Author Topic: Long term investement in Europe  (Read 14515 times)

Armaron

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Long term investement in Europe
« on: June 27, 2013, 06:02:25 AM »
Hello from a European reader! Let me introduce myself and my financial situation a bit and then I'll ask your opinions about investment schemes I'm looking into. (All money descriptions will first be in EURO (€) and I'll put the value in USD ($) in brackets behind it. The conversion is done using Google "x euro to usd".)

So first of all about myself. I'm a 26yo guy who bought a house last year with my girlfriend. I have about €10 000 ($13 000) in my savings account and another €10 000 ($13 000) into a fund that is not accessible for the next 3 years. I can save between €200 and €400 ($260-520) each month, this depends on how much we go out, etc.

I want to keep about €5000 ($6500) in my savings for emergencies. The other €5000 ($6500) I want to invest and each time I have over €5000 "to spare", I'd like to pile that up in the investment that I'm looking for. Which I've boiled down to a couple of choices. Now my question to you is, what do you think of this strategy and would you take a look at the below Vanguard funds I'm looking to invest in and tell me which one you like best. My goal is to increase my wealth so that I have a bigger 'stach for later.

Either a bond
- https://global.vanguard.com/international/web/pdfs/A4_FA076EN.pdf
- https://global.vanguard.com/international/web/pdfs/A4_FA077EN.pdf

or a stock option
- https://global.vanguard.com/international/web/pdfs/A4_F9116EN.pdf
- https://global.vanguard.com/international/web/pdfs/A4_F9902EN.pdf

matchewed

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #1 on: June 27, 2013, 06:15:03 AM »
I'd personally go a stock option with the initial investment. You're young with a long timeframe ahead of you. Probably the European Fund, but I am not an expert on international investments so take that one with a grain of salt.

Then I'd make the contributions automatic for a fixed amount each month. That way you're not tempted to spend the 5k € that is building.

pom

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #2 on: June 27, 2013, 06:40:05 AM »
Hi Amaron,

What country are you in? That would help us a bit to give more specific advice.

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #3 on: June 27, 2013, 07:53:56 AM »
Hi Amaron,

What country are you in? That would help us a bit to give more specific advice.

I'm from Belgium. If anybody wants some extra info, ask and you shall receive. :)

@matchewed: in the last couple of years I have taken out only once from my savings account, it was for a vacation. And I only did that because my fee would've been covered by my normal, day to day account, but the invoice came a little late and my transfer to my savings account was a bit early. So I don't really consider that bad. Besides this one, I have been adding to my pile with every job I've had.
Except my first paycheck of full time work. I fully blew my very first paycheck. Took me effort too. When I was halfway through spending my money I was out of things to buy that I wanted. And I didn't want to buy useless crap that was just going to collect dust. Then my girlfriend said she wanted to go to a ball that her student club organised each year. So instead of driving myself and dressing in my 'fanciest' suit. I rented a tuxedo and got a limo to drive us and her friends. As I knew her only about 3 months back then, they were all impressed. But I can still see myself handing over my hard earned cash to the driver and thinking: "I can't imagine living my life like this", spending each penny every month.

matchewed

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #4 on: June 27, 2013, 08:00:17 AM »
That's fair. I still encourage automatic investment as it has other bonuses.

It is set and forget, it encourages a concept of paying your future you first, you can get on with the other things in your life you enjoy...etc.

But each to their own, you can keep it manual if that is what you want.

pom

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #5 on: June 27, 2013, 08:29:05 AM »
So we are neighbors.

My problem with the Vanguard funds that you have there is that their fees seem fairly high (0.50% for the European fund).

You might want to have a look at ishare or Lyxor, both have fees in the 0.20% range. On €5000, it makes a difference of €15 a year which is enough for 5 bottles of La Chouffe ;)

http://fr.ishares.com/fr/rc/produits/EXSA

Be careful with your bank, some charge a recordkeeping fee ("frais de garde"). Better buy the shares in a bank that does not have such fees.

Here is a list in French (it does not looke extensive, you may be able to find a better list):

http://www.comparebanque.be/fr/investir/comparez-les-tarifs-pour-les-ordres-de-bourse-en-ligne-euronext-bruxelles.html

Looks like ING and BNP are expensive.

Good Luck!






daverobev

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #6 on: June 27, 2013, 06:49:11 PM »
Deutsche Bank has some no-mer ETFs - I would assume they are listed across Europe; the one I have is XESX.L (London Stock Exchange). That is the 50 biggest Eurozone (I think) stocks, the STOXX 50E index.

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #7 on: June 28, 2013, 05:01:37 AM »
Deutsche Bank has some no-mer ETFs - I would assume they are listed across Europe; the one I have is XESX.L (London Stock Exchange). That is the 50 biggest Eurozone (I think) stocks, the STOXX 50E index.

Could you tell me a bit more about ETFs? I don't know what those are. Wikipedia sais they're Exchange-Trade Funds and that they look like stock. But what is the difference with stock?

pom

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #8 on: June 28, 2013, 07:47:00 AM »
I'll give you an exemple, it is easier that way.

Imagine they want to start a BEL20 ETF.

They simply put a bunch of money in a trust fund, lets say 10 million euros and buy all 20 components of the BEL20 in proportion with they weight. For exemple, InBev is 12.5% of the BEL20 so they buy for 1.25 million worth of InBev shares, then 1.35m€of GDF, 840k€ of Ageas ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BEL20

Then they sell 100 000 shares of the fund for 100€ each. These shares will trade the same way that other stocks trade, it is just that the "business" behind the trust fund that holds the BEL20 or, if you want a mix of the business of the 20 largest companies in Belgium. The ETF company makes money by charging a fee, for exemple 0.20% of the fund each year.

For the BEL20 you don't really need tan ETF because you could buy the 20 stocks separately but imagine the headache if you wanted to buy all of the stocks in Europe, there would be hundreds of stocks to keep track of ... it is easier and cheaper to just buy the ETF.

I don't know if I am very clear, don't hesitate to ask questions.

econoob

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #9 on: June 30, 2013, 02:09:33 PM »
Hi Amaron,

What country are you in? That would help us a bit to give more specific advice.

I'm from Belgium. If anybody wants some extra info, ask and you shall receive. :)

Are you sure you can invest in Vanguard funds from Belgium? I don't see it in the list of countries at https://global.vanguard.com/. I'm asking because I'm also interested in Vanguard too but my current country of residence is not in the list either.
« Last Edit: June 30, 2013, 02:12:45 PM by econoob »

cerberusss

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #10 on: June 30, 2013, 02:25:52 PM »
I don't know about Belgium, but In The Netherlands, you can buy Vanguard via online brokers. SNS Fundcoach is one of those.

Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #11 on: July 01, 2013, 12:26:49 AM »
I don't see it in the list of countries at https://global.vanguard.com/. I'm asking because I'm also interested in Vanguard too but my current country of residence is not in the list either.

Not sure it would make sense to invest in Vanguard, unless you can get a US account. Most of the interesting funds that MMM mentions are not available, and those that are have a much higher TER. At least in Germany Vanguard is more expensive than most of the competition.

For instance, I wanted to invest in REITs (seems like an interesting investment), but the fund isn't available. So I go the "build my own index fund" route that is discussed in another thread and just buy the top 20 by market value in the REIT index fund (https://personal.vanguard.com/us/FundsAllHoldings?FundId=0123&FundIntExt=INT&tableName=Equity&tableIndex=0&sort=marketValue&sortOrder=desc) which is over 50% of its net assets.

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #12 on: July 01, 2013, 12:45:06 AM »
Not sure it would make sense to invest in Vanguard, unless you can get a US account. Most of the interesting funds that MMM mentions are not available, and those that are have a much higher TER. At least in Germany Vanguard is more expensive than most of the competition.

For instance, I wanted to invest in REITs (seems like an interesting investment), but the fund isn't available. So I go the "build my own index fund" route that is discussed in another thread and just buy the top 20 by market value in the REIT index fund (https://personal.vanguard.com/us/FundsAllHoldings?FundId=0123&FundIntExt=INT&tableName=Equity&tableIndex=0&sort=marketValue&sortOrder=desc) which is over 50% of its net assets.

How do you buy stock directly from the market? Because I asked my bank and they do not allow it because people would buy stuff at random and then blame the bank for their decission. And do you need to have a minimum sum or can I just buy shares if I have enough money for one share? If so, I would just buy a sum of shares with my money from the BEL20.

@pom: you are very clear, that gave me a very good idea what ETF's are and why I would be interested in them.

@econoob: I believe I can buy them if I got to a Dutch bank in Belgium, RaboBank for example. It does help that one of the countries listed is a neighboring country and that banks have offices in both countries.

Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #13 on: July 01, 2013, 01:22:06 AM »
I've an account with an online broker (ING). It looks like a similar account is available in Belgium, as well (https://www.ing.be/en/retail/investments/shares-and-bonds/pages/shares.aspx?WT.xac=category). Then I transfer money from my checking account to an ING account and use that to buy shares. Buying requires finding the share by name, ISIN, or any other number and placing an order. Most brokers offer purchasing at various European stock exchanges, so you can buy pretty much any share that is traded in Europe.

The minimum purchase is one share which can be less than a cent for some shares, or up to 125000 Euros for Warren Buffet's company. In addition to the share price you pay transaction fees. Some of those are fixed, some of them are percentages of your order. That makes buying a single share less attractive. I typically invest around 1000 Euros at a time.

You might have to fill out a form that describes your experience with stocks. Since you are likely to have any practical experience, at all, you should get a disclaimer when you purchase shares stating that this purchase is outside of your experience, the bank won't recommend this and please confirm that you are absolutely sure you want to proceed. At least in Germany brokers also include learning material about various investing options. If you get the same, make sure to go through all of this stuff so that you buy the right stuff. For instance, you would probably be interested in shares, bonds and funds, but not interested in certificates, puts, calls, and similar gambling stuff.

HmtmC

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #14 on: July 01, 2013, 02:43:09 AM »
Not sure it would make sense to invest in Vanguard, unless you can get a US account. Most of the interesting funds that MMM mentions are not available, and those that are have a much higher TER. At least in Germany Vanguard is more expensive than most of the competition.

I have the same opinion. The funds which are offered in Europe (well speaking for Germany here) are fairly expensive. The ETFs that would offer quite a good value for money in my opinion (like https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/snapshot?FundId=0923&FundIntExt=INT and https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/snapshot?FundId=3141&FundIntExt=INT#tab=0 with TER 0.1% and 0.19% are close to impossible to purchase out of Germany. I contacted the three major direct brokers (for those who care: DAB, comdirect and cortalconsors) and with all three you can't purchase the ETFs (mainly because they are in USD and the volume is too low for them).

I guess I will have to stick to some other ETFs here which have higher TER (around 0.4%-0.5% at comstage, lyxor, ishares, db-xtrackers) and some are not even physically replicating the index...

Or does anyone have a better idea?!

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #15 on: July 01, 2013, 04:50:21 AM »
If you say you don't like what they're offering, do you have any suggestions in what I can invest? Or should I open an investing account and kind of hand pick my own portfolio?

HmtmC

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #16 on: July 01, 2013, 05:25:31 AM »
I said I don't like the funds they are offering here, which have relatively high expenses around 0.5% for what I wanted.

https://www.vanguardinvestments.de/content/de/en/investments/mutual-funds.shtml#pagetab4

I was looking for a global stock fund/ETF with low expense and dividend pay (i.e. no automatic reinvesting). I cannot tell you what is the best way to invest, but for me I decided not to go gobal, because I do not want to rely on only one region (i.e. only Europe or only the US).

So if I it was possible for me to buy the ETFs of Vanguard (see here: https://www.vanguardinvestments.de/portal/site/de/en/etf#funds_tab ) I would go ahead and do so.

I just wanted to add to the discussion, that at least for me it seems like it is not easy to purchase those ETFs in Germany - if at all possible... :(

I don't know about Belgium though.

Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #17 on: July 01, 2013, 05:35:50 AM »
The type of product offered by Vanguard isn't bad, it's only that Vanguard is more expensive and more difficult to use. You have to fax documents to Ireland, for instance. There are other options that replicate the same index (like MSCI World):

http://www.lyxoretf.be/fr/homebe/products/product/FD-LYX-MSIWO/category/7

that are easier to get (they should be available through any broker) and less expensive. 0.45% instead of 0.50% doesn't sound much, but that's 10% difference. The STOXX indexes are even cheaper like this one replicating the Euro STOXX 50 at 0.25% fees.

http://www.lyxoretf.be/fr/homebe/products/product/ETF-DJ-ST50/category/5


HmtmC

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #18 on: July 01, 2013, 02:05:41 PM »
I read on their homepage that you need to fax your orders to Ireland and I was shocked! I mean faxing orders, what year is it? 1993?! Can't believe this is how they set the business up in Europe!

I currently use an ETF on the MSCI with a TER of 0.4% which I also can buy without any fees over my online broker. That is sort of the best I found. The ETF from Vanguard (VT) was at 0.19% - that's why I wanted to switch to that. But as I said - not possible for me.

What bothers me most about the lyxor and the other is:
1) most of them do NOT pay out dividends, the automatically reinvest - and I want it the paid out and
2) most of the replicate the indexes synthetically, right? Not sure what this really means in terms of adding another structural risk to the investment. iShares might be different?!?
3) most of them focus on a "small" index (like the EuroStoxx50, the German DAX30, CAC40 etc.) and not a "full global market"

@Christof: how do you calculate 10% out of the difference between a 0.45% and 0.50%? and BTW: could you add the ISIN no for the ETFs you mentioned? Not only is my French a little bit rusty - the links also do not lead anywhere for me :)

« Last Edit: July 01, 2013, 02:07:28 PM by HmtmC »

Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #19 on: July 01, 2013, 09:10:46 PM »
Thanks for pointing out the problem. Thanks to EU cookie regulations, you have first click on one link, accept the terms and then can click on both links to get to the actual page. Could have been implemented better, but I guess lower TERs aren't achieved by spending a lot on web site development.

ISINs are FR0007054358 and FR0010315770

Those aren't necessarily the best options, though, when investing from Germany. For instance, there's ETFLab that is replicating indexes, has a lower TER, but mostly European indexes. iShares also has a few funds that do not reinvest.

10% of 0.50% is 0.05% which is the difference between 0.45% and 0.50%. I'm pointing this out, because it's much easier to dismiss the difference as negligible when we talk about tenth of a percent. It's more obvious when we look at the actual fees of 2500 Euros vs. 2250 Euros. That money saved buys food for almost a month or cell phone service for a full year.

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #20 on: July 02, 2013, 12:47:56 AM »
Thanks for showing me those sites, I'm fairly new in this world. Let me ask another question (as long as you don't seem to mind answering :) ).

I looked at the page Lyxor ETF MSCI World (http://www.lyxoretf.be/nl/homebe/products/product/FD-LYX-MSIWO/category/7) and to the fact sheet. I noticed that the website sais the performance is:
  • Year 1: +14%
  • Year 3: +22%
  • Year 5: +22%

I like those numbers. But then I take a look at the fact sheet and I see following numbers below performance:
  • Year 1: +11%
  • Year 3: +34%
  • Year 5: -13%

And some more percentages behind those. I'm kind of confused now. Which one do I believe?

HmtmC

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #21 on: July 02, 2013, 05:21:08 AM »
without having had a closer look into it - the numbers probably might taken in a different point of time. That means: online usually calculates 1/3/5 years from today and the factsheet was taken at some day in the past (now I did check it out: was taken on 31 August 2012). This might be the reason for the difference.

But as they always say: past returns are no guarantees for future returns ;)


Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #22 on: July 02, 2013, 11:09:25 AM »
Five years around this time is in interesting time frame for performance values. The website return start basically when the stock price was way down around the time of the bank collapse in 2008. So low prices, shares been increasing since, you get a great return. The fact sheet was published almost a year ago and its five year frame is the boom time right before the crash with share prices at the then all time high. If you bought then, you just recovered now. That's why you need to invest steadily...

pom

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #23 on: July 03, 2013, 02:39:50 AM »
Five years around this time is in interesting time frame for performance values. The website return start basically when the stock price was way down around the time of the bank collapse in 2008.

This is so true, I am afraid people will be fooled with unrealistic expectations. When the US funds start showing 1/1/2009 to 12/31/2013, the picture will look extremely rosy; the return of SPY for exemple has been 18% a year since 1/1/2009.

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #24 on: July 04, 2013, 07:32:45 AM »
So what is your adivce? Pick one, invest, keep investing?

Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #25 on: July 04, 2013, 08:19:17 AM »
Yes, pick an index fund that covers wordwide enconomies (eg. such as MSCI World), shop around for the lowest TER and lowest brokerage fees and just keep buying everytime you have enough money so that the brokerage fees do not exceed 1-2% of your fund purchase. To give some numbers, the annual fund costs (TER) should be 0.5% or less, the brokerage fees less than 20 Euros per trade.

Work on not looking at your depot, even though it will likely take some time (I'm still checking way too frequently).

Next start reading on the topic. Most importantly, though, question everything you read! There's a lot of opinions and sales attempts out there that are not backed by facts. Keep learning, and later adjust your depot by adding bonds, local fonds, gold, or whatever you see fit.

pom

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #26 on: July 05, 2013, 02:13:24 AM »
I work with two of them, one Europe and one World; so far so good.

I also use 20% of my investments as play-money where I buy individual stocks.

If you foray into picking your own investments, start with small amounts. Most of us made many mistakes in the first few years (excessive trading, anchoring, confirmation bias ...); I still make mistakes but now they are few and far between.

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #27 on: July 08, 2013, 12:27:59 AM »
Ok, thanks for the information. I'll start looking around. :)

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #28 on: July 11, 2013, 03:01:35 AM »
I come once again asking for advice. I like the look of this product (http://uk.ishares.com/en/rc/products/SSAC). I know this is the UK information, I found it on the belgian part of their site and I looked the english version up so you can easily read it.

My question is: is this something worth investing in? Because I got the advice of looking for something with a TER of 0.2%, and this is a whopping 0.6%. Then again, it does capitalize it's earnings. Since I don't know a whole lot of investing, I would ask you to take a quick look and see if I'm not buying something that'll swindle me out of my money. Since the stock I'll be buying is from bigger corporations (Microsoft, Apple, J&J,...) this looks to me like a nice thing to invest in.

Thanks for your patient help with a (little bit) scared newbie.

HmtmC

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #29 on: July 12, 2013, 05:32:20 AM »
In my opinion there are far worse than the one found here! In case you find an ETF on the MSCI World with 0.2% TER - let me know! Because I didn't find one that fits my idea of a percet investment. iShares ETFs tend to have higher TERs, seems to me. Might be due to the physical reproduction of the index. You maybe could find cheaper ones at Lyxor, etc. but they probably use swap-replication.

The MSCI is indeed an index with large cap companies in it. It has a fairly large share of US companies (+further anlgo-saxons UK, AUS, NZ). You could use the iShares DE0002635307 with TER 0.2% to increase the share of Eurpean large caps if you like.

I cannot approve your investment - but looks not too far off from what i would do :)

Armaron

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #30 on: July 14, 2013, 06:25:58 AM »
You could use the iShares DE0002635307 with TER 0.2% to increase the share of Eurpean large caps if you like.

Not available for belgian investors. :( I looked it up, but it's for the German market, not the Belgian.

PolarBeer

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #31 on: July 14, 2013, 01:15:51 PM »
You could hold on to the money for a bit if the Belgian fund market is that bad. In Norway, there were only a couple of index funds until 1-2 years ago, and they had ridiculous charges. But now there are 4-5 ones linked to MSCI World offered by Norwegian banks with the lowest ones at 0.3% TER with no additional charges. There's also a domestic one with 0.2% TER. Things might change in Belgium soon too, index funds are becoming more popular and the market should provide. I would be skeptical about putting away my money abroad through complex mechanisms if there are simpler and better alternatives available soon.

Mr Mark

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #32 on: July 14, 2013, 08:13:35 PM »
Why can't Vanguard exploit this obvious market for low cost quality indexes in Europe? 

It seems to be a market opportunity. Vanguard Europe.

Many of my funds have a 0.1% fee. And they do your taxes.

Christof

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #33 on: July 14, 2013, 11:16:28 PM »
Vanguard is operating in Europe... I guess, if they could offer cheap funds they would do so, but they don't.

One reason could be that "Vanguard Europe" is impossible. There's Vanguard Ireland. Europe isn't a single country like the US, it's dozens of independent countries each with their own tax code, banking systems, retirement approaches, etc. They would need an office in every country making each submarket rather small.

Then there's a lot of regulation of the banking sector here. It might be more expensive to administrate a fund with the extra restrictions.

Not all countries in Europe are heavy investors. Germans, for instance, tend to keep money in a cash account, that's 20% of the European market. Not sure about other countries, but right now I doubt that investing in the stock market is the first choice for many in the Mediterranean countries. Unemployment rates for young people soared to almost 50%, and it's still very high in the group between 30-40, the group that bought a house in the boom, funded a family and is now broke.

HmtmC

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #34 on: July 15, 2013, 12:29:55 AM »
When you see how fragmented the regulation in financial products is it is hard to imagine that we use the same currency and are supposed to have a joint European domestic market...

But Vanguard could try to list its ETFs with the national brokers. Because that would make it a lot easier without much effort. I do not know why they don't distribute their ETFs by more brokers. They need to invest in that because the volume is currently far too low for the brokers to include Vanguard in their product list. Thus you can not buy them. One more reason is, that many of the Vanugard ETFs are only traded at US stock exchanges. And buying/selling there out of Europe is very expensive. So I guess Vanguard could indeed do something but they don't do it.

They rather stick to the "fax your order to Ireland"-thing. Still can't believe that is supposed to be the regular process...!

Oh and to PolarBeer's point of waiting for better products and keep sitting on your cash for a couple more years: personally I started investing with the available products. You never know when (and even if) better products will appear. So I think it is better to invest in a good product and swallow the 0.5/0.6% TER than sitting on your cash for several years. And buying the ETFs that are available are not that complex to be honest. It is just that they cost more than they should.
But I will keep looking for better products - whenever they appear you might switch at that point in time.

EdenHazard

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #35 on: July 07, 2016, 03:30:25 PM »
Vanguard is not interesting in Belgium, because all their funds are distributing dividends. Belgium has no taxation on capital gains, including the dividends immediately reinvested in accumulating funds

daverobev

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #36 on: July 07, 2016, 05:50:54 PM »
I don't understand. If you have a brokerage account, you can buy ETFs.

DB do accumulating ETFs.

Vanguard is great, but there's no need to get hung up. iShares, HSBC, DB etc all do somewhat decent ETFs.

Just get a brokerage account, and buy what fits. If you want ACC, buy ACC. If you want distributing, buy whatever, on whatever exchange!

Panly

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #37 on: July 09, 2016, 08:56:00 AM »

@armaron: open an account at Degiro and buy each month a few ETF shares with ticker IWDA. The dividends of this world stock market tracker are capitalised so you do not have to give 27% tax to the government.  Plus, there should be no transaction costs with IWDA at degiro and the TER is rock bottom. And no speculaastax neither.

For the german who can't buy vanguard etf's: open an account at interactive brokers/lynx and you can buy anything you want.

But be careful with the Irish Vanguard etf's, they tend to distribute 15% less dividend than their USA based equivalents, at least last time I ran the numbers.  My speculation is that those funds are not really based in Ireland but in the USA and hence the US witholding tax applies.

Panly

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #38 on: July 09, 2016, 09:04:11 AM »
In my opinion there are far worse than the one found here! In case you find an ETF on the MSCI World with 0.2% TER - let me know!

IWDA
http://www.morningstar.nl/nl/etf/snapshot/snapshot.aspx?id=0P0000MLIH

EdenHazard

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #39 on: July 09, 2016, 11:06:01 AM »

But be careful with the Irish Vanguard etf's, they tend to distribute 15% less dividend than their USA based equivalents, at least last time I ran the numbers.  My speculation is that those funds are not really based in Ireland but in the USA and hence the US witholding tax applies.
This would surprise me. Could you give example, than I will do research.

Panly

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Re: Long term investement in Europe
« Reply #40 on: July 09, 2016, 12:25:33 PM »
VFEM vs VWO 

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!