatility. International (non-U.S. stocks): - IShares IDEV (developed ex-US) contains Canada while the recommended EAFE doesn’t. Probably performance chasing on their part. - iShares IEMG is their emerging mkts etf like VWO in Vanguard. Many combine developed and emerging into one etf IXUS
Can't get more passive than a low cost, well diversified etf investing in the world's best companies. VOO VT VTI ITOT Pick one, keep adding, and enjoy retirement when you get there.
My ITOT/VTI is higher today than it was when the war started. While I have gold etfs as well, it’s not like the equity markets have collapsed. The total US stock market is up since the conflict commenced.
DCA-ing has been shown to outperform lump sum but not by enough that I would lose sleep over it Given global volatility I would personally DCA here. I would probably also opt for a more diversified fund like ITOT but historically that has not mattered
VTI, VXUS, BND, BNDX - Vanguard version ITOT, IXUS, AGG, IAGG - iShares version In order: Total US Stocks, Total International Stocks, Total US Bonds, Total International Bonds If you get a target date fund at Fidelity, Vanguard, or Schwab, it puts you in a combination of these. Schwab is slightly different in that their target date funds don't use international stocks from developing nations (only developed) or international bonds.
See r/bogleheads I have done backtests on many complicated portfolios suggested by financial advisors. They all end performing pretty much identical to the simple 3 ETF portfolio recommended by Bogleheads: 1) broad market US stock market ETF like VTI or ITOT or SCHB, 2) a broad market international stock ETF like VXUS or IXUS, and 3) a broad bond ETF such as BND.
If permanent life insurance is that thing where you put money into it, *more* as you get older, and then you can pull it out as a cash benefit, I'd say run to the hills. These grow more slowly than the market average and get progressively more expensive as you age. The main selling point is that it's cheap now when you're young and healthy (and naive). If the best selling point is a sense of urgency, is it a great idea? If they're selling you relief from potential FOMO, is that the same as relief because you made good choices managing your money? Guess what is equally cheap, doesn't get more expensive to contribute to as you age, and historically yields higher returns? Furthermore, you can manage it yourself and avoid fees for managed or guided investing. SCHB, VTI, ITOT, or VOO, SCHX, IVV, SPYM, etc. aka. the total U.S. market or the S&P 500. And you don't need all of those, you can just pick one. Or pick VT for the whole world market and chill.
But are you funding traditional IRA or Roth? Are your municipal bonds sourced in the state you reside in to eliminate state income tax? Are you using ITOT or the like to hold the entire cap field of the DOW? Are you reducing tax drag by funding ETFs instead of mutuals after maxing your ROTH? Is your 403b annuity? Custodial? Roth 403b? Traditional? Why? It shouldn't be a mystery, you're right. But I *PROMISE* the difference between "I use the Buffet model" and MAXIMIZING what you can truly achieve is staggering.
Since I am tax loss harvesting ETFs I just check when the headlines are screaming about big downturns. You do not have to monitor closely. You can just check when "the stock market crash" is the first item on the news. I often also rebalance cash+bonds vs equities at the same time. For example. The last time I did TLH was early April 2025 when stocks took a nosedive over tariff uncertainties. I did a little bit of TLH, selling some recent lots of VTI and simultaneously buying ITOT, but I bought a lot more ITOT than I had sold of VTI because the sharp drop in stock/stock ETFs moved my cash+bonds location above my rebalance threshold.
VTV and VTI are clearly not substantially identical. Wealthfront and Betterment have published white papers on their tax loss harvesting methods and they use index funds that are very similar, but which follow indexes from different index or providers. The IRS has not objected. The IRS has not even objected to swapping between ETFs that follow the same index, such as SPY and VOO, which are both SP500 ETFs. That is pushing it too far for my taste, but I do TLH between VTI, ITOT, and SCHB which are in total US market ETFs, but the index providers are different.
The large cap Russell 1000 (=S&P 500 + mid cap S&P 400 + 100 largest S&P small caps) has slightly outperformed the s&P 500 in select 30-40 year periods. However the fees are usually a bit more. There may be some slight differences in terms of when a mid cap gets added to especially the S&P 500, but probably not that significant mathematically. The long term chart of SPTM (S&P 1500) is close to SPY and SPYM (SPDRs S&P 500 ETFs), .. but ITOT (iShares S&P completion index of 2200-2300 stocks ~ “S&P 2250”ish) lags a little. Now if all small caps roar back ITOT will probably soar, but also think it’ll be short-lived.
Go look at r/bogleheads >\-More diversified than VOO? If so, what? Total US EtF such as VTI/ITOT/SCHB is slightly more diversified than VOO/SPY. More important is diversification by holding international equities via an ETF like VXUS or IXUS. As you approach retirement you should add bonds. >\-Dividend ETFs? And reinvest the income (after tax and living expenses) into SPY or VOO? That creates an unnecessary tax drag. Dividends are not "free money" and in fact actually end up a negative during the accumulation phase when you are just reinvesting the dividends. >\-Treasuries and bonds? Yes, 5 to 7 years before your expected retirement start transitioning to your desired asset allocation in retirement.
ITOT is core S&P and is similar to VTI while IXUS is similar to VXUS
I’m an idiot. Your post made me realize the utility of the VTI/ITOT ping pong. Derp. Thanks, sir.
I prefer ETFs in taxable for a variety of reasons * usually lower ER * better tax efficiency * easier to tax loss harvest (sell VTI and buy ITOT) * universally portable For ETFs (as opposed to mutual funds) there is no downside to owning an ETF from a different fund family (i.e. Vanguard ETF at Schwab brokerage, Schwab ETF at Fidelity brokerage). In tax sheltered accounts it is largely a preference. My Roth IRA is simply 100% FZROX.
Edward Jones is truly horrendous. Their fees are absurd. Their value is negative. Move all your money there to a legit broker. I personally like Fidelity > Vanguard > Scwab. Even Webull or Robinhood are WAY better. Then put all your money in VTI + VXUS (or ITOT/IXUS) and ignore it.
get roth ira first, and deposit a little bit of money every month until you hit the max contribution ($7,000 last year). you can see your contribution limit/how much you have contributed on the summary page of the account on fidelity. it takes a grand total of 2 minutest to set up, couldn't be easier. after that just put majority of your contribution in a fund that tracks the s&p, for me the majority (57%) of my fund is in ITOT. The rest is in individual stocks such as NVDA or AMD and then a small portion is kept for day trading in the account since it is tax free gains.
>, growth-based stocks and or ETFs/mutual funds should be 100% the goal you had me in the first half, IMHO I do not know what will out perform in the next 30 years , VTI/VOO are not growth funds, they are broad market funds that will hold growth and value and also pay dividends Growth focused funds like SCHG are not guaranteed to grow more in the next 20 years, they might, they might not. I would say age doesn't even matter , I have no clue why people think they need dividends after 40/50/60? Returns are what matter. TLDR do not bet on growth or dividends buy the market . SCHB/VTI/ITOT take your pick
Either one will work. FZROX / FZILX, VTI / VXUS, ITOT / IXUS (blackrock iShares), etc
> My income is over the Roth limit so that is not an option. Except that you can contribute to an IRA and do a backdoor Roth conversion. And don't sleep on an HSA, if you're eligible. > what is the best strategy to reduce risk in my (eventually) heavy-weighted VOO portfolio in 20+ years when I am closer to retirement? In a taxable account, ideally it's through contributions. Figure out what you might want your retirement-time portfolio to look like, and work backwards to figure out how long you can gradually get there. Like maybe starting 10 years out. You will also have occasions through market declines where you could potentially sell existing positions for offsetting gains and losses and use that opportunity. Or perhaps if you have similar-and-correlated-but-definitely-not-substantially-identical holdings (VOO and ITOT?) and do some loss harvesting strategy that you can carry forward to mitigate taxable gains at a future rebalancing point.
I buy when my asset allocations hit my preset rebalance thresholds, per my IPS (investment policy statement). The last time that happened was the tariff tantrum in early April. Stocks fell so far that my fixed income holdings went above my rebalance threshold and I rebalanced back to my target allocation by buying stocks. The total stock market ETFs I bought in April are up 35%. I a,so did some tax loss harvesting as I so,d some recently purchased VTi and replaced it with ITOT.
I'm not sure what you're asking. Maybe you're asking what to invest in for the long haul. That's easy: broad US market ETFs like ITOT, VOO, or VTI (you really only need 1 of these). Some international is probably good so sprinkle in some VT.
What’s your risk tolerance? Low tolerance then use ETFs like VOO, SPY, ITOT. High tolerance then I’m invested in companies developing LiDAR technology which will become the standard for many industrial, military and consumer products.
If you look at other broad market funds like ITOT or SCHB they are up .74% , so VTI did drop its just the market is up more then the drop.
VT, or two funds such as VTI/VXUS, ITOT/IXUS, make sense here [https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Lazy\_portfolios](https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Lazy_portfolios)
Wash sales are only on losses not gains. So it depends if the 100k in ITOT is sold for a gain or loss
Hi everyone. I have a wash sale rule question. I would like to withdraw $100k of ITOT from my brokerage account to use as a down payment for a new home. If I then sell my current home and use the proceeds of that to buy $100k of ITOT within 30 days, does that negate the taxable event from the withdrawal?
As with a lot of things tax related it is not that clearly specified. ETFs that follow different indexes are clearly OK. Many people will even swap between ETFs that both follow the same exact index, such as the SP500, but which are run by different ETF managers (for example, SPY and VOO). That is pushing it too far for my taste, but so far the IRS has never challenged that. Roboadvisors such as Wealthfront and Betterment have published white papers on the tax loss harvesting techniques where they simultaneously sell and buy "similar" ETFs, such as VTi/ITOT/SCHB if VXUX/IXUS. The IRS has never challenged them for doing this, so I am comfortable doing it. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/substantiallyidenticalsecurity.asp is a simple to read article about the subject.
>Is there a reason why so many people on here suggest VOO instead of saying something like "an S&P500 ETF"? Simplicity, brevity. I also will say VTI rather than "a total US stock market ETF" and what I really invest in is a mix of ITOT, SCHB, and VTI as I tax loss harvest between those three "total US stock market ETFs".
I’ve maxed out my 401k with matching since 2012 all in ITOT and it’s up like 250%. There is just no reason to do anything else but play the market
Good question: I'm in between. Let me explain. Over the past 20 years I've sworn off stocks for ETFs so many times I can't count. And always for the same reason: *single-issue risk.* What it that? Musk tweets something stupid, Tesla drops 10%. Oracle doesn't meet expected earnings, it drops 15%. Enron, "the smartest guys in the room", weren't: bankruptcy. **So since March I've only done ETFs.** If you ever catch me trading a single stock, I want you to shoot me. Please. And sure some ETFs have big drops, but they're ones I don't touch: crypto and cannabis. Other than that, ETFs just don't move that quickly. And why? Because they're baskets of stocks, right? (For the most part.) So if an ETF holds 100 stocks, and one goes to zero, how much should the ETF drop? Just 1%. (Aside from sector-sympathy that might drag some of the others down too.) Why don't I use SPY and QQQ and the like? 1 - because I'm not an indexer by nature, because: 2 - I like to find things *that are going up*, and trade those. But don't get me wrong, if SPY or QQQ were going up fast enough to screen-in to how I screen, then I'd trade them. I recently traded IWM, the Russell 2000, because of that. Now maybe let me expand your mind a bit: *Do you know how many ETFs there are in the US?* **4,300!** Four **THOUSAND** and three hundred. But you only hear about a dozen of them, don't you? VT, VTI, SCHD, VOO, IVV, VXUS, maybe ITOT, like that. *Did you know that* [momentum in equity prices persists](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0927538X18303998?via%3Dihub#preview-section-references)*?* It does. For 1, 2, 3, even 6 months or more. Now, what if we put those 2 things together and looked for **ETFs with momentum**? And then instead of *buying* them, buy **LEAPS Calls** on them. Deep ITM LEAPS Calls act as *share substitutes* and give us **leverage**. Let me know if you're interested in hearing more.
It's truly admirable that you have this kind of investment mindset and plan at such a young age. Long-term investing certainly has its advantages of stability and historical validation, especially for retirement planning or the slow, safe growth of family assets—I completely agree with that. However, in the current economic climate, relying solely on long-term investing often results in too long a return cycle and limited growth, making it difficult to significantly improve your quality of life. If you plan to retire at 55, you can continue with a diversified investment portfolio, such as a combination of medium-, long-, and short-term investments. Long-term investing is like slowly nurturing a tree, while short-term investing is like seizing the season to reap the rewards. The two are not contradictory, but a combination yields better results. Especially now, with clear market trends and opportunities, missing out on current opportunities may require a much greater effort to catch up in the future. I choose short-term trading now, not for speculation, but because it can truly benefit my life. You can continue holding ITOT and IXUS; I find them to have tremendous growth potential, and your wealth will double in a few years.
Please, tell me if ITOT is down 10%, and I sell it and immediately use the proceeds to buy IVV, how have I done anything but reduced my taxes for the year? ITOT and IVV perform nearly the same since they track very similar indices. It sounds right now like you don't understand how tax loss harvesting with index funds works.
That is moronic advice. I sell ITOT or IVV and immediately buy the other. That locks in the losses for tax purposes while not impating my overall gains to any significant degree.
All the other popular ETFs are open ended funds , VOO, VTI , VUG , SCHD , IVV, ITOT, SCHB, SCHX this really just brings QQQ inline with the other most popular ETFs I really see no reason to vote no on it especially if you hold one of the above funds you already own open ended fund what QQQ wants to convert too. It cuts the expense ratio 10% ; its seems weird to complain they should have cut it more then vote no and pay a higher expense ratio
Sell the ETF and buy a similar but not identical one. VTI to ITOT, for example. The key is to capture the meaningful exposure you’re looking for while being different enough to not trigger a wash sale (the deferral benefit of the TLH is much smaller than the true economic gain youd miss out on if the shares rip during the 31 day cooldown period). I am personally not a fan of doing TLH with individual securities, since the idio risk of the holding is what you’re trying to capture in the first place; however, certain circumstances could make it a more attractive strategy. The wash sale rule applies to “substantially identical” holdings, and while this has never been explicitly defined by the Service, it’s generally accepted that ETFs issued by different companies tracking indexes created by different providers is well within the safe harbor.
This is how I ended up with ITOT instead of VTI
Yeah when I say my US holdings I mean the ETF XUU, which is simply a US index fund in Canadian dollars (it mostly holds ITOT and IVV)
I rebalance not from cash held aside, but from my allocation to cash+bonds. If equities go up, then although the cash+bonds value stays constant it goes down as a percentage of total portfolio. At some point my fixed income allocation hits my lower rebalance threshold and I sell stocks. The opposite happens when stocks dip. The fixed income part of my portfolio rises as a percentage and eventually it hits the rebalance threshold. At is a signal to me to buy stocks. The last time that happens was in April, when the tariff dip led me to buy VTi/ITOT. Then about a month ago the recovery led me to trim my equity portfolio a bit.
Yeah, I just started a Roth in hood for that 3% match on Oct. 30 and take away the 3% match and the portfolio is down 1.96%. Still have $3200 on the sidelines waiting but I only have until eoy. Playing this like my 401k so ITOT, IXUS, AGG, SPY, QQQ, QQQI, SPYG, WMT and SCHD
ETF's like ITOT or SPY might be a good starting place for you. ETF's are "Exchange Traded Funds" which are basically collections of other stocks. Good brokers make it easy to see what an ETF holds (the stocks it's comprised of). If there's anything specific you think could take off in 20 years look for an ETF or Index Fund (basically the same thing) for that interest. Biosciences, space exploration, mining, entertainment, big tech, etc are all kinds of things that have a fund or idex.
Weekly or monthly contributions to an IRA invested in index funds like ITOT or VOO over decades will grow nicely and you will sleep well at night.
Dude... just autoinvest $50/week into VT or VTI or ITOT or VOO and go live your life.
You've got a lot of overlap there; SCHG's top holdings are already a huge part of VOO. If you're aiming for a real value blend and risk management, a dedicated value fund or even a broader total market index like ITOT or VT would give you better diversification than VOO alongside SCHG.
1. Establish or add to an emergency fund as needed 2. Complete your IRA contributions this year 3. Pick a brokerage you like and put the rest in a taxable account Any broad index fund is a good start, such as VT, VTI, ITOT, or SCHB
Yeah I agree. This how we know we are in a big FOMO market. It remind me of 2021 when everyone thought things just keep going up. Reddit was on extreme doomer collapse bs back in April when the stock market was falling. That made me optimistic and I was buying. Right now seeing this comments is giving me extreme 2021 vibes and now I am being cautious. I will continue my weekly buys of ITOT and DGRO but as far as individual stocks snd plowing money into the market like in April that part is done for me.
“Recent” run-ups in the big tech “mega-cap” space in all likelihood. Longer term, the US Russell 1000 (the top 1000 US stocks) has edged out the US S&P 500 by a sliver since 1978 when I checked earlier this year. However Russell index funds have had a bit higher ER. My problem with the S&P 500 is when they didn’t add Applovin’ stock to either that or the S&P 400 until the last while the Russell 1000 (or 3000) had it. Fwiw iShares has their ITOT etf (0.03% er) using the S&P “completion index” for the top 2,200 or so US stocks including new additions. No more waiting like a kid before Christmas gift opening…
I don't ever hold the same asset in two different accounts (if one of the accounts is a taxable brokerage account). I am too lazy and too paranoid about the IRS to have the possibility of a wash sale out there. If this were my account, I would use a different broad market fund in my Roth IRA, such as VTI, DFUS, SCHK, ITOT, or SPTM.
I'm super jazzed about this hot new stock. Trades under ITOT. Buy it now!
Even bulls are concerned with AI concentration, but it is what it is. Could expand to the large cap Russell 1000 or even iShares ITOT (the top 2,200 or so US stocks including the S&P 500) or Vanguard’s VTI the top 4,500-ish include the S&P 500). This as not only will IPOs get incorporated but a number of big European stocks are looking at domiciling in the U.S. (pharma and perhaps energy). Could also go global with Vanguard’s VT with several thousand global stocks for 0.06% ER .. or State Street’s more concentrated/often better returning SPGM with a few thousand bigger global stocks at 0.09% ER. The American tech giants still pack a punch though.
Posted. Largest absolute gains come from FZROX, ITOT, and FZILX, which are broad index ETFs. Next biggest winners are NVDA and IBIT, both stocks and calls/leaps
I am not market timing, I am rebalancing per my written plan. I have target allocations of 88% for equities, 12% for cash+bonds. Rebalance thresholds are 10.8% and 13.2% (+/-10% relative) for cash+bonds. It is common that tax loss harvesting and rebalancing happen simultaneously. In my case I sold a few lots of VTI and simultaneously bought ITOT, but a larger amount to reduce my cash and increase my equity holding.
Kwolek2005 specifically said his reference point was the dip on April. We are indeed up 35% since then. I can easily verify that because I am up 35.13% on the 500 shares of ITOT (total US market ETF) I bought on April 9. My April 4 purchases are up 32%, April 7th purchases are up 34%. I did both tax loss harvesting and rebalancing of fixed income vs equities asset allocation in early April, per my investment policy statement.
It counted for me. I tax loss harvested and also rebalanced between fixed income into equities to maintain my target allocations. The extra ITOT (total US stock market ETF) I bought April 4 and 7 is now up 32%.
VTI/ITOT/SCHB are total US stock market ETFs but the track index from different index suppliers, so there is no wash sale problem. Some of the roboadvisor like Betterment and Wealthfront have white papers describing their tax loss harvesting techniques and they have very useful list of "near equivalent" but not "substantially identical" ETfs they use for tax loss harvesting. Some people will go so far as to swap between different ETFs that follow the same exact index, such as SP500. The IRS has never gone after anybody for doing that, but that is too aggressive for me.
Have a plan. Execute the plan. Figure out your plan during a time when both the market and you are calm, and write it down. Google "investment policy statement" to see what I mean by a plan. The key items are your target asset allocations, and your plan/triggers for rebalancing. I have a target asset allocation for equities and for cash+bonds. I rebalance when my actual allocations get more than 10% (relative) from their target. On April 4 and 7 of this year my cash holdings we higher than the trigger threshold, because my stocks had dropped sharply due to tariff concerns, I rebalanced by using cash to buy ITOT (total US market ETF, similar to VTI). I also, did some tax loss harvesting where I sold recently purchased lots of VTI at a loss and immediately replaced them with the near equivalent ITOT. This helps reduce taxes. Recently the gradual recovery of the market, and that my spending had drawn out more cash than dividend income, had lowered my cash+bonds to where it was at only 90% of my target allocation. So I sold off stocks. Not my recent wins, but some long term stocks from years ago. Try and avoid making decisions on the spur of the moment, or in the heat of the moment. Think in advance, during a period of quiet defection what you will do on various circumstances. And write it down for reference later.
SCHF looks like a international ex-US developed fund, and doesn't include ex-US emerging markets holdings (Taiwan, China, etc) Two low cost funds would be VTI or ITOT, (total US, SCHB is pretty close) and VXUS or IXUS (total international, including developed, emerging, and frontier markets). Or a single low cost fund with both US and ex-US would be VT or SPGM.
I have a 12% allocation to cash+bonds. I rebalance if cash+bonds goes below 10.8% or above 13.2%. (+/-10% relative). The big drop in the stock market on "Liberty Day" meant that my cash exceeded my preset rebalance threshold, and I bought enough ITOT (total US market ETF) to get my cash+bond percentage back down to 12%. I hold a few thousand shares of ORCL. The big pop a couple days ago dropped my cash+bond percentage down to 10.3%. I sold off some stock to start bringing my cash up (and also to be ready to pay Sept 15 estimated taxes). Simple rebalancing helps me time my buys and sells.
Lol. Again. Diversifying is for safety and prudence. As an advisor I can tell you: we diversify to cover our asses. When a client wants to sue us for mismanaging their money, we will tell the judge: we used modern portfolio theory to cover our bases and have diversified portfolio with exposure to large mid small international bonds yada yada yada. Tried and true investing strategies and portfolio management techniques. Rebalancing on XYZ schedule, and here are the timestamps proving we did exactly what was promised. Does any of that sound like it will make you more money? Because it sounds like added effort and cost to me. It is for stability and predictability. The reality is you could achieve all of this with VOO and chill. Buy weekly. Tax loss harvest with the ITOT IVV SPLG, emergency cash with SGOV. It would just be indefensible in court for not being diversified enough. And clients won’t have the stones in a downturn to not panic sell as the sheer quantity gets huge.
I don't know, and even if I did, it basically wouldn't tell me anything useful about the stock. ITOT and chill.
Hello! If this is better for a forum like r/personalfinance, just let me know. I'm entering a very new to me period of my life. First kid on the way in October. Datapoints: - me 39, wife 35, USA - gross household income is 500k - net we bring in about 27k/month - expenses usually come to about 20-23k per month - this leaves us with ~5k per month to invest/save - we own a home (885k, have about 700k left on mortgage) in a VHCOL area. goals would be to move to a bigger home in about 5 years. - risk tolerance is medium. today, we have 70k in an HSYA for rainy day fund - have ~50k in a wealthfront automated investment account. ~20k goes to VTI/ITOT, another 10k in VIO, about 5k in SCHF, the rest split between some automated emerging market stocks, bonds. wealthfront does tax harvesting on losses etc. we've seen around %10 positive gains on this account and we've had it open about 1 year and a handful of months. - biggest debt is the mortgage (included our expenses above) which is about 6k a month. car is negligible, 400 dollars a month, loans against our 401ks are about 1000 a month between us, will be paid back in 5 years. - next biggest debt would be our upcoming child. childcare expected to run us 2.5-3k a month all in. Now my question: I feel very nebulous about the next ~20 years of our finances. We live very very comfortably, but I can't shake the feeling we are leaving money on the table. Do I just keep pouring into the Automate Index funds? I'll most likely need to start a 529 for the kid, etc. I know this is almost too general - but what does this community recommend for the next 20 years? Prime earning years, but also prime expensive years. Thanks!
I decided that I have far too much liquid cash sitting around in one of my saving accounts, so I figured it would be high time to invest \~$40k of that to make more money than the 3.5% APY. I also plan on maturing a CD that nets 4.5% APY in early September and investing an additional $30k or so. Here is my current portfolio with percentages of total value. * VOO - 54.0% * VTI - 17.8% * VO - 10.1% * ITOT - 8.9% * TKO - 5.7% * KO - 3.5% What would be my best course of action in how to invest \~$40k right now? I wouldn't mind selling ITOT or KO to tighten up things a bit more and give myself some more to play with. I've been told ITOT is quite like VTI, so there isn't much reason to hold both. I'm not chasing dividends and in it for the long-term, so KO can also be sold since I'm just reinvesting what I make from that anyway. I'm 40, if that matters, debt-free and make less than $80k per year. I max out my Roth IRA every year through a different brokerage and don't have a 401k since my job doesn't offer benefits.
Definitely diversified but some investors want every down to small cap too .. even though it won’t move a market cap fund. Still long term, there’s barely a difference between the Russell 1000 S&P 500 since 1978, for all the IPOs, rapidly rising stars, etc.. the former quickly adds .. vs. the latter has a committee study said stock additions (remembering both indices may need to kick a stock out). Then there’s a drop off in performance [currently] when looking at the top 1500 (S&P 1500), VTI, ITOT, etc.. The US would need a prolonged economic period where small caps are favored and then would private equity snag these?
95k in ITOT and spend 5 grand on a really nice ebike. Been eyeing up a Tern HSD for years now.
First is avoid debt. If you have high interest debt then investing is a fools errand. Second, the best investment for building wealth when “broke” is to acquire/obtain skills that will qualify you for higher paying employment. Trade school, certifications, college, etc. Third, with small starting investments you’ll only get the ball rolling after several years of continuous contributions. A $100 one time investment won’t amount to much. $100 per month will build up over a few years and start gaining steam. Fourth, invest in broad market ETFs (VOO or VT are decent starting points (or SPY, or SCHB, or ITOT, or …)) using an account with Fidelity, Schwab, or Vanguard. I believe these types of funds offer a simple means of achieving a good balance of risk and reward. Personal experience anecdote: I spent 20 months in 2023 & 2024 investing $150 per month, so $3,000 total, and at the end of those 20 months my investment was worth ~$3,225 (after first 10 months ($1,500) I was at ~$1,575). 7 months later that first $3,000 of investments is worth ~$3,350. In another 7 to 10 years, with no further additional investment, I can expect that it will be worth ~$6,700 (typical doubling rate of broad market ETFs). I’ve been fortunate that I can now afford to increase my contribution rate so I’m currently at $7,350 invested worth ~$7,850 (up ~$500, ~$350 of that is from the first $3,000 of investments).
There are tons of sp500. SPY VOO SPLG ITOT IVV. Fidelity is great because you can just setup weekly buys for dollar amount. Supports fractionals. No reason to use mutual funds. ETF more tax efficient. You should open “some” 529 money. Maybe a smaller amount of the auto. It is a good place for friends and family to put birthday and Christmas gifts. Make it easy for them to deposit. Make sure it is not custodial 529 so you have options with other kids in case the times comes. Best of luck!!
The vast majority of my money is the ETF ITOT, which is a broad basket of most US equities. Could also park it in a world ETF like VT. If you're not feeling quite so star spangled patriotic and believe the rest of the world is something you'd like in your basket, do that. Both cost you basically nothing to just exist.
Generally speaking, you’re better off investing in a market /S&P 500 index fund (VTI, VOO, ITOT, IVV). Sector-based ETFs have historically had lower risk-adjusted returns. If you’re “certain” about the growth of these companies then they would end up being a larger portion of your portfolio as their market caps increase and losers are removed/downweighted by the index.
The good news is that for a long-term investor in a Roth IRA, the **ETF vs. Mutual Fund** debate is far less important than your actual asset allocation. In many cases (like at Vanguard), they are just different wrappers for the exact same underlying assets. Crucially, because you're in a Roth, the biggest historical advantage of ETFs—their superior tax efficiency in a *taxable* account—is **completely irrelevant**. All your growth is tax-free anyway. The choice really comes down to practical differences and investing behavior. Here’s a simple breakdown: **Choose Mutual Funds if:** * **You want to AUTOMATE everything.** This is their superpower. You can set up recurring investments like "$500 on the 1st of every month" and never have to think about it again. It puts your wealth-building on autopilot. * **You want to invest exact dollar amounts.** You can invest precisely $100.00, ensuring all your money goes to work immediately without any leftover cash. * **You want to be protected from your own worst instincts.** Mutual funds only trade once per day at the closing price. This is a feature, not a bug, as it prevents you from panic-selling in the middle of a volatile day. **Choose ETFs if:** * **You want the flexibility to trade like a stock.** You can buy or sell any time the market is open and use more advanced order types like limit orders. * **The ETF version has a significantly lower expense ratio.** For major index funds, this gap has mostly disappeared (e.g., Vanguard's `$VTI` ETF and `$VTSAX` mutual fund have nearly identical fees), but it's worth checking. * **Your broker offers commission-free ETFs but charges for the mutual funds you want.** This is less common now with major brokers like Fidelity, Vanguard, and Schwab, but it can be a factor. **The Bottom Line:** For 99% of people focused on long-term, "set it and forget it" wealth building in a Roth, the ability to **auto-invest into a low-cost index mutual fund** is the single biggest advantage. It automates good behavior. * At **Fidelity**, this would be a fund like `$FSKAX` (Total Market Index). * At **Vanguard**, this would be `$VTSAX` (Total Stock Market Index). You truly can't go wrong with the ETF equivalents (`$ITOT` or `$VTI`) either. Don't let this decision paralyze you. The most important step is to pick one and start investing consistently.
> can’t see it beating a Chinese/Indian .. AI/robotics No one knows for certain though India is likely prime for “growth”. Also consider that the U.S. has 62% to 66% of global market cap despite only 4% of the global population (80% if talking about the “‘mega-caps”). Market standards and the American worker kowtowing to Milton Friedman style capitalism [perhaps not that willingly but anyways..] do matter. One idea may be a “global” portfolio or even fund/ETF. Vanguard’s all-cap VT or for just large/mid caps .. iShares ACWI for a pure market cap play. There’s also dividing up VTI (US) and VSUX(non-US) …or ITOT and IXUS for iShares. Another interesting twist would be Vanguard’s new environmental/social all-cap funds .. ESGV (US) and VSGX (non-US); “feel good” stuff especially if there’s an eco-disaster in the future, .. plus DFA research noted some sectors, like emerging small cap value, have large stocks that just sit there; a firm going after environmental certifications the company may be more proactive in all aspects imho.
You don't want VT and VTI as they contain many of the same companies. I use ITOT, IXUS, and SGOV/AGG myself.
They talked you into the “dividends are great” thing? They aren’t. This fund will underperform almost every other index the vast majority of the time. Like it has historically. As per this performance (with dividends reinvested). So on top of low performance you have the tax drag of the significant dividends to add to the negatives. https://totalrealreturns.com/n/QQQ,VOO,ITOT,SCHD
S&P does some due diligence on these stocks .. vs the Russell. Stocks do pop up on their “completion index” of 3500 stocks (example: the iShares ITOT etf had Applovin’ but not the IVV or IJH .. while their Russell ETFs already did), but they take at least some time when adding the stocks to the large cap 500, mid cap 400, etc..
S&P does some due diligence on these stocks .. vs the Russell. Stocks do pop up on their “completion index” of 3500 stocks (example: the iShares ITOT etf), but they take at least some time when adding the stocks to the large cap 500, mid cap 400, etc..
By total market funds, you mean VTI or ITOT?