Is this a good time to start investing already?

[ulmont]

(nb, I won't be "playing" at stocks - it's too much hassle considering our firm's corporate governance rule etc.)

I work for a publicly-traded company and the only rules revolve around trading our company's stock during blackouts and using knowledge gained at work to influence trading (which presumably only affects trading the company's stock and the stock of its competitors and possibly vendors/clients).

My firm works *for* countless publicly listed companies and we often have access to insider information. I need to get a specific permission from our London HQ to do any share deal in the public market.

That sounds surprising.  In my very first lawfirm I started out in the securities department, so pretty much by definition every single one of our clients were publicly listed companies, or were intending to become public companies.  I do not recall any such restriction.

It is suprising indeed.  This sounds more like just another one of Marti's "look at me look at me, I have more money then some of you" threads.

I have roughly the same restrictions - every trade must be preapproved.  Same restrictions at a previous non-legal job working for the Vanguard group.

[Martinus]

Sometimes, you guys should learn to just read between the lines. Also, stuff might get lost in translation.

I don't know, to me "doing a trade in stocks" pretty much means making an individual, specific publicly listed transaction (and not, for example, putting money into investment funds and the like). Especially, as I pretty much stated in the opening post that this is exactly what I can do.

I think crazycanuck is just looking for an opportunity to troll me - I noticed that recently pretty much all his posts are a form of attack.

[Martinus]

Some excerpts from our rules:

The firm's people must ask for consent before they buy, sell or deal in shares in public companies. This applies to everyone – senior partner, secretary, associate, translator, etc etc, everywhere – London, Paris, Washington, Tokyo etc etc.

Dealings in units in a unit trust or other collective investment scheme is fine.

The rules also apply to dealings by or on behalf of any member of your immediate family.

[MadImmortalMan]

Some excerpts from our rules:

The firm's people must ask for consent before they buy, sell or deal in shares in public companies. This applies to everyone – senior partner, secretary, associate, translator, etc etc, everywhere – London, Paris, Washington, Tokyo etc etc.

Dealings in units in a unit trust or other collective investment scheme is fine.

The rules also apply to dealings by or on behalf of any member of your immediate family.

That's pretty strict. It basically puts you at the mercy of brokers, so find one you trust. The family part is bullshit. They can't put an injunction on them.

[crazy canuck]

I have roughly the same restrictions - every trade must be preapproved.  Same restrictions at a previous non-legal job working for the Vanguard group.

Which is exactly why people in those positions who wish to invest in equities use other means to do so such as blind trusts or their equivalents.  Generally professionals are too busy with their own work to pay enough attention to the markets closely enough to do their own trading.  Although if you are a buy and hold type person that can be done.

Generally one does not try to make the exuse that they have not invested because of these rules ala Marti.

[crazy canuck]

That's pretty strict. It basically puts you at the mercy of brokers, so find one you trust.

Its also pretty common in firms that have access to inside knowledge of publicly traded firms.

[The Minsky Moment]

Martinus -
unless you want to put a good amount of time and effort in research and analysis, you probably wouldn't want to trade single stocks anyway.
Or for that matter attempt to time the market.

I just come up with a basic asset allocation scheme, buy into passive index funds or ETFs for the applicable asset classes and then rebalance about two or three times a year.

That should be doable for you to the extent you are investing primarily in euro-denominated assets.  Could get more tricky to the extent you want more zloty exposure.

[Malthus]

Martinus -
unless you want to put a good amount of time and effort in research and analysis, you probably wouldn't want to trade single stocks anyway.
Or for that matter attempt to time the market.

I just come up with a basic asset allocation scheme, buy into passive index funds or ETFs for the applicable asset classes and then rebalance about two or three times a year.

That should be doable for you to the extent you are investing primarily in euro-denominated assets.  Could get more tricky to the extent you want more zloty exposure.

This is more or less my approach - one note: far more significant that what fund to invest in, is your tax issues, which obviously vary by jurisdiction. For example, in Canada we are rewarded for investing as much as possible in a registered retirement savings program (RRSP) - you are not taxed on the amount you put into such funds until you take the money out (presumably, at a much lower rate than when you put the money in!) The savings by doing this with money you really do not need to use can be significant if you are in the 38% tax bracket ...

Poland may have things like this, I dunno. Ask your tax guys.

[Martinus]

Here, the best way to avoid tax is to invest into a pseudo life insurance programme with a possibility of cashing it out after a fixed amount of years. That way you do not need to pay the capital gains tax.

[CountDeMoney]

zloty exposure.

Still sounds contagious.