Thread regarding Wells Fargo & Co. layoffs

You should see 3% just from WFC dividends. Of course, you could invest in something like payx and make almost that in dividends and have some capital gains too.

Yes! It’s time to buy stocks. Don’t sell shares of your stock funds now…you paid way more for them than they are worth today. Sell stable value and buy large cap and small cap weekly until you see the S & P 500 hit 3250. Then buy more and wait for a massive rally. This could take months, but it’s going to happen. You are not retiring tomorrow so you can take some risks.

hsd+1iStNIyl

The one caveat to the after-tax version being the better option if you think your tax rates will be higher in retirement, is that you also have to consider how much you can afford to contribute currently to either. For instance, if you could afford to give the max annual contribution pre-tax, but would have to give 5-6k less annually with the post-tax to still have enough take-home to meet your needs, you might still be better off with the pre-tax because of the opportunity cost of not having that extra 5-6k invested compounded over the years. It could very well outweigh whatever increase in taxes you’re paying then.

If anything, this is the time you should be contributing MORE. investing when the market is sucking is always hard, it's not supposed to be a comforting environment during a bear market. Just don't look at your balance and keep contributing and you will thank yourself in 10 to 30 years.

Not financial advice of course! But don't sell the bottom.

LMAO @ the gold bug.

Watch them start hawking crypto next.

Take the penalty and get your money OUT of any 401k plan or the stock market and buy PHYSICAL SILVER or GOLD. Physical means you have it in hand. Get a small safe and keep it at home. It will go up exponentially very soon and YOU will be in charge of your future.

I remember when this site was about layoff news and other topics related to layoffs. Now, some what to get free investment / retirement advice here. You get what you pay for.

Read investopedia and kipplingers, both online, and learn some simple strategies.

Have you ever heard the phrase "buy low, sell high"? How do you ever expect to get good returns of you stop buying when stocks are down? When markets tank it's the perfect time to buy. Just make sure to DCA so you don't catch falling knives.

My dad fled to safety prior to the dotcom bubble bursting, which was admittedly luck. Market tanked, and his response wasn't lucky at all, it was calculated. He went ALL in. Shaved about 5 years off his retirement date when the market came storming back.

Thank you for all of the advice. I appreciate it.

Keep contributing 6% and think of the company match as a 100% ROI. Keep your money in a stable value fund if stock market fluctuations make you anxious. You will miss out on gains when the market is up but you will know exactly what you have and can plan accordingly. You won’t get rich quick but you will sleep at night.

@hsd+1iStNIyl

Sound advice mathematically, but you need to take into account psychology as well. I see so many people underspend in retirement due to having a large amount of their wealth in a traditional IRA. Knowing that every dollar they take out will be taxed makes it harder for them to spend it psychologically. If that money was all in an after-tax qualified account instead, they’d spend it much more freely.

Never stop the 6%, that is free money! The market is down and this is the time to make the most money long term. Honestly, having a million in retirement is as easy as being steadfast and consistent with the 6% over many years. That is one thing I can say wells has done for me and I’m in a mediocre pay job. Don’t stop contributing!

If your tax rate is higher now than it will be at retirement, pretax is the way to go.

Take into consideration taxes will probably go up in the future to fight off inflation and keep our current AA+ credit rating.

Think of it this way: because the market as a whole has performed poorly over the past year (more specifically YTD 2022), now is an amazing buying opportunity.

I would recommend ja--ing up your contributions.

The other thing I would recommend anyone do is make after-tax contributions rather than pre-tax contributions. It’ll hurt your current take home a tiny bit but the long term benefits when you retire will be incredible when you can roll that into a Roth IRA and take that money out tax-free

I changed companies recently. You should have seen the abject horror on their faces when I asked about their 401k and shared how it works here. My new employer matches 6% of your contributions and if you don’t contribute, they deposit 3% per paycheck into your 401k because they want people to save for retirement.

So, if you contribute you get the 6% and if you don’t, they still give you 3%! They also match every pay period in CASH and it is from your very first paycheck. So I didn’t sign up for 401k until paycheck two, forgot how much new hire paperwork there is, so I got a 3% deposit and then the 6% match on the second check.

Look around people, there are companies that will treat you like an asset and not an expense.

your contributions to 401K are pre-tax, AND you get the match. It's simple arithmetic - in order for you to do better than a 401k, even if the 401K has zero appreciation, you'd have to get a return that makes up for your tax rate (20+ % annually, and the lack of match). No way.

What your money earns in the 401K is up to you/your investment choices.

It's just a basic fact of financial management. Any FA will tell you the same. Always max out your 401K, and pick what you invest in relative to your risk tolerance and time to retirement.

The annual risk-free match and interest on the stable value fund plus tax deferral on top is extremely hard to beat in an after-tax account.

It also creates discipline of deferring consumption. If you hate volatility you can use a target date fund, although that one is also down, but should do better than stable value over the long term.

Good luck

Buy when there's blood in the streets.

Market goes up and down, right now it is down. Can't speak to specific funds, but in the long run you will never get to a comfortable retirement putting everything in savings accounts. And the company match is free money, you can always put it into the stable value fund rather than passing it up.

You are missing out if you don't get the full company match. That doubles your money. You can always put it in the Stable Value Fund and not risk it, but don't miss out on the company match. Put in the 6% and get the 6% match.

The Empower 401K is NOT worth it for me. The company match is NOT worth it for me, either. I would’ve lost a lot of money if I listened to the Empower financial consultants.
I get 2.15% APY with my Synchrony.com HSY, alone.
I’m also doing almost 12% with my high yield dividend stocks, even with the market down.
Seek out a good FA you can trust for solid advice…