Comments on Triaging My Way To Financial Success: Capital Losses in the Tax-Free Savings Account (TF...

It is interesting to me that people seem more conc...

2009-07-02T14:29:47.278-04:00

It is interesting to me that people seem more concerned about being able to write off their capital losses for tax purposes rather than protecting the capital gains they should be getting... this seems like completely backwards thinking! To me, investing is not about trying to get the biggest tax refund by the end of the year.

The goal of investing is to make profits and grow your money. That being the case, in a growth portfolio, any tax benefit from losses should be more than outweighed by the tax penalites from your capital gains. You're only offsetting your tax burden if you are breaking even in the account. If that is all you're doing then I think you need to be more concerned with your lousy investment strategy rather than how much you're paying in taxes!

In addition, it seems to me that the more heavily traded account would benefit the most from the tax shelter because of high turnover. Contrast this with investments that you intend to hold for years that then receive less tax penalties on its growth overtime.

Thus, using your TFSA for a trading account seems like a reasonable idea to me.

lol. there is a clear difference between the cost ...

2009-07-01T22:38:44.628-04:00

lol.
there is a clear difference between the cost of doing business and losses.
i think of it like a business and something like the idea of 'opportunity cost', you have to be willing to put your time and money in (educating yourself, finding a proper advisor, paying their fees) to generate revenue in the first place.
once your revenue exceeds your expenses every year, you are always earning a tidy profit (aka. a sustainable business model) and (wrt to personal finance) are likely rich and retired. this is actually the opposite of money just evaporating in your investment account because of opaque macroeconimc forces.
losses are unanticipated downturns that result from naivety or overconfidence. expenses (like fees and taxes) are fully knowable in advance and hence i wouldn't classify it as a 'loss' unless i was feeling extremely miserly.
maybe it's just my view of paying for quality.
and i did experience losses regularly when i followed conventional wisdom and invested heavily in the stock market- i got sick of it so i changed my perspective and strategy, since then it's been up up and into my wallet.

I don't think that line is either incorrect or mis...

2009-07-01T00:29:06.949-04:00

I don't think that line is either incorrect or misleading. The fact is that no investor experiences zero losses no matter their skill, strategy or luck. Whether you look at fees, inflation, price loss, etc. Readers can make the judgement for themselves, but I think my comment is both fair and accurate. Have you never lost any money while investing to any source?

"Capital losses, when investing, are inevitable an...

2009-06-30T20:24:46.527-04:00

"Capital losses, when investing, are inevitable and every investor should realize this"

oh man, don't know where to begin with that line.
who was the sage that convinced you of that 'truth'?