Good afternoon thank you for always Providing such helpful information. I was wondering if you could offer me some clarity
I have a Roth IRA and a Traditional IRA
I recently open a brokerage account for my Roth IRA to purchase individual stocks and ETFs
Question: can I do the same with my Traditional IRA
My Traditional IRA are 401(k) plans i rolled over from former employers
Welcome @Headcoachead!
Yes! If you have a Rollover/Traditional IRA that is full of 401k plans you rolled over into it, you can move that to any brokerage you want (you would keep it in a pre-tax/Traditional/Rollover IRA account). You likely wouldn’t make any new contributions to that account. New contributions would be made to the Roth/Contributory IRA. But inside of your Traditional/Rollover IRA you can buy/sell/trade to your heart’s content, and none of it would be a taxable event. Of course, I recommend buying and holding index funds, not a lot of trading, but you certainly are allowed to.
Sorry for all the slashes in the account names… sometimes people refer to them by different names. For example, a “Rollover” and a “Traditional” IRA both often mean the same thing: a pre-tax IRA. The word rollover just indicates it was transferred from a 401k, and also means you may be able to transfer it back to a 401k in the future if you want.
Is that what you were asking? Where is your Traditional IRA right now? Is it not invested in stocks and ETFs?
Yes, that’s exactly what I was asking. My traditional is with Vanguard. Right recently reallocated my funds to the following index funds: VFIAX (70%), VDADX (15%), VIGAX (15%).
My goal was to get the biggest bang at the lowest expense ratio
0.04 - VFIAX
0.08 - VDADX
0.05 - VIGAX
The thoughts I’m going back and forth with is if I want to replacement an index fund with an Amazon or Google.
Inside of my Roth I am currently 100% stocks with the goal of getting that account 50/50 stocks (high quality tech stocks) and ETF
I’m eager to hear your feedback