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Whether in a rising or falling economy, you may needlessly quash the idea of building or upgrading walls due to financial strain. A tight budget might otherwise keep you from having a simple partition for privacy, a structurally important retaining wall or better-insulated framework. But don't let money troubles wall you in -- arm yourself with knowledge of a few low-cost or no-cost options and funding alternatives.
Callable CDs and non-callable CDs are different in a few interesting ways. Learn about a callable CD versus non-callable CDs with help from a professional public speaker and radio personality in this free video clip.
GAP-basis and income tax basis investment funds are each associated with their own particular disclosure practices. Learn about the disclosure differences between GAP basis and income tax basis investment funds with help from a registered investment adviser in this free video clip.
Low Cost Alternatives to Cable. Part of the series Enhanced Entertainment.
Net expense ratio and revenue sharing are two terms that every business owner should know. Find out about net expense ratio and revenue sharing with help from a business and finance professional in this free video clip.
The government typically provides a very specific type of insurance for money market funds. Get an explanation of government insurance for money market funds with help from a financial planner in this free video clip.
An exchange-traded fund is a package of investments, including stocks, bonds and commodities, traded on various stock markets around the globe. A mutual fund operates in a similar manner, though the fund usually has professional oversight and is available to only select investors. Both funds are free to charge cost expense ratios to investors to compensate brokerage firms for the cost of managing these portfolios. Low cost expense ratios can lead to higher investor profits.
You can create or add constraints and indexes to modify the data saved in Oracle tables. The syntax used to make constraints and indexes is similar, but the reasons for using either feature differ greatly. Indexes help determine how and where data is saved, while constraints merely restrict the data that you can enter into a table.
A career in tax law versus one at a hedge fund will be different in a number of ways. Learn about tax law versus a hedge fund career with help from an attorney in this free video clip.
Bond expense ratio is something that investors and personal financial advisers will need to be very aware of. Find out about a bond expense ratio with help from a certified financial planner in this free video clip.
"On-the-run" and "off-the-run" treasuries are two different things and should be treated as such when it comes to investing. Learn about "on-the-run" treasuries versus "off-the-run" with help from a certified financial planner in this free video clip.
Mutual funds update prospectus on a regular basis. Learn how often mutual funds update prospectus with help from a certified financial planner in this free video clip.
A secured funding and offset bond is a very specific type of bond. Learn about a secured funding and offset bond with help from a certified financial planner in this free video clip.
You may have gotten a letter returned to you from the Post Office marked "Return to Sender." Perhaps you misspelled the address. Maybe the person or business moved. The same thing can happen with electronic mail. Like the Post Office, email applications like Microsoft Exchange usually send or receive mail without a hitch. These programs rely upon proprietary techniques or standards-based utilities like Mailer Daemon to determine whether or not an email address is valid and deliverable.
The complex relationship between shareholders and managers in the companies they own can result in some conflicts of interest that result in the need for shareholders to take direct action in the company. Managers of mutual funds who purchase these companies on behalf of shareholders are considered agents of the shareholders. Their actions can result in direct intervention by shareholders, but this is not usually intended.
Investors determine their cost basis for stocks and securities at the end of the fiscal year when filing their income tax returns. Money earned from investments is not reported as traditional income, and the IRS typically taxes investment returns at a different tax rate. If you do not specify that your investment uses a short-term cost basis, you might calculate your tax liability incorrectly.
You can advertise expense ratio in a number of different ways depending on your preferences. Find out how to advertise expense ratio with help from an accomplished consultant, financier, and marketing expert in this free video clip.
Trading in stock and commodity derivatives is a highly volatile end of the investment business. Skillful navigation of this area can net substantial gains for investors but can also cause substantial losses. This is why mitigating risk is a key component in any derivative investment strategy. The risk or profit potential for each investor depends on the type of derivatives used and the volatility of stocks or assets tied to those derivatives.
Plywood panels bear two letters, ranging from A to D, that indicate the quality of the front and back sides. The closer the grade of a plywood panel is to the letter “A” the better the appearance and the fewer knots and imperfections. The American Plywood Association (APA) sets the grading standards for all types of plywood, including CD and CDX.
The most fundamental and basic tool in construction is the nail. Nails come in a variety of sizes, shapes and colors. These useful pieces of metal are available at most hardware and home improvement stores. Frequently-used nails include common and box nails. When you're looking for nails for a project or craft, compare these two to see which one is the best fit.
Mutual funds pool investors' money to buy stocks, bonds and other securities. The funds incur various costs, such as management compensation and trading commissions. Mutual fund investors bear these costs in the form of management fees, marketing fees, redemption fees and other charges. The United States Securities and Exchange Commission requires the disclosure of these fees in a mutual fund's prospectus, which describe the fund's investment objectives, historical performance and main risk factors.
Cost-to-benefit ratios can be used to determine whether a project is worth doing. These ratios are derived from a process regularly used in business and other industries known as a cost benefit analysis. This measures feasibility of projects based on whether the costs outweigh the benefits of the project.
The investment-management industry deals with many complex financial instruments and trading strategies involving institutional investors. Hedge fund trading and proprietary trading are two common types of investment methods used in the industry. Hedge fund managers invest in many types of financial securities to earn a return on the investments. The clients of hedge funds include high-net worth individuals and financial institutions. Proprietary trading only involves banks directly trading market securities to earn a return for their own benefit. Both types of investing methods possess advantages and disadvantages for investors and the financial institutions involved.
While most individual retirement accounts invest in mutual funds, exchange-traded funds can also be put into IRAs by IRA account holders. An ETF is an investment fund holding stocks or bonds and traded on a stock exchange. Money contributed to IRAs can be invested in a variety of investments. Among all investment choices, mutual funds remain a common investment vehicle as mutual fund companies continue to attract the steady source of funds from various retirement plans including IRAs and 401ks. However, other investment options such as ETFs have their own benefits compared with traditional mutual funds.
Mutual holding companies are an odd occurrence in the business world, meaning that they are not as common as organizations such as corporations; however, they do hold a number of distinct advantages for owners and employees. Simply defined, a mutual holding company is an insurance company owned by the policyholders rather than stockholders. This allows the insurance company to keep its costs low and ensure that any surpluses end up only in the hands of those who own the policies.
If you make money from an investment, you have to pay capital gains tax. However, understanding how to calculate your capital gains tax can be confusing, so confusing that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) estimates the government loses about $345 billion annually due to errors in capital gains tax reporting. Understanding how a return of principal reduces your cost basis can help you avoid errors when you report your capital gains.
An expense ratio is an expense expressed as a percentage of a company’s net sales, which equals sales minus the money a company loses for sales returns and discounts. An income statement that shows a company’s expense ratios for each of its expenses and total expenses is called a common-size income statement, the analysis of which is known as vertical analysis. Expense ratios help you gauge the relative size of each expense and analyze trends over different accounting periods. You can interpret a company’s common-size income statement to determine how well it manages its expenses.
Horn enclosures are part of a three-way sound system. Speakers deliver the mid-range. Woofers deliver the bass. Horns deliver the treble. They can all be in the same box, or they each might have separate boxes. The more expensive the system, the more likely that they will have individual boxes for each component. You can add back-loaded horn enclosures to any system if it has external speaker outputs. It's no different than adding another speaker. Just build a plywood box and install the horn from the back. Horns are narrow. Make your enclosure 12-by-18-by-18-inches.
A corporation that makes the election under Subchapter S of the Internal Revenue Code is an S corporation. One of the main advantages of forming an S corporation is that the company does not pay corporate tax. Instead, an S corporation shareholder reports his share of the business' profits or losses on his personal income taxes based on his percentage ownership stake. A shareholder's basis is the cost he incurred to acquire a stake in the S corporation. This determines how much of the company's profit or loss he reports on his income tax return.
Saving for retirement to enjoy a high standard of living at the end of life is a personal financial goal that many workers share. Contributing money toward tax-advantaged retirement accounts like 401k plans offered by employers is a common wealth creation strategy. However, if a 401k account holder dies, the money left in the account passes on to beneficiaries, like a spouse or children, depending on the account holder's marital situation, the beneficiaries named in his 401k plan and his will.
With average life expectancies growing, the golden years are becoming more and more expensive to fund. No one wants to run out of money too quickly; so, many people begin investing in individual retirement arrangements (IRAs) during their working years to accumulate a comfortable nest egg for retirement. Though contributions are key to building an IRA, the rate of return on the account plays an even more crucial role, as it can mean the difference in hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of compounded account growth over time.
A 401(k) plan is a common type of tax-advantaged retirement account that some employers offer to their workers as a benefit. Money you save in a 401(k) plan is tax deductible and you do not pay taxes on funds in the account or investment growth in the account until you withdraw money during retirement. If your company offers contribution matching, the money your employer contributes to your 401(k) does not count against your personal contribution limit.
It is part of normal business for real estate brokers and salespersons to receive trust funds in the course of doing real estate transactions. It is also normal for other types of property to be purchased through a trust. Because a trust is a legal identity, it can transact any business approved by the trust indenture. In purchasing property, the agent or broker is has a fiduciary responsibility to the trust funds’ owners.
Investors who invest in mutual funds buy shares of stocks and other securities from mutual fund companies, which aggregate investments from different investors to buy different securities for their portfolios. Investors can sell or redeem their individual shares or exchange them for different investments within fund families. According to the Internal Revenue Service, you must report any realized gains if you sell or exchange your mutual funds. However, you may also report a capital loss and deduct your loss. To avoid income tax liabilities, you must sell your mutual fund as a "wash sale" and then purchase new funds. If…
Owning equity in a real estate property works like home ownership. The rights are direct. Owning shares in a REIT, a real estate investment trust, is an indirect means of ownership. The trust actually owns the real property or invests in companies that own real property, and shareholders own interests in the REIT. REITs may be public or private. Public REITs file required documents with the SEC. Some public REITs trade on the exchanges like equities and other securities. Others do not. Private REITs do not trade on the exchanges and do not file with the SEC.
A pooled investment vehicle is any investment company as defined in section 3(a) of the Investment Company Act of 1940, according to the Securities Lawyer's Deskbook of The University of Cincinnati College of Law. Pooled funds refer to money collected from a number of different investors that is pooled together into a common fund and used to purchase securities or other investments on behalf of all of the contributors. This type of investment has a number of advantages including access to diversification and professional management.
When you invest in a company, you're entitled to earn dividends on that company's profits. Dividends are awarded to investors according to the shares they own in a company. The different types of dividends include common dividends and those earned under a dividend reinvestment plan.
Cost basis is the total amount that you paid for an investment, such as a stock. A spin-off occurs when a company divides itself into two or more pieces. If you own stock in a company that has a spin-off, the cost basis you have in the original company is divided amongst the resulting divisions. To calculate your cost basis in the now-separate entities, you must allocate your original cost basis in the same proportion that the company assigns to the resultant companies.
An operating expense ratio measures an investment property’s total operating expenses as a percentage of its potential gross income. Operating expenses are the costs an investment property owner pays to maintain and manage the property. Potential gross income is the total income the property would generate if it were fully occupied with tenants. A lower operating expense ratio means a property has lower operating expenses compared to income, which leads to higher net operating income, or profit. This can increase a property’s value.
Transactional funding makes it possible for real estate investors to quickly buy and sell a property. Simply put, transactional funding allows the real estate investor to use funds to start the purchase without necessarily having to have a loan in place on the property. Institutions that offer transactional funds make their money available to the investor so that the investor can close on the property and sell it in back-to-back transactions that take place within about 24 to 48 hours in most cases. The risks associated with transactional funding are minimal and do not outweigh the advantages.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, if you are 35 and getting a 7 percent return on your 401(k), a fee of 1.5 percent instead of 0.5 percent will decrease your savings by 28 percent by the time you retire. Knowing what fees 401(k) plans charge can help you select plan options with lower fees.
Real estate ETFs, or exchange-traded funds, and REITs, or real estate investment trusts, are similar in some ways but quite different in others. They're both a way to invest some of your funds in real estate without becoming a landlord or property owner. Each invests in property, but with the REIT, the investment team may be more hands-on than the ETF managers, because they frequently manage the real estate.
The rising cost of college tuition has resulted in a subsequent rise in the amount of student loans applied for to pay for those tuition costs. Most students seeking financial aid must complete a Free Application for Federal Student Aid provided by their college or university. Upon completion of the application process, the student is notified about the types and amount of aid that will be offered by each school designated on the FAFSA application. Depending on the overall cost of tuition, fees and expenses at the student's college of choice, it may be necessary to decline some of the…
It's important to consider potential tax consequences when investing in a security. Dividends and interest payments are taxed as income, and any increases in the value of a security are taxed as capital gains when sold or when the gains from portfolio holdings are distributed, which typically occurs annually. Exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, and closed-end funds, or CEFs, are often compared as alternatives to mutual funds, but they do have many differences, including the tax consequences of their structure.
Statutory expense ratios are calculated under Statutory Accounting Principles (SAP), which are governed by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (a nonprofit coalition of state insurance agencies). SAP rules are in place to ensure the proper accounting of expenses in insurance premiums when drafting financial statements. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) differ significantly from SAP, in that SAP requires expenses to be recorded immediately, as opposed to being deferred, as is customary under GAAP.
A money market fund is a type of investment that pools investors’ money to buy safe, short-term assets that generate interest. The fund is highly liquid, which means an investor can typically withdraw cash from it at any time. You categorize your investment in a money market fund as part of cash and cash equivalents in the current assets section on your balance sheet. Cash and cash equivalents include the most liquid items a company holds, which means the items are either cash or can be converted to cash quickly.
When investors choose mutual fund investments for their portfolios, it's important for them to think about some of the management costs associated with different fund options. All mutual funds pay a certain portion of their assets to management, which vary according to the class and the industry of the fund. The expense ratio is a way to evaluate this factor, and those using it benefit from learning the difference between a net expense ratio and a weighted average expense ratio.
When companies need to borrow money they have a number of options at their disposal. Most businesses can simply go to a bank and open a line of credit or even take out a small business loan. But what if a company needs to raise billions of dollars and negotiating directly with a lending institution is out of the question? In this case large businesses generally issue corporate bonds or common stock to investors. Both forms of funding corporate debt have their advantages and disadvantages and every company must decide which option is preferable for its particular circumstances.
If you have lost money on a mutual fund investment, Internal Revenue Service tax rules allow you to declare the loss as a capital loss and use the loss as a tax deduction. Capital losses are first used to reduce any capital gains you have to declare. If you have excess losses or no capital gains, a loss from the sale of mutual funds can be used to lower your taxable income.
An Individual Retirement Account is a tax-deferred savings vehicle used to provide retirement income. Assets are contributed over working years based on earned income with two basic structures existing. The traditional IRA structure uses pre-tax dollars and is added to income when taken out. The Roth IRA uses after-tax dollars but yields tax-free income. In either IRA structure, various investments are allowed, some of which may have maturity dates .
