Diversification Is Key To Success When investing in Stocks, Bonds, Mutual Funds, , FOREX, Commodities and ETF’s and just about every other legit investment available. Why is it that some people only buy one or two stocks? Others may have 15 stocks but have 50 percent of their investment assets in just one of those 15 stocks. In Wall Street we refer to this type of behavior as concentration. Some firms call it over-concentration. When this happens in a brokerage firm it is always considered dangerous. It is so dangerous, in fact, that if the brokerage firm is using a concentrated stock position as capital, then the market value of the security in question is given a haircut. This means that the full market value of the security is chopped by some fixed percentage in any capital computation. In other words, if you are over-concentrated, you don’t get full value. Some of you may have margin accounts. Its always best to have cash ownership of stocks you invest in. If you own stocks on margin, it is our opinion that you will get sold out on margin. Normally in a margin account you put up 50 percent of the value of the stock you acquire in cash. If equity falls below 35 percent, you get a margin call. Now, brokerage firms love it when clients have 15 or 20 different stocks in a margin account. If there are some bonds in that account, guess what, they love it even more. Why? Because brokerage firms know that stocks represent risky investments. Something can always go wrong in any one situation....
While mutual funds have become one of the most popular and accessible forms of investing, they do come with a few strings attached. It doesn’t matter what sort of investing you are trying, stocks, bonds, securities and even mutual funds come with fees. But how can you tell what kind of fund has what kind of fee and what are the different kinds of fees out there? A common fee connected to mutual funds that are bought through a broker or a third party is a sales charge. One of the major advantages of buying your mutual funds directly through the company that sells them is that you can usually avoid the sales charge fee. One of the most important lessons you can learn about mutual fund investing is to always look for no-load mutual funds. A no-load fund has no fees attached. But what if you see a load fund that you really want to try? Load funds are broken down into thee classes: A, B and C. Each letter carries a different set of fee rules. For A load funds, you can expect to have a 4-6{f50081c0ec796da126603b263a099f347acb98e56a69dffae82b7eb84c3f1a5d} chunk of your investment taken once you buy the fund. There is an additional annual fee of about .25{f50081c0ec796da126603b263a099f347acb98e56a69dffae82b7eb84c3f1a5d} that is also taken out. For B funds, there is no fee taken out at the beginning, but there is a fee once you want to take your money out of the mutual funds. This fee does go away after six years of having the fund, but you will get dinged if you try to take your money out any sooner....
Every kind of investing has its ups and downs. Those that deal in stocks enjoy the way that stock ownership works and that it meets their investing goals. The same can be said for those that invest in mutual funds. There are both positives and negatives to investing in mutual funds, and we’ll take a look at some of those positives right now. Maybe the most reassuring aspect of investing in mutual funds is the knowledge that your fund is being managed and taken care of by a professional. With stock and bond trading, your best weapon is your gut instinct and a dog-eared copy of the Wall Street Journal. With mutual funds, you’re trusting your investment to someone who probably has the Journal memorized and also has an entire corporation’s brain trust at his disposal. For those that are working on a tight budget and may not have much wiggle room, mutual funds are a great choice because they have maximum liquidity. Liquidity is the ability to get your cash back on your investment if you need to. With some investments, your money is tied up for extended periods of time with no way for you to access it without huge penalties. Mutual funds allow you to sell back what you’ve bought at the end of every trading day so you can have instant access to your money. A common buzzword associated with investing is diversification. It’s based on the premise that you don’t want all of your investments on the same thing. Since mutual funds invest in stocks, commodities, bonds and other things, you can help to...
One of the biggest parts of investing is determining your own risk tolerance. When most people think of risk tolerance, they think, “How much can I stand to lose before I start to struggle.” Risk is a huge part of investing because it dictates what sort of mutual funds you can put your money into, how much money you can invest and for how long. Knowing your risk tolerance is one of the biggest keys to successful investing. Risk is usually defined as short term volatility in prices or variability in prices. But there is a whole other kind of risk at the other end of the spectrum. The risk of not meeting your goals by investing. The main reason why anyone begins to invest is to meet goals that they have set for themselves. The most common goal in investing is saving money for retirement or for that second home. Risk goes both ways, there is the chance you could lose your shirt with an investment, and the chance that if you don’t take enough risks, you won’t meet the goals you’ve set for yourself. The first thing you need to do is to take a personal assessment of your own risk and develop what is known as an investment personality. Everyone’s personality will be different, they are unique like fingerprints. Some investors can stand to take some big chances now with the lure of a potential payoff down the road, while others who may not have much time between the time they start investing and the point where their financial goals need to be realized and can’t...
