I’m curious how many of you (CFA charterholders and candidates) manage your own and/or family and friends money? By “manage” I mean you have some sort of discretion over the money and how it’s invested. I’d also be curious to hear if you’re compensated for it or do for free.
I manage my own money in various ways, e.g. I do some fund allocations in my 401k based on an algorithm given there’s not many options available, and I trade options (e.g. mostly sell underlyings that have high implied volatility, and use mostly delta neutral strategies like sell strangles/straddles/iron condors) in my individual brokerage account.
Just curious how common these strategies are in this community, and how many stock pickers (whether short term or long term value-oriented stock pockets) there are here.
i know some who contribute regularly, but that only makes sense if no transaction costs when i first started and had a small acct, if started with no transaction etfs. but now i prefer to purchase individuals, so i like to deposit 5.5k all at once, and purchase a stock once i have at least 8k available
I’m 30. Not a high-roller like you guys but I do ok career-wise (financial modeling at a US management consulting firm). 401k in SPX index. This is the biggest account. Cash in bank for emergency covering six months (I don’t mess with this). I manage my personal trading account in Scottrade (value of around $30K, I put in around $26K over two years) in individual stocks. When I started two years ago SPX was at 2100, so in hindsight I fell short of the market gains, but I learnt a lot that I couldn’t have experienced by putting it all in SPY and studying for level 1 and 2. A few bets backfired terribly (Kinder Morgan, Macy’s, Fitbit), just as a few did extremely well (Activision, Shell, Valeant). I don’t do any derivatives or short plays. At some point (I guess when account grow past $50k) I’ll cut back on individual stock-picking and allocate across sectors and markets because it’s easier, less risky, less time-consuming, and less stressful.
I manage my own and my parents. Parents are index funds and LendingClub. Mine is a mix of bank stocks, index funds, LendingClub, and real estate peer lending. I just go wherever I think the most attractive returns are at the time for me. For my parents, it is keeping them from following stupid advice of some guy in a suit with a CFP
401k is long only active strategies. dollar cost average.
unless you’re in ER, i don’t know how people have time to play individual companies and read cash flows. i guess you can use an existing fund’s current holdings if you trust their screening process. then overweight/eliminate names based on your own conviction. probably the most time effective route if you like a concentrated portfolio.
i keep some cash sidelined for swing trading. I employ it if I feel there is an asset price dislocation… typically use leveraged ETF/ETNs that deal in short term futures for commodities/volatility. most of my activity here is a hedge against a repricing in equities. most people don’t like these vehicles because of negative roll yield, but they still have purpose if you can get in/out quickly.
Manage my own money…and recently convinced my girlfriend to manage hers as well…I use a screen with a combination of Short Interest, Analyst Price Target to Current price, 52 week price percentage change, 4 Starmine models, Volume (avg at least 100k/day over past 12 months), and RSI for potential entry point. Once I find some suitable candidates through the screen then I dig a little deeper (macro factors, industry analysis, etc.,) been using this for the past year…although not killer results but consistent…recently went long…