Trading the stockmarket (NO Referrals)

Vanilla · 17 Jan 2018 at 15:29

Hi all, a little help in understanding how brokers facilitate US stock as i'm a little confused. Example:

- Purchased 500 units of NTNX in March 17 for £10300 GBP / $12400 USD at 1.20 Exchange rate. £24.88 per share
- Sold 500 units of NTNX today. Saw a profit of about $4760 so expected about £3400 profit.
- However when the trade closed out I got only about £2000 in profit. Even at today's exchange rate of 1.39 i'd expect to see a lot more.

Is it the fact that I need to apply the exchange rate across the whole value of the trade as I am opening and closing in GBP and not just the value of the profit?

Edit; Looks like this is the reason which is a shame. The entire value of the trade is subject to forex changes, not just the profit profit portion seen in the account. When you close out there looks to be a large adjustment on the whole number because, i'm moving the whole thing back to GBP :/

daztrouk · 18 Jan 2018 at 14:41

Hi all, wanting to invest in some US stocks. Can anyone recommend a website or app with which to do this?

Richdog · 18 Jan 2018 at 17:12

daztrouk said:
Hi all, wanting to invest in some US stocks. Can anyone recommend a website or app with which to do this?

Read the last 10 or so pages of the thread, plenty of recommendations.

daztrouk · 18 Jan 2018 at 20:02

Richdog said:
Read the last 10 or so pages of the thread, plenty of recommendations.

Will do, cheers

kkelly · 20 Jan 2018 at 11:47

How does the draw down if the vanguard retirement funds work? Surely if they're at there date the are worth nothing and they're be no buyers?

silversurfer · 20 Jan 2018 at 12:51

Vanilla said:
Edit; Looks like this is the reason which is a shame. The entire value of the trade is subject to forex changes, not just the profit profit portion seen in the account. When you close out there looks to be a large adjustment on the whole number because, i'm moving the whole thing back to GBP :/

a lot of stock gains can be linked to the decline of the dollar, actual and projected. Microsoft issues bonds with 1% interest for five year terms I think and then buys back stock and other companies (the stock pays far higher then 1% so seems it makes sense presuming dollar is weaker)

silversurfer · 23 Jan 2018 at 16:17

^^

Inverse correlation to general risk appetite. The really risky stuff will really fall off if Dollar recovers.

Dollar index is like a mix of exchange rates in one number. It was 120 at the beginning of the century I think.

strumpusplunket · 25 Jan 2018 at 20:12

So my stop-losses kicked in on my NG. and UU. shares. Looking into their situation, I'm not confident they don't both have a little more downwards to go before they recover, so I'm looking for a couple of dividend yielding stocks to replace them with. Ideally, low(ish) risk, solid fundamentals and capitalisation, decent yield.

Any ideas for shares I should be researching?

Fusion · 25 Jan 2018 at 20:47

SSE are worth looking into. 7.2% yield, have increased the dividend yield every year since 1999. They're at a 5 year low at the moment. I think the fear about government price caps on energy products is a bit overblown. Can't see a Tory government dealing serious damage to the energy sector, thought there may be some token measures.

strumpusplunket · 25 Jan 2018 at 21:24

Ta.

7.2% seems a bit suspiciously high, though. Will have to look into how well it's covered. Gives me one to start with, though, so cheers!

Fusion · 25 Jan 2018 at 21:34

No probs. Think that's more do to with the recent price drop than anything. Shell were yielding 9.3% when I bought, now at 4.7% (with no cut, adjustment purely down to share price movement)!

strumpusplunket · 25 Jan 2018 at 21:36

Ah right. Cheers. I'll have a look at their fundamentals. Be quite good to replace one utility with another, actually, as it keeps that portfolio balance.

martin363 · 26 Jan 2018 at 04:54

silversurfer said:
^^

Inverse correlation to general risk appetite. The really risky stuff will really fall off if Dollar recovers.

Dollar index is like a mix of exchange rates in one number. It was 120 at the beginning of the century I think.

Trump wants the USD to be as weak as possible. Increased competitiveness of US exports, and coupled with the new US corporate tax rates, make the US an attractive place to base a factory... likely to get weaker and stay weak.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/...-House-IMF-clash-dollar-trade-war-erupts.html

Richdog · 29 Jan 2018 at 09:14

My tech stocks are now 20% up and look like they will head to 40% over the next year. Now to decide what to invest in next.

Mark M · 29 Jan 2018 at 11:44

Quick question for the more experienced investors in here - a lot of people suggest Vanguard funds because of their consitant performance but when you look on trustnet they are actually way down the rankings companred to other funds? Is there a reason to invest in Vanguard over say Yuki Japan Rebounding Growth which appears to be in the top 5 funds for the past 3 years?

Perhaps answering my own question slightly but Im guessing the above and similar funds are more risky so investing with more caution is needed?

Randomface74 · 29 Jan 2018 at 11:52

The funds contain very different things.

Vanguard consists of multiple regions and asset classes.
Yuki Japan Rebounding Growth is 100% Japan.

So if Japan outperformed, well done you. If it didn't, rip you.

Also looks like Yuki Japan Rebounding Growth is actively managed - so there's a high fee where you pay some people to pick stocks for you. People generally don't beat the index over the long term, so atm passive investing is popular - where you basically buy the index and don't bother paying a person.

There is a strategy which says once a year look at what's performing well now and buy that.

booyaka · 29 Jan 2018 at 11:52

Mark M said:
Quick question for the more experienced investors in here - a lot of people suggest Vanguard funds because of their consitant performance but when you look on trustnet they are actually way down the rankings companred to other funds? Is there a reason to invest in Vanguard over say Yuki Japan Rebounding Growth which appears to be in the top 5 funds for the past 3 years?

Perhaps answering my own question slightly but Im guessing the above and similar funds are more risky so investing with more caution is needed?

Vanguard Lifestyle has a much larger divesification of geographical /sectors etc - Obviously the Japan fund is very focused on that one region. Also the Yuki one is very unlikley to be avaliable to you as a individual investor - it's mainly an institutional fund (i.e £1million minimum investment) - Vanguard Lifestyle funds are cheap and cheerful and good for first time investors dipping their toe so to speak. I wouldn't EVER pick a fund based on past performance as that is no guide to the future. Pick a fund that fits your attitude to risk and leave it alone.

Mark M · 29 Jan 2018 at 12:10

Thanks for the explanation booyaka. I've had a look at the Japan fund and there is indeed a minimum investment value but its only £3k to be fair. Im not looking at putting any money into anything other than vanguard at the moment but will do some research into some of these to see how they might work for me.

Randomface74 · 29 Jan 2018 at 12:17

You've gotta look at what the funds consist of, what the fees are, whether it improves your portfolio or not.

I think if you already own Vanguard, then you have some exposure to Japan. Buying a Japanese fund isn't a separate portfolio - it's part of the same portfolio. You'd be increasing the percentage of your portfolio invested in Japan. If you know something everyone else doesn't, that's fine. Otherwise it's just a case of you damaging your portfolio by fiddling with it.

For example... my global equity fund doesn't contain bonds or property. So I have a global REIT fund, and a global bond fund. These purchases improve the diversity of my portfolio.

Another example is if I could get a good price on Gold someday, I might get some.

silversurfer · 29 Jan 2018 at 17:37

As far as gold price, it depends what your selling. Thats the cost and it could be very cheap if the thing sold is overvalued, if selling growth to buy an inert metal then its a mistake. I always figure long term its going to be hard to regret selling dollars to hold gold but that is long term and people want to withdraw back out within five years usually. As a straight number, gold hasnt look cheap since 2000's because our sterling and the dollar is declining so I kinda appreciate the dilemma. The alternative is gold miners but that is risky (maybe), they can be very cheap relative to plain gold.
Also miners relate to the price of oil as a large part of their costs, often there is some kind of politics going on like if you look at ACA which is a subsidiary of the largest gold miner in the world ABX then its dirt cheap but only if they can work out a tax deal and it seems very iffy.
For a similar reason CEY was 30p in the egypt revolution and attempts to confisicate. However its 50% government owned, it deserves to be over 200, 160 now

The disaster scenario for me there is ABX just forces a delisting, Im not sure on the rules but its been done before on cheap stock where the largest holder makes an easy 'profit'

For Japan I like Neptune fund as they short the Yen via bonds I think but are long Japanese stocks. So its hedged to sterling, sterling hasnt been strong but its going have higher interest rates then Yen because UK bonds are index linked. Not a popular position because Yen is very strong in market sell offs but the government has something like 260% gdp debt and a 17 year long QE program that is certain to fail or default. One famous pundit always says gold is cheapest bought in Yen

Japan isnt going to stop operating car plants, its a global play with a national decline. I expect no real growth in the country itself

I also hold emerging market debt, probably very risky in theory but also it pays so long as dollar declines.