Own no stocks? anyone else?

[Which Roger]

The only time I've ever owned an individual stock was when my employer offered company stock at a discount. I see no reason that someone saving for retirement needs to own individual stocks.

[COcheesehead]

Equities in ETF's and funds, yes. Individual stocks, no. Every once in a while I will take a flyer on something, the most recent being STZ, bought it when it got hit big, sold the bounce. Those transactions are rare for me though.

[kgtest]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wmc1000 Currently 80% individual stocks, 20 equity funds.

I am the exact opposite. 20% stocks, the rest ETFs. and i've outperformed the 3 major indices on average over the past six years.

Not sure there is a single silver bullet.

[SpartacusSchmartacus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by albireo13 Our entire retirement savings has been based on 401Ks and IRA funds, also counting on some pensions. We own no stocks themselves. Our funds tend towards 60/40 AA currently, equities/bonds. Have we been missing out on something? ... poor diversity? Any thoughts out there? My Dad was the opposite. He invested heavily in stocks, tending towards those offering dividends. Today his dividends supplies most of his monthly income. He owns no investment funds. My employer has stock purchase plan but, I never partook of it. I suppose the fund approach has to consider loss due to the fees. On the other hand I was never interested in worrying about trading, tracking the market, etc. Too busy with life I suppose.

You did/are doing the right thing. With little interest in stock picking you would be making uninformed "chances" rather than decisions.
The company stock purchase plan should be done but only if you get a serious discount. Then sell that stock and keep the difference, when allowed, usually annually.

[Cayman]

One individual stock makes up a larger % of our portfolio than it probably should, but we choose to let it ride. Most of our equity allocation is in index funds.

[copyright1997reloaded]

As a % of Total Net worth (not counting real estate):
Individual equities: 30%
Stock Mutual Funds: 37%
Fixed/cash: 30% (both individual such as iBonds, Tips, and mutual funds)
Other: 3%
The market rising is pushing my equity ratio higher, back up to 67%.

[GrayHare]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpartacusSchmartacus Then sell that stock and keep the difference, when allowed, usually annually.

ESPP stock provides a way to continue contributing to an IRA after FIRE. If you hold ESPP stock past FIRE, you can sell portions in later years, and in most cases the company will issue you a W-2, which means the sales are considered earned income. With earned income you can then contribute to an IRA.

[haha]

Quote:

Originally Posted by albireo13 Our entire retirement savings has been based on 401Ks and IRA funds, also counting on some pensions. We own no stocks themselves. Our funds tend towards 60/40 AA currently, equities/bonds. Have we been missing out on something? ... poor diversity? Any thoughts out there?

This is usually not what people mean when they say that they own no stocks. You may not own stocks, but your exposure is the same as someone who has a diversified portfolio of individual stocks.

Ha

[kgtest]

Quote:

Originally Posted by GrayHare ESPP stock provides a way to continue contributing to an IRA after FIRE. If you hold ESPP stock past FIRE, you can sell portions in later years, and in most cases the company will issue you a W-2, which means the sales are considered earned income. With earned income you can then contribute to an IRA.

Interesting. Learn something new everyday. I'll be sure to see if this is the case when I leave mediumCorp. I have a hard time calling it mega since its really just a regional operation.

[ocean view]

Quote:

Originally Posted by GrayHare ESPP stock provides a way to continue contributing to an IRA after FIRE. If you hold ESPP stock past FIRE, you can sell portions in later years, and in most cases the company will issue you a W-2, which means the sales are considered earned income. With earned income you can then contribute to an IRA.

I’m not sure this is correct. A disposition of ESPP shares will only be included in W2 income if the sale is a disqualified disposition, which means the holding period (IIRC is 2 years from date of grant AND 1 year from purchase) has NOT been met.

What you have described would happen only if you buy espp shares in final work year and then sell the same lot of shares in ER year 1 (or maybe ER year 2 depending on timing). You may get a w-2 with ordinary income for the purchase discount. But beyond the holding period, this is just regular cap gains.

[brokrken]

You guys got me thinking so I just checked.


Individual Equities - 38%
Equity Funds - 39%
Individual Bonds - 2%
Bond Funds 4%
Preferred Stocks - 2%
Cash - 8%
Other (Private Lending, business ventures, etc) - 6%


Looks like I'm missing 1%, but that's just rounding.

[GrayHare]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ocean view I’m not sure this is correct. A disposition of ESPP shares will only be included in W2 income if the sale is a disqualified disposition, which means the holding period (IIRC is 2 years from date of grant AND 1 year from purchase) has NOT been met. What you have described would happen only if you buy espp shares in final work year and then sell the same lot of shares in ER year 1 (or maybe ER year 2 depending on timing). You may get a w-2 with ordinary income for the purchase discount. But beyond the holding period, this is just regular cap gains.

The reporting probably depends on one's megacorp. If it appears on Box 1 of your W-2, you're good to fund an IRA:

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/41...nventional-ira

Ed Slott usually has these details well covered, but I could not find any mention at his site.

[UnrealizedPotential]

I do not own any individual stocks. In 1999 I owned CMGI and Dell. CMGI went bust and I sold Dell, that was in 2000. I lost 5K in CMGI. Lesson learned. Ever since then it has been ETF's or mutual funds for me.

[gwraigty]

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnrealizedPotential I do not own any individual stocks. In 1999 I owned CMGI and Dell. CMGI went bust and I sold Dell, that was in 2000. I lost 5K in CMGI. Lesson learned. Ever since then it has been ETF's or mutual funds for me.

CMGI. My million dollar mistake. I lost money also buying and selling that dog. A few years after I dumped it for good, my husband came home from work and said that some of the guys had been talking about CMGI. I said, "Oh no!" Yep, when I checked to see how much our 5K invested several years earlier would have been on that day, yep, it would have been worth over a million. No serious regrets though. I couldn't stomach the volatility of that one.

Even when I thought I was being more conservative...GE, C, lost money on those also. I'm a horrible stock picker, so I haven't bought individual stocks in a long time. I went ultra-conservative and started buying CDs about 18 years ago and slowly ventured into individual corporate and muni bonds. It suited my temperament more, I think. We mainly hold individual bonds and recently have ventured into bond mutual funds/ETFs, and preferred stock ETFs. We've generated enough income to replace my husband's paycheck, if needed. I'd like to venture a little more into stocks using funds/ETFs, but not today.

[RobbieB]

I own nothing but individual stocks and individual bonds. No funds of any kind.

[target2019]

Have about 5% in a brokerage, with individual stocks, and an ETF or two. Over time we're diversifying one larger company stock in the account. The portfolio return YTD is 21.91%.

Everywhere else we are holding boring mutual funds. AA is like 52-42-6 (equity-bond-cash).

[HI Bill]

I have a friend who lost a ton in the markets prior to 2008, and holds no equities in any form whatsoever. Real estate and cash only!!!

[Walt34]

No stocks here either. I showed my stock-picking acumen when I did not buy America OnLine because I thought the interface was so dumbed down that "no one would pay for that silly stuff". At the time I did have an Internet connection via a PC user group but the interface was UNIX.

Index funds only. I'm pretty sure that a monkey throwing darts at the WSJ would do better than having me pick stocks.

[38Chevy454]

Like many previous replies, I did have some company stock in my 401k along with mutual funds, but since retirement, I moved everything into IRA and invested in widely diversified mutual funds. No individual stocks owned by me directly.

[Tom52]

We have about 10% of net worth in about 20 different dividend paying stocks that were inherited. The only other stock we own is BRK B which was purchased about 4 years ago. It is doubtful we will add any additional individual stocks in the future, but we are looking forward to sometime in the future when we will take the dividends instead of reinvesting .