Sure wish my personal finances could be finagled the way the nation's are.

Yes, wouldn't THAT be lovely???!!!
@Mark is correct, too.
@rono has written about this many times lately. "This will not end well." The dollar will lose quite a bit of value. Inflation will sooner or later run rampant. And "Brother, can you spare a dime?" will become "Brother, can you spare a sawbuck?"
I notice that the EU has reached a landmark stimulus agreement. I'm currently reading Vaclav Havel's "To The Castle And Back." In it, he mentions how the EU bureaucracy is like a hairball, a quagmire of committees upon committees upon committees. So, they have a monetary union, but no fiscal union. And Havel was thinking that someone, somewhere, ought to be THE designated leader at the top of the heap. But it did not happen that way.
https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=what+is+a+sawbuck&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

Thank you all once again for joining. Very much enjoyed.
Here's link to briefing deck:
https://1drv.ms/b/s!AmF1g-5ef-jInOUzGhmW61HQ0kY9gw

Donna
As you say, your grandson will begin to learn the ropes pretty quickly (once he has skin in the game). So you're not trying to select a fund that he'll have to keep forever.
He's young and has time on his side, so he can be adventurous. QQQ or a technology oriented fund would be appropriate.
This strikes a chord with me -- this week my 15-year old grandson called wanting advice about stocks (he had inherited a little money from his other grandparents). We talked about possibilities, but he made his own decisions. Of course, as soon as something went up a dollar, he wanted to sell it! My strongest recc. was SMH (semiconductors ETF). Volatile ( he had to look up this word) but will probably beat the market in the long run. I've had FSELX, the Fidelity semiconductors (managed )Select Semiconductors fund in my IRA and in my wife's Roth IRA for years and it has been very strong (especially recently).
Are you providing his initial investment (which is perfect as long as he has actually worked and earned some money)? My grandaughter just graduated from college and started working; I told her I'd match what she wanted to put in a Roth IRA. It turned out that she'd made about $6000 working last year, so she could open a Roth for that much -- my 3K and her 3K. My real goal is to get her engaged in the investment process.
This will be fun; let us know what you grandson decides.
David

Generally, Fidelity funds have a $0 min. Likewise, Schwab offers 60 house funds (Schwab and Laudus) with no mins. In addition, Schwab offers nearly 3K outside funds at a $100 min, including 110 from T. Rowe Price. (All figures are for open, NTF funds)
Fidelity Screener
Schwab screener
If you like buying stocks or ETFs by the price instead of by the share, Fidelity lets you do this. Minimum purchase per security is $1. Other, smaller brokerages like Robinhood offer this as well, but with their payments for order flow, you'll likely get poorer execution. (There are additional concerns about these brokerages pushing trades because they make money based on the volume of trading.)
Two points: stick with name brand brokerages and funds, and focus on the investment and not on the minimums.
Of course this depends on your grandson, but for a first investment I might suggest a more traditional "growth and income" type of fund like a basic S&P 500 index fund (e.g. VOO or FXAIX) or an actively managed fund like PRBLX (through Schwab with a $100 min NTF).
On the one hand, a novice investor can get spooked by sizeable drops in value. On the other hand, as a long term investment, one leans toward equity. A hybrid fund like @P_F 's suggested VGSTX could also make sense if one wants to start off more conservatively.
An S&P 500 fund starts one off with a familiar name, adding (one hopes) a measure of comfort. Otherwise I'd suggest a total stock market index fund. The Parnassus fund is a fine long term actively managed vehicle, with a socially conscious bent as an added plus.

I might do the broader VONG instead of QQQ
RSP is another one, simply SP500 but equally weighted

Most (if not all) of the funds at T Rowe Price have a $1,000 minimum for an IRA (including Roths). Not the lowest expense ratio in town, but reasonable. You’d be setting him up with one of the most respected outfits out there.
First $1,000 POMIX - T. Rowe Price Total Market Index fund. That’s the one Jack Bogle always recommended as his top choice index. ER .30%
Next $1,000 PIEQX - T Rowe Price Developed Markets Ex-North America index fund. ER .45%
Thereafter - two-thirds of contributions to former and one-third to latter.
Sure, there’s a lot of great managed funds out there (of which I own some). But with a 50-year investment horizon, index is the way to go. Lower fees (not visible at first glance) and you avoid potential managerial changes and / or mistakes.
If you can find the $1,000 minimum somewhere else offering those indexes, than of course you can elect them. I’m pretty much T. Rowe so not aware of minimums at other houses. But I’d think the $1,000 minimum is going the way of the plasma TV. (rapidly disappearing). Also, T. Rowe is no-load. I think some of the ones with lower initial investments charge a front-end load, which you don’t want.

Hi @Donna,
Not a suggestion ... Just what I'm doing for my grandaughter. However, this concept might be of some help.
I have my 18 month old granddaughter in AMECX, CAIBX, ANCFX and SMCWX at American Funds, The min. for each fund is $250.00. I make quarterly gift contributions to her account splitting the money evenly. Her mutual fund distributions pay to AFAXX which is a money market fund to accumulate until they become invested into ABALX which is a balanced fund. In this way she will have an awarness of just how much interest, dividends and capital gain distributions play in the overall sucess of investing. I'm thinking over time ABALX will become larger that the first four starting funds by the time she becomes 21 (age of majority).
Even though this is invested conseratively it is up better than 8% over the past rolling year. At her age and with the many years she has ahead I feel a conserative steady as you go approach is the wise one over an agressive growth portfolio that will have, at times, some good volatility associated with it. This might lead one into trading over staying invested for the long term.
I became an investor as a teenager at age 12 (1960). I started investing with some money my great grandparents gifted to me. And, it was put into Franklin Income (FKINX). My father's broker told me that this fund will give you some exposure to income generation (put a little gingle in your pocket if you wish) and also give you exposure to both stocks and bonds as well. It will be a good fund for you to build a base from and help you to understand the facets of investing. My next fund that I ventured into was American Funds Income Fund of America (AMECX) during my early twenties as I was learning don't put all you eggs in one basket, by this time. Today, these two funds are my largest holdings within my portfolio now just short of fifty funds split among twelve investment sleeves. I went the conserative route in the beginning and branched out from there. Now stock market volatility is viewed, by me, as a buying opportunity. While some run and sell ... I am a buyer even at the age of 72. I bought during the past market swoon and now that stocks have recovered I have been selling into the now present market strength.
If you wish to view how the asset allocation, of my grandaughter's portfolio bubles, or any of the other suggestions that has been made, below is a link to Morningstar's Instant Xray analysis tool. It's a good tool to learn how to use.
https://www.morningstar.com/instant-x-ray
Just enter the ticker symbols and amount invested in each fund then press Xray and the Portfolio Xray analysis will appear. For my granddaughter, I felt it wise to mix some income generation funds on the income side with some value and growth stocks funds on the equity side. Sometimes, with the income generation that protfolios produce keeps folks invested. My late father had a saying ... "Income never goes out of style." Thus far, in my lifetime, he has been correct.
Your grandson can follow his portfolio through M*'s portfolio manager which is another tool I use.
My best wishes to you and your grandson in starting this endeavor. It is something that he can begin small and build upon through his lifetime. In the years to come he will remember ... this is something my grandmother got me started me on. And, give thanks that you did.
Old_Skeet
edited on 7/23/2020

It's not a fund per se, but Schwab has introduced "stock slices", where he could invest as little as $5 to purchase a partial share in companies such as Amazon, Google, Facebook, Netflix, McDonald's, Electronic Arts, Nike, Home Depot, Target and Apple. They advertise that you can buy a basket of all 10 for $50.

It opened Monday at 12, I bought in a lowball bid at $11. It's up big to 14.50 in today's aftermarket on news about its plans, plus DOD restarting funding of rare earths projects ... at first I thought it was a pump-and-dump thing by their execs, but it apparently wasn't. And there aren't many Robinhooders holding the stock, either ... yet. :)

Your speculative play has paid off -- FVAC is up to $12.40
Did you get in at the initial $10 price?
A relevant article: https://investorintel.com/sectors/technology-metals/technology-metals-intel/us-rare-earths-industry-comeback-begun-mp-materials-announces-nyse-listing-via-merger-fvac/
David

Before I start sounding like a Vanguard apologist, let me say that in my experience Vanguard's human service is inferior to that of other providers including Fidelity, Schwab, and T. Rowe Price (where I've been helped not only with fund investments but with administering an individual 401k plan).
That said, how does the Vanguard brokerage platform (VBS) compare with the T. Rowe Price brokerage platform? I haven't tried the latter for a few reasons: without being a customer I cannot find what third party funds TRP offers (NTF or otherwise); and its trading costs (which I can find) are quite high.
On the other hand, at Vanguard one can buy DODFX for $20 or less (vs. $35 at TRP), and one needs only $25K to invest in PIMIX (vs. $100K at Schwab). When it comes to some third party funds, the VBS platform does have its advantages.
I really did mean that Vanguard should push people onto their VBS platform. My sense is that their mutual fund platform support is now so weak that the risk of losing customers alienated by the platform's poor support is comparable to the risk of losing customers displeased by being moved to their VBS platform. Assuming that's correct, it makes no business sense to continue expending resources in providing inferior support for the fund platform.
My last fund platform experience is informative. It involved a cash IRA transfer from an outside account to Vanguard. I filled out a paper transfer form (required by Vanguard). I directed Vanguard to invest the cash in Prime MMF. Instead, Vanguard opened a new Federal MMF on the fund platform.
ISTM it might make this blatant error if it has become so focused on the VBS platform that it has forgotten how to process fund platform transactions. Only on the VBS platform must all cash go through the Federal MMF. It didn't make any difference that the instructions were in writing on its own form. It's time for Vanguard to give up the ghost.
That's my rational observation. Subjectively, I won't move (because the features are different) until kicked off their fund platform. IMHO Vanguard's best course of action is to do that, and leave me grumbling about the lost features. What bothered me about the note I posted is that they dismissed the lost features as "minor changes" without giving people advance notice of what these changes are.

Hello @bee,
I’ve been an infrequent poster but have been snooping on MFO for some time. In 2002, after the dotcom implosion, I crafted an Excel file to keep track of our (with DW) investment accumulations. I would track the bi-weekly changes, as well as the starting totals on January 1st of each year.
As we got closer to retirement, I calculated our current expenses and projected a retirement budget for comparison. The retirement budget had/has two versions = “Frugal Lite” and “Frugal Extreme.“ With those numbers, I then calculated the taxes to add to this total number. From this number I calculated the percentage passive income we needed to offset this total expense need. I calculated a 2.5%, 3.0%, and 4.0% yearly return. I use 2.5% as my S.W.A.N. figure.
I then projected the social security we would each receive and subtracted that amount from the total expense budget. The remaining balance was the amount our portfolio would need to generate each year. When 2.5% would cover this cost, I believed that I would/had come to a place I considered - “financial independence.”
All of this data is the “Rube Goldberg” that comes down to the final number. That is, the difference between what is needed for living expenses & aspirations, and how much our portfolio generates. My concern is that this number be on the “positive” side of the ledger even with withdrawals (RMDs, etc.). If it should dip to the negative, then we would need to shift our expenses from the “frugal lite” to the “frugal extreme“ budget.
I am in my 3rd year and my DW her 6th year of retirement. So far so good.
Best to all,
Brian

@WABAC, hope this thread helps your headache. Your retirement income needs will come from SS, maybe a pension, maybe part time work, maybe a portion of your personal retirement accounts (RMDs or other withdrawals).
If considering an annuity run some withdrawal scenarios with a fund like VWINX which may provide a similar withdrawal rate to an annuity and still allow you to have full control over it.

Not too worried about headaches at the moment. Aside from market performance, we are saving cash every month under the current conditions. This has been an interesting stress test.
Used to spend 135$ a month filling up the cars. Now, one car, or the other, gets filled up every third month,
The little numbers might be small for what some folks here may need. But they add up quick for our situation.
While I have "enjoyed" the accumulation stage. I'm not so sure I want to manage the RMD stage. We're still 7-8 years out from that. And I don't have to sort it out today.
But it's something to think about so long as we can entertain the idea of relying on our retirement accounts, without tapping into taxable accounts.
The recent changes in the way inherited retirement accounts are treated by the IRS has influenced my thinking.

This is a good, in-depth discussion on the mining that will be necessary to meet the needs of the renewables industry from the Manhattan Institute. manhattan-institute.org — mines-minerals.pdf
Some observations:
All energy-producing machinery must be fabricated from materials extracted from the earth. No energy system, in short, is actually “renewable,” since all machines require the continual mining and processing of millions of tons of primary materials and the disposal of hardware that inevitably wears out.
He says: Compared with hydrocarbon using devices, green machines entail, on average, a 10-fold increase in the quantities of materials extracted and processed to produce the same amount of energy. But I don’t see where he includes the extraction of fossil fuels for the conventional devices. Also, no mention of nuclear power is this report.
Expansion of today’s level of green energy—currently less than 4% of the country’s total consumption (versus 56% from oil and gas)—will create an unprecedented increase in global mining for needed minerals.
Among the material realities of green energy:
Building wind turbines and solar panels to generate electricity, as well as batteries to fuel electric vehicles, requires, on average, more than 10 times the quantity of materials, compared with building machines using hydro-carbons to deliver the same amount of energy to society.
Replacing hydrocarbons with green machines will vastly increase the mining of various critical minerals around the world. For example, a single electric car battery weighing 1,000 pounds requires extracting and processing some 500,000 pounds of materials. Averaged over a battery’s life, each mile of driving an electric car “consumes” five pounds of earth. Using an internal combustion engine consumes about 0.2 pounds of liquids per mile. (note, I think “consumes” is a misnomer here, the half a ton of materials are not actually consumed. Also, this 5 lbs to 0.2 lbs talk is not an apples to apples comparison)
By 2050, with current plans, the quantity of worn-out solar panels—much of it non- recyclable—will constitute double the tonnage of all today’s global plastic waste, along with over 3 million tons per year of unrecyclable plastics from worn-out wind turbine blades. By 2030, more than 10 million tons per year of batteries will become garbage. (While a million tons seems to be a large amount, we really don’t know that it is for a country of 350 million people.)
In sum
Even without subsidies, mandates, and policies that favor green energy, the future for both America and the rest of the world will see many more wind and solar farms and many more electric cars. That will happen precisely because those technologies have matured enough to play significant roles. And given the magnitude of pent-up global demand for energy and energy-using machines and services—especially after the world struggles out of recession — the world will need “all of the above” in energy supplies.
Note this report is a follow up to a report the author wrote in early 2019. Here’s a link without discussion https://manhattan-institute.org/green-energy-revolution-near-impossible

@MikeW,
Thank you for your question about how I follow the markets.
The barometer is not geared to follow the foreign markets as it follows the S&P 500 Index. However, the way I have my portfolio organized is by sleeves. I have three sleeves that are global in nature. Two are in the growth & income area of my portfolio and one in the growth area. All of the sleeves within the portfolio are set up in M* Portfolio Manager and are followed for performance as well as the funds contained in each sleeve. With this, I can tell what is moving and what is not by sleeve and by fund as well.
My three best performing sleeves ... One Month Leaders ... are my global growth sleeve +5.83%, domestic growth large mid cap sleeve +5.52% and my global growth & income sleeve +3.85%. The global hybrid sleeve is the laggard (of the global sleeves) at +1.82%; but, it is an income generating sleeve with a yield of 3.9%.
In comparison, my portfolio, as a whole (which includes my allocation to cash) has gained 2.14% over the past month and produces a yield of about 3.4%.
In addition, I have a compass that tracks a number of equity and bond etf's, domestic, global and foreign.
For my global compass the one month leaders are EEM +7.17% ... GSP +6.18% ... and, CWB +5.94%.
For my domestic compass the one month leaders are XLB +9.21% ... XLV +6.20% ... and, XLK +4.52%.
I'm thinking that any investor that wishes to actively engage the markets needs a way to follow the asset classes they wish to invest in. To do this I use my compass and my portfolio sleeve system as it provides data as to what is moving within my portfolio and what is not.
Generally, any equity ballast (or spiff position) that I might position into centers around the S&P 500 Index which the barometer follows.
Again, thank you for your question. I hope my answer has been helpful.
Old_Skeet

Chapter I -Too complex for me. Fortunately I purchased the DejaOffice App at Apple around the time I retired. It has proven highly reliable and very versatile for creating various files and keeping backups. Updating the most recent backup to all devices (weekly) works reliably. So I have basic records of just about everything related to investing since retiring 20+ years ago. Annual returns, additions from other sources, withdrawals by year, total withdrawals to date, total gains to date, Roth conversion dates and amounts, etc. etc. I also record every fund exchange, transfer or sale I make, but normally discard those files after 3 years. The thought of having to maintain all that garbage in some type of paper file (as might have been common 25 years ago) is daunting to say the least.
Chapter II - I don’t worry too much about any overarching plan. Looking at those detailed records gives me some degree of confidence I’m heading in the right direction. We’ve skated around the related issue in the past of whether it’s better to keep a 3-5 year cash reserve to smooth out those market shocks or to just pull what you need from the overall blend of assets. The former allows for a more aggressive investment approach of course (but with fewer dollars). Good arguments both ways. I’m in the minority here as I believe in not maintaining a separate cash reserve. However, am quite conservatively invested,
Chapter III - In terms of how much and when to withdraw? Depends on needs. Pull substantial amounts for a new car or home renovation maybe every 5 years. Lesser amounts for other years. If worried about market levitation I do a 6 month “advance” by transferring the next year’s anticipated needs into cash still within the tax-sheltered domain. I did that mid-way through 2019. Not planning on doing that this year. Politicians have gone spending crazy in an election year. A trillion here ... a trillion there ... Hell to pay some day. But I expect the markets to hold at least until November. As far as those drawdowns for major purchases go ... if the market’s sucking air and your investments are way down, postpone whatever you’d intended. Wait for a better time. I suspect that in that regard the human brain is better enabled to make the decision than would be MonteCarlo or any other computer simulation.
Chapter IV - Can’t quite get my head around the popular notion of “spending down” assets. My invested assets have increased (in nominal terms) during retirement. I expect them to continue to increase. (That’s after whatever withdrawals were taken.) There’s something to be said for having an increasing “net worth” at any age. In fact, it seems counterintuitive to me to be “investing” (presumably for growth) while at the same time planning how to divest oneself of said assets. Maybe it’s because I have a decent pension. Don’t know. But it’s a real brain stopper for me.

perhaps further of interest:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/stock-buybacks-and-a-shaky-economy/2020/07/19/5d31791a-c84c-11ea-8ffe-372be8d82298_story.html
https://www.nber.org/papers/w26958

This might be a very strange post.
I had a new electrician over my house the other day. A real sharp guy with 50+ years of experience & a streak of the philosophical. My house which was built in the 1970s is a landmine of aluminum & copper wiring. Typically I handle most of the wiring myself but for this I needed a professional. I was mentioning that it was sort of like detective work trying to figure out where the short was when while standing on the ladder looking at the wiring issue, he turned to me & said "you know this might sound really weird but I do my best problem solving when I'm sleeping". I didn't think it was weird at all.
Which brings me to this post.
I really respect & appreciate someone like Old_Skeet's barometer postings which lays out a very robust systematic way of investing using numbers.
However, that's not how I roll even though I have at times tried. I've most likely left good money behind in the process but fortunately also avoided any major blow-ups along the way. I have tried to put as much on auto-pilot regarding finances as I can & have tried to idiot-proof the process along the way (to guard against my own bad decisions).
The encounter with the electrician (who is now my go-to electrician for me when needed) crystallized how I do approach investing as with most of my life. My best problem solving & subsequent decisions come to me while either on a walkabout (hike of some sort) or sleeping. Not very scientific but has worked out extremely well for me throughout my life. I have been out on my own since I was 16 & have done okay. I also have done either yoga or tai chi throughout my life which I find helps immensely in clearing my mind. The more I consciously think about investing, the worse decisions I generally make. I tried rule-based investing for stocks for a short time, but wasn't very successful. Yikes, I sold Amazon at $400.
I do try to stay stay informed & am not data-phobic. Information gathering (from a multitude of sources including here at MFO) is important & helps the unconscious processing.
This process also is helped if one does not carry a lot of expectation. One has to be okay with the unknown.
Why 'Sleeping on It' Helps
So that's my strategy for investing.
Any thoughts or comments?

I remember Ed’s depth of knowledge as well as the “wickedly sarcastic sense of humor” Mark references. His last post ISTM was to the effect he didn’t want to participate in a board he characterized as “Links Central” or something fairly close to that. So often when people leave - or threaten to - they’re back again. In Ed’s case I can’t remember his ever posting again. A true loss.
I’m fairly certain that remark might be buried in the board’s extensive archives, as it was after we transitioned from FA to mfo.
@msf - Thanks or all the digging.
@bee - Thanks for the link to a 2001 Fund Alarm page. It appears that was before my time. Being a science buff, I surely would have remembered a handle like Neutron. How clever and unique!
For convenience, here’s that link again.
https://web.archive.org/web/20011205080443/http://64.45.57.12/wwwboard/wwwboard.html

The simple way of computing an average credit rating would be to score AA's as 1, BB's as 2, etc. (with fractional adjustments for AAA, A, etc.). That's what many sources do.
M* instead weights each grade by the risk it represents. BBB bonds have around 4-5x the default risk of AAA bonds, CCC bonds have around 50-100x the default rate of AAA bonds. So it's pretty clear that a simple average won't do if what you're interested in is a sense of average default risk.

Source:https://www.livewiremarkets.com/wires/quantifying-the-risk-of-bonds-with-s-p-credit-ratings
Add to this the fact that M* counts non-rated (NR) bonds as BB or B, and one begins to see how PTIAX could have a weighted credit risk "score" of BB.
Ted posted a thread last November entitled Are Bond Funds Misreporting Their Portfolio Holdings?
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/54229/are-bond-funds-misreporting-their-portfolio-holdings
This linked to a story about an NBER white paper, Don't Take Their Word For It: The Misclassification of Bond Mutual Funds. The thesis was that funds themselves are overstating the quality of their holdings. That would tend to make even M*'s fund credit ratings too optimistic.
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3474557 (Actual research paper)
This paper generated some back and forth between the authors and M*. I don't know if the M* page below represents the tail end of that exchange, but it should help anyone who's interested get started in sorting through the issues.
https://www.morningstar.com/learn/bond-ratings-integrity
One of the papers M* links to gives this hypothetical fund scoring:

Credit Quality	Weighting %	Default Score	 Average Score
AAA		15.00		  0.00			0.00
AA		24.00		  0.56			0.13
A		18.00		  2.22			0.40
BBB		34.00		  5.00			1.70
BB		 9.00		 17.78			1.60
B		 0.00		 49.44			0.00
Below B		 0.00		100.00			0.00
Not Rated	 0.00		 49.44			0.00
Average Score						3.83

Since M* considers all funds with weighted average scores between 3.47223 and 9.02778 to be of BBB quality, this hypothetical fund would get a BBB rating from M*.