Not Buying - Not Selling - Waiting

[Garpal Gumnut]

I enjoy this time of day, the whatifery and the last minute mulling the tealeaves.

Up a bit, down a bit today.

Yep, 3.45pm to 4.15pm post auction is exciting.

I'm still on the sidelines.

BHP fell less than I thought it would today. WDS may end up a bit ahead.

CDA is in 3rd place in the May Comp, only 2 more to knock over, it is a bit cloudy, nice and cool and there must be a snake about as a kookaburra is quite intent on one corner of the garden.

gg

 

[eskys]

Looks like I'm gonna have a date with Dave tonight. Meanwhile, the puppy is wooping and running in her sleep..... I'm packing up, back to the smoke......

 

[Craton]

I must admit I never use DRP.

In the pre-franking days, when I first started out, a mate of mine did my tax. He said if you want to buy a stock, buy it, don't do a DRP as it is more complicated in the tax return and made him more money in accounting fees.

And as you point out the whole idea is to either enjoy the moolah while alive or give it away before you die.

So I would completely agree with your strategy.

gg

Do you mean pre Franking Credits?

Yes it is different now, one needs to account for the divvy in whatever form it takes, cash, DRP or BSP, franked or unfranked etc at tax time.

 

[bux2000]

and there must be a snake about as a kookaburra is quite intent on one corner of the garden.

They are amazing birds ...........my Brother has a family that he feeds every morning on the handrail of his deck, what started a one Male now extends to 6 with the offspring. His Wife has chooks so very few snakes except for the odd python and lately a fox.

There seems to be a lot of....... I think I can .....charts at the moment.
Lets hope they can get over the top of that hill to become ......I knew I coulds......but not holding my breath.

bux

 

[Belli]

I must admit I never use DRP.

In the pre-franking days, when I first started out, a mate of mine did my tax. He said if you want to buy a stock, buy it, don't do a DRP as it is more complicated in the tax return and made him more money in accounting fees.

And as you point out the whole idea is to either enjoy the moolah while alive or give it away before you die.

So I would completely agree with your strategy.

gg

Apart from Vanguard which is full DRP or none, with the remaining listed equities you can do a partial DRP. I know a few who do that so they not only continue to invest but also get some cash. With the software available to accountants, the complications which applied in the past no longer do. There is probably some free on-line software if prepared to take that risk.

 

[Belli]

Apart from Vanguard which is full DRP or none, with the remaining listed equities you can do a partial DRP. I know a few who do that so they not only continue to invest but also get some cash. With the software available to accountants, the complications which applied in the past no longer do. There is probably some free on-line software if prepared to take that risk.

LOL. Just realised every buy I have has it's own cost base anyway so a few DRPs each year would be an administrative nothing.

As I haven't sold anything for many years, apart when I swapped STW for VAS when it listed which was probaly not a great move but it seemed like a good idea at the time, it's the same as having a DRP in place. It ain't going to be my problem though because if I don't sell, and I have no intention to, it's an issue for my executors not me.

 

[Craton]

Apart from Vanguard which is full DRP or none, with the remaining listed equities you can do a partial DRP. I know a few who do that so they not only continue to invest but also get some cash.

Yes exactly, a lot of companies do and also something I'll be looking into as the holdings build up further.

With the software available to accountants, the complications which applied in the past no longer do. There is probably some free on-line software if prepared to take that risk.

If you know your way around spreadsheets.

I use two Excel workbooks. One to record all buys and sells including top-ups like SPP.

The other I record all the current financial year divvy info including any Residual amount left over from the DRP pricing and confirm the Carried Forward amount tallies with what I have on record.
Setup so it automatically provides the total franked, partially franked and unfranked income and grossed up amounts.

I copy and paste into another sheet for the next financial year and repeat. There's more to it of course like recording the DRP price and number bought, number of share before and after etc but that the gist.

 

[Craton]

I forgot to mention the the buy and sell spreadsheet includes the DRP because of the cost base.

 

[Craton]

LOL. Just realised every buy I have has it's own cost base anyway so a few DRPs each year would be an administrative nothing.

As I haven't sold anything for many years, apart when I swapped STW for VAS when it listed which was probaly not a great move but it seemed like a good idea at the time, it's the same as having a DRP in place. It ain't going to be my problem though because if I don't sell, and I have no intention to, it's an issue for my executors not me.

Oh the h/ache you'll create, LOL!!!
As long as the doco's are all intact, it'll be no worries.

 

[Belli]

Oh the h/ache you'll create, LOL!!!
As long as the doco's are all intact, it'll be no worries.

The small cost will be well worth it to them. It would cost them a hell of a lot more otherwise. Know of some estates which involved over $25k in fees to reconstruct the holdings as records were never kept.

As for documents, every buy is stored in PDF by company folder, by date e.g. ARG 2021_11_02 BUY as well as ETF Annual Tax Statements as are all tax returns going back to 2005 for me and 1998 for the SMSF on PC hard disk, Google Drive (folders automatically synched) and backed up on external hard disks and a NAS.

Instructions on the record structure is left with a certified copy of my Will and those instructions include access codes and passwords for items such as Spotify subscription, etc.

All it involved was a small effort in planning on my part plus some very tedious (and, by God, was it tedious) initial scanning of paper documents.

 

[Belli]

Yes exactly, a lot of companies do and also something I'll be looking into as the holdings build up further.

If you know your way around spreadsheets.

I use two Excel workbooks. One to record all buys and sells including top-ups like SPP.

The other I record all the current financial year divvy info including any Residual amount left over from the DRP pricing and confirm the Carried Forward amount tallies with what I have on record.
Setup so it automatically provides the total franked, partially franked and unfranked income and grossed up amounts.

I copy and paste into another sheet for the next financial year and repeat. There's more to it of course like recording the DRP price and number bought, number of share before and after etc but that the gist.

I don't bother to go to that effort. At the end of each financial year, I merge all the PDFs for the relevant year into one PDF using a free merge program and give it to the accountant via their secure portal.

 

[Gretsch]

In a proper crash your stops will be bypassed and you may be sold out at the bottom to the market makers.

It's not a bad idea though, if it's not a complete rout to have your cash.

Then again your stop may be triggered just as the market decides not to crash.

gg

Yep, my tech ETF's (ATEC, ETHI, NDQ) had dipped and then I bought more so it doesn't make sense to sell them now, while HACK is getting close to the edge, and I'm hearing tech stocks could go down even further.

do you want to sell those stocks before a major fall ( pick the answer that fits YOU best )

If I had a crystal ball, YES!
In any event, something - for sure - will throw a spanner, and another buying opportunity.

 

[Craton]

I don't bother to go to that effort. At the end of each financial year, I merge all the PDFs for the relevant year into one PDF using a free merge program and give it to the accountant via their secure portal.

Fair enough and each to their own. E.g. from the spreadsheets I can create pretty little visual graphs that show the ups and downs, ins and outs, the largest and smallest holdings and much more besides.

That's me though seeing I'm in I.T. whereas yourself, it's a different strategy not only for accounting but for the holding/portfolio. All good.

 

[Craton]

Yep, my tech ETF's (ATEC, ETHI, NDQ) had dipped and then I bought more so it doesn't make sense to sell them now, while HACK is getting close to the edge, and I'm hearing tech stocks could go down even further.

If I had a crystal ball, YES!
In any event, something - for sure - will throw a spanner, and another buying opportunity.

The market goes up, the market goes down, the market goes round 'n' round!

 

[Belli]

Fair enough and each to their own. E.g. from the spreadsheets I can create pretty little visual graphs that show the ups and downs, ins and outs, the largest and smallest holdings and much more besides.

That's me though seeing I'm in I.T. whereas yourself, it's a different strategy not only for accounting but for the holding/portfolio. All good.

You're right. There is not one way. I'm lazy and wanted the least stressful method of investing so initially settled on some LIC (boring stuff) and added two ETFs at a later stage. Suits my level of incompetence and general attitude to the share market.

 

[divs4ever]

Talking dividends.

Thanks to the Covid downturn I did my usual contrarian play and nibbled away aka topped up the historically bigger divvy payers and kept most of the DRP's in play. Ha, when a divvy was actually paid!

As I'm an investor not a trader per se and not that I've a lot of holdings (or even in $$$ value) but as my holdings have grown one thing I've changed of late, especially when a SP is IMHO too high or overvalued (e.g. AMP), is to revert a divvy paying stock out of the DRP and back into a cash divvy.

That cash is rarely used to buy more of that stock later on. The intention is to reinstate that DRP at a time where I think I'm getting value for money (e.g. WBC). The cash is either added to the rainy day/sleep well at night dry powder, to top up or buy other holdings or to treat myself.

In the case of BHP's recent record divvy and that live music had opened up again hence back to gigging again, I took the divvy in cash and splurged on purchasing a brand new Gibson guitar, this el cheapo guitar and other equipment including this Looper, this 3 way guitar stand and other essentials like strings, plectrums and straps.

It may not be a perfect system but is one that gives me a sense of control and alleviates that feeling of ennui, especially more so now with the new toys.

i was planning to swap SOME div. paying stocks out of DRP ( where they had them ) when i swapped to the aged pension ( and still MIGHT )

but some of them i planned to turn to cash divs ( either fully or say 50/50 ) have been so mediocre i have actually sold them down ( like WOW ) or exited completely ( like AMP , and IPL )

could never find a Gibson i was comfortable playing ( 3 prospects sounded GREAT , but i like to play , not fight the guitar )

HINT put out the big bucks and buy quality leads ( they usually have gold plated tips )

have fun

 

[divs4ever]

I enjoy this time of day, the whatifery and the last minute mulling the tealeaves.

Up a bit, down a bit today.

Yep, 3.45pm to 4.15pm post auction is exciting.

I'm still on the sidelines.

BHP fell less than I thought it would today. WDS may end up a bit ahead.

CDA is in 3rd place in the May Comp, only 2 more to knock over, it is a bit cloudy, nice and cool and there must be a snake about as a kookaburra is quite intent on one corner of the garden.

gg

the kookas around here bump off the odd rodent as well , so there may be some rodents chasing the chook food ( and a Joe Blake hoping to catch the rodent before the kooka does )

 

[Knobby22]

I sold nearly everything to pay down my home loan and to provide seed funding to a possible mine. Will let everyone know if it floats.

 

[Smurf1976]

Yeah odd isn’t it? it’s taken me this long to question my ability to time the market, so now it’s going to be a matter of time IN the market.

Time in the market or timing the market?

The age old question.

As a practical observation, the saying is more useful as an indicator than as a statement of fact.

"It's time in the market, not timing the market" they say. If that's true then it signals a top. If it's false then it signals a bottom.

Just my practical observation having seen a few cycles now.

I moved my superannuation, which is simply in a fund not self managed, to cash in January for the record. Outside of that, my actively traded account is about half invested at present.

 

[Belli]

Time in the market or timing the market?

The age old question.

As a practical observation, the saying is more useful as an indicator than as a statement of fact.

"It's time in the market, not timing the market" they say. If that's true then it signals a top. If it's false then it signals a bottom.

Just my practical observation having seen a few cycles now.

I moved my superannuation, which is simply in a fund not self managed, to cash in January for the record. Outside of that, my actively traded account is about half invested at present.

I consider it is associated with an individual's psychology. We all have our own bias and those drive us to certain conclusions.

For what it is worth, somewhere in one thread I uploaded a spreadsheet which I created as an exercise just to see what would happen. It involved buying 100 units of STW (and later I added VAS & VGS) at the beginning of each month starting in January 2002 so it would cover the GFC and other events. I haven't kept the spreadsheet but I remember it showed at the end of FY 2021 a holding of abit 23,500 units and an income (cash only no franking or other components) of over $40k with the total cash income for the entire period of 21 years being close to $500k. Probably not to bad for essentially doing SFA.