TD Ameritrade's Expanded Commission-Free ETF Program The "expanded ETF" sheet (first link) says that TDAmeritrade is tripling its commission-free ETFs from 100 to 296.
According to its current website (day before switchover), they offer 152 equity ETFs, 9 sector ETFs, 95 bond ETFs, 112 international ETFs, and 11 commodity ETFs commission free. Maybe my arithmetic is wrong, but that seems to total 379 ETFs. It seems that TDA is reducing the number of commission free ETFs by 20%.
Not to mention that 30 Vanguard ETFs are being dropped: BIV, BLV, BND, BSV, EDV, MGK, VB, VBK, VBR, VCIT, VCSH, VEA, VEU, VGIT, VGLT, VGSH, VIG, VMBS, VNQ, VO, VOE, VOT, VSS, VT, VTI, VTV, VUG, VWO, VXF, VYM. (Some iShare ETFs are being dropped as well, but many are being kept).
The current (old) page says that there are 83 commission-free iShare ETFs. The "expanded ETF" sheet shows 44 (if I counted correctly). For example, AGG is dropped.
In spot-checking, I haven't been able to find a fund in the new list that isn't in the old list. (I'm working off a downloaded pdf file dated Oct. 16, 2017.) That's not to say there aren't any new ETFs, just that a not-so-random sampling has turned up none.
The Closing Bell: Wall St. Inches Up With Financials, Energy @Derf, Thanks for the report. In the interest of complete accuracy, mine was a bit in the
red too.
Lost .0
1% on the day. :)
2017 Capital Gains estimates
RNDLX I've owned this fund for a few years now. 4 years ago there was some discussion about it. Currently it seems quite. I own about 10% in my 401k. About a year or so from retirement. I have to say it has always bothered me that the expense ratio has been so high for the low return rate. Curious as to members opinions on this fund as well as alternatives. Thanks in advance.
The Closing Bell: Wall St. Inches Up With Financials, Energy My diversified mix of funds ended flat - as were many of my individual funds. Bloomberg’s talking heads were yacking in the morning about the big surge in commodities. If it existed, it didn’t show up in the related funds I own. If fact, gold had an off-day. A bit unusual to see the DJ climb 85 points and yet end the day flat. Guessing those market gains must have been narrowly confined.
FWIW - HSGFX continued to slide, falling .31% for the day to close at $6.36.
Reviewing Allocation Funds in a Retirement Portfolio @bee, a possible 3rd and 4th option for replenishing the
1-3 bucket is
1) any year where your growth bucket(s) have returned "x"% over inflation or 2) any time stock valuations (PE's) are "x" above predetermined averages (similar to the old_skeet method). Waiting for the
1-3 bucket to be low could make it so you pull money out of equities at the worst time.
Reviewing Allocation Funds in a Retirement Portfolio @PRESSmUp, Thanks for mentioning the need to differentiate taxable and tax sheltered funds.
As far as "coughing up" goes... my sense is it often will have at least two triggers.
1. The
1-3 year bucket balance is low and in need of replenishing or,
2. The other (buckets) have reached a predetermine goal (dollar or percentage gain).
As
@MikeM mentioned, none of this is done in a vacuum.
Income from pensions, social security, annuities and other income streams (part time work in retirement) paint a large part of the retirement mosaic while these other investments (buckets) fill in the rest.
Thanks all for your fund suggestions so far. Always nice to see what funds others incorporate into their portfolio.
TD Ameritrade's Expanded Commission-Free ETF Program
Reviewing Allocation Funds in a Retirement Portfolio Interesting
@bee. I think as I age I have similar risk reward confidence in my allocation funds and I've tried to build around that allocation core with a mix of equity and bond funds. And with those funds the trade off between risk-reward is always a major factor in what I own.
I have less funds then you but I think I have a similar comfort level when thinking about balanced-allocation funds. I have
13 funds in my self-managed portfolio, a combination of equity, bond and balanced funds. I don't think specific region or sector funds are needed, but that's just me. My largest % weighting to the portfolio is balanced funds, PRWCX for large cap and ICMBX for small. One is aggressive, one is very conservative. I know ICMBX is going to payoff only if held through the economic cycle, so you have to accept the under-performance during the bull. I'm happy with the combination. And I know it's not, but I think of DSENX as a 'pseudo' allocation fund. So just those 3 funds make up the bulk of the portfolio at about 40% of the total.
I plan to stop working full time in 20
18 at the ripe old age of 64. When I do I may do the bucket system approach. I would do something much simpler than your 5 buckets approach though. I'm also considering an immediate annuity to minimize what I need in the conservative bucket. This would allow me to be (slightly) more aggressive with the growth bucket. When I plug the fixed annuity option into my spreadsheet, it initially looks like a pretty attractive option.
I love to hear how you and others approach risk-reward and the income options when retired. Thanks for starting the discussion.
Reviewing Allocation Funds in a Retirement Portfolio Bee...several funds you listed are common to what I have as well. I don't have it broken down into the annualized categories that you've described, but I think the result may be similar.
I have a group which can go by many names...1-3 year funds, bucket 1, etc...the objective of the group to hold spending money for the next 3 to 4 years regardless of what the market does. A secondary objective is to contribute 2-3% account growth to offset possible cash drag. In an ideal world, these dollars are not touched because the second and third groups are supplying needed funds used for income. The initial group consists of:
Taxable Account: VWITX and VWAHX
IRA: PIFZX, SSTHX, ZEOIX, and SUBFX
The next group consists of a bunch of items which throw off income. This has changed in my recent retirement, as these now generate the dollars I use for annual spending, where before it was reinvested. It consists of:
Taxable: FKINX and then a half dozen dividend paying stocks
IRA: VWINX, PONDX, WATFX, PTIAX, SAMBX and then 4 individual REITs
Funds for growth....in both taxable and IRA, I have a slew of funds whose goal is to provide appropriate growth that I can periodically, when the funds hit a specific dollar threshold, take a slice off the top to send to my checking account. It holds a variety of usual suspects, all equity funds.
Falling outside these classifications, in both IRA and taxable, I do hold a few individual equities that are "flyers"...things which are generally inadvisable but could send me and siblings on a cruise to French Polynesia.
Bee....as I think the process is equally important as what you actually hold, how do you determine when the subsidiary groups cough up their contribution to the group (1-3 year, Bucket 1) used to hold your spending dollars?
State Street Is Slashing EFT Fees @Maurice: Boy, your on fire today with all of your insightful links. that calls for a special tribute !
Regards,
Ted
