Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

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AlaskaTeach
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Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by AlaskaTeach »

I was a victim of my current family of fund's success a long time ago. I remember exactly where I was when I picked up the Sunday newspaper and my fund, Janus 20, recorded a ridiculous 73% gain during the calendar year that just ended, 1999 or 1998, almost sure 99. Sure enough, most people were probably like myself, not knowing when to get off, so kept going.

At some point during the 80s or 90s, Janus pulled off what I consider to be the genius marketing move of all time, offering a lifetime of free maintenance fees for a one time payment of $100. Without paying the $100, I would have paid 10 or 15$ every year.

Janus became Janus-Henderson and the only thing that got my attention to stay was the hiring of some guru, probably a bond guru, which should not have impressed me because I'm not into bonds at all.

It's well past time to move on. At age 58, I want to stay diversified, and the two funds I have with Janus are:

Janus Henderson Forty Fund
Janus Henderson Global Tech

These are my two very aggressive parts of my portfolio. They are both traditional IRAs

I also have one year's worth of IRA contributions in a money market because I am unsure where to put it right now.

Fidelity has an IRA bonus of $100. I don't know much about T Rowe Price.

Opinions?

Thanks
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dogagility
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by dogagility »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 12:50 am Janus Henderson Forty Fund
Janus Henderson Global Tech

These are my two very aggressive parts of my portfolio. They are both traditional IRAs

I also have one year's worth of IRA contributions in a money market because I am unsure where to put it right now.

Fidelity has an IRA bonus of $100. I don't know much about T Rowe Price.

Opinions?
I use Fidelity for DIY investing and "banking". Great platform.

If you want advice on how to invest your IRA holdings, it would be best if the forum had information on your entire portfolio in this format. viewtopic.php?t=6212
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22twain
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by 22twain »

I've never used Fidelity, but many people here do, and their customer service and online interface seem to be highly regarded. My taxable and Roth accounts are at T Rowe Price.

If you think you might want to invest in ETFs or (shudder) individual stocks, TRP's brokerage site is actually run by Pershing. It's separate from the TRP mutual fund site, but linked to it automatically. It makes for a slightly clunky, bifurcated experience. My ETFs are on the brokerage side, but the settlement funds (money market) are on the mutual-fund side.

I started with TRP mutual funds a long time ago because I remembered that my father used to have an account with them. Then I switched to Vanguard ETFs. I decided to hold them at TRP, and deal with the separate brokerage interface, instead of opening a new account elsewhere and transferring my money. If I were starting from scratch now, I'd probably use Fidelity instead.
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RetiredCSProf
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by RetiredCSProf »

I have funds at both Fidelity and TRP. I have been invested with both of them for about four decades. If I had to merge them, I would move from TRP into Fidelity.

I find Fidelity to be more flexible and I like that they have a local office. In general, there are short waits on phone calls and the reps are usually knowledgable. I am able to take care of most of my transactions online.

You can transfer your Janus funds in-kind into Fidelity. You can hold TRP funds and Janus funds at Fidelity with no transaction fees. Fidelity has transaction fees on Vanguard funds.

The biggest perk that I have from TRP is a free subscription to Morningstar. I have done really well with several of TRP's actively managed funds. They have index funds, as well, but not considered their strength. TRP has gone through some "growing pains" -- for a while, it was taking me an hour to reach a rep on the phone, and then it was dicey about whether the rep knew what they were doing. But things have improved. Last year, they updated their software to allow me to take Roth conversions online instead of having to call over the phone.
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by mkc »

RetiredCSProf wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 11:07 am I have funds at both Fidelity and TRP. I have been invested with both of them for about four decades. If I had to merge them, I would move from TRP into Fidelity.
Ditto.

We have TRP solely for CapAppreciation (PRWCX/TRAIX) which we've held for over 20 years. Brokerage account and new money is Fidelity. HSAs are Fidelity.
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Wiggums
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by Wiggums »

I have an account at both brokers. I prefer Fidelity over T Rowe Price.
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pointyhairedboss
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by pointyhairedboss »

While both companies are capable, Fidelity's is the no brainer choice imo. They offer a far greater range of financial options. Cash management accounts, etf, stocks, fixed income, active funds, index funds, bill pay, credit cards, and local offices for assistance.
ThreeDB
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by ThreeDB »

My experience matches that of the members who commented before me. Both companies are capable, but Fidelity has an edge in breadth of offerings and online experience.

For those reasons I recommend Fidelity over TRP unless you plan to invest in TRP funds. In that case I recommend that you invest directly with TRP.
retire2022
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by retire2022 »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 12:50 am At some point during the 80s or 90s, Janus pulled off what I consider to be the genius marketing move of all time, offering a lifetime of free maintenance fees for a one time payment of $100.
I also like you, I had given Janus my $100 lifetime contribution, I closed my account in 2020 (age 60), I don't regret it at all.

I found the 34 years of investing, one win some, lose some, I am still ahead 2.39 million.

I had accounts with TRowe Price, they have good products and a good website, I transferred over all assets to Vanguard.

But If I had to pick, Fidelity would be my choice.
Topic Author
AlaskaTeach
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by AlaskaTeach »

retire2022 wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 10:06 pm
AlaskaTeach wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 12:50 am At some point during the 80s or 90s, Janus pulled off what I consider to be the genius marketing move of all time, offering a lifetime of free maintenance fees for a one time payment of $100.
I also like you, I had given Janus my $100 lifetime contribution, I closed my account in 2020 (age 60), I don't regret it at all.

I found the 34 years of investing, one win some, lose some, I am still ahead 2.39 million.

I had accounts with TRowe Price, they have good products and a good website, I transferred over all assets to Vanguard.

But If I had to pick, Fidelity would be my choice.
Thanks a bunch. Great to hear from someone else who enjoyed the $100 maintenance fee transaction.
Topic Author
AlaskaTeach
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by AlaskaTeach »

Thanks to everyone for replying. I had forgotten Fidelity has local offices as well. I used to see a Fidelity building in Austin TX near a highway, I think.

It will be Fidelity.
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ruralavalon
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by ruralavalon »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 12:50 am I was a victim of my current family of fund's success a long time ago. I remember exactly where I was when I picked up the Sunday newspaper and my fund, Janus 20, recorded a ridiculous 73% gain during the calendar year that just ended, 1999 or 1998, almost sure 99. Sure enough, most people were probably like myself, not knowing when to get off, so kept going.

At some point during the 80s or 90s, Janus pulled off what I consider to be the genius marketing move of all time, offering a lifetime of free maintenance fees for a one time payment of $100. Without paying the $100, I would have paid 10 or 15$ every year.

Janus became Janus-Henderson and the only thing that got my attention to stay was the hiring of some guru, probably a bond guru, which should not have impressed me because I'm not into bonds at all.

It's well past time to move on. At age 58, I want to stay diversified, and the two funds I have with Janus are:

Janus Henderson Forty Fund
Janus Henderson Global Tech

These are my two very aggressive parts of my portfolio. They are both traditional IRAs

I also have one year's worth of IRA contributions in a money market because I am unsure where to put it right now.

Fidelity has an IRA bonus of $100. I don't know much about T Rowe Price.

Opinions?

Thanks
T. Rowe Price is a very highly rated fund company, Morningstar, The Best Fund Companies and Their Ratings. Only 5 fund companies are top rated, T. Rowe Price is 1 of the 5.

T. Rowe Price offers some worthwhile funds. Wiki article, T. Rowe Price. They offer several index funds with fairly low expense ratios.

My personal preference would be Vanguard, Fidelity or Schwab (in that order), because they offer larger selections of very diversified index funds with very low expense ratios.

I would NOT make this decision based on a $100 bonus. That's a good marketing ploy, but not a good reason for picking a company to invest with.
"Everything should be as simple as it is, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein | Wiki article link: Bogleheads® investment philosophy
sycamore
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by sycamore »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 12:50 am Opinions?
(I was writing this up before you posted you're going with Fidelity... I'll post it anyway in case there's anything of value for you.)

I would take the time to learn about several independent decisions you need to make.

1) What asset allocation do I want for my portfolio?
How much do you want to invest in asset classes like stocks, bonds, and/or cash for your retirement portfolio? This question is not about which fund manager to use, or which brokerage to use.

2) What kinds of funds should I use for my asset classes?
The typical Boglehead approach is to use low-cost broad-market index funds.

3) Which specific fund manager should I use to manage my stocks, bonds, and/or cash?
This is easy to do if you choose index funds, and we can give you suggestions if you like. But it's much harder if you choose actively managed funds like Janus Henderson or T. Rowe Price. There's so many choices and no way to know which will be "best".

4) Where should I hold my investments?
You can choose between:
- a brokerage account lets you hold all kinds of investments: mutual funds, ETFs, individual stocks and bonds, brokered CDs, etc. This doesn't mean you have to trade all of those; you can hold only mutual funds if that's your preference.

Sometimes you may have to pay a transaction fee to trade a fund at a brokerage. Example: Fidelity brokerages charges a fee for Vanguard mutual funds. Likewise Vanguard brokerage charges a fee for Fidelity mutual funds. Sometimes a brokerage establishes a relationship with a fund manager, and their funds get special "no transaction fee" (NTF) treatment. You'll have to investigate each brokerage's fee schedule to see if your desired fund manager is NTF or not.

- a "mutual fund only" account which means you hold an account directly with the fund manager. You can't hold other investments like ETFs or bonds, or mutual funds from another fund manager.

It appears you're used to using the latter where you have an account directly with the fund manager. The investment industry favors the brokerage model going forward. That doesn't mean you should use it. Just know about the pros and cons.

Some of the brokerages have local offices, like Fidelity and Schwab. This is important if you need or want face to face interaction for customer support.

In my opinion you should (1) open an IRA account with one of the major retail brokerages: Fidelity, Vanguard, ETrade, Schwab.
2) sell your Janus funds, and rollover the proceeds to your new brokerage IRA
3) use the money in your new brokerage IRA to buy a low-cost US "total stock market" index fund. Such a fund is aggressive enough in my opinion. (There's little to be gained by going after some magic 40 stocks or "global tech" stocks.) Let us know if you prefer mutual funds or ETFs, and which brokerage you prefer. Then we can suggest specific stock funds.

As a side note, brokerages often compete for new customers by way of a "transfer bonus". Schwab and ETrade are the usual places for bonus offers. Vanguard doesn't offer bonuses. Fidelity's bonuses are usually pretty small, like $100. If you're going to open a new brokerage account anyway, might as well get a bonus for it.
Topic Author
AlaskaTeach
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by AlaskaTeach »

I haven't done anything yet, and that is number two on my summer list after getting a summer job . I had the feeling with all of the discussions about ETFs that the mutual fund model I was using was out of style, so I am not surprised by this info.

I am also interested in income ETFs at some point, probably when I retire. During retirement, I will probably be something like 80/20, as in 80% income by way of pension and 20% aggressive growth/income ETFs. But that is about at least 4 years from now.
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ruralavalon
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by ruralavalon »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Tue May 30, 2023 2:53 pm I haven't done anything yet, and that is number two on my summer list after getting a summer job . I had the feeling with all of the discussions about ETFs that the mutual fund model I was using was out of style, so I am not surprised by this info.

I am also interested in income ETFs at some point, probably when I retire. During retirement, I will probably be something like 80/20, as in 80% income by way of pension and 20% aggressive growth/income ETFs. But that is about at least 4 years from now.
In my opinion regular mutual funds are not "out of style". At Vanguard ETFs are just another share class of the mutual funds.

Regular mutual funds have their advantages over exchange traded funds (ETFs), the choice is largely a matter of personal preference.

My personal preference is regular mutual funds for simplicity and convenience. With regular mutual funds the trading mechanics are simpler, it's easier to set up automatic investment of new contributions, and it's easier to set up automatic reinvestment of distributions.

Wiki article, ETFs vs Mutual Funds.

I suggest that you rollover your IRA(s) to a low cost fund provider like Vanguard, Fidelity or Schwab. Then switch to using very diversified index funds with very low expense ratios.
AlaskaTeach wrote: Thu May 25, 2023 8:25 am Thanks to everyone for replying. I had forgotten Fidelity has local offices as well. I used to see a Fidelity building in Austin TX near a highway, I think.

It will be Fidelity.

Since you prefer Fidelity, you should read the wiki article about them. That article suggests Fidelity index funds to consider using.
"Everything should be as simple as it is, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein | Wiki article link: Bogleheads® investment philosophy
retire2022
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by retire2022 »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Thu May 25, 2023 8:22 am
Thanks a bunch. Great to hear from someone else who enjoyed the $100 maintenance fee transaction.
Alaska

I had Janus Global Technology, and the Vanguard Transfer specialist said it could not be transferred in kind, that is when the actual stock funds get transferred to receiving account. I had sold it and transferred cash from Janus's Money Market to Vanguard.

At Vanguard I had set up a receiving pretax Traditional IRA and brought VGT (ETF), a tech equivalent fund.

ETF's are no big deal if you have experience buying and selling equities (stocks) Mutual funds are priced after 4:00PM NAV.
Topic Author
AlaskaTeach
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by AlaskaTeach »

retire2022 wrote: Tue May 30, 2023 7:16 pm
AlaskaTeach wrote: Thu May 25, 2023 8:22 am
Thanks a bunch. Great to hear from someone else who enjoyed the $100 maintenance fee transaction.
Alaska

I had Janus Global Technology, and the Vanguard Transfer specialist said it could not be transferred in kind, that is when the actual stock funds get transferred to receiving account. I had sold it and transferred cash from Janus's Money Market to Vanguard.

At Vanguard I had set up a receiving pretax Traditional IRA and brought VGT (ETF), a tech equivalent fund.

ETF's are no big deal if you have experience buying and selling equities (stocks) Mutual funds are priced after 4:00PM NAV.
Thanks 22, so I am new to this process. I did not realize I could get the "transfer in kind". Ha, I've been a Janus guy my whole investing life. Once I begin the process of moving money, do I call Fidelity and ask them which funds can be transferred in kind?
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by retire2022 »

AlaskaTeach wrote: Tue May 30, 2023 9:42 pm
Thanks 22, so I am new to this process. I did not realize I could get the "transfer in kind". Ha, I've been a Janus guy my whole investing life. Once I begin the process of moving money, do I call Fidelity and ask them which funds can be transferred in kind?
RetiredCSProf suggested the "in-kind" option as well.
RetiredCSProf wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 11:07 am You can transfer your Janus funds in-kind into Fidelity.
Since they are the Traditional IRA, you could do a pull from Fidelity as long the account is setup correctly, matching names, social security number and corresponding address.

Please read IRS publication 590a on transfers page 20 to 22 rollover chart as a reference.

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p590a.pdf

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/rollover_chart.pdf

Make sure you download any electronic records before you close the Janus account, get all of 1099-r and any other Janus records.
Topic Author
AlaskaTeach
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Re: Fidelity vs T Rowe Price?

Post by AlaskaTeach »

retire2022 wrote: Tue May 30, 2023 10:04 pm
AlaskaTeach wrote: Tue May 30, 2023 9:42 pm
Thanks 22, so I am new to this process. I did not realize I could get the "transfer in kind". Ha, I've been a Janus guy my whole investing life. Once I begin the process of moving money, do I call Fidelity and ask them which funds can be transferred in kind?
RetiredCSProf suggested the "in-kind" option as well.
RetiredCSProf wrote: Wed May 24, 2023 11:07 am You can transfer your Janus funds in-kind into Fidelity.
Since they are the Traditional IRA, you could do a pull from Fidelity as long the account is setup correctly, matching names, social security number and corresponding address.

Please read IRS publication 590a on transfers page 20 to 22 rollover chart as a reference.

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p590a.pdf

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/rollover_chart.pdf

Make sure you download any electronic records before you close the Janus account, get all of 1099-r and any other Janus records.
Thanks a bunch! This is my go to for moving to Fidelity.
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