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[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is it bad etiquette to use a credit or debit card to pay for single figure amounts at the pos", "role": "user" }, { "content": "until the card act, credit card rules required that merchants had no minimum purchase requirement to use a card. new rules permit a minimum but it must be clearly posted. update - stores can now refuse small credit card charges is an excellent article which clarifies the rules. it appears that these rules apply to credit, not debit cards. so to be clear - the minimum do not apply to the op as he referenced using a debit card. \"superiority\"? hm. i'd be a bit embarrassed to charge such small amounts. although when cash in my wallet is very low, i may have little choice. note, and disclaimer, i am 48, 30 years ago when i started using cards, there were no pos machines. credit card transactions had a big device that got a card imprint and the merchant looked up to see if your card was stolen in a big book they got weekly/monthly. times have changed, and debit cards may be faster, especially if with cash you give the cashier $5.37 for a $2.37 transaction, but the guy entered $5 already. this often takes a manager to clear up.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what are the tax implications of dividends that i receive from stocks (equity) that i hold?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "note the above is only for shares. there are different rules for other assets like house, jewellery, mutual funds, debt funds. refer to the income tax guide for more details.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "basic questions about investing in stocks", "role": "user" }, { "content": "now a days, your stocks can be seen virtually through a brokerage account. back in the days, a stock certificate was the only way to authenticate stock ownership. you can still request them though from the corporation you have shares in or your brokerage. it will have your name, corporation name and number of shares you have. you have to buy shares of a stock either through a brokerage or the corporation itself. most stock brokerages are legit and are fdic or sipc insured. but your risks are your own loses. the $10 you are referring to is the trade commission fee the brokerage charges. when you place an order to buy or sell a stock the brokerage will charge you $10. so for example if you bought 1 share of a $20 stock. the total transaction cost will be $30. depending on the state you live in, you can basically starting trading stocks at either 18 or 21. you can donate/gift your shares to virtually anyone. when you sell a stock and experience a profit, you will be charged a capital gains tax. if you buy a stock and sell it for a gain within 1 year, you will taxed up to 35% or your tax bracket but if you hold it for more than a year, you will taxed only 15% or your tax bracket.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how is it possible that a preauth sticks to a credit card for 30 days, even though the goods have already been delivered?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it is barely possible that this is citi's fault, but it sounds more like it is on the costco end. the way that this is supposed to work is that they preauthorize your card for the necessary amount. that reserves the payment, removing the money from your credit line. on delivery, they are supposed to capture the preauthorization. that causes the money to transfer to them. until that point, they've reserved your payment but not actually received it. if you cancel, then they don't have to pay processing fees. the capture should allow for a larger sale so as to provide for tips, upsells, and unanticipated taxes and fees. in this case, instead of capturing the preauthorization, they seem to have simply generated a new transaction. citi could be doing something wrong and processing the capture incorrectly. or costco could be doing a purchase when they should be doing a capture. from outside, we can't really say. the thirty days would seem to be how long costco can schedule in advance. so the preauthorization can last that long for them. costco should also have the ability to cancel a preauthorization. however, they may not know how to trigger that. with smaller merchants, they usually have an interface where they can view preauthorizations and capture or cancel them. costco may have those messages sent automatically from their system. note that a common use for this pattern is with things like gasoline or delivery purchases. if this has been citi/costco both times, i'd try ordering a pizza or some other delivery food and see if they do it correctly. if it was citi both times and a different merchant the other time, then it's probably a citi problem rather than a merchant problem.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how much power does a ceo have over a public company?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "also keep note - some companies have a combined ceo/chairman of the board role. while he/she would not be allowed to negotiate contracts or stock plans, some corporate governance analysts advocate for the separation of the roles to remove any opportunity for the ceo to unduly influence the board. this could be the case for dysfunctional boards. however, the alternate camps will say that the combined role has no negative effect on shareholder returns. sec regulations require companies to disclose negotiations between the board and ceo (as well as other named executives) for contracts, employee stock plans, and related information. sometimes reading the proxy statement to find out, for example, how many times the board meets a year, how many other boards a director serves on, and if the ceo sits on any other board (usually discouraged to serve on more than 2) will provide some insight into a well-run (or not well-run) board.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "owning reit vs owning real estate - which has a better hypothetical roi?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "your question may have another clue. you are bullish regarding the real estate market. is that for your city, your state, your nation or for the whole world? unless you can identify particular properties or neighborhoods that are expected to be better than the average return for your expected bull market in real estate, you will be taking a huge risk. it would be the same as believing that stocks are about to enter a bull market, but then wanting to put 50% of your wealth on one stock. the ytd for the dow is ~+7%, yet 13 of the 30 have not reached the average increase including 4 that are down more than 7%. being bullish about the real estate segment still gives you plenty of opportunities to invest. you can invest directly in the reit or you can invest in the companies that will grow because of the bullish conditions. if your opinion changes in a few years it is hard to short a single property.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "i am the sole owner of an llc. does it make a difference if i file as an s-corp or a sole-member llc?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "s-corp are taxed very different. unlike llc where you just add the profit to your income with s-corp you have to pay yourself a \"reasonable\" salary (on w-2) which of course is a lot more paperwork. i think the advantage (but don't hold me accountable for this) is if your s-corp makes a lot more than a reasonable salary, then the rest of the money can be passed through on your personal return at a lower (corp) rate.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "dealing with event driven market volatility", "role": "user" }, { "content": "if you are worried about elections think about writing some calls against your long positions to help hedge. if you have msft (@ $51.38 right now) you could write a msft call for lets say $55. you can bank $170 per 100 shares (let's say you write it at 1.70) (msft 01/20/2017 55.00 c 1.73 +0.01 bid: 1.69 ask: 1.77) if msft goes down a lot you will have lost $170 less per 100 shares than you would have because you wrote an option for $170. you will in fact be break even if the stock falls to 49.68 on the jan strike date. if msft goes up $3.50 you will have made $170 and still have your msft stock for a net gain of $520. $170 in cash for the premium and your stock is now worth $350 more. if msft goes up $3.62 or more you will have made the max $530ish and have no msft left potentially losing additional profit if the stock goes up like gang busters. so is it worth it for you to get $170 in cash now and risk the stock going up more than $5 between now and jan. that is the decision to make here.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how can i understand why investors think a particular company should have a high pe ratio?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "does the company see itself expanding into new product lines or new territories? what is the current predicted growth for the company's earnings for the next 5 years? these would generally be where i'd look for growth in companies. in the case of costco, there may be a perception of the company as being a \"safe\" company as the market capitalization for the stock is over $50 billion which is rather large. thus, there is something to be said for costco providing a dividend and may well weather the current market for an idea compared to holding funds in money markets that are paying nothing in some cases. there is also something to be said for looking at the industry and sector values that costco is in where on yahoo! finance, i find the p/e for the industry and sector to be 35.05 and 28.47, respectively. thus, costco isn't as inflated as the other stocks in the same ballpark for another idea here.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why can low volume move a stock price drastically?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "in a sense, yes. there's a view in yahoo finance that looks like this for this particular stock, a market order for 3000 shares (not even $4000, this is a reasonably small figure) will move the stock past $1.34, more than a 3% move. say, on the ask side there are 100,000 shares, all with $10 ask. it would take a lot of orders to purchase all these shares, so for a while, the price may stay right at $10, or a bit lower if there are those willing to sell lower. but, say that side showed $10 1000, $10.25 500, $10.50 1000. now, the volume is so low that if i decided i wanted shares at any price, my order, a market order will actually drive the market price right up to $10.50 if i buy 2500 shares \"market\". you see, however, even though i'm a small trader, i drove the price up. but now that the price is $10.50 when i go to sell all 2500 at $10.50, there are no bids to pay that much, so the price the next trade will occur at isn't known yet. there may be bids at $10, with asking (me) at $10.50. no trades will happen until a seller takes the $10 bid or other buyers and sellers come in.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "i am brasilian resident, how to buy shares on nyse?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i am not sure what a brazilian equivalent is but you could just do an adr. keep in mind that when you are investing in a foreign company there are certain currency risks that you may need to consider.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "should i fund retirement with a static asset allocation or an age based glide path?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "so i did some queries on google scholar, and the term of art academics seem to use is target date fund. i notice divided opinions among academics on the matter. w. pfau gave a nice set of citations of papers with which he disagrees, so i'll start with them. in 1969, paul sameulson published the paper lifetime portfolio selection by dynamic stochaistic programming, which found that there's no mathematical foundation for an age based risk tolerance. there seems to be a fundamental quibble relating to present value of future wages; if they are stable and uncorrelated with the market, one analysis suggests the optimal lifecycle investment should start at roughly 300 percent of your portfolio in stocks (via crazy borrowing). other people point out that if your wages are correlated with stock returns, allocations to stock as low as 20 percent might be optimal. so theory isn't helping much. perhaps with the advent of computers we can find some kind of empirical data. robert shiller authored a study on lifecycle funds when they were proposed for personal social security accounts. lifecycle strategies fare poorly in his historical simulation: moreover, with these life cycle portfolios, relatively little is contributed when the allocation to stocks is high, since earnings are relatively low in the younger years. workers contribute only a little to stocks, and do not enjoy a strong effect of compounding, since the proceeds of the early investments are taken out of the stock market as time goes on. basu and drew follow up on that assertion with a set of lifecycle strategies and their contrarian counterparts: whereas a the lifecycle plan starts high stock exposure and trails off near retirement, the contrarian ones will invest in bonds and cash early in life and move to stocks after a few years. they show that contrarian strategies have higher average returns, even at the low 25th percentile of returns. it's only at the bottom 5 or 10 percent where this is reversed. one problem with these empirical studies is isolating the effect of the glide path from rebalancing. it could be that a simple fixed allocation works plenty fine, and that selling winners and doubling down on losers is the fundamental driver of returns. schleef and eisinger compare lifecycle strategy with a number of fixed asset allocation schemes in monte carlo simulations and conclude that a 70% equity, 30% long term corp bonds does as well as all of the lifecycle funds. finally, the earlier w pfau paper offers a monte carlo simulation similar to schleef and eisinger, and runs final portfolio values through a utility function designed to calculate diminishing returns to more money. this seems like a good point, as the risk of your portfolio isn't all or nothing, but your first dollar is more valuable than your millionth. pfau finds that for some risk-aversion coefficients, lifecycles offer greater utility than portfolios with fixed allocations. and pfau does note that applying their strategies to the historical record makes a strong recommendation for 100 percent stocks in all but 5 years from 1940-2011. so maybe the best retirement allocation is good old low cost s&p index funds!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why do people take out life insurance on their children? should i take out a policy on my child?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "adam davis's answer is pretty good. however, i think he misses something with regard to the costs of a funeral. according to funeralplanning101.com, a traditional funeral can cost upwards of $15,000. having just planned and paid for a funeral for an adult, i can assure you that this figure is low. i've heard \"$10,000 - $30,000\", and that seems a reasonable ball-park given my experience. additionally, grief affects people differently. if your child died, would you be able to continue work afterwards? most people can, but some people have to take extended leave (generally with no income) because of the emotional impact. combined, these expenses can easily outstrip the savings for an average family. almost by definition, insurance is not cost-effective; insurance companies profit by selling it to you, after all. but you may decide that it is appropriate to mitigate your risk by buying insurance. i do not have children and would likely not choose to insure them if i did. nevertheless, other people may reasonably choose differently.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "high dividend stocks", "role": "user" }, { "content": "like almost all investing question: it depends! boring companies generally appreciate slowly and as you note, pay dividends. more speculative investing can get you some capital gains, but also are more likely to tank and have you lose your original investment. the longer your time horizon, and the more risk you are willing to take, then it is reasonable to tilt towards, but not exclusively invest in, more speculative stocks. a shorter horizon, or if you have trouble sleeping at night if you lose money, or are looking for an income stream, would then tend towards the boring side. good luck", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "avoiding capital gains long term", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it's correct. be sure of your personal opportunity cost and not that you're letting the tax tail wag the dog just to score \"tax free\". your upside is $3,700 (single) or $7,000 (married) in taxes saved until you're out of the 0% zone. is that worth not receiving an income? even if your savings are such that you don't need to work for income for a fiscal year, how would this affect the rest of your career and lifetime total earning prospects? now, maybe: otherwise, i'd hope you have solid contacts in your network who won't be fazed by a resume gap and be delighted to have a position open for you in 2019 (and won't give you the \"mother returning to the workforce\" treatment in salary negotiations).", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what are the risks of dividend-yielding stocks?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "having a good dividend yield doesn't guarantee that a stock is safe. in the future, the company may run into financial trouble, stop paying dividends, or even go bankrupt. for this reason, you should never buy a stock just because it has a high dividend yield. you also need some criteria to determine whether that stock is safe to buy. personally, i consider a stock is reasonably safe if it meets the following criteria:", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "does an executed limit order imply a spot price?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "think of all the limit orders waiting in line, first organized by price, and then by the time the order was placed (earlier orders are closer to the front of the line). in order for your buy order to trade, there must be no other limit orders of 10.01 or higher, or the sellers order would have matched with them instead. so once your order is filled, the price is 10.00, even if just for a millisecond, because there was a trade at 10.00, even though the price might go right back up after the trade.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "foolish to place orders before the market opens?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "more on a technical note, but the spread on an etf tends to be worst at market open and near market close. (assuming the etf constituents are traded on a synchronous basis.) if possible, it's often best to let market makers get up and running before allowing your order to flow into market.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to s&p having a negative outlook on the usa?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "when people (even people in the media) say: \"the stock market is up because of x\" or \"the stock market is down because of y\", they are often engaging in what nicolas taleb calls the narrative falacy. they see the market has moved in one direction or another, they open their newspaper, pick a headline that provides a plausible reason for the market to move, and say: \"oh, that is why the stock market is down\". very rarely do statements like this actually come from research, asking people why they bought or sold that day. sometimes they may be right, but it is usually just story telling. in terms of old fashioned logic this is called the \"post hoc, ergo proper hoc\" fallacy. now all the points people have raised about the us deficit may be valid, and there are plenty of reasons for worrying about the future of the world economy, but they were all known before the s&p report, which didn't really provide the markets with much new information. note also that the actual bond market didn't move much after hearing the same report, in fact the price of 10 year us treasury bonds actually rose a tiny bit. take these simple statements about what makes the market go up or down on any given day with several fistfuls of salt.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how much is my position worth after 5-1 stock split?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the average price would be $125 which would be used to compute your basis. you paid $12,500 for the stock that is now worth $4,500 which is a loss of $8,000 overall if you sell at this point.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what does it mean to be offset against taxable gains?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "offset against taxable gains means that the amount - $25 million in this case - can be used to reduce another sum that the company would otherwise have to pay tax on. suppose the company had made a profit of $100 million on some other investments. at some point, they are likely to have to pay corporation tax on that amount before being able to distribute it as a cash dividend to shareholders. however if they can offset the $25 million, then they will only have to pay tax on $75 million. this is quite normal as you usually only pay tax on the aggregate of your gains and losses. if corporation tax is about 32% that would explain the claimed saving of approximately $8 million. it sounds like the plaintiffs want the stock to be sold on the market to get that tax saving. presumably they believe that distributing it directly would not have the same effect because of the way the tax rules work. i don't know if the plaintiffs are right or not, but if they are the difference would probably come about due to the stock being treated as a \"realized loss\" in the case where they sell it but not in the case where they distribute it. it's also possible - though this is all very speculative - that if the loss isn't realised when they distribute it directly, then the \"cost basis\" of the shareholders would be the price the company originally paid for the stock, rather than the value at the time they receive it. that in turn could mean a tax advantage for the shareholders.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "advantages/disadvantages of buying stocks on dips vs buying outright?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "dollar-cost averaging will allow you to reduce your risk while the stock prices falls provided: you must invest a fixed amount $x on a fixed time scale (i.e. every y days). by doing this you will be able to take advantage of the lowering price by obtaining more shares per period as the price falls. but at the same time, if it starts to rise, you will already have your pig in the race. example: suppose you wanted to invest $300 in a company. we will do so over 3 periods. as the price falls, your average dollar cost will as well. but since you don't know where the bottom is, you cannot wait until the bottom. by trying to guess the bottom and dumping all of your investment at once you expose yourself to a higher level of risk.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "can i transfer self-employed income into llc?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "an llc is a very flexible company when it comes to taxation. you have three basic tax options: there are other good reasons to create an llc (mainly to protect your personal assets) so even if you decide that you don't want to deal with the complications of an s-corp llc, you should still consider creating a sole proprietorship llc.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "if i have all this stock just sitting there, how can i lend it out to people for short selling?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "you just disclosed that you are new investor to the stock market. i'd advise that you first understand investing a bit better, as most will advise that investors need to be above a certain level before picking individual stocks. that said, most stocks trade in high enough volume and have low enough short interest that they don't fall under the category you seek. you want to first ask your broker if they have such a process, not all do. if so, they would need to provide you with the stocks that fall into this odd situation, specifically, the shares that have traders seeking to short the stock, but the stock is unavailable. even then, the broker may have requirements that you don't fall into, minimum history with broker, minimum size account, etc. worse, they are not likely to offer this for 100 shares, but may have a 1000 or higher share requirement. are you willing to buy some obscure $50/sh priced stock to lend out at 1%/mo? the guy trying to short it is far smarter than both you and i, at least regarding this particular stock. this strategy is more appropriate for the 7 figure net worth investor. if any reader has actual experience with this, i'm happy to hear it. this response is from my recollection of two articles i read about 3 years ago, coincidence they both were published within weeks of each other.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "insurance, healthcare provider, apparent abuse, lack of transparency", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i wouldn't classify your treatment as abuse. medical billing has become more complex not less complex. you need to learn to ask even more questions regarding expenses, you probably need to see these price quotes in writing. you did several things correctly. staying in-network generally is best because many plans have two deductible limits: in-network, and out-of-network. you need to make sure that the insurance company does credit you with having paid the new patient fee. that will qualify as an expense toward the deductible and your maximum out of pocket for the year. some doctors offices don't send to insurance companies items that they know will not be covered, not remembering that these costs are critical under the high deductible plans with a health savings account. doctors offices have problems determining how much the cost to you will be. it depends not just on the insurance company but also which type of plan you have, which sub-plan you have, and are you covered by more than one plan. not to mention individual deductibles, family deductibles, and annual out-of-pocket amount. all this is wanted prior to the doctor seeing the patient. most doctors offices will work with you, they know that each insurance plan treats each medical billing code differently, sometimes they make a mistake. talk to them.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "peer to peer lending small notes vs large notes", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i started with lending club about a year ago. i love it. it has been insightful. off topic, but i am in a loan to a guy who make 120k a year and is regularly late and has a pretty high interest rate. crazy. you gain some economies of scale by going with a bigger note. i have $100 notes that i get hit for 2 or 3 cents for a fee, where $25 notes are always a penny. however, i don't think that should be your deciding factor. i scale my note purchases based on how much i like the status of the borrower. for example, i did $100 (which is currently my max) for a guy with a reasonable loan amount 16k, a stable work history (15+ years), a great credit history, and a great interest rate (16.9%). if one of those things were a bit out of \"whack\". i might go $50, two $25. i prefer 36 month notes, really 5 years to get out of debt? it is unlikely to happen imho. keep in mind that if you invest $100 in a loan, then you get one $100 note. you can't break them up into 4 $25 notes. for that reason, if you are likely to want to sell the note prematurely, keep it at $25. the market is greater. i've had a lot of success using the trading account, buying further discounted notes for people who want out of lending club, or get spooked by a couple of late payments and a change in billing date. another advantage of using the trading account is you start earning interest day 1. i've had new notes take a couple of weeks to go through. to summarize: there are some other things, but that is the main stuff i look at.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "will the ex-homeowner still owe money after a foreclosure?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it is in the bank's interest to sell the property for as much as they can (although it is doubtful they will put as much effort/time into selling it as the owner might). they will certainly not sell it for $1. the main reason for this is that the bank would prefer to own $100k, than a loan to them from a customer for $100k. banks have to discount the value of loans to take into account the likelihood of the loan not being repaid. they classify certain loans as riskier than others, and these are discounted more heavily. an unsecured home loan to a customer that has already defaulted, has no collateral, and now needs to pay rent and loan repayments would count as an extremely risky loan.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what are the differences between gold/siver coin vs. round?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "littleadv gave a great answer, but neglected to mention one thing. modern minted coins usually only contain a (high) percentage of a precious metal. for example pre-1965 quarters are 90% silver and 10% other, to maintain strength and durability. rounds of silver bullion are usually .9999%, or fine, silver, which is considerably softer.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "difference between a mortgage and buy-to-let in uk", "role": "user" }, { "content": "another factor that makes buy to let more expensive is the risk involved. with a buy to let you are dependent on finding a tenant that will keep regular payments. if the property is left empty you need to finance the mortgage yourself putting you under financial strain and raising risk. also as chis mentioned they are regarded as a business enterprise, if the mortgage was to be taken by a business that would be very high risk for a bank as the business could dissolve leaving the bank out of pocket. because of this it can be very difficult to get a buy to let through a business unless you are moving from a personal portfolio. for a regular mortgage these risks don't exist so this is reflected in lower interest repayments. it's because of these differences in risk that banks created buy to let so they can better manage those risks.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "sanity check on choosing the term for a mortgage refinance", "role": "user" }, { "content": "one thing you didn't mention is whether the 401(k) offers a match. if it does, this is a slam-dunk. the $303 ($303, right?) is $3636/yr that will be doubled on deposit. it's typical for the first 5% of one's salary to capture the match, so this is right there. in 15 years, you'll still owe $76,519. but 15 * $7272 is $109,080 in your 401(k) even without taking any growth into account. the likely value of that 401(k) is closer to $210k, using 8% over that 15 years, (at 6%, it drops to 'only' $176k, but as i stated, the value of the match is so great that i'd jump right on that.) if you don't get a match of any kind, i need to edit / completely rip my answer. it morphs into whether you feel that 15 years (really 30) the market will exceed the 4% cost of that money. odds are, it will. the worst 15 year period this past century 2000-2014 still had a cagr of 4.2%.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is technical analysis based on some underlying factors in the market or do they work simply because other people use them?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "technical analysis assumes that the only relevant number(s) regarding a security is (are) price (and price momentum, price patterns, price harmonics, price trends, price aberrations, etc.). technical is all based on price. technical is not based on any of the fundamentals. technical analysis is for traders (speculators) not for long term investors. a long term investor is more concerned with the dividend payment history and such similar data as he makes his money from the dividend payments not from the changes in price (because he buys and holds, not buy low sell high).", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what ways are there for us to earn a little extra side money?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i don't know what you program during the day, but you could always try your hand a programming for iphone, android or blackberry. just spend an hour or two a night on a simple but useful application. find something that matches a hobby interest of yours and come up with an app that would be beneficial to people of that hobby.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "might i need a credit score to rent, or for any other non-borrowing finances?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "alas, institutions do not always act rationally, and being an outlier by never having debt may be bad enough. therein is your problem. the question, then, is do you want to do business with institutions that are not acting rationally? while i cannot specifically speak to canadian business practices, i have to imagine that in terms of credit history as a prerequisite to a lease, it can't be too different than america. it is possible to live without a credit score. this is typically done by those with enough resources that do not need to borrow money. to make transactions that commonly use credit scores, such as a lease, they will provide personal financial statements (balance sheets, personal income statements, bank statements, pay stubs, tax returns, etc...) to show that they are credit-worthy. references from prior landlords may also be beneficial. again, the caveat is to elect to only conduct business with those individuals and institutions that are intelligent and rational enough to be able to analyze your financial position (and ability to pay) without a credit score. therefore, you'll probably have better luck working with individual landlords, as opposed to corporate-owned rental complexes.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what's the difference between buying bonds and buying bond funds for the long-term?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "why would anyone buy a long-term bond fund in a market like this one, where interest rates are practically bottomed out? 1) you are making the assumption that interest rates has bottom out hence there is no further possibility of it going down further , i mean who expected lehman brother to go bankrupt 2) long term investors who are able to wait for the bad times of the bond market to end and in the mean time dont mind some dividend payment of 2-3%", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "where was the huge scandal in the wells fargo scandal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the wells fargo scandal was and still is a big deal because wells fargo opened over 1.5 million unauthorized bank and credit card accounts. the credit card accounts were opened without authorization, which means people's credit scores and reports were pulled without permission. that is considered fraud and identity theft. other than the legal side of it, by opening more bank accounts without authorization, it was showing \"synthetic growth\", which resulted in an inflated number when quarterly and annual performance numbers were reported. this caused people to invest more in wells fargo stock, not knowing that the growth in stock was not organic. after the scandal was uncovered, stocks decreased. however, the root cause of this can be traced to the culture at wells fargo, where customer service reps (i.e. bank tellers, and store operations employees) were faced with the challenges of meeting quotas that could be considered a stretch. as a result, faced with pressure from upper management, they opened unauthorized accounts. in addition, these unauthorized accounts cost consumers money either because credit cards had balances, or bank accounts did not meet a minimum balance. it is not about ending \"up with 8 rows in their database instead of just 1 row\" as op wrote. it is about stealing consumer money and committing fraud and stealing the consumer's identity. *suggestions and constructive criticism are welcomed in improving my answer.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "one company asks for picture of my debit card", "role": "user" }, { "content": "believe it or not, what they're asking you is not as unusual as you might think. our company sells a tremendous amount of expensive merchandise over the internet, and whenever there's something odd or suspicious about the transaction, we may ask the customer to provide a picture of the card simply to prove they have physical possession of it. this is more reassurance to us (to the extent that's possible) that the customer isn't using a stolen card number to order stuff. it doesn't help too much, but if the charge is disputed, at least we have something to show we made reasonable efforts to verify the ownership of the card. i think it's pretty thin, but that's what my employer does.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "$65000/year or $2500 every two weeks: if i claim 3 exemptions instead of zero, how much would my take home pay be?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it will usually take a week or two for changes to your withholding to take effect in payroll. however 0 deductions will withhold more per check than 3. so if at 0 deductions you are having to pay in april then i would suggest not changing your w2 to 3 deductions. instead in the section for extra with holding add $25 per week. this should leave you with a more manageable return in april.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what are the benefits to underwriters in a secondary offering?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "your impression about banks and bankers is very wrong. wall street banks can and often do lose in transactions. in fact, banks go bankrupt and/or require massive bailouts to survive because they sometimes lose a ton of money. the business of investment banking often involves bearing risk for customers, which, by definition, means they lose some of the time. generally the risks they take on individual transactions are not large enough to bring the whole bank down, but sometimes they are. banking is a job like any other, except that it has more risk than most. anyway, to your point, how do underwriters make money on shares that fall in value before the sale? on the commission. the issuing company will normally pay the investment bank a percentage of the funds raised in the offering, regardless of the price. of course, it's possible for the bank to still lose money if their contract stipulates a minimum price and they are not able to meet it. in that case, the bank may lose on that offering, contradicting your preconceived notion. by the way, one other question implicit in your post: why was the secondary offering considered bad news? if the ceo and other insiders have private information that indicates that the stock is overvalued, then doing a secondary offering at the inflated price will greatly enrich them. because this happens some times, investors are wary about secondary offerings. this makes companies that would otherwise do a secondary offering shy away from it, even if shares are not overpriced. therefore if a company is doing a secondary offering, the market is likely to worry that the stock is overvalued even at a reduced price.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "car finance, apr rates and per week in adverts; help understanding them", "role": "user" }, { "content": "easier to copy paste than type this out. credit: www.financeformulas.net note that the present value would be the initial loan amount, which is likely the sale price you noted minus a down payment. the loan payment formula is used to calculate the payments on a loan. the formula used to calculate loan payments is exactly the same as the formula used to calculate payments on an ordinary annuity. a loan, by definition, is an annuity, in that it consists of a series of future periodic payments. the pv, or present value, portion of the loan payment formula uses the original loan amount. the original loan amount is essentially the present value of the future payments on the loan, much like the present value of an annuity. it is important to keep the rate per period and number of periods consistent with one another in the formula. if the loan payments are made monthly, then the rate per period needs to be adjusted to the monthly rate and the number of periods would be the number of months on the loan. if payments are quarterly, the terms of the loan payment formula would be adjusted accordingly. i like to let loan calculators do the heavy lifting for me. this particular calculator lets you choose a weekly pay back scheme. http://www.calculator.net/loan-calculator.html", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "credit and debit", "role": "user" }, { "content": "in view of business, we have to book the entries. business view, owner and business are different. when capital is invested in business by owner, in future business has to repay it. that's why, capital always credit. when we come about bank (business prospective) - cash, bank, fd are like assets which can help in the business. bank is current asset (real account) - debit (what comes into the business) credit (what goes out of the business) hence credit and debit differs from what type of account is it.... credit - when business liables debit - what business has and receivables", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how can contractors recoup taxation-related expenses?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "anything is negotiable. clearly in the current draft of the contract the company isn't going to calculate or withhold taxes on your behalf - that is your responsibility. but if you want to calculate taxes yourself, and break out the fees you are receiving into several \"buckets\" on the invoice, the company might agree (they might have to run it past their legal department first). i don't see how that helps anything - it just divides the single fee into two pieces with the same overall total. as @mhoran_psprep points out, it appears that the company expects you to cover your expenses from within your charges. thus, it's up to you to decide the appropriate fees to charge, and you are assuming the risk that you have estimated your expenses incorrectly. if you want the company to pay you a fee, plus reimburse your expenses, you will need to craft that into the contract. it's not clear what kind of expenses you need to be covered, and sometimes companies will not agree to them. for specific tax rule questions applicable to your locale, you should consult your tax adviser.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what are dividends, when are they paid, and how do they affect my position?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "dividends are declared by the board of directors of a corporation on date a, to stock holders of record on date b (a later date). these stockholders then receive the declared dividend on date c, the so-called payment date. all of these dates are announced on the first (declaration) date. if there is no announcement, no dividend will be paid. the stock typically goes down in price by approximately the amount of the dividend on the date it \"goes ex,\" but then moves in price to reflect other developments, including the possibility of another declaration/payment, three months hence. dividends are important to some investors, especially those who live on the income. they are less important to investors who are out for capital gains (and who may prefer that the company reinvest its money to seek such gains instead of paying dividends). in actual fact, dividends are one component of \"total\" or overall return. the other component is capital gains, and the sum of the two represents your return.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how to invest in a currency increasing in value relative to another?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "on international stock exchanges, they trade puts and calls, typically also for currencies. if for example 1 nok is worth 1 $ now, and you buy calls for 10000 nok at 1.05 $ each, and in a year the nok is worth 1.20 $ (which is what you predict), you can execute the call, meaning 'buying' the 10000 nok for the contracted 1.05 $ and selling them for the market price of 1.20 $, netting you 12000 - 10500 = 1500 $. converting those back to nok would give you 1250 nok. considering that those calls might cost you maybe 300 nok, you made 950 nok. note that if your prediction is common knowledge, calls will be appropriately priced (=expensive), and there is little to make on them. and note also that if you were wrong, your calls are worth less than toilet paper, so you lost the complete 300 nok you paid for them. [all numbers are completely made up, for illustration purposes] you can make the whole thing easier if you define the raise of the nok against a specific currency, for example $ or eur. if you can, you can instead buy puts for that currency, and you save yourself converting the money twice.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "digital money pots?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i guess it depends on your bank. my bank (rabobank) recently did introduce this feature. you don't get a card per category, though. instead you set up rules to match each expenditure to one of the existing pots.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is it better to miss the dividend and buy the undervalued stock?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "as yet another explanation of why it does not really matter, you can look at this from the valuation point of view. stock price is the present value of its future cash flows (be it free cash flow of the firm or dividends, depending on the model). let's have a look at the dividends case. imagine, the price of the stock is based on only three dividends streams $5 dollars each: dividend to be paid today, in year 1, and in year 2. each should be discounted back to today (say, at 10%), except today's dividend, since today is now. once that dividend is paid, it is no longer in the stream of cash flows. so if we just delete that first $5 from the formula, the price will adjust itself down by the amount of the dividend to $8.68. note that this is a very simple example, since in reality cash flows streams are arguably infinite and because there are many other factors affecting stock price. but simply for your understanding, this example should provide you with the reason simply from the valuation perspective.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "basic info on construction loans", "role": "user" }, { "content": "construction loans are typically short term that then get rolled into conventional mortgages at the end of the construction period. since the actual construction loan is short term, you cannot combine it with a long-term land loan as well. you could do the two separate loans up front to buy the land and finance the construction, then at the end roll both into a conventional mortgage to close out the land and construction loans. this option will only work if you do all three through the same lender. trying to engage various lenders will require a whole new refinance process, which i very much doubt you would want to go through. these are sometimes called combo loans, since they aggregate several different loan products in one \"transaction.\" not a lot of places do land loans, so i would suggest first find a lender that will give you a land loan and set an appoint with a loan representative. explain what you are trying to do and see what they can offer you. you might have better luck with credit unions as well instead of traditional banks.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "death and capital gains taxes (united states)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "my understanding is that when you die, the stocks are sold and then the money is given to the beneficiary or the stock is repurchased in the beneficiaries name. this is wrong, and the conclusion you draw from michael's otherwise correct answer follows your false assumption. you seem to understand the estate tax federal threshold. jersey would have its own, and i have no idea how it works there. if the decedent happened to trade in the tax year prior to passing, normal tax rules apply. now, if the executor chooses to sell off and liquidate the estate to cash, there's no further taxable gain, a $5m portfolio can have millions in long term gain, but the step up basis pretty much negates all of it. if that's the case, the beneficiaries aren't likely to repurchase those shares, in fact, they might not even know what the list of stocks was, unless they sifted through the asset list. but, that sale was unnecessary, assets can be divvied up and distributed in-kind, each beneficiary getting their fraction of the number of shares of each stock. and then your share of the $5m has a stepped up basis, meaning if you sell that day, your gains are near zero. you might owe a few dollars for whatever the share move in the time passing between the step up date and date you sell. i hope that clarifies your misunderstanding. by the way, the irs is just an intermediary. it's congress that writes the laws, including the tangled web of tax code. the irs is the moral equivalent of a great customer service team working for a company we don't care for.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "giving kids annual tax free gift of $28,000", "role": "user" }, { "content": "from the irs' website: how many annual exclusions are available? the annual exclusion applies to gifts to each donee. in other words, if you give each of your children $11,000 in 2002-2005, $12,000 in 2006-2008, $13,000 in 2009-2012 and $14,000 on or after january 1, 2013, the annual exclusion applies to each gift. the annual exclusion for 2014, 2015, and 2016 is $14,000. what if my spouse and i want to give away property that we own together? you are each entitled to the annual exclusion amount on the gift. together, you can give $22,000 to each donee (2002-2005) or $24,000 (2006-2008), $26,000 (2009-2012) and $28,000 on or after january 1, 2013 (including 2014, 2015, and 2016). https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/frequently-asked-questions-on-gift-taxes basically, this means that it doesn't matter which person it specifically comes from as it's a \"joint\" gift. there is more complicated paperwork to fill out if the gift comes from a single check and needs to be \"split\" for taxes. each parent would need to fill out a separate gift tax return form, essentially proving that both parents approve of the gift. it seems like it's easier if each parent writes a separate check, however it's not a requirement.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "getting cash from credit card without fees", "role": "user" }, { "content": "nope. or at least, if it were possible the company offering such a credit card would quickly go out of business. credit card companies make money off of fees from the merchants the user is buying from and from the users themselves. if they charged no fees to the user on cash advances and, in fact, gave a 3% back on cash advances, then it would be possible for a user to: the company would lose money until they stopped the loophole or went out of business.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how is the price of vxx determined?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "generally, etfs work on the basis that there exists a pair of values that can be taken at any moment in time: a net asset value of each share in the fund and a trading market price of each share in the fund. it may help to picture these in baskets of about 50,000 shares for the creation/redemption process. if the nav is greater than the market price, then arbitrageurs will buy up shares at the market price and do an \"in-kind\" transaction that will be worth the nav value that the arbitrageurs could turn around and sell for an immediate profit. if the market price is greater than the nav, then the arbitrageurs will buy up the underlying securities that can be exchanged \"in-kind\" for shares in the fund that can then be sold on the market for an immediate profit. what is the etf creation/redemption mechanism? would be a source on this though i imagine there are others. now, in the case of vxx, there is something to be said for how much trading is being done and what impact this can have. from a july 8, 2013 yahoo finance article: at big option trade in the ipath s&p 500 vix short-term futures note is looking for another jump in volatility. more than 250,000 vxx options have already traded, twice its daily average over the last month. optionmonster systems show that a trader bought 13,298 august 26 calls for the ask price of $0.24 in volume that was 6 times the strike's previous open interest, clearly indicating new activity. now the total returns of the etf are a combination of changes in share price plus what happens with the distributions which could be held as cash or reinvested to purchase more shares.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "f1 student and ebay selling tax", "role": "user" }, { "content": "if you have income - it should appear on your tax return. if you are a non-resident, that would be 1040nr, with the ebay income appearing on line 21. since this is unrelated to your studies, this income will not be covered by the tax treaties for most countries, and you'll pay full taxes on it. keep in mind that the irs may decide that you're actually having a business, in which case you'll be required to attach schedule c to your tax return and maybe pay additional taxes (mainly self-employment). also, the uscis may decide that you're actually having a business, regardless of how the irs sees it, in which case you may have issues with your green card. for low income from occasional sales, you shouldn't have any issues. but if it is something systematic that you spend significant time on and earn significant amounts of money - you may get into trouble. what's \"systematic\" and how much is \"significant\" is up to a lawyer to tell you.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how to protect yourself from fraud when selling on ebay uk", "role": "user" }, { "content": "just ship using a reputable courier (definitely not yodel or hermes!) that requires and obtains a surname and signature which you can view on their website (citylink, parcel force to name a couple). then remember to submit the tracking details when you mark the item as shipped on ebay. if the buyer is still brazen enough to claim the item never arrived, paypal (in my experience) don't even entertain their claim. if however they claim the item arrived damaged/not as described, it could be trickier to defend. i'd recommend thoroughly documenting your item with photographs and recording the serial number, just in case you need to provide the details to paypal. again, in my experience, this has been enough to protect me from any fraudulent claims. to answer your second question, i don't believe ebay permits you to specify 'no paypal', but if they did then yes, bank transfer is 100% safe (short of someone using stolen money to pay for the item, in which case you'd be guilty of money laundering thanks to the uk's wonderful laws on such things...)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "long term investment for money", "role": "user" }, { "content": "what explains the most of the future returns of a portfolio is the allocation between asset classes. in the long term, stock investments are almost certain to return more than any other kinds of investments. for 40+ years, i would choose a portfolio of 100% stocks. how to construct the portfolio, then? diversification is the key. you should diversify in time (don't put a large sum of money into your stock portfolio immediately; if you have a large sum to invest, spread it around several years). you should diversify based on company size (invest in both large and small companies). you should also diversify internationally (don't invest in just us companies). if you prefer to pick individual stocks, 20 very carefully selected stocks may provide enough diversification if you keep diversification in mind during stock picking. however, careful stock picking cannot be expected to yield excess returns, and if you pick stocks manually, you need to rebalance your portfolio occasionally. thus, if you're lazy, i would recommend a mutual fund, or many mutual funds if you have difficulty finding a low-cost one that is internationally diversified. the most important consideration is the cost. you cannot expect careful fund selection to yield excess returns before expenses. however, the expenses are certain costs, so prefer low-cost funds. almost always this means picking index funds. avoid funds that have a small number of stocks, because they typically invest only in the largest companies, which means you fail to get diversification in company size. so, instead of euro stoxx 50, select stoxx 600 when investing to the european market. etfs may have lower costs than traditional mutual funds, so keep etfs in mind when selecting the mutual funds in which to invest. for international diversification, do not forget emerging markets. it is not excessive to invest e.g. 20% to emerging markets. emerging markets have a higher risk but they also have a higher return. a portfolio that does not include emerging markets is not in my opinion well diversified. when getting close to retirement age, i would consider increasing the percentage of bonds in the portfolio. this should be done primarily by putting additional money to bonds instead of selling existing investments to avoid additional taxes (not sure if this applies to other taxation systems than the finnish one). bond investments are best made though low-cost mutual funds as well. keep bond investments in your local currency and risk-free assets (i.e. select us government bonds). whatever you do, remember that historical return is no guarantee of future return. actually, the opposite may be true: there is a mean reversion law. if a particular investment has returned well in the past, it often means its price has gone up, making it more likely that the price goes down in the future. so don't select a fund based on its historical return; instead, select a fund based on low costs. however, i'm 99% certain that over a period of 40 years, stocks will return better than other investments. in addition to fund costs, taxes are the other certain thing that will be deducted from your returns. research what options you have to reduce the taxes you need to pay. 401-k was explained in another answer; this may be a good option. some things recommended in other answers that i would avoid:", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "feasibility of using long term pattern on short term investments", "role": "user" }, { "content": "there are patterns inside of patterns. you will see short term patterns (flags / pennants) inside of long term patterns (trend lines, channels) and typically you want to trade those short term patterns in line with the direction of the long term pattern. take a look at the attached chart of gpn. i would like to recommend two excellent books on chart patterns. richard w. schabacker book he wrote in the 1930's. it is the basis for modern technical pattern analysis. technical analysis and stock market profits peter brandt diary of a professional commodity trader. he takes you through analysis and trades.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what do these numbers mean? (futures)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the two answers given previously provide excellent information. in relation to your statement: if i buy the above future contract, does that mean i pay $1581.90 on june 13th you cannot buy the futures contract at that price. the 'price' you are seeing quoted is not a dollar value, but rather a value in points. each contract has a point value, and this varies from one contract to another according to the specifications set out by the exchange. the point value is in dollars, and it therefore acts as a multiplier for the 'price' that you've seen quoted. let's look at an example for the e-mini s&p futures. these trade electronically on the globex exchange, the ecn order book of the cme, and carry the ticker symbol es. the es contract has a point value of $50. if the quoted price for the es is 1581.75, then its dollar value is 50 x 1581.75 = $79,087.50 so in order to buy this contract outright, with absolutely no use of leverage, then one theoretically requires $79,087 in one's account. in practice though, futures are traded on margin and so only a deposit amount is required at the time of purchase, as cqm has explained.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "so the vending machine tore my $5 in pieces. what now?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "there is usually contact information for the owner of the machine printed somewhere on it. call that number. if it is in a business you could always try the clerk. whether you get your money back is up to that person, i suppose.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why do many british companies offer a scrip dividend option in lieu of cash?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "there are quite a few reasons that a company may choose to pay dividends rather than hold cash [increasing the share value]. of couse there are equally other set of reasons why a company may not want to give dividends and hold on to cash. related question here please explain the relationship between dividend amount, stock price, and option value?", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "expense ratio of an etf included in the price or calculated separately", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the expense ratio reduces the return of the etf; your scenario of paying 100.0015 is that of a load. most (all?) etfs can be bought without paying a load (sales charge as a percent of amount invested), and some etfs can be bought without paying a brokerage fee (fixed or variable charge for a buy transaction just like buying any other stock through the brokerage) because the brokerage has waived it. your broker might charge fees for both buying and selling shares in an etf, but in any case, this is quite separate from the expense ratio.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why can we cancel cheques, but not western union transfers?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "you are presuming that after the transfer, the cash is still \"sitting in a western union register\" but no, that cash may have already been taken by the fraudster. to refund the victim, western union would have to (1) pay the victim back the amount of money lost, and then (2) pursue the fraudster to reclaim the lost funds. because the fraudster at the other end can simply show id to get the money [ie: they do not have an account with western union], the cost to pursue that person to reclaim the lost funds would be substantially higher than for your bank, because your bank can simply ding your account. in the event that your account goes into overdraft [because there were insufficient funds to reclaim the full amount], the bank at least has a framework in place to pursue you for penalties.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why doesn't change in accounts receivable on balance sheet match cash flow statement?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "quick answer what @mike haskel wrote is generally correct that the indirect method for cash flow statement reporting, which most us companies use, can sometimes produce different results that don't clearly reconcile with balance sheet shifts. with regards to accounts receivables, this is especially so when there is a major increase or decrease in the company's allowances for doubtful accounts. in this case, there is more to the company's balance sheet and cash flow statements differences per its accounts receivables than its allowances for doubtful accounts seems responsible for. as explained below, the difference, $1.25bn, is likely owing more to currency shifts and how they are accounted for than to other factors. = = = = = = = = = = dirty details microsoft corp. generally sells to high-quality / high-credit buyers; mostly pc, server and other devices manufacturers and licensees. it hence made doubtful accounts provisions of $16mn for its $86,833mn (0.018%) of 2014 sales and wrote off $51mn of its carrying balance during the year. its accounting for \"other comprehensive income\" captures the primary differences of many accounts; specifically in this case, the \"foreign currency translation\" figure that comprises many balance sheet accounts and net out against shareholders' equity (i.e. those assets and liabilities bypass the income statement). the footnotes include this explanation: assets and liabilities recorded in foreign currencies are translated at the exchange rate on the balance sheet date. revenue and expenses are translated at average rates of exchange prevailing during the year. translation adjustments resulting from this process are recorded to other comprehensive income (“oci”) what all this means is that those two balance sheet figures are computed by translating all the accounts with foreign currency balances (in this case, accounts receivables) into the reporting currency, us dollars (usd), at the date of the balance sheets, june 30 of the years 2013 and 2014. the change in accounts receivables cash flow figure is computed by first determining the average exchange rates for all the currencies it uses to conduct business and applying them respectively to the changes in each non-usd accounts receivables during the periods. for this reason, almost all multinational companies that report using indirect cash flow statements will have discrepancies between the changes in their reported working capital changes during a period and the dates of their balance sheet and it's usually because of currency shifts during the period.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "evidence for/against real estate investing vis-a-vis investing in etfs", "role": "user" }, { "content": "real estate potentially has two components of profit, the increase in value, and the ongoing returns, similar to a stock appreciating and its dividends. it's possible to buy both badly, and in the case of stocks, there are studies that show the typical investor lags the market by many percent. real estate is not a homogeneous asset class. a $200k house renting for $1,000 is a far different investment than a $100k 3 family renting for $2,000 total rents. both exist depending on the part of the country you are in. if you simply divide the price to the rent you get either 16.7x or 4.2x. this is an oversimplification, and of course, interest rates will push these numbers in one direction or another. it's safe to say that at any given time, the ratio can help determine if home prices are too high, a bargain, or somewhere in between. as one article suggests, the median price tracks inflation pretty closely. and i'd add, that median home prices would track median income long term. to circle back, yes, real estate can be a good investment if you buy right, find good tenants, and are willing to put in the time. note: buying to rent and buying to live in are not always the same economic decision. the home buyer will very often buy a larger house than they should, and turn their own 'profit' into a loss. e.g. a buyer who would otherwise be advised to buy the $150k house instead of renting is talked into a bigger house by the real estate agent, the bank, the spouse. the extra cost of the $225k house is the 1/3 more cost of repair, utilities, interest, etc. it's identical to needing a 1000 sq ft apartment, but grabbing one that's 1500 sq ft for the view.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how feasible would it be to retire just maxing out a roth ira?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "assuming you max-out your roth ira with $5000 in inflation-adjusted contributions every year from 25-65, your balance at age 65 will depend on the post-inflation return you get in the account. assuming you withdraw 4% per year after that, here is what your income will be: (all numbers are in inflation-adjusted 2011 dollars.) if your post-inflation return is zero - if you buy treasury bonds, money-market accounts, or something like that - you'll have a simple $5000 * 40 = $200,000, which will give you an income of around $8000 per year. if you get a 3% post-inflation return - e.g. fairly safe muni bonds, corporate bonds, and boring stocks - you'll approximately double your money to around $393,000, giving you an income of over $15,000 per year. if you get a 6% return - e.g. more aggressive stocks and more risk-taking - you'll approximately double your money again to over $825,000. a 4% withdrawal rate will give you an income of around $33,000 per year. stocks have historically returned around inflation + 8% - that will get you over $1.4 million - and an annual income of over $56,000 per year. so, yes, it is feasible to retire on nothing but a maxed-out roth ira.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is the interest on money borrowed on margin in/for an rrsp considered tax deductible?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i believe your question is based on a false premise. first, no broker, that i know of, provides an rrsp account that is a margin account. rrsp accounts follow cash settlement rules. if you don't have the cash available, you can't buy a stock. you can't borrow money from your broker within your rrsp. if you want to borrow money to invest in your rrsp, you must borrow outside from another source, and make a contribution to your rrsp. and, if you do this, the loan interest is not considered tax deductible. in order for investment loan interest to be tax deductible, you'd need to invest outside of a registered type of account, e.g. using a regular non-tax-sheltered account. even then, what you can deduct may be limited. refer to cra - line 221 - carrying charges and interest expenses: you can claim the following carrying charges and interest [...] [...] you cannot deduct on line 221 any of the following amounts:", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "deductible expenses paid with credit card: in which tax year would they fall?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "being a professional auditor and accountant, deduction against expenses are claimed in the year in which expenses has been incurred. it has no relationship with when it is paid. for example, we may buy on credit does not mean that they will be allowed in the period in which it is paid. this is against the fundamental accounting principles.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what is the average cost of a portfolio on a trading site?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it sounds for the most part you are a 'buy and hold' type investor and continue to contribute monthly. i follow the same philosophy and continue to contribute monthly as well. i use questrade.com as my online broker. for trading it costs a penny per share with a minimum cost of $4.95 (so if you only buy 100 shares you will still pay $4.95) up to a maximum of $9.95 per trade (so if you buy 10,000 shares you only pay $9.95. three trades at $4.95 per month across the year would be $178.20. this is assuming you are trading less then 495 share each trade. so switching to questrade would save you an additional $111.80 per year! multiply over number of year before you retire plus compound interest which could accrue and that can quite a bit of extra savings. you pay nothing else to questrade either. no management fees, etc. you manage the accounts.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how do i enter canadian tax info from us form 1042-s and record captial gains from cashing in stock options?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i can't give you a specific answer because i'm not a tax accountant, so you should seek advice from a tax professional with experience relevant to your situation. this could be a complicated situation. that being said, one place you could start is the canada revenue agency's statement on investment income, which contains this paragraph: interest, foreign interest and dividend income, foreign income, foreign non-business income, and certain other income are all amounts you report on your return. they are usually shown on the following slips: t5, t3, t5013, t5013a to avoid double taxation, canada and the us almost certainly have a foreign tax treaty that ensures you are only taxed in your country of residence. i'm assuming you're a resident of canada. also, this page states that: if you received foreign interest or dividend income, you have to report it in canadian dollars. use the bank of canada exchange rate that was in effect on the day you received the income. if you received the income at different times during the year, use the average annual exchange rate. you should consult a tax professional. i'm not a tax professional, let alone one who specializes in the canadian tax system. a professional is the only one you should trust to answer your question with 100% accuracy.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "i'm thinking of getting a new car why shouldn't i lease one?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it's a very simple equation. if we forget about the stress and limitations that come with the so-called \"lease\", and make the following assumptions: then after 3 years of using this new car: i will never understand why people still \"lease\" a car. even for very low income people who have to have a car, financing a per-owned decent car would do, but it's just \"show off\" seduction and lure that either unknowing minded or idiot teenagers fall for.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "are large companies more profitable than small ones?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "small companies could have growth prospects. large companies may not have that many. so look at roe of companies by quatile to determine which companies have better growth.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "isn't an initial coin offering (ico) a surefire way to make tons of money?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "there is no sure thing in investing. everything has a risk component. sure, people talk about these cryptocurrencies like they have nowhere to go but up, but there are massive risks with these. for example, they could be declared illegal, the exchanges could go bankrupt (and some have), the backing companies off the icos could fail, the algorithms behind them could have a fatal flaw with unknown consequences, they can be stolen in unusual ways, everyone could suddenly realize that they have no real value...", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is it better to pay an insurance deductible, or get an upgrade?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i think you have a few choices that cannot be described by math alone: repair current phone: 149 replace current phone with new model from carrier: 100 + cost of new phone replace current phone with new model on payment plan from carrier: 100 + cost of new phone + finance charge (could be zero or cleverly hidden). you can also replace the current phone with either a used or new bought from a separate party. quite recently i was selling some gently used iphones 4s for around $140. so really you have to determine what is most important to you guys. is it important to have the newest model phone with laying out the least amount of cash now? then by all means go with the payment plan with your current carrier. is it most important to be financially efficient, while having a good working phone? then pay the deductible; or buy something gently used. in my opinion, having a phone payment is a losing game, akin to buying a new car every three years or so. you are buying something on time that quickly depreciates and hiding the true cost of the item in \"painless\" monthly payments.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how to resolve imbalances and orphan transactions in gnucash?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the gnucash manual has a page with examples of opening new accounts. the tl;dr is: use the equity:opening balance to offset your original amounts. the further explanation from the gnucash page is: as shown earlier with the assets:checking account, the starting balances in an account are typically assigned to a special account called equity:opening balance. to start filling in this chart of account, begin by setting the starting balances for the accounts. assume that there is $1000 in the savings account and $500 charged on the credit card. open the assets:savings account register. select view from the menu and check to make sure you are in basic ledger style. you will view your transactions in the other modes later, but for now let’s enter a basic transaction using the basic default style. from the assets:savings account register window, enter a basic 2 account transaction to set your starting balance to $1000, transferred from equity:opening balance. remember, basic transactions transfer money from a source account to a destination account. record the transaction (press the enter key, or click on the enter icon). from the assets:checking account register window, enter a basic 2 account transaction to set your starting balance to $1000, transferred from equity:opening balance. from the liabilities:visa account register window, enter a basic 2 account transaction to set your starting balance to $500, transferred from equity:opening balance. this is done by entering the $500 as a charge in the visa account (or decrease in the opening balance account), since it is money you borrowed. record the transaction (press the enter key, or click on the enter icon). you should now have 3 accounts with opening balances set. assets:checking, assets:savings, and liabilities:visa.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "does the cra reprieve those who have to commute for work?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the answer on the canadian government's website is pretty clear: most employees cannot claim employment expenses. you cannot deduct the cost of travel to and from work, or other expenses, such as most tools and clothing. however, that is most likely related to a personal vehicle. there is a deduction related to public transportation: you can claim cost of monthly public transit passes or passes of longer duration such as an annual pass for travel within canada on public transit for 2016. the second sleeping residence is hard to justify as the individual is choosing to work in this town and this individual is choosing to spent the night there - it is not currently a work requirement. as always, please consult a certified tax professional in your country for any final determinations on personal (and corporate) tax laws and filings.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how and where do companies publish financial reports?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "yes it is true. the us based companies have to meet the requirements placed on them by the us government. the agency with all these reports is the security and exchange commission. they run the edgar system to hold all those required reports the sec’s edgar database provides free public access to corporate information, allowing you to quickly research a company’s financial information and operations by reviewing registration statements, prospectuses and periodic reports filed on forms 10-k and 10-q. you also can find information about recent corporate events reported on form 8-k but that a company does not have to disclose to investors. edgar also provides access to comment and response letters relating to disclosure filings made after august 1, 2004, and reviewed by either the division of corporation finance or the division of investment management. on may 22, 2006, the staffs of the divisions of corporation finance and investment management began to use the edgar system to issue notifications of effectiveness for securities act registration statements and post-effective amendments, other than those that become effective automatically by law. these notifications will be posted to the edgar system the morning after a filing is determined to be effective. as pointed out by grade 'eh' bacon: other countries may require different types of information to be reported to the public, in particular, financial statements. to find the financial statements released for a particular company, you can go to the appropriate stock exchange, or often simply the company's corporate website.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "wash sale rule with dividend reinvestment", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i was not able to find any authority for the opinion you suggest. wash sale rules should, imho, apply. according to the regulations, you attribute the newly purchased shares to the oldest sold shares for the purposes of the calculation of the disallowed loss and cost basis. (c) where the amount of stock or securities acquired within the 61-day period is less than the amount of stock or securities sold or otherwise disposed of, then the particular shares of stock or securities the loss from the sale or other disposition of which is not deductible shall be those with which the stock or securities acquired are matched in accordance with the following rule: the stock or securities acquired will be matched in accordance with the order of their acquisition (beginning with the earliest acquisition) with an equal number of the shares of stock or securities sold or otherwise disposed of. you can resort to the claim that you have not, in fact, entered into the contract within 30 days, but when you gave the instructions to reinvest dividends. i don't know if such a claim will hold, but to me it sounds reasonable. this is similar to the rules re short sales (in (g) there). in this case, wash sale rules will not apply (unless you instructed to reinvest dividends within the 30 days prior to the sale). but i'd ask a tax professional if such a claim would hold, talk to a ea/cpa licensed in your state.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is it better to use drip or invest when stock drops before ex-date?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the benefit of a dividend reinvestment program is you, generally, don't pay transaction costs or commissions and you don't have to remember to do it. whether or not you may be able to eek out a little more by managing this yourself is a crapshoot and the equivalent of timing the market. if you're so good at timing the market you shouldn't even be holding the stock, you should be buying and selling as the price fluctuates.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "may i invest as a non accredited investor?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "without knowing the specifics it is hard to give you a specific answer, but most likely the answer is no. if they limit the participation in the site to accredited investors, this is probably not something they are doing willingly, but rather imposed by regulators. acredited investors have access to instruments that don't have the same level of regulatory protection & scrutiny as those offered to the general public, and are defined under regulation d. examples of such securities are 144a shares, or hedgefunds.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what does a contract's worth mean?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it means $400m expected revenue, likely spread out over multiple years as it gets implemented, and not entirely guaranteed to happen as they still need to fulfill the contract. the impact on the stock price is complex - it should be positive, but nowhere close to a $400m increase in market cap. if the company is expected to routinely win such contracts, it may have no significant effect on the stock price, as it's already priced in - say, if analysts expect the company to win 1.2b contracts in this fiscal year, and now they've done 1/3 of that, as expected.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "historical stock prices of delisted company [duplicate]", "role": "user" }, { "content": "for those on a budget, check if your local library has access to / or a copy of the \"standard & poor's daily stock price record\". access to that or a similar service may be available as part of your library patronage. if not available it may be available at your metropolitan central library. comprehensive stock pricing data which provides adjustments for splits, mergers, capital distributions and other relevant events is still a premium product. external link to new york public library blog post on subject: http://www.nypl.org/blog/2012/04/09/finding-historical-stock-prices", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "do stocks give you more control over your finances than mutual funds?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the issue with trading stocks vs. mutual funds (or etfs) is all about risk. you trade microsoft you now have a stock risk in your portfolio. it drops 5% you are down 5%. instead if you want to buy tech and you buy qqq if msft fell 5% the qqqs would not be as impacted to the downside. so if you want to trade a mutual fund, but you want to be able to put in stop sell orders trade etfs instead. considering mutual funds it is better to say invest vs. trade. since all fund families have different rules and once you sell (if you sell it early) you will pay a fee and will not be able to invest in that same fund for x number of days (30, 60...)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "i want to invest and save for my house downpayment at the same time", "role": "user" }, { "content": "yes you should invest; and yes you should save for the house down payment. these should be two separate pools of money and the goals and time frames for them are different. with a 3 year time frame for the down payment on the house, the risk you should accept should be essentially zero. that means it is less of an investment and more plain vanilla savings account, or maybe a higher interest account, or a cd. the worst thing to have happen would be to try and save for the house while the value of your investment keeps dropping. you have to decide how to allocate your income between retirement accounts and saving for the house, while still meeting all your other obligations. the exact balance depends on how much you need to save for retirement, and things such as rules for the company match.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "few questions related to balance sheet and income statement?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1.) there is no logic in this question, because when there is an increase in net income for the year it will be in the form of something, ie it can be cash and cash equivalent like cash in hand or cash at bank. so as your ques says if there is increase in net income of 20 then asset side also increase by 20(cash) which makes the equation asset = liability + share capital tally 2.) balance sheet is a statement of assets, liabilities, and capital of a business or other organization. expenditure or income related items wont come under balance sheet it comes under profit and loss account 3.) stockholders' equity can increase just as easy. when a firm issues bonus to the existing share holders from free reserve a/c or capital redemption reserve a/c or security premium this will increase the share holders equity and also decreases the reserve a/c", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "american taxes if living outside the us and get paid by us company on a us bank account", "role": "user" }, { "content": "technically, if you earn in us (being paid there, which means you have a work visa) and live in other country, you must pay taxes in both countries. international treaties try to decrease the double-taxation, and in this case, you may pay in your country the difference of what you have paid in us. ie. your country is 20% and usa is 15%, you will pay 5%, and vice-versa. this works only with certain areas. you must know the tax legislation of both countries, and i recommend you seek for advisory. this site have all the basic information you need: http://www.irs.gov/individuals/international-taxpayers/foreign-earned-income-exclusion good luck.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why does flagstar bank harass you about payments within grace period?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "they call you because that is their business rules. they want their money, so their system calls you starting on the 5th. now you have to decide what you should do to stop this. the most obvious is to move the payment date to before the 5th. yes that does put you at risk if the tenant is late. but since it is only one of the 4 properties you own, it shouldn't be that big of a risk.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why does a stock's price fluctuate so often, even when fresh news isn't available?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "news about a company is not the only thing that affects its stock's price. there is also supply and demand. that, of course, is influenced by news, but it is not the only actor. an insider, with a large position in their company's stock, may want to diversify his overall portfolio and thus need to sell a large amount of stock. that may be significant enough to increase supply and likely reduce the stock's price somewhat. that brings me to another influence on stock price: perception. executives, and other insiders with large positions in their company's stock, have to be careful about how and when they sell some of that stock as to not worry the markets. many investors watch insider selling to gauge the health of the company. which brings me to another important point. there are many things that may be considered news which is material to a certain company and its stock. it is not just quarterly filings, earnings reports and such. there is also news related to competitors, news about the economy or a certain sector, news about some weather event that affects a major supplier, news about a major earthquake that will impact the economy of a nation which can then have knock-on effects to other economies, etc... there are also a lot of investors with varying needs which will influence supply and demand. an institutional investor, needing to diversify, may reduce their position in a stock and thus increase supply enough that it impacts the stock's price. meanwhile, individual investors will make their transactions at varying times during the day. in the aggregate, that may have significant impacts on supply and demand. the overall point being that there are a lot of inputs and a lot of actors in a complicated system. even if you focus just on news, there are many things that fall into that category. news does not come out at regular intervals and it does not necessarily spread evenly. that alone could make for a highly variable environment.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "is it legal to receive/send gifts of non-trivial amounts to a friend?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "in almost all cases, gifts from employers are considered taxable compensation, based on the employer-employee nature of the relationship. furthermore, cash gifts are always considered to be intended as wages, regardless of how you receive the money. furthermore, regardless of whether you expect to receive anything in return (such as contractual consideration) or whether the amounts are large enough to be declared as taxable personal gifts, it is likely that the irs would consider these payments to be \"disguised wages\", as these payments would fail several tests that the irs uses to determine whether benefits provided by the employer are non-taxable, including: i'd recommend reviewing irs publication 535 here, as well as publication 15-b here for more on what constitutes taxable wages & benefits. it seems very unlikely to me that you could make a persuasive legal defense in which you claimed to be working full-time for $60.00 per year and just happened to be receiving large personal gifts of $130,000.00. in my opinion it seems much more likely that these payments would be found to be taxable wages for services rendered.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "main source of the shares/stocks data on the web", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the main source is a direct feed from the stock market itself. the faster the feed, the more expensive. 15-minute delay is essentially free... and for those of us who do long-term investment is more than adequate. if you want data sooner, sign up with a brokerage that provides that service as part of what you're paying them for... and remember that every bit you spend on services is that much more profit you have to make just to break even, so there's a real tradeoff.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "how is a condominium / apartment building fiscally identified?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "in such cases, it has a ein, like any business would. even absent the rent you suggest, the condo should have reserve funds, similar to an individual's emergency account, only more codified as to level and flows. these funds should be earning interest.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "does being on the board of a bankruptcy-declaring company affect my credit rating?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "the answer to your question is governed by the structure of the company and your ownership or lack thereof in the business. australian business can be structured the same way u.s. ones are, as a sole proprietorship, partnership, llc, or company. if you are only on the board and have no equity, you cannot be affected. you must have some amount of equity in the business to have any chance of being affected. if the business is a sole proprietorship, then the single individual running the business is personally responsible for all debt and the inability to pay obligations would result in personal bankruptcy which would in all likelihood affect your credit score (it would in the u.s.). if it is a partnership, then anyone holding stock in the company is likewise personally responsible for a portion of the debt, and can be subject to bankruptcy and credit score implications. if the business is structured as a limited liability company or a corporation, a stakeholder's personal finances are separate from the business's and their credit score cannot be affected.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why does warren buffett say his fund performance, relatively, is likely to be better in a bear market than in a bull market?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "warren buffet and berkshire hathaway took a 50% loss in each of the last two bear markets. his stock even lost 10% in 2015 when the s&p lost 8%. he doesn't have a track record to support the claim that his stock performs relatively better in a bear market, so perhaps it's best to take his letter with a grain of salt. edit: as one commenter points out, mr. buffett is comparing the book performance of his fund to the market performance of an index. that is an apples to oranges comparison. it's deceptive at best.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "should i hedge my ira portfolio with a life cycle / target date mutual fund?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i choose lifecycle funds because i am placing faith (perhaps foolishly) that a full time fund manager knows better what to pick than i. the same reason i go with mutual funds in general apply to to why i also have the lifecycle funds. presently my diversification strategy is really just index funds and lifecycle funds. the radio advice guy clark howard often promotes them. http://www.wacotrib.com/none/content/shared/money/stories/clark/0601/060425money.html (i count in the intimidated group)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what is meant by one being in a tax bracket?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "as applepie discusses, \"tax bracket\" without any modifiers refers to a single jurisdiction's marginal tax rate. in your case, this is either your california's \"tax bracket\" or your federal \"tax bracket\" (not including marginal social security and medicare taxes). but if someone says \"combined state and federal tax bracket\", they probably mean the combination of your state and federal income tax brackets (again, lot including sales taxes, business and occupational taxes, social security taxes, and medicare taxes). the math to combine the state and federal marginal tax rates is a bit tricky, because most people can deduct either their state and local income taxes, or their state and local general sales taxes when computing their income for federal income tax purposes. (the federal \"alternative minimum tax\" restricts this deduction for some people.) for a single person earning $ 100,000 of salaries and wages in california, whose state income taxes are close to their standard deduction, the calculations for the combined marginal income tax rate look something like this: as mentioned above, this understates the tax bite on marginal \"earned income\". to find the true marginal rate, we need to add in social security taxes, medicare taxes, sales taxes, and business & occupation taxes. the social security and medicare taxes are sometimes called \"self employment taxes\". this math omits unemployment insurance and workers' compensation insurance, because those taxes are typically capped well below $ 100,000 per year of income. this math also omits b & o taxes, because this question is california specific. if an employer wishes to increase an employee's pay by $ 1,076.50, the first $ 76.50 will go to the employer's share of social security and medicare taxes. the remaining $ 1,000.00 will be subject to the combined marginal income tax rate discussed above, plus will have $ 76.50 go to the employee's share of social security and medicare taxes. the employee might buy some extra things with some of their extra money, and pay sales tax on them. in 2016, a 9 % sales tax rate was common in california's largest cities. the irs estimated that (for a single person with no dependents making $ 100,000 per year who did not buy a boat, rv, motor vehicle, or major home construction), about 9 % of their marginal gross income was subject to sales tax.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "why does yahoo! finance report different prices for the same index?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "are you sure you're using the same date range? if you're using max, then you're not, as ^ftmc goes back to 12/1/1985 while ^gdaxi only goes back to 11/1/1990. if i enter a custom date range of 11/1/1990 through 10/24/2015, i get: and: which, other than the dates it chose to use as labels on the x-axes, look identical. (i tried to add the urls of the charts, but it looks like the yahoo! urls don't include the comparison symbol, which makes them useless for this answer. they're easy enough to construct though, just add the secondary symbol using the comparison button and set the date range using the calendar button.) on your ps, i don't know, as you can see by my charts it even chose different labels when the date ranges were identical (although at least it didn't scale different dates differently), so maybe it's trying to be \"smart\" and choose dates based on the total amount of data available for the primary symbol, which is different in the two cases.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "first time home buyer. how to negotiate price?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "do some homework to determine what is really a fair price for the house. zillow helps. county tax records help, including last sale price and mortgage, if any (yes, it's public). start at the low end of fair. don't rely on the realtor. he gets paid only if a sale occurs, and he's already coaxing you closer to a paycheck. he might be right with the numbers, though, so check for yourself. when you get within a thousand or two of acceptance, \"shut up\". i don't mean that in a rude way. a negotiating class i took taught me how effective silence can be, at the right time. the other side knows you're close and the highest you've offered. if they would be willing to find a way to come down to that, this is the time. the awkward silence is surprisingly effective.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what's the benefit of opening a certificate of deposit (cd) account?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "others have pointed out why one typically chooses a cd: to lock in an interest rate that's higher than most other savings accounts (at the expense of having quick access to your money). while most savings accounts have practically 0% return, there are high yield savings accounts out there with little to no strings that offer ~1% apy. i've personally not found cds to be compelling when viewed against those, especially for something like an emergency fund where i'd rather just know it's available without having to think about penalties and such. some people ladder cds so that they're always no more than a month or so away from having access to some of the money, but for the return i've decided i prefer to just avoid the hassle. for 2.25%, which i haven't really seen, i might consider it, but in any case, you're better served by paying more to your loans.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "which dividend bearing stock should be chosen by price?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "in the scenario you describe, the first thing i would look at would be liquidity. in other words, how easy is it to buy and sell shares. if the average daily volume of one share is low compared to the average daily volume of the other, then the more actively traded share would be the more attractive. low volume shares will have larger bid-offer spreads than high volume shares, so if you need to get out of position quickly you will be at risk of being forced to take a lowball offer. having said that, it is important to understand that high yielding shares have high yields for a reason. namely, the market does not think much of the company's prospects and that it is likely that a cut in the dividend is coming in the near future. in general, the nominal price of a share is not important. if two companies have equal prospect, then the percentage movement in their share price will be about the same, so the net profit or loss you realise will be about the same.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "strategic countermeasures to overcome crisis in russia", "role": "user" }, { "content": "you could do nothing for a while longer. foreign exchange simply means your services are cheaper and imports and more expensive, local transactions are otherwise unaffected. your main worry is whether the government's attempts to revert these issues will create inflation within russia. local clients will likely not care to pay you in euros, dollars, or pounds (as it will cost them significantly more, they'd have to acquire the currency to pay you with) but does it matter if they pay in roubles? the financial crisis in more an international thing, not a local one. now it is possible there will be inflation setting in but i doubt the powers that be will allow that to happen... if you are concerned about it, buying non-liquid assets are the thing to do - a house will still be worth \"1 house\" no matter what a 1-million rouble note will buy you in a year's time. similarly, you can invest in 'blue-chip' stocks that should be a good hedge against any further inflation (the rich don't tend to turn poor in difficult times!) in the meantime, get some international clients - as the rouble is so low, relatively speaking, your services are very competitive. the rest of the time, is to wait it out a little - nobody knows what will happen, but in my knowledge of history interest rates like this drop back to something much closer to normal quite quickly.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "live in florida & work remote for a new york company. do i owe ny state income tax?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "if you're not a ny (tax) resident, then as long as you're not physically present in new york - you do not owe ny taxes on compensation for your services. but that is if you're a 1099 contractor/employee. if you're a partner/shareholder in a partnership/llc/s-corp registered or conducting business in new york, and that company pays you money - you do owe ny taxes. see this page of the ny revenue agency for more details.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "what is the median retirement savings in the united states today?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "note that the quote distinguishes between \"all families\" and \"families with some savings\" - this just means there are so many families with less than 5k that they equal all those with savings above 5k. that might be because they are young and haven't started yet, or because it is just not a priority for them compared to food and rent. nothing about the quote suggests that anyone believes once you've saved 5k, you're done. in fact since they show savings vs age, you can immediately see many people still have decades to save more. they may have 5k or less now, but they're not retiring now. how do you survive if you get to 65 and have nothing saved? there is some government money (social security) and many people sell their houses or get a reverse mortgage. having equity in a house is not the same as having savings. and some older people live very frugally - they stop buying clothes, they stop redecorating their houses - while others live in flat out poverty. but you can't tell if that is their future from the fact they only had 5k saved when they were 32.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "shorting diluting stocks", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it depends on how big the dilution is. could be a good trade. do the math yourself, many times nobody else has as all the employees think they are going to get rich because \"options\" :)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "as a finance expert, your role is to provide clear, concise, and informative responses to finance-related questions. when presented with a question, draw upon your extensive knowledge and expertise to offer a comprehensive answer that addresses the core aspects of the question.", "role": "system" }, { "content": "tax consequences of changing state residency?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "it also depends on where you work. if you move your home and your job then the date you establish residency in the new state is the key date. all income before that date is considered income for state 1, and all income on or after that date is income for state 2. if there is a big difference in income you will want to clearly establish residency because it impacts your wallet. if they had the same rates moving wouldn't impact your wallet, but it would impact each state. so make sure when going from high tax state to low tax state that you register your vehicles, register to vote, get a new drivers license... it becomes more complex if you move your home but not your job. in that case where you work might be the deciding factor. same states have agreed that where you live is the deciding factor; in other cases it is not. for virginia, maryland, and dc you pay based on where you live if the two states involved are dc, md, va. but if you live in delaware and work in virginia virginia wants a cut of your income tax. so before you move you need to research reciprocity for the two states. from massachusetts information for nonresident and part-year resident income, exemptions, deductions and credits massachusetts gross income includes items of income derived from sources within massachusetts. this includes income: a few questions later: massachusetts residents and part-year residents are allowed a credit for taxes due to any other jurisdiction. the credit is available only on income reported and taxed on a massachusetts return. nonresidents may not claim the taxes paid to other jurisdiction credit on their massachusetts form 1-nr/py. the credit is allowed for income taxes paid to: the credit is not allowed for: taxes paid to the u.s. government or a foreign country other than canada; city or local tax; and interest and penalty paid to another jurisdiction. the computation is based on comparing the massachusetts income tax on income reported to the other jurisdiction to the actual tax paid to the other jurisdiction; the credit is limited to the smaller of these two numbers. the other jurisdiction credit is a line item on the tax form but you must calculate it on the worksheet in the instruction booklet and also enter the credit information on the schedule ojc. so if you move your house to new hampshire, but continue to work in massachusetts you will owe income tax to massachusetts for that income even after you move and establish residency in new hampshire.", "role": "assistant" } ]