NameRedacted
Recycles dryer sheets
- Joined
- Oct 23, 2016
- Messages
- 236
Any help on this would be much appreciated.
Every year for the last 6-7 years I've done my gf's brother's taxes. They are usually straightforward but this year he sold part of a mutual fund that he owns. He sold $1000 worth of shares or 61.996 to be exact.
He gave me the paper work over a month ago but there was no indication of the cost basis. I told him to contact his FA and get details of how much he paid for the stock. After much back and forth he finally got that. Here is the problem. He has apparently been investing $25 each month since 1985. I now have a print out showing the number of shares purchased each month plus the dividends and capital gains which were re-invested and on which dates. I know he's been paying taxes on the gains and dividends.
I've never owned mutual funds. I've always owned individual stocks and never re-invested dividends.
Since the paperwork doesn't indicate which 61.996 shares were sold I'm assuming that I can choose any arbitrary set of shares that are most favorable tax-wise as long as I keep track of which ones for future years? I can choose the ones he paid the most for to give him a small tax loss.
I'm thinking I don't need to worry about the capital gains and dividends since they've already been taxed. They won't increase/decrease the cost basis of the original shares? He didn't sell all his shares just a small portion.
On a different topic, looking at the print out - I'm surprised that there was no real growth in the share price over the last 30 years. So, for example, I see in 1986 he purchased some at 17.77 but the recent sale was at 16.13. Is this expected for mutual funds? No growth in 30 years? I think this is a fairly well known fund. It's Templeton World Fund.
Every year for the last 6-7 years I've done my gf's brother's taxes. They are usually straightforward but this year he sold part of a mutual fund that he owns. He sold $1000 worth of shares or 61.996 to be exact.
He gave me the paper work over a month ago but there was no indication of the cost basis. I told him to contact his FA and get details of how much he paid for the stock. After much back and forth he finally got that. Here is the problem. He has apparently been investing $25 each month since 1985. I now have a print out showing the number of shares purchased each month plus the dividends and capital gains which were re-invested and on which dates. I know he's been paying taxes on the gains and dividends.
I've never owned mutual funds. I've always owned individual stocks and never re-invested dividends.
Since the paperwork doesn't indicate which 61.996 shares were sold I'm assuming that I can choose any arbitrary set of shares that are most favorable tax-wise as long as I keep track of which ones for future years? I can choose the ones he paid the most for to give him a small tax loss.
I'm thinking I don't need to worry about the capital gains and dividends since they've already been taxed. They won't increase/decrease the cost basis of the original shares? He didn't sell all his shares just a small portion.
On a different topic, looking at the print out - I'm surprised that there was no real growth in the share price over the last 30 years. So, for example, I see in 1986 he purchased some at 17.77 but the recent sale was at 16.13. Is this expected for mutual funds? No growth in 30 years? I think this is a fairly well known fund. It's Templeton World Fund.