LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

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Ugly_Bird
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LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by Ugly_Bird » Thu Mar 11, 2021 1:52 pm

Hello fellow PPs,

Could you please help me with choosing possibly better funds for PP?
Currently, my Fidelity brokerage mostly has SHY and IAU, while Fidelity IRA has TLT and IVV.
For fresh money addition to both Fidelity Brokerage and Fidelity IRA accounts:
1) Is there better alternative to TLT? Another ETF or an index fund? I just remember people here were not very happy with TLTs for some reason.
2) It seems index fund FXAIX could be better than ETF IVV. Should I buy FXAIX? Or anything else?

Thank you!
pp4me
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by pp4me » Thu Mar 11, 2021 3:29 pm

Ugly_Bird wrote:
Thu Mar 11, 2021 1:52 pm
1) Is there better alternative to TLT? Another ETF or an index fund? I just remember people here were not very happy with TLTs for some reason.
You can buy your own LT bonds on Fidelity and it is very easy. I think there is even a tutorial about how to do it on this website because I used it when I first bought mine. Coupon payments go directly into your account twice a year and there are no fees. You can do whatever you want with the payments - buy more bonds, add to lagging assets, whatever. The fee charged by TLT for a few minutes of your time, even though relatively small, isn't worth it. Plus, it's kind of like the difference between holding physical and paper gold though not quite as emotionally/psychologically satisfying.
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sophie
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by sophie » Thu Mar 11, 2021 4:03 pm

Bonds are great to buy on Fidelity, but if you ever want to sell them without having to spend an hour or two on the phone, make sure to buy in lots of at least $10,000 (Face value). Also, having part of your bond allocation in FNGBX (mutual fund) gives you a nice mix of purity and convenience.

For stocks....why SP500 instead of total market? And, I must say that the Golden Butterfly's split of the stock allocation between total market and small cap value has paid off big time. I had to exert all my self-discipline to buy as per plan when I rebalanced last April, due to the doom and gloom predictions at the time for SCV. Of course I should have realized that this was, in retrospect, the perfect time to buy. So nice that rebalancing has you doing it automatically.
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by dualstow » Thu Mar 11, 2021 4:58 pm

sophie wrote:
Thu Mar 11, 2021 4:03 pm
Bonds are great to buy on Fidelity, but if you ever want to sell them without having to spend an hour or two on the phone, make sure to buy in lots of at least $10,000 (Face value).
...
Wow, I did not know that. Weird.
RIP Marcello Gandini
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Ugly_Bird
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by Ugly_Bird » Thu Mar 11, 2021 4:59 pm

Thank you for your reply
sophie wrote:
Thu Mar 11, 2021 4:03 pm
Bonds are great to buy on Fidelity, but if you ever want to sell them without having to spend an hour or two on the phone, make sure to buy in lots of at least $10,000 (Face value). Also, having part of your bond allocation in FNGBX (mutual fund) gives you a nice mix of purity and convenience.
Something tells me that I do not want to deal with bonds. FNGBX sounds interesting.
sophie wrote:
Thu Mar 11, 2021 4:03 pm
For stocks....why SP500 instead of total market?
Good question! :-)
I think I was just following the book.
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by Kbg » Fri Mar 12, 2021 7:43 am

Fxaix is an excellent SP500 fund. Personally I’d stay away from total market funds. They have a ton of crap companies in them. If someone wants to add mid and/or small cap buy a fund that is based on the sp400 and/or sp600.

Head on over to portfolio visualizer and run Russell vs. S&P index funds and you’ll see the performance difference.
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Ugly_Bird
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by Ugly_Bird » Fri Mar 12, 2021 7:52 am

Kbg wrote:
Fri Mar 12, 2021 7:43 am
Fxaix is an excellent SP500 fund. Personally I’d stay away from total market funds. They have a ton of crap companies in them. If someone wants to add mid and/or small cap buy a fund that is based on the sp400 and/or sp600.

Head on over to portfolio visualizer and run Russell vs. S&P index funds and you’ll see the performance difference.
Thanks! I might just go with FNGBX and FXAIX for bonds and stocks regarding added money. Will keep already allocated TLT and IVV for now.
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Re: LTT and SP500 funds at Fidelity?

Post by jswinner » Sat Mar 20, 2021 4:01 pm

I have not had issues selling less than 10k of bonds at Fidelity entering the details on the web form
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