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I’m looking to add another stock or two to my portfolio, any recommendations?
[Discussion] How will AI and Large Language Models affect retail trading and investing?
[Discussion] How will AI and Large Language Models Impact Trading and Investing?
Would it be a bad idea investing in the same investments in a Roth IRA and a regular brokerage account?
Is it ok to never have bonds if you start investing early?
Anything I should know about investing in Vanguard ETFs on Fidelity?
What would you all recommend for second year of IRA?
Let's go! For most, the best investment route is to just purchase a S&P500 index fund/ETF and hold on (*while adding to it often and extra when markets are in a down-cycle). Vanguard's VOO and VFINX have low expense ratios % and are great choices! VTI / VTSMX are also good (total market) options.
Let's go! For most, the best investment route is to just purchase a S&P500 index fund/ETF and hold on (*while adding to it often and extra when markets are in a down-cycle). Vanguard's VOO and VFINX have low expense ratios % and are great choices! VTI / VTSMX are also good (total market) options.
Let's go! For most, the best investment route is to just purchase a S&P500 index fund/ETF and hold on (*while adding to it often and extra when markets are in a down-cycle). Vanguard's VOO and VFINX have low expense ratios % and are great choices! VTI / VTSMX are also good (total market) options.
I hit $100,000 in Broad Market Index Funds (mostly VOO and VTI) this Jan
QQQ or VOO which one will you choose ?
Question about ETFs: What happens if the provider goes under as a business?
Wife's IRA has positions in high-expense ratio funds. Sell and buy VOO?
i want to start investing and i don't know where to begin
Looking to invest savings in VTX and VOO. What should I invest more in.
After watching Nvda go up up and up some more, i dove in at 600 a share. 🤔😳
What stock/suggestion have you gotten from this sub that actually WORKED?
As a whole this sub is overly negative on taking profits and building a cash position
What to do with $300,000 just sitting in my checking account?
What stocks(s) did y’all buy recently and when was it?
100% stocks is not universally good advice. Stock market indexes are not always the right benchmark for your performance.
Is FZIPX same as AVUV? Looking for Low ER small cap ETF
Is putting $50 into VOO every 2 weeks (for the next 20 years) a good or bad idea?
What index fund do I pick for my Roth IRA?
12m Emergency : 100% CD/Tbills vs ~25-75% VOO & rest in CD/Tbills?
Is it normal for the index funds to be weighted this heavily by mega caps?
Where to invest 10k leveraged from CC cash advance (5% fee)?
As a non-US resident is it worth getting Ireland-domiciled ETFs?
Advice for a 27 year old trying to leave the nest?????
Any advantage to buying VOO through Vanguard rather than Schwab?
What are y'all's plays on tomorrow's CPI news? Any calls being made?
Looking for long-term investment suggestions, 30yo • $1-2k / mo.
What is the difference between some EFTs like Vanguard S&P 500?
Mentions
Rycey is one you don’t always hear about, but it’s an interesting company and has room to grow, imo. I have to wonder if there will be a dip soon though-the last couple days have seen some gains. The reason I know that is because ive been looking at it for a while now, and the instant I decided to buy some shares, it went up over a dollar per share. Thank me for that. Google is just a winner and will be for the long haul. VOO is a great ETF. Some people say VOO, some say VTI, but either way they are safe bets that have great returns, often better than individual stocks. You have to remember that ETFs are managed by people WAY WAY better than we are at playing the market.
Nice picks to start with! Since it’s for a course project, I’d suggest looking at companies/funds across different sectors so you can compare performance more meaningfully: * **Large-cap tech** (like GOOGL, MSFT, or NVDA) → strong fundamentals and growth stories. * **Consumer staples/defensives** (like PG, KO, or UNILEVER) → good for stability. * **Index fund/ETF** (VOO or SPY) → gives you market-level exposure, which is a great benchmark for comparison. That way you’ll get a mix of growth + stability, and you can analyze how sector trends impact performance rather than just stock-picking in one area.
The best way to build wealth (besides living at home for free) is to invest in yourself and your career. Work on increasing the earnings from your day job and then invest everything you don't need in an emergency fund or for a big upcoming purchase in VOO or something similar in regular intervals. Only invest what you're willing to lose. The quickest and easiest way to lose a lot of money is to try to get rich quick. If you're dying to take big risks to obtain potentially big rewards, once you have more money than you need at the moment and near future / you're very comfortable financially, you can invest/gamble a small portion of your portfolio in options or more volatile/speculative stocks.
I would slowly move that bank account into ETFs I would suggest QQQ, VOO for example, or maybe some long term stocks like google
Invest some of the money (2-3k) into yourself. Gym membership, phone upgrade, mid-tier watch, new laptop, room decor, etc. VOO/QQQM is fine. If you’re actually interested in high income, imo look into BDCs
If you’re in it for the long term; - VOO: US market - VT: 60% US, 40% international - VXUS: 100% international Play with options and penny stocks, only with money you’re willing to lose
At 22 with no debt, you’re already in a solid spot. Stick with broad ETFs like VOO and keep stacking cash in VUSXX - slow compounding beats chasing gimmicky 'high income' funds that usually bleed on the back end. Options can wait till you’ve got more capital and screen time under your belt.
The thing with those dividend stocks is that you dump a lot of money into it and then all that it does is basically pay you your money back very slowly over a long timeframe while you give them your money so that they can use it to play with options. If that stock doesn't go up sharply in value, then you're basically just waiting to get your money back through the dividends until you break even. Only then will you start to make profit assuming that the fund doesn't dry up and liquidate, which it can with those kinds of stocks. You are best off investing in something like SPY or VOO and chilling for a few decades until you are ready to sell and retire.
Before making this post I didn’t know about VOO or ETFs. So I’m going to switch up my strategy soon. Thanks !
As someone that thought the same thing about options, tried it, made $770 on my first week, including some trades where I made $100+ in just a few minutes, but then lost all of that and $900 more a month later, stay away from options unless you just do very cheap ones for fun during companies' earnings reports to try to make big money on small bets. With your savings you are best off investing in the S&P500 through an ETF like SPY, VOO, etc.. You'll thank yourself in 20 years when you have six figure gains with consistent investing.
Open a roth ira at Vanguard schwab or fidelity, max every year... Every single dollar will go to VOO then chill💪😎
You are too diversified. At this point you might as well just buy an ETF like VOO and chill. If you still want to invest in individual stocks keep it less than 20, I’d say around 15 is a good number. Think about it, can you stay updated on 50+ different companies?
SPY is worse than VOO , and VOO is worse than FXAIX. tiers here bud, tiers.
Well you’re doing great that you’re saving. Not much need for the HYSA if you’re living at home. During uptrends put it all in VOO. Up some 22,000 percent sine inception in 2010. Always have a 10% trailing stop.
I would prioritize hitting the annual limit on that IRA every year. Keep a nice buffer for emergencies, if you can do this then also make sure to treat yourself occasionally, then buy more VOO. If you still have money keep it in that HYSA. Then go gamble with options or buy coke I guess
I wouldn't gamble with options. If you want to save for retirement a Roth IRA is your best vehicle given the tax advantages. Can do VOO/qqq, or VT if you want to be conservative. If you want to invest and not have the money tied up bc u want to use it in 10 years then probably just a brokerage acc with the above ETFs.
You already have an IRA and you know about VOO, why aren't you fully invested? You're already on the right path, you just need to start walking.
Not a fan of target date funds. They tend to under perform and the fees are higher than VOO and equivalents
Move the HYSA to VOO and just have a checking account. $15000 in a checking account at your age and point in life sounds a tad conservative but you would know your situation best.
it IS a set number. you have your emergency savings in check and that's the perfect first step. second would be working on that Roth IRA. you can only put 7k per year in, so getting as close to that if not fully maximizing the opportunity, is the next best option! ( download fidelity and open a Roth IRA, then with your contributions, buy 70% FXAIX , 30% FTIHX ). Third, After maxing out that roth, anything additionally you're able to invest above your immediate high yield savings should go toward a brokerage account (also able to be opened on Fidelity) and in there, invest in 40% VOO , 30% VXUS , 20% SPMO and 10% QQQM) that'll maximize your growth opportunity and still maintain a nice set of diversification. This account is traditionally used for larger life purchases before retirement such as a car and/or your first or next home purchase! amazing questions, we wish you nothing but the best on your journey!
For starters, max out your Roth IRA ($7000) and put all of it into VOO, which you can then trade tax-free for a different ETF mix later if you do more research. Just putting money into an IRA isn't useful, it should be invested in something. If possible maxing out your Roth IRA every year is a great step because it's the best tax advantage for your money.
Follow the tried and trustee “VOO and chill”. You would’ve been up 17% this year without the stress and emotions that come with penny stocks.
Straight bull shit, just buy VOO and QQQ
Nah, invest in VOO and chill lol
VOO isn’t a stock it’s an index fund. BBW has some awesome and unexpected growth, and also arguably the best ticker on the entire market.
Wow thank you. I didn't know about that. You're probably right that my attention is better spent elsewhere but I still do like saving the money where I can. I'll probably keep my position but just add new capital to VOO
Don't waste your time, just 100% VOO, and nobody here cares about your portfolio
Alternatively, if expense ratios bother you that much, then you could consider opening an account with Fidelity and invest in FNILX, rather than SPY or VOO. They offer a 0% expense ratio.
Keep it simple, stick to VOO specially as a new investor. Paper trade with other stocks for a year before picking individual stocks.
Agreed, however those who are into betting would argue that there can be a massive amount of upside in placing bets/parlays with crazy odds. If I lose this bet, I lost $5. If I win I make $6. I won't make $6 off my $5 in VOO tomorrow. (Devil's Advocate obviously.)
ORCL might be a good buy. It sounds like they are going to acquire TikTok. Part of that is probably priced into the stock after last week, but you will still get a bump from the announcement, so now could be a good time to get in position. SOFI is a good buy because the share price is still low. It’s a little volatile, but it’s been trending upwards. Someone mentioned HOOD, and it seems like it’s sort of in the same boat. Coreweave and Broadcom could be good longterm holds. Eventually, when you are not working on a class project, you probably want to invest in ETFs. You’ll want VOO or SPY at the core of your portfolio, with maybe QQQ or VXUS making up a large share, but you might learn a lot from playing around with these individual stocks, which I highly recommend experimenting with, especially at a small scale.
Way too much overlap and no reason to have a TDF unless you're 100% in it. With your amount stick to 1 fund, either VTI or VOO would be my pick. Also VOOV isn't an S&P 500 fund, it's a S&P 500 Value fund. At your age, look for growth, not value and dividends.
Next couple of weeks is way too short. I would prioritize capital preservation as opposed to gains because I would imagine that your classmates may take shots on individual stocks that could just go ass up. Something like: - 60% VOO - 20% SPMO - 15% mix of individual stocks ranging from shit-tier to MAG7 (NVDA, GOOGL, OPEN) - 5% crypto (FBTC or FETH, any Bitcoin or Ethereum ETF) This is on the very aggressive side of a reasonable portfolio. Your holdings in VOO ensure some capital preservation while the SPMO ensures you have a steady basket of stocks beating the market, and your choice of individual stocks are targeting the companies with the highest trading volumes, and the crypto is a hedge on the federal reserve cutting interest rates amidst rising inflation. I’ve done historical projections on this portfolio breakdown, and over a 1 year span, you could assume an alpha of 1-2%. Obviously you can’t guarantee anything but be reasonable. I don’t know what they’re teaching in your economics class but if you want this to be somewhat reflective of a real portfolio I would suggest something along the lines of what I have above with some justification for why you would choose that.
Actually, the three stocks you've chosen are quite clever. VOO is like a "safety net," representing the entire US market, which generally won't do too badly and can also help you compare against other stocks. GOOGL, on the other hand, is a natural growth player, with strong AI and advertising businesses. RYCEY is quite interesting. It's not a mainstream favorite, but the recovery in the aviation and defense industries could potentially give it a boost, making your research more distinctive. However, if you want to impress your professor, you could add a tech stock like NVDA or MSFT. This combination will create a presentation that combines stability (VOO) + growth (GOOGL) + recovery (RYCEY) + innovation (NVDA/MSFT). It's like a portfolio, with both defensive and offensive elements. Finally, a little advice: Don't just focus on numbers; tell a story. For example: VOO = "A representative of the broader market, a microcosm of the entire US economy." GOOGL = "A veteran in the AI race, a powerhouse of advertising and cloud businesses." RYCEY = "From the pandemic's impact to the aviation industry's recovery, a story of phoenix rebirth." This will help your teacher understand that you're not just piling up data, but also understanding the core logic.
This is why /r/bogleheads only buy VT (I prefer a custom mix of VOO and VXUS).
I forgot to ask if we can use ETF’s oops. Might have to scrap VOO temporarily Incase I get a no about it
I'm only investing in NVDA, GOOGLE, APPLE, VOO, VTSAX, CCJ, VOO, and QQQM. Had to stop buying all the meme shit and the AIs. Really wish I held onto all my OKLO, though!
Yeah ideally you wouldn't really touch it, but if the market tanks in this time period due to some event or something, and it's looking like the winner will be whoever loses the least, you can look at inverse ETFs. You've also mentioned "companies" several times, but also mentioned VOO. Are you allowed to invest in ETFs in the exercise, or just individual companies?
Ive been going back and forth on this as well. I have about 3 yrs until I stop working. My Bucket 1 is fully funded by my mil retirement which covers all monthly expenses and with a $1700 a month positive delta. Bucket 2 will be funded when I redistribute (2) 401ks. Right now Im looking at VOO, VTI, VT and SCHD. Bucket 3 is my Roth IRA and some precious metals. The IRA contains three bonds which have a yield of between 4.3% - 7.4%, as well as some REITS, International and Small/Mid cap ETFs.
You mock bears, and indeed bear option gambles not doing great. But smart bears are beating SPY or VOO in their 401k and IRAs.
Nice win, but for the past 3 years you'd have the same return as investing in VOO.
Very beginner question that I feel like I've seen others asking. Let's say I want to put a small sum, $500 in SPY or VOO, and add a smaller $100 each month. I looked into doing this and shares are over $600. How would I go about doing this? I have a fidelity account where I've bought extremely small stocks before like ETFs... Is something like Acorns a better option for someone like me?
If you invested $10,000 in VOO around 9/30/2010, today it would be around $65,956.54 Vs SPY, today it would be around $65,322.22 A difference of around $634 over 15 years. So, yes long term there is a difference, but long term its not very significant.
VOO is up 22% from Sep'24 the way they have created this infinite money glitch needs to be studied
Congrats bro Im looking to get into investing, i have 25k rn to put in the stock market, the best thing ive been hearing to do is to put it in an a ETF like VOO or SPY and hold it, what do you think?
Just my personal philosophy, so don't give it too much weight. Once your needs are taken care of, debt managed and you have emergency funds set aside then put any extra money you have in stocks. You can have an automatic transfer setup weekly/monthly if you'd like. Personally I do it manually and check every 2 weeks when my paycheck hits. I transfer any excess money after debts (CC, upcoming bills, etc) and emergency fund is accounted for. Definitely manage your own funds, it's not hard, saves you money, and is a valuable skill to have. I'd suggest going 70-80% $VOO or equivalent broad market ETF. That is going to be your set and forget long term growth. Since your young you can afford to take some risks, I'd suggest picking some solid companies that you will think perform well over the next couple years for the remaining 20-30%. Nvidia, Microsoft, CrowdStrike, Coke, Reddit, Costco, Google, etc. Ideally pick an industry your familiar with and already follow closely. But in general, avoid any company you wouldn't want to hold for at least a year. Long-term vs Short-term capital gains can be a big factor depending on your income. I wouldn't worry too much about diversifying out of stocks, your young and long-term growth is more important that stability at this point. Bonds can make sense later in life when you want to reduce risk. Real estate as an investment can be a lot more work than people (especially the influencer real estate gurus) make it out to be. The potential benefits aren't worth the added hassle relative to securities (stocks/bonds) that require zero effort imo. I personally only consider buying properties to serve as my primary residence. Especially when your young, owning real estate can tie you to certain locations and there is a lot of value in mobility as a young person who may need to move for better job opportunities. Side-businesses are a crap shoot. I'd avoid generally speaking. My only regret is not starting younger. I mostly avoided it, but I have many, many friends who regret their forays into option trading and crypto. That said, being young is the time to take risks. Just be smart about the risks you take.
Buy VOO on an auto weekly basis. The most you can afford. Use a place like Fidelity that supports fractionals. Work to increase the weekly amount. Sell ONLY when you have something urgent to pay for. This is the step people mess up. They panic sell (selling for any other reason than paying for something urgent). Learn as you go. Educate yourself on bogleheads. Get started today. Always have a weekly. Work to increase that auto weekly. Max your 401k early if you can. Set that to low cost sp500 fund as well. Set and forget, only log in to increase the contribution amount. You’re super young! You will do great!!
Not wrong but I'm a digital age with day traders, AI algorithms making automatic trades, and huge funds where people don't look what's in them (VOO is a prime example) basic fundamentals really don't matter unless it affects the company in question so hard that everyone has to see it and jump ship at same time. The average P/E for US companies is way higher than European companies. The US stock market is stupidly overvalued and that's why massive correction is inevitable.
Dumb question probably, If VOO tracks SP500. How does it benefit from the lift stocks have when added and the depreciation other stocks have when removed? I'm assuming they have no inside information... My only thought is that they don't and in the grand scheme of things those amounts don't really matter?
Yes but SPY charges 0.09% per year in fears and VOO is 0.03%. My bad i didn't mention that in my question
It's not Nostradamus it's the mechanics of the market. Why investors move between Equities, Bonds and Commodities. But nvm. Just DCA VOO
I’m getting ready to invest but posts like these make me want to stick it in VTI or VOO to play it safe even though the potential to get filthy rich is low
Stock picking works and if your conviction is high, VOO and chill doesn’t make sense
Just consistently invest in the S&P 500 like VOO or VFIAX. Reddit is a horrible place for serious advice most of the time because it's nothing but doom and gloom. Everyone thinks they're a master trader and knows what's gonna happen before it does. In April the market had a perfect sale and people were constantly saying "it'll get worse this is just the beginning" and here we are 20%+ later. If you're consistently buying, the ups and downs are moot. Market down? You get more shares per dollar. Market high? Less shares per dollar. Do that over 30 years and it'll be a great nest egg but you have to detach your emotions from your money and what it's intended to do.
VOO might have more AUM, but the people buying it generally aren’t trading it. As a result, SPY has around 10 times the average volume as VOO.
Compare the 5 and 10 tear charts. Not sure what you call "the market". I call VOO the market.... Long term the market goes up. Just have to be in it long enough, don't panic, and just hold. Time in the market.
I need to block this sub. Huge selection bias where everyone shows off their 1500% gains and makes me want to chase it instead of being happy with the 20% VOO annual return. Market makers have way more tools (as well as natural exposure to hedge positions against) that there’s no way retail can win
Any thoughts on VOO vs VTI? Expecting the 500 companies will outperform the market as a whole long term?
>you don't hear about this anywhere especially conventional media like bloomberg. How do I learn and get this info? I don't know where to look. Im one of those VOO and chill guys.
>SPY is more liquid Is that still true? A few months back I heard news VOO became the biggest sp500 etf and overtook SPY. logically VOO should have more liquidity now.
There's a reason it's called index and chill. If you're not retiring in the next five years, then you shouldn't care about reducing equity exposure and buying US Treasury bills or bonds. Ignore all the noise and always buy whether the market is going up or down. In the long term, you will hopefully see the average returns of VOO/VTI. When the market tanks, that's the rare sale. Our income is a little more than yours at around $388K combined. Wife had RSUs from 2022 to 2024. She never sold a share until after she was laid off. In previous years, our income was closer to $340K including those RSUs. We also had a paid off house since the fall of 2022 (though maybe not worth as much as yours since ours is around $600K). I cashed out an old pension around October 2022 for around $180K since my previous company was only expecting it to grow by 5% a year until retirement and the lump sum versus monthly payments until death all assumed 5% growth. I figured with VOO/VTI I could do better. I bought when the S&P 500 was around 400 and then it immediately dipped below for a few months. To give you some context, our investments hit $1M for the first time in June 2023. Exactly two years later June 2025 it hit $2M. This was a portfolio based on 85% SPY/VOO/VTI, 5% MSFT, 5% QQQ, and 5% BRK.B. MSFT was sold for VOO/VTI this year. I also worked part time for a startup and cashed out around $27K after the company was bought out. After paying long term capital gains taxes (I bought startup shares for less than $20, the most I could purchase), that money also went into VOO/VTI. This happened after we hit $1M in investments. There will be some future years where we may be in a recession. In fact, the yield curve inversion of the 10 year US Treasury versus 3 month US Treasury has predicted the past few recessions. However, these are the Black Friday sale times. How many years or months the sale lasts depends on the event. These are the times you want to buy as many shares as possible. Source (click on max and observe the events that occurred after the yield curve was inverted): https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/T10Y3M
Dude, just park it in VOO/ S&P and leave it alone. Stop selling. It’s only going to keep going up even if the market dips 10% or more in the short term. It always recovers and makes new highs. Just leave it alone and stay the course
Just dollar cost average into an etf like VOO or something else over a long period of time. Whatever cash you want to invest divide it by 26… every 2 weeks buy.
>How do I navigate if recession hits General advice is not to invest more than you’re willing to leave in the market for a minimum of 5 years. Diversification also helps. VT is total world stock market and captures every publicly traded company on the planet. Alternatively you could go VTI/VOO + VXUS to control your exposure to US and International independently. BNDW is total world bond market. Alternatively you could go BND + BNX to control your exposure to US and International independently. Recommend doing some reading on r/bogleheads
Growing up is realizing the "VOO and chill" retards make more money than most people here
real question OP, is is too hard for you to just VOO and chill? damn
Ok…everyone has great ideas but try this. Just invest the money in one or two investments in your own account (earmarked for the child. VOO vs SPY) Could be whatever…just gift them the investment when you’re ready to give it to them. Your assets don’t count as much for FASA. 529s are great for college planning, but try just investing it and then gifting it away. They take the cost basis and then you make sure you don’t give them more than the gifting limits. Since they have very little to no income they could sell and diversify or just sell it and then make sure their income is in the 0% cap gains bracket.
I recommend getting a ETF that you are comfortable holding for 20 years. Something like VOO would be good. Do not buy mutual funds. Every year, check the child's investment income. If it is below the threshold, sell any with gains and buy back the ETF. Only do enough to bring the income up to the taxable limit.
bro sell that sh\*t like yesterday. Take the gains and VOO and chill omfg.
Fidelity is the best for this. Fractional VOO, set and forget.
Seriously though… What were you buying? penny stocks? Or just badly positioned options? I’m glad you’re admitting it was gambling. It’s always funny to see loss porn, but at the same time it hurts me to see. We all make mistakes. But i really wish people wouldn’t wait till their account is at $0 to post the loss porn. Once you’ve gone down from $250k to $50k it’s a good time to re-assess and give up on the strategy. Consider it a total loss and throw the last $50k in VOO and walk away. Then at least you can come back in a decade and have something resembling the original sum that you worked hard for. But when you drag losses to zero it really makes it worse. Hopefully other people reading this see. That if you lose 75% of your portfolio, you need to stop and change it up. This might not be for you and take the last 25% and let it build up in a boring index fund and leave it alone for a decade or so while you get the help you need and start some traditional savings.
Just set up an automatic $100/ week or month VOO buy in a retirement account and delete everything and never check it until you’re ready to retire.
If by lower rates you mean the price, then no, you shouldn't sell SPY to buy VOO. Both SPY and VOO track the same S&P 500 index. This means that it is expected that they both will perform roughly the same. So as far as the difference in price is concerned, math wise it does not matter. If you buy 2 shares at $10, for $20, and the value goes up 5%, that is (10 \* 1.05) \* 2 = $21 If you buy 4 shares at $5, for $20, and the value goes up 5%, that is (5 \* 1.05) \* 4 = $21
Thank you\~ These are great advises. :) VOO is a great choice, I will look more into it ;) I hope you are having a great weekend buddy!
Yea this. The riskier the investment, the less you should put into it. My IRA consist of only QQQ and VOO
I'd only need to be out of Cali for two years. I'm one of those FIRE people. Financial Independence Retire Early. Most FIRE people have all their money in VTSAX. So, when they hit their FIRE number, they don't have a massive tax problem with unwinding their risk. Unfortunately for me, almost none of my money is in VTSAX. All my money is in Google (48%), AMD (15%) NVDA (13%), AVGO (12%), VOO (10%), META (2%). I have to unwind my risk, which means selling out of huge percentages of these positions. Positions that have doubled. Some of them have tripled. Which means huge amounts of LTCG (Long Term Capital Gains) Obviously, I'm blessed to have the problem of too many LTCG's and thus too much taxes, but I still have to deal with the taxes. I could unwind the vast majority of my risk over a two year period, and I might save like 15 to 18k each year in doing so.
If you don't know a thing about investing and want to invest in stocks then step 1 is to open a brokerage account (ideally a retirement account with some kind of tax advantages, like an IRA or Roth IRA if you live in the US). I'm not familiar with other countries, but stick with whatever passes for the big trusted brokers wherever you live like Fidelity, Vanguard, Schwab, or Merill. The last thing you want is for some Chinese fintech startup to abscond with your retirement money. Stocks and funds composed of multiple stocks all go by "tickers," or abbreviations. It's generally agreed that you won't go wrong putting your money in large diversified stock funds like VOO (largest 500 US companies) or VT (entire world stock index). Most of their value over time will come from a rising market value if you choose to sell your shares back to the market. If you'd prefer something more like a second salary (income) instead then you may prefer something like SCHD (which focuses on companies with larger payouts) or VIG (which focuses on companies which grow their payouts more over time). Many people say you should also diversify into assets besides stocks, so putting some of your investing money (maybe 10% or less if you're under 30 and up to 50% if you're in your 50s or later) in a bond fund like BNDW is worth considering. Overall this will invest your money in a wide variety of assets so that you can receive an average profit based on their performance over time. Don't use money you think you might need in the next 5 years to invest in stocks. Prices will fluctuate unpredictably and selling when prices are low because you suddenly need the money is how you lose a lot of money forever. You may hear about "diversification," which is protecting your investments from bad luck by owning lots of different things. Each of these funds has hundreds of unique assets in it so owning just one or two of the funds is plenty of diversification. It's very difficult to get a better return than the market average you'll get from one of these funds, but it is possible if you work hard and have a knack for investing in individual companies. If you think you might enjoy learning about it and want to try beating the average you can start with books like One Up on Wall Street and Beating the Street by Peter Lynch. He was one of the best investors of the last hundred years and his approach is very common sense. Start with just a few companies you think might excel with just 1 or 2% of your money in each. You'll make a lot of mistakes at first and it's better to lose 1 or 2% than 10 or 20%. You'll also get a lot of benefit from a more numbers-based approach, which you can start learning about in a book like The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham or Aswath Damodaran's corporate finance and asset valuation courses on YouTube. After you've invested 10-30 companies over the course of 5 or 10 years and finished several of those books and courses you'll know for sure if you're cut out for individual stock investing or should stick to the large diversified funds.
Higher upside with the individual stocks, more diversification and overall safety with the ETF’s. Depends on your risk appetite, but I’d say do the split, keep your stocks and diversify into an ETF or ETF’s such as VOO and QQQM (lower expense ratio than QQQ)
It’s not just 7k a year - you will likely have other options. Switch jobs and had a 401k? You can roll it into a Roth (paying taxes of course). There are also backdoor roths. There are also Roth 401k options. I think it also depends on your anticipated retirement goal and future income expectations. I’m risky in my Roth since I know my income will go up in the future and I’ll be doing backdoor Roth / I can tolerate the risk for outsize early gains whereas a underperforming safe VOO won’t matter *as* much. I look for stocks I like and want to hold for a while. I’m about 50% index, and 50% single stocks (MSFT, Google, lots of UNH). Had palantir but sold way too early - that’s something that would have been great to have kept in Roth. Briefly played with long dated options for extra leverage but I decided that wasn’t worth it for me. I’d consider it again after a recession.
I myself am shorting VOO but to a safe degree. Waiting to see when the market momentum will stop.
You are only 26. You can deal with the risk. Put 7k into VOO or SPY every year and don't touch them.
This is how I do it. Heavy research to find a stock that has the potential to 2x or more in a year, without a too much downside risk. All in on said stock. Then later, I'll switch to VOO and VT to de-risk.
Hopefully your “funny money” operation is a very small peice of you strategy or you are likely to make less than the boring yet excellent VOO
I am 21M living in the USA. I am a student and work part time ~15k a year. I want to buy and hold for like 30+ years. I bought SPY shares before I knew what VOO was. Should I liquidate it all and buy VOO instead? I saw they have lower rates, and capital gains tax won't do much to me right now
There aren't any fees for individual stocks. There are two different tickers because GOOGL has voting rights and the GOOG doesn't. Normally this would mean GOOGL is more expensive, since you get everything GOOG does and a vote, but the vote is useless since two of the founders have over 50% of the votes. Thus, the market doesn't assign any premium to them, and GOOGL happens to be cheaper right now. Also, there's no volatility difference between SPY and VOO. SPY is more liquid, which means it is easier to buy and sell. This isn't a feature of the fund itself, it's just older so more people use it.
Why doesn't warren buffett just DCA VOO?
Playing with options and flexing making 17% in a year. Bro just put it in VOO and you would litterally have made 17% in the last year doing nothing and not fucking with your blood pressure
Even all the advice about VOO (S&P500 ETF) and QQQ (Nasdaq ETF)… with the market so high now, I might hold off til the market crashes a bit. Another approach, do a plan of adding $500 a week for the next 20 weeks. That way it dollar-cost-averages out, instead of trying to time the market. In the meantime, a mutual fund like TTTXX is essentially a high-yield savings account. You all assume OP doesn’t need this money for 40+ years, but the money might be useful in the next couple years for college expenses or other living expenses. With interest rates so high, using this money is a better financially than a 7-10% APY loan.
>#hope we get a nasty correction, so that I can buy in cheap again. Fuck yeah If you look at February peak to peak S&P total returns, it's about 14% CAGR since then. Earnings are growing at around 13% YoY. I wouldn't bet too hard on a nasty crash. u/VOO_bull_forever
Yesterday I posted about kids accounts, today I want to ask about my own account. US ex-pat, so limited to US ETFs but less of a need for HSA and the like. I have a local pension (functions I guess similar to a 401k) and don't make enough money beyond that to invest in both a taxable brokerage and also a Roth IRA. So currently in a taxable brokerage account but there's no specific purpose other than long-term growth. I have a provident fund from work as well which is separate. Currently it's a mess with no clear strategy, major overlap (I have VOO, SPY, and QQQ \[which I know is different but just based on weights has a lot of overlap\]). I'm looking at a long-term strategy of simplifying, though that will also require short-term figuring out the best way to do so without a severe tax hit, even though the account isn't so big (only $20K). I'm looking at an idea that would see: 1. 35% VOO 2. 20% VXUS 3. 10% AVUV 4. 10% BND or BLV?? (my emergency fund is held in my local, non American account, so not looking for something like SGOV) 5. 5% GLD?? (some type of hedge??) 6. Remainder on sectoral fund(s)? Right now, it's a mess. There's just so much of this and that sprinkled around and that's dumb (for me) because I want passive investment. I'm not looking to actively manage and constantly readjust. So even if what I wrote is a ton, it's still a massive overhaul and simplification. Maybe I need to sit with an investment advisor, but I'm curious if there's one that'll sit for just a couple of hours for a small portfolio like mine because I'm not looking to move away to a managed portfolio (for a variety of reasons).
You’re basically holding the big dogs that already make up a fat chunk of SPY and QQQ, so adding ETFs just gives you built-in diversification without stock-picking stress. If you want low-cost plays, check out VOO for S&P and QQQM for Nasdaq—both passive, cheap, and solid long-term.
Well that becomes more difficult to calculate because you would be responsible for paying taxes on your VOO that you were holding outside of your Roth when you sold at 65. And it's hard to say what the tax rate will be decades into the future. That's the beauty of a Roth, is that as long as you wait until you're 59 1/2 to start withdrawing, you will pay no taxes.
So let's say you invest a few thousand in VOO every year on top of maxing out Roth ira. How much could you have made by 65?
Trading options != investing. If you want to invest set up automatic deposits into QQQ or VOO
At your age I’d buy an S&P500 ETF like VOO.