The Roundup: Rookie Essentials
One of my goals for 2016 is to increase my financial literacy and become a more active manager of my investment accounts. My mom really loves finances and has even gone so far as to say that if she was in her twenties again that she'd pursue a career in finance rather than nursing. After leaving for college, I would also come back to stacks of new books on smart investing and she made it a ritual to watch CNBC every morning before breakfast and every night after dinner. I really admire how she became so financially literate and had the knowledge base to speak with her financial adviser as an equal, rather than an inferior.
The wonderful thing about our investment firm, TD Ameritrade, is that they have an Education Center with loads of resources for teaching rookies how to start thinking about their finances and investing. Working in a healthcare setting has really taught me that delivering care requires administrative and financial support systems. In a lot of ways, these auxillary divisions can make or break a patient's healthcare experience. Ensuring that the patient receives the appropriate amount of care involves coordination between the administrative, financial, and clinical arms of these huge healthcare machines.
Portfolio Management: Rookie Essentials
Retirement Basics
401k / 403b: employer sponsored, matching contributions
Roth IRA: post-tax contributions, grows tax-free
Traditional IRA: pre-tax contributions, grows tax-deferred
Rollover IRA: consolidates old retirement accounts (employer sponsored or self-directed)
Benchmarking a Portfolio
Absolute performance: watch your portfolio over 1-5 years
Relative performance: compare your portfolio to indices annually or quarterly
S&P 500: large cap index
Russell 2000: small cap index
EAFE: international index
Bull market: share prices are rising, encourages buying
Bear market: share prices are falling, encourages selling
Types of Investments
Exchange-traded fun (ETF): fund which is traded like a stock, profits earned through appreciation or dividends
Lower management costs than mutual fund
Lower minimum investment than mutual fund
Stocks: by buying a share, you're buyig a piece of that company's assests
Bonds: loan given to company or government by an investor
High default risk = higher coupon rate
Government bonds usually have lower coupon rate
Corporate bonds usually have higher coupon rat
How was everybody else's weekend? Two of my best friends from high school were hosting one of their friends from college this weekend and showing him the sights in DC. We ended up going to Beefsteak and The Big Hunt in Dupont - both of which I highly recommend! As a tried and true carnivore, I didn't think I would like Beefsteak as much as I did! I got the kimchi-wa bowl with chicken sausage (and I substituted seaweed for the corn nuts) - it was absolutely delicious! Stand-up at The Big Hunt was also a hoot and I would definitely be interested in revisiting. This morning we grabbed some brunch at True Food Kitchen in the Mosaic District. I got the Mediterranean chopped salad which had probably the best vinaigrette that I have encountered in quite some time!
This coming week I'll be attending the Innovation and Future of Healthcare panel being hosted by Duke DC! The panel features Gregory Daniel, PhD; Leslie Atkinson; Karen Joynt, MD, MPH, MD; and Justin Klein, MD, JD who will be discussing how advances in medicine and technology continually revolutionize the healthcare landscape. I"m most interested in hearing about how innovation is changing the delivery and management of care! Next weekend I'll be attending the TEDxAmericanUniversity event at the Katzen Recital Hall. Wishing everybody a good week - can you believe February is almost over already?
