No Gifts for Uncle Sam This Year
This is no time for sharing.
With stocks and bonds posting modest returns this year, your investments probably haven't made you a whole lot of money.
My advice: Don't make matters worse by being overly generous with Uncle Sam.
Fact is, if you are careless, you could easily lose 25% or more of each year's investment gains to taxes.
But if you are careful, Uncle Sam could collect next to nothing. Like the idea of being careful? Here's how to slash your portfolio's tax bill.
Taking Shelter
Every year, your top financial priority should be funding your employer's 401(k) plan. Once you have invested at least enough to get your employer's full matching contribution, consider funneling additional dollars into either a tax-deductible individual retirement account or a Roth IRA.
A 401(k) and regular IRA will give you tax-deferred growth, while a Roth's gains should be tax-free. But no matter which account you are dealing with, you can invest without worrying about the immediate tax consequences.
That makes these retirement accounts a great place to buy tax-inefficient investments like real-estate investment trusts, taxable bonds and actively managed stock funds.
You wouldn't want to hold these investments in your regular taxable account, because bond interest, most REIT dividends and the short-term capital gains from your stock funds will all be taxed as ordinary income. That can mean losing as much as 35% to federal taxes.
Tax-sheltered accounts are also the best place to trade, because you don't have to report these transactions on your tax return or pay taxes on any realized gains. For instance, I like to tweak my portfolio every year or so, to bring my various mutual-fund holdings back into line with my target portfolio percentages. This "rebalancing" could trigger a fistful of taxes, but I sidestep the problem by making the trades inside my retirement accounts.
Delaying Tactics
What if you have maxed out on your 401(k) and IRA and you are looking for additional tax-deferred growth? You could buy a variable annuity.
To be sure, variable annuities are renowned for their hefty expenses and rough tax treatment. Still, they can be a decent investment. But to improve your odds of earning healthy returns, stick with low-cost variable annuities, such as those offered by New York's TIAA-CREF and Vanguard Group of Malvern, Pa.
In addition, buy a variable annuity only if you plan to pursue tax-inefficient strategies, such as buying bonds and REITs or regularly rebalancing your portfolio. As critics point out, all taxable withdrawals from a variable annuity are dunned as ordinary income, rather than at the lower dividend or capital-gains tax rate.
If you are employing tax-inefficient strategies, however, that doesn't matter. Why not?
With these tax-inefficient strategies, your gains will likely be taxed as ordinary income, whether you invest through a taxable account or a variable annuity. But with the taxable account, you will have to pay the taxes right away, while the variable annuity will give you tax-deferred growth.
Gunning for Gains
On the other hand, if you have plenty of tax-deferred money between your IRA and your 401(k), I would skip the variable annuity and instead focus on tax-efficient strategies in your taxable account.
Your goal: Use your taxable account to generate long-term capital gains, which are now taxed at a maximum 15%, and try to put off realizing those gains for as long as possible.
To that end, you might use your taxable account to buy and hold tax-managed stock funds, stock-index funds and individual stocks. All three strategies should result in modest annual tax bills.
Some people take this one step further, arguing that you should avoid dividend-paying stocks and stock funds in your taxable account, because those dividends are immediately taxable. But I am not sure this is good advice.
After all, dividends are currently taxed at a maximum 15%, so having a little dividend income doesn't seem so terrible. In addition, if you shun dividend-paying stocks, you will have an unbalanced portfolio that is skewed toward volatile growth stocks and away from lower-risk, dividend-paying companies.
As you buy stocks for your taxable account, keep in mind that not all dividends qualify for the 15% rate. For instance, as I indicated above, REIT dividends are usually taxed as ordinary income -- and thus REITs are best held in a tax-sheltered account.
Betting on Bonds
Anxious to hold down their tax bills, many investors load up on tax-free municipal bonds in their taxable account. But I don't think this is as sensible as it seems.
For starters, buying munis isn't a smart strategy unless you are in a lofty income-tax bracket. More important, there is a better way to get bond exposure. My suggestion: Bypass munis and instead purchase taxable bonds in your 401(k) or IRA. That way, you will get the higher yield from the taxable bonds, but you won't have to pay the tax bill right away. Meanwhile, use your taxable account to pursue the sort of tax-efficient stock strategies mentioned above.
Many folks, however, balk at this advice. They prefer to hold their bonds in their taxable account, so they can quickly convert them to cash if they get hit with a financial emergency.
By contrast, cashing out bonds from a retirement account can be costly indeed, because any retirement-account withdrawal may get slapped with both income taxes and a 10% tax penalty.
But it is easy enough to get around this problem. Suppose you suddenly need $10,000 and you want to cash out some of the bonds in your retirement account.
To get the necessary money without triggering a big tax bill, sell $10,000 of stocks in your taxable account, while simultaneously moving $10,000 from bonds to stocks within your retirement account. Result: Your total stock holdings are unchanged, you have trimmed your bond holdings by $10,000 and you have yourself $10,000 in cash.
今年不给山姆大叔进贡
现在可不是共享收入的时候。
由于今年股市和债市回报平平，你的投资可能没有赚到可观的一笔钱。
我的建议是：不要对山姆大叔过于慷慨，以免把事情弄得更加糟糕。
实际情况是，你一不小心，每年25%甚至更多的投资所得就充当了税金。
但如果你谨慎小心，山姆大叔可能什么也收不到。对这个小心行事的主意有兴趣吧？下面我就告诉你如何削减投资组合中的税务。
选择避税投资
每年，你最优先考虑的理财目标应该是充实在雇主那里的401(k)计划。一旦你在雇主建立的401(k)计划里按照最低要求金额投入了资金，就要考虑让额外的钱进入可减税个人退休帐户，或者进入罗斯个人退休金帐户(Roth IRA)。
401(k)和普通的个人退休帐户给你带来的资金增长要产生延期税金，而罗斯帐户的增长则是免税的。但无论你面对的是哪类帐户，你在投资时都无须担心立即产生的税务后果。
出于这一原因，这些退休金帐户成了购买非省税(tax-inefficient)投资工具的最佳选择，这些投资包括房地产投资信托，可征税的债券和处于积极管理之下的股票基金。
你不会愿意把这些投资放在常规的可征税帐户中，因为债券利息、大多数房地产投资信托的红利和你股票基金的短期资本利得都将作为一般收入予以征税。这意味著你将会遭受35%的联邦税收损失。
使用免税帐户也是上佳选择，因为你不需要在纳税申报单上报告这些交易，也不需要就任何实际的所得纳税。比如，我喜欢大约每年对自己的投资组合进行一次调整，让各种共同基金重新达到我在投资组合中设定的目标比率。这种“重新配平”可能引发大量税收，但我通过在退休帐户内的调整避免了这个问题。
选择推迟交税的投资工具
如果你的401(k)计划和个人退休帐户上的数额都已经用到了最高限度，而你又在寻找其他延期交税的投资工具，这时该怎么办呢？你可以购买浮动年金。
诚然，浮动年金以费用较多和税收较高而著称，但它仍然不失为一种很好的投资。不过，为了提高获得良好收益的几率，你要坚持购买低成本的浮动年金，如纽约的美国教师退休基金会(TIAA-CREF)和宾夕法尼亚州Malvern的Vanguard Group的浮动年金。
另外，你只有在采取非省税战略时再购买浮动年金，这些战略包括购买债券，房地产投资信托，以及定期对投资组合进行重新调整。正如批评家所指出的，从浮动年金中提取任何可征税的所得，都被视作一般收入，而不是按照红利或资本利得的较低税率征税。
然而，如果你采取非省税策略就没有关系。为什么呢？
实行非省税策略，你的所得很可能被作为一般收入征税，无论你是通过可征税帐户还是浮动年金进行投资。但如果你采用的是可征税帐户，你将不得不立即交税，而浮动年金给你带来的收益则是延期交税的。
盯住资本利得
另一方面，如果在个人退休帐户和401(k)计划中有充足的延期交税资金，我就不会购买浮动年金，而是去关注可征税帐户中的省税策略。
你的目标是：用可征税帐户创造目前最高税率为15%的长期资本利得，并且这些资本利得提取的时间越晚越好。
为了达到这一目的，你大概要用可征税帐户买进并持有处于税收管理之下的股票基金，股票指数基金和个股。所有这些投资带来的年度纳税额都不高。
有人考虑得更多些，声称你的可征税帐户中应该避免买入分红型的股票和股票基金，因为这些分红是立即征税的。但我不能确保这是一条好的建议。
不要忘了，目前红利的最高税率是15%，因此有一些红利收入并不是件多么可怕的事。另外，如果你避免买入分红股票，你的投资组合就将失去平衡，向动荡不定的股票这一边倾斜，而缺少风险较低的分红型公司股票。
当你在可征税帐户中购买股票时，不要忘记，并非所有的红利都符合最高税率15%的要求。比如我前面说到的，房地产投资信托往往就被作为一般收入征税，因此最好在免税帐户中持有。
把赌注押在债券上
许多投资者避税心切，在可征税帐户中大量买进免税的市政债券，但我认为这种做法并不象看上去那么明智。
对刚刚起步的投资者来说，除非你必须交纳大量的所得税，否则购买市政公债并不是聪明的选择。更重要的是，购买债券还有一条更好的途径。我的建议是，不要购买市政公债，而在你的401(k)计划或个人退休帐户中购买可征税债券。这样，你将从可征税债券中获得更高收益率，而不需要立即支付税金。同时，用你的可征税帐户购买前面提到的省税的股票。
然而，许多人对这项建议退避三舍。他们更喜欢把债券放在可征税帐户中，这样如果遇到紧急情况，就能立即将其变现。
比较而言，将退休金帐户中的债券提取出来变现代价是十分高昂的，因为任何从退休金帐户中提取的现金都可能既要交纳个人所得税，又要交纳10%的税收罚款。
但是这个问题很容易解决。设想你突然需要1万美元，因而想将退休金帐户中的债券变现。
要想获得必要现金而无须引发高额税款，你可以抛出可征税帐户中1万美元的股票，同时在退休金帐户中将1万美元的债券转为股票。这样操作的结果是，你的股票总持有量不变，而你削减了1万美元的债券持有量，同时自己拿到了1万美元现金。
