Recently I learnt stock trading and invested some amount in buying and selling shares. I want to know and understand the mutual funds as investment..can we invest by ourselves or do we need a broker for this? How do we know which MFs have got good growing potential? can anyone give some pointers on this. Thank you
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? Do you want this for a retirement account or for a regular account?
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? Tina Please explain both type of accounts. But for now I am looking at any temporary funds for short term goals or benefits like next 2 or 3 yrs...
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? SriVidya, you can buy from fund companies, or you can use a discount broker. For your 401K account, the administrator/broker should offer an array of funds you can choose. If you want to buy just for short term investment you can buy directly from fund companies like Vanguard, Fidelity etc or go through a discount broker such as Ameritrade, Charles Schwab or Scottrade (just a few examples)
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? I have a scottrade account. So am I supposed to contact the broker firm and ask for suggestion? or how do i find which fund is good for short term investments?
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? If you set up an IRA you will lower your taxable income but you tie up the money until retirement age when you can draw it out. There are two types of IRAs: regular and Roth. With the regular one you pay the taxes as you draw out the money at the end. You will need to keep track of your basis. With the Roth you invest with money that has already paid taxes and the subsequent increase in value is not taxed when you withdraw. If you will never have use of a retirement account here then forget this but punch the numbers and perhaps it will save you enough money that it is advantageous. Also consider whether you want your money in dollars as the exchange rate may be not advantageous in the future. Withdrawing from these accounts have hefty penalties so be sure before doing. For a regular account, you can go through a broker or you can use an online service and do yourself. For the online ones, you have to keep track of your basis for income taxes. The brokers with the big companies will keep track for you. You will have to report all income yearly on income tax (or losses). (IRAs you don't report until you retire and take out the money.) I have been following the financial pundits and I am still scared to get back in the market. No one knows whether we are out of the woods or in a lull before another round of trouble. I suggest you watch the Nightly Business Report on PBS, Charlie Rose on PBS, Suze Orman and some of the reports on CSNBC. I would also if I were you investigate Indian stocks as the Indian outlook in the next few years is far better than USA and the Bombay Sensex is still depressed.
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? Tina I am not interested in IRAs as the money gets locked down and there are penalties for early withdrawals..so I was looking at any MFs with short term profit possibility. Yupp i am watching CNBC fast money or quick money mostly i manage to watch that for trading stocks...but i want to understand this MF concept also as to how it works and where do I find which one is good
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? You can use some of the online mutual fund screeners available - MorningStar, Yahoo Finance, etc and there are several others (just google for mutual fund screen). These are a bunch of dropdown boxes where you specify values for the criteria and it will choose funds that meet your criteria. Note that "good funds" is a very relative term - it really depends on a variety of factors such as what sector of the market you want to invest it, what is your investment horizon etc. Also remember the golden rule - past performance is not a predictor of future performance Also many financial publications/sites publish a "Best Mutual Funds of the year (2009)" rating/report - Google for this and read up - make sure the sources are good, reputable agencies. (I just remember kiplinger on top of my mind but there should be several others.
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? Thank you Dear let me do that ...i was looking for Vanguard funds..they are the most talked about ones i guess
Re: How to invest in Mutual Funds in US? Hi Srividhya, This is a serious topic and I suggest that you do some reading before you think about picking good funds to invest in. I suggest the following books. The Little Book of Common Sense Investing: The Only Way to Guarantee Your Fair Share of Stock Market Returns (Little Books. Big Profits) by John C. Bogle The Bogleheads' Guide to Investing by Taylor Larimore, Mel Lindauer, Michael LeBoeuf, and John C. Bogle (Paperback - Sep 28, 2007) The Only Guide to a Winning Investment Strategy You'll Ever Need: The Way Smart Money Invests Today by Larry E. Swedroe By the way, Picking stocks that did well recently is a bad way to invest as the recent good performance leads to poor performance in the near future. If you are looking for something to read on the net for free, you can look at Active Investors - Index Funds Advisors, Inc. and you may also download their book at http://www.ifa.com/pdf/IFA_ShortBookonInvesting.pdf Also vanguard.com is a low cost provider of index funds and something I very highly regard. Rahul
