401 k

[Aquaholic]

Does anyone keep dry powder ( e.g. ~15% in money market) in their 401k? Use it for a market correction. I am not ready for ~50% market drop if a black swan event occurs. My only 401k changes have been to rebalance into defensive positions and spending more on physical gold/silver and bitcoin/eth. I'm very cautious of the U.S. market going forward. Are drunken sailor uncle Sam can continue to kick the can down the road by continuing to stimulate the economy by spending. Not hard to see it continuing with elections coming. Fed will probably back step on rates if inflation gets to hot. I'm at a crux. Should I consider sitting partially on the sideline out of the market, or let'r rip. And hope I have time to pull back the reins if needed. It took about a month Feb 9ish to march 15 2020 to dump the market until all the extra gov help came in that pushed the market and real-estate bubbles even higher.
I have plenty of time to work still. My goal is not to work harder but smarter. Be outside with my family. Cheers

 

[Up Y'oars]

What you're referring to is one concept of having 10% available in cash, not invested and ready to move. If you have an active broker (or yourself) that manages the money and can pull that trigger fast enough is one thing. Most folks have their 401k's in another concept option of dollar-cost-averaging and just keep buying into the fund where it goes up or down. Over the long run the dollar cost average reportedly makes for a better return than keeping money on the sideline waiting for that event to happen.

 

[Allen]

What you're referring to is one concept of having 10% available in cash, not invested and ready to move. If you have an active broker (or yourself) that manages the money and can pull that trigger fast enough is one thing. Most folks have their 401k's in another concept option of dollar-cost-averaging and just keep buying into the fund where it goes up or down. Over the long run the dollar cost average reportedly makes for a better return than keeping money on the sideline waiting for that event to happen.

Right! The keeping of money set aside to "pounce" may cause it to be sitting there earning nothing, or next to nothing, for how long until the market falls enough to push you into finally investing it? A year ago, the S&P was around 3900, and it peaked at 4700 around the end of December. Roughly a 20% gain. Just in the past couple weeks though it has fallen back down to around 4500. Which is about a 4.25% drop from Dec. So, if a person were looking for at least a 4% drop to employ that money, you would just now be putting it to work. Which means you would have lost a little over 15% by waiting for "the drop" since you are now buying at 4500 instead of the 3900 opportunity you had last year at this time.

 

[wjschmaltz]

The best investments I ever made have been dollars spent on hunting trips with my kids or buddies. Never had a greater return on anything than the memories I made on that money.

Dying Broke | Field Ethos
This is a relevant article.

I tend to live my life very risk adverse. You never know when tragedy is right around the corner so I make sure I can get my hands on large chunks of money if needed. Thank God as it really paid off over the last year and softened the blow during some very rough times. I keep a big egg on hand knowing that I'm losing money on inflation - I mark it up as the cost of insurance. But I do plan to really start putting a much larger percentage of income into hunting trips starting in the next few years and working up from there! Hopefully it's in the form of an airplane!

Luckily I'm young enough that I don't need to even look at my 401K. We put the scheduled 15% or whatever in and then just keep on DCA into crypto with leftovers.

 

[Dirty]

I too have that egg. When the day comes that I have to crack it, I’m hoping it softens whatever blows are dealt.

Hope you are doing well up there wjs.

 

[Aquaholic]

I totally agree with the above. When I rebalanced the wife's plan and mine, I did not set anything to the side. Having said that, I am really interested in getting into a self directed plan with better options. Something with real estate, metals, international emerging markets.
Anybody know who to contact for this type of plan?
Thanks

 

[Flatrock]

Thankfully, after the last 2 trading days, my account is only down for January % wise what i was up for all of 2021!
Lets hope Feb and beyond is better. How about you ppl?

S&P was up over 28% last year with dividends. Was a banner year!

 

[Captain Ahab]

I totally agree with the above. When I rebalanced the wife's plan and mine, I did not set anything to the side. Having said that, I am really interested in getting into a self directed plan with better options. Something with real estate, metals, international emerging markets.
Anybody know who to contact for this type of plan?
Thanks

If you are still employed by the company that offers you the plan, you will be stuck in that plan. That is unless you are old enough for an in-service withdrawal or some other exemption. The company would have to adopt a whole new plan for all the employees for it to change. IME

 

[jr2280]

2020 + 21%. 2021 + 20%. So far this year-4.6%. I’m not worried yet.

 

[Bfishn]

I totally agree with the above. When I rebalanced the wife's plan and mine, I did not set anything to the side. Having said that, I am really interested in getting into a self directed plan with better options. Something with real estate, metals, international emerging markets.
Anybody know who to contact for this type of plan?
Thanks

Start a Roth IRA at a brokerage like Fidelity or Vanguard and buy whatever you want. There are income and contribution limits, but basically if your a marred couple making under $200k you can contribute $12-14K depending on age. The general consensus is get 401k company match, then max out Roth, then go back to 401k.

You could also possibly ask the person at your company who handles the 401k if certain funds can be added. Basically everything you listed has become available in my work plan the last 5 years or so and I think its because people were asking for them.

 

[Up Y'oars]

Start a Roth IRA at a brokerage like Fidelity or Vanguard and buy whatever you want. There are income and contribution limits, but basically if your a marred couple making under $200k you can contribute $12-14K depending on age. The general consensus is get 401k company match, then max out Roth, then go back to 401k.

You could also possibly ask the person at your company who handles the 401k if certain funds can be added. Basically everything you listed has become available in my work plan the last 5 years or so and I think its because people were asking for them.

Correct, sir. Taxes will never go DOWN, so pay the tax now on that ROTH-IRA contribution and withdraw it with zero taxes later. I've maxed out my ROTH contribution every year for the past eleven years. Add in what it has gained and there's been $20k added to my account. That $20k buys a lot of hunting trips with the buddies and doesn't cost me a dime, if I'm taking the approach from Aquaholic, Dirty, and Schmaltz.... not that they're wrong. It's either my dime or it's someone else's dime. I just prefer someone else's dime.

 

[Aquaholic]

I'm the plan sponsor for my small company. The bank or fiduciary of the plan that I currently use does not offer anything other than U.S. stocks and bonds. I have added some ETFs to the plan. The bank does not want to deal with physical metals or real estate or BTC.
I'm trying to find someone to talk to and find out different options. I think I need to find a new asset management company and I don't know where to look.

The end goal is to get majority of assets out of U.S. dollar denominated stocks. Or own high dividend/yield stocks. Basically, own things that hedge against market and real-estate crash and a dollar that's turning into toilet paper. Buy things that pay me to own them.
I'm scared were turning into a Weimar Germany in the 1920's. A Million German Marks for a loaf of bread. Were at 30 TRILLION in debt and keep printing more dollars.
Cheers

 

[3Roosters]

Another plus of ROTH's is you do not have to take RMD's(REQUIRED MINIMUM DISTRIBUTIONS) each year once you hit age 72 like with the Traditional IRA. ROTH's and life insurance death proceeds are not taxable, currently. Of course, if Congress wants to change that to garner more $, they probably will... especially if debt keeps rising. They will find a way to tax.;:;banghead