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Does Your Risk Tolerance Need a Realignment?

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Investor information graph. Careful forex trader make money revenue, sell stock indicator with diagram profit information crypto analysis professional marketing vector illustration of investment graphMarket volatility. A change in your time horizon. Different goals. All these things can affect the amount of risk you feel comfortable taking with your investments. Your ability to tolerate risk influences the investment choices you make and may have a significant impact on your success in achieving your financial objectives. Periodically revisiting your risk tolerance is an important step in the portfolio review process.

A Moving Target

Your feelings about risk may change depending on what the markets are doing. During a prolonged period of market volatility, you may find your comfort level dropping, even if you previously thought you had a high tolerance for risk. If you’re a conservative investor, an extended market upswing may have the opposite effect, encouraging you to take on additional investment risk. In either case, basing investment decisions on market behavior instead of a well-thought-out investing strategy isn’t the best plan. Instead, take time to reassess your feelings about risk. If they’ve truly changed, adjust your strategy going forward to reflect the changes.

More Than a Feeling

How much money could you afford to lose if investment values dropped significantly? Your ability to accept risk also depends on your financial circumstances and your time horizon for tapping your assets. If investment losses would leave your finances in jeopardy and you have a relatively short time frame before you’ll need your money, your capacity for taking risk may be limited. Make sure you consider your risk capacity in your review.

A Realistic View

A long period of either strong or weak market performance may convince you that the current trend will continue indefinitely. Perceived risk is how much risk you think an investment holds. However, your perception of an investment’s risk might not match its actual risk. In that case, you could be taking more or less risk than you should to remain within your comfort zone and still reach your goals.

Your financial professional can help you reassess your risk tolerance along with the level of risk in your portfolio.

Your Plan Account Statement Can Reveal Valuable Information

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Cropped shot of a man and woman completing paperwork together at a deskIt’s smart to make a point of reviewing your retirement plan account statement in detail at least once a year. You’ll want to ensure that the information in your statement is accurate and assess whether you should make any changes in your contribution level or investments going forward.

Ensure Personal Details Are Correct

To start your review, check the following for accuracy:

  • Personal information (e.g., name, address, phone, etc.)
  • Hire date (since it can affect vesting)
  • Contribution amounts (yours and your employer’s, if applicable)
  • Investment instructions
  • Beneficiary designation

Review Your Investments’ Performance

Any large change — up or down — in one investment market can impact your portfolio’s overall asset allocation.* Consider rebalancing** your portfolio at least once a year so that the percentages you have invested in stocks, bonds, and cash alternatives remain in line with your desired asset allocation.

As a retirement plan investor, your investment goals are typically long term. As such, you may decide to allocate a greater percentage of your portfolio to stock funds*** since a longer investing horizon gives your portfolio more time to recover from any short-term declines in the stock market. However, if there have been changes in your financial situation — for example, you have experienced a job loss, or you have had to deal with large, unexpected expenses — you may have less tolerance for investment risk than before. If that’s the case, you may choose to lower your exposure to higher risk investments in your portfolio.

One of the best ways to measure your portfolio’s performance is to compare your investments to benchmarks. Benchmarking helps put performance in perspective. For example, it can be disturbing when a fund you own has a negative return. However, it doesn’t seem so bad if the fund’s comparable index dropped by a similar percentage.

Likewise, if the overall market fell 10% while your fund only fell by 5%, you would understand that your fund did well in the circumstances. However, if your fund earned returns of 5% during a period when its benchmark rose by 15%, then you may want to examine whether continuing to hold that fund makes sense.

Portfolio Turnover Rate

The term portfolio turnover rate refers to the percentage of a mutual fund’s holdings that changes over a given period of time. Certain types of stock funds may have high turnover rates because they pursue aggressive or growth strategies. Other types — value funds, for example — may have lower turnover rates.

It can be a red flag if a fund’s portfolio turnover rate is much higher than that of other funds in the same style category and the fund consistently underperforms similar funds and its benchmark. Portfolio turnover rate is just one of the many factors investors should review when assessing funds in their portfolios.

Management Fees

Mutual funds charge management fees to help cover the expenses of operating the fund. Typically, management fees are used to compensate the investment managers who select and monitor the fund’s investments. Deciding whether to continue owning a mutual fund based on how much it charges in annual management fees is a subjective judgement. If the management fees are higher than those of other comparable funds and the fund’s performance demonstrates no appreciable difference, then it might be worth looking deeper into the issue.

Work With a Professional

Reviewing your retirement plan account statement can help identify strengths as well as deficiencies in your retirement planning and allow you to respond accordingly. Your financial professional can also be a valuable partner in ensuring that you are on the right track to a financially solid retirement.

Tax Tips for Businesses

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Banker offering loan. Investor or entrepreneur getting income. Woman with heap of cash, sack and wallet. Vector illustration for finance, money, financial success, profit, business conceptAs a business owner, you should familiarize yourself with your federal, state, and local tax requirements. Understanding what your obligations are will assist you in filing returns and paying taxes accurately and on time. Whatever taxes you are required to pay, you have to be very aware that there are deadlines for remitting them and any delays on your part could result in penalties. Here are some tips that can help you avoid tax trouble with the IRS.

Employment Taxes

The IRS requires employers to withhold federal income tax and FICA (Social Security and Medicare) taxes from their employees’ wages. The IRS also wants you to remit these employment taxes, along with your company’s FICA contributions, to them in a timely manner. Failing to remit these taxes can lead to serious penalties for noncompliance. This is one issue you absolutely must stay on top of.

Remember, sole proprietors, general partners, and, usually, members of limited liability companies do not have Social Security and Medicare taxes withheld like employees do. Instead, they must pay self-employment taxes, which typically cover Social Security and Medicare.

Estimated Taxes

You must generally make quarterly estimated tax payments to cover self-employment taxes and income tax on income that is not subject to withholding. If you do not make required estimated payments on time, you may owe the IRS an underpayment penalty.

Misclassifying Workers

Employees and independent contractors are treated differently for income tax withholding and employment tax purposes. Generally, the more control you have over a worker’s tasks and hours of work, the more likely that individual is an employee. In the case of employees, you must withhold federal income tax and FICA taxes, pay your share of FICA taxes, and pay unemployment taxes. You are not required to withhold income or FICA taxes from an independent contractor. Independent contractors pay income taxes and self-employment taxes on their own. If the IRS determines that your business has misclassified employees as independent contractors, it could prove to be costly.

Keep Business and Personal Transactions Separate

Personal bank and credit card accounts should always be kept separate from business accounts. Doing so makes it easier to identify all appropriate business expenses at tax time. That, in turn, simplifies things when it comes to claiming business tax deductions.

Substantiating Business Expenses

Like every business, your company will incur various expenses that are simply the cost of doing business. Many of these business expenses will be deductible. You should have proof of purchase for those expenses that you intend to deduct. Proof can be a cancelled check (or a legible image of the check), or a credit card, debit card, or electronic funds transfer (EFT) statement that shows the payee, amount of purchase or transfer, and the date of the transaction.

It’s also important that you can provide an invoice or receipt that identifies the purchase. If it’s not clear what the business purpose for the purchase is, then you should attach a note of explanation or write directly on the invoice or receipt. This can be helpful if the deductibility of the purchase is ever questioned by the IRS. Deductions for business travel expenses have very specific substantiation requirements, so be sure you are familiar with them before claiming these expenses.

Determining what taxes your business is subject to and when those taxes must be remitted is complex. Unfortunately, errors can be costly to your business. A professional who specializes in small business tax and accounting matters can help your business put systems and procedures in place so that it can claim all the deductions it is entitled to and meet its tax obligations in a timely and accurate manner.

What Is Your Most Valuable Asset?

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Woman working on laptop online, checking emails and planning on the internet while sitting in an office alone at work. Business woman, corporate professional or manager searching the internetYour most valuable asset isn’t your real estate or the tech stocks you bought in the 90s that have done well. It isn’t even your business per se. Your most valuable asset is you — specifically your ability to run a profitable company and make money.

Are you protecting that asset from the risk that a disabling illness or accident might prevent you from working? If you don’t have disability income insurance, you’re not protected.

What Are the Odds?

People generally think the odds of becoming disabled are low. But the numbers say otherwise: More than one in four 20-year-old workers become disabled before reaching retirement age. Here’s another reality check: Serious accidents are not the leading cause of long-term disability; chronic conditions are. Muscle and bone disorders (such as a back disorder or joint or muscle pain) are responsible for more than one in four disabilities.

How Long Could You Go Without an Income?

Even a short period of disability could be devastating. The average group long-term disability claim lasts 2.6 years. Even if you have reserves you 3 could tap, your personal finances would take a hit. If and when you were able to start earning an income again, you might have to start all over.

What Would Happen to Your Business?

Your involvement is vital to your company’s financial success. If you’re unable to work, you might have to hire someone to take your place and borrow money to pay the bills until you’re back on the job. Bottom line? If you’re sidelined by a long disability, it could jeopardize the success or even the survival of your business.

What Can You Do?

Call your financial professional to review and discuss this important issue.

Try a Trust

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Shot of a young woman bonding with her dog in the parkYou don’t have to be fabulously wealthy to benefit from a trust. For many people, a trust is a great financial planning tool.

What Is a Trust?

A trust is a legal arrangement between the person who sets up the trust and transfers property to it (the “grantor”) and the individual or institution that agrees to manage the trust assets (the “trustee”). The grantor specifies who is to benefit from the trust (the “beneficiaries”) both during his or her lifetime and at death, if applicable, names the trustee, and spells out in the legal document creating the trust how the trust assets are to be managed and distributed.

What Can a Trust Do?

Trusts can be used for many purposes, including:

  • Managing your assets if you become incapacitated. With a revocable living trust, you can stay in control of your assets while you’re able and avoid probate after your death. You can also arrange to have a successor trustee make investment decisions and handle other financial matters for your benefit if you’re no longer able to do so. This arrangement avoids the expense and complications of a court-ordered guardianship or conservatorship.
  • Reducing the size of your estate. With a grantor retained annuity trust (GRAT), you transfer assets with the potential for appreciation to an irrevocable trust for the benefit of a child, other family member, or noncharitable beneficiary and retain an annuity interest for a term of years. When the annuity ends, your child (or other beneficiary) will receive the remaining trust assets. If you outlive the trust term, the value of the assets won’t be included in your estate.
  • Donating to charity. If you set up a charitable remainder trust (CRT), you receive an income stream from the donated assets for life or a set number of years. Then, at your death or when the trust term ends, the charity you have chosen will get the trust assets. If you set up a charitable lead trust (CLT), the charity you choose receives income from the assets for a period of time that you specify. After that period ends, the assets flow to your family as “remainder beneficiaries.” Both CRTs and CLTs offer potential income tax and estate tax advantages.
  • Preserving wealth for future generations. With a dynasty trust, wealth is preserved and generated by cascading through multiple generations. Any income or appreciation generated by the trust assets may be exempt from estate and generation-skipping transfer taxes as long as it remains in the trust and if the laws governing such trusts are satisfied. Typically, your children and then your grandchildren would be the trust income beneficiaries. You also can determine under what conditions your beneficiaries can or cannot receive income from the trust.
  • Protecting assets from creditors. When you set up a trust, you can generally include “spendthrift” provisions that prevent your beneficiaries from assigning their interest in the trust to creditors. Putting assets in trust for your child instead of giving them to your child outright may be a good way to provide asset protection in case of a future divorce or major lawsuit.

Your financial and legal professionals can provide more information about the different types of trusts and how they may apply to your situation.

LLC vs. S Corp: Which is Best for Tax Purposes

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Close up Businessman consultant holding pen and pointing at financial on wooden desk in coffee shop. freelance, tax, accounting, statistics and analytic research concept.If you’re confused by the difference between LLCs and S Corps, this article is for you! Here, we clarify the difference and provide guidance on which option is best for you.

Before we get to the best qualification for your small business regarding tax filing, let’s define an LLC and an S Corp so that we know what each designation means.

What is an LLC?

An LLC is a limited liability company. It is a legal designation. The owner is protected from personal liability regarding business activities in this business structure. Owners are considered “members” of the LLC and are self-employed. An LLC can have one or more owners who can actively participate in a business organization or be hands-off. Further, an unlimited number of owners can reside anywhere in the world.

What is an S Corp?

An S Corp is a tax classification. It is desirable because it protects business owners from double taxation. Like an LLC, owners can be hands-off; owners of an S Corp may also take a salary as an employee. There is a limit to the number of owners of an S Corp – there can be no more than 100 owners, and all must be United States citizens.

How are LLCs and S Corps taxed?

LLCs are taxed like sole proprietorships or partnerships (if there are multiple members in the LLC). Because an S Corp is a tax classification, an LLC, as a business entity, can attain S Corp status by meeting specific qualifications.

For LLCs, not S Corps, the owner(s) must pay a 15.3 percent self-employment tax on all net profits. The owner can take a salary for S Corps to avoid the self-employment tax.

How do I know which is best for my business?

To help you determine whether your business should remain an LLC or further classify as an S Corp, consider the following:

  • How many owners are there in your business?
  • Where do you do business (U.S. only or overseas as well)?
  • Who else has a stake in your company (i.e., a partnership or a corporation)?
  • Do you plan to scale your business?
  • How important is personal liability protection to you?
  • How hands-on do you wish to be in terms of business upkeep?

Answering these questions will help guide you on the best option for your business’ tax filing status. To determine what is best for you financially now and over time, speak to a qualified tax accountant or CPA. They will be up to date on the most recent tax laws, so they can better guide you.