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Rocky Transfer of Assets

edited June 2021 in Other Investing
I’ve avoided sharing my frustrations over the past few weeks. But perhaps the experienced investors at mfo will indulge my venting or possibly offer some advice. In May I began the process of transferring all my accounts from TRP to Fidelity. This out of frustration with TRP’s front office / client relations. Held at TRP were Traditional and Roth IRAs, in roughly equal amounts, plus a non-retirement account. Completed the applications online, but needed to sign, date and mail some papers to Fido.

For the largest holdings I specified “transfer in-kind”. For 3 short-term bond funds having relatively low balances, I elected the “liquidation” option. The transfer-in-kind went through as intended and much faster than the cash transfers, Later, 3 separate checks from the liquidated accounts arrived at Fido, appearing there as “cash available to trade”. I invested the cash in 3 mutual funds, 1 ETF and 1 stock.

Three days later my account turned “delinquent”. Fido without consultation began force-selling those assets. After I called, Fido’s team informed me that all 3 checks from TRP has “bounced” - meaning they’d been returned to Fido unpaid by TRP’s bank. I and Fido’s reps nearly immediately contacted TRP. Their answer was that there’d been a “systems error” resulting in an unspecified number of similar cases and they were “investigating”. A week passed. Untold hours on the phone with both. At TRP the average wait is about 30 minutes (followed by additional delays while they “check”). Yesterday, TRP informed me the checks had been resent and should arrive at Fido next week.

At Fido things went from bad to worse. I suffered a modest market loss when the 4 investments were sold out under me after only a few days. Than, they hit me with 3 commissions or early redemption fees totaling $233 (later reversed). The real issue now is that all of my Fido accounts are saddled with a multitude of “restrictions”. The Roth, which hadn’t even been funded when the issue arose in the Traditional, is also restricted. And, so is my cash management account, though the impact would seem slight. Fido says I’ll still be allowed to trade, but only with “settled” cash - a minor nuisance.

Here’s the restrictions placed on all my accounts as I understand them. There may be more I’m not aware of.

- 3 separate “bounced check” violations which won’t clear for one year

- 1 “free ride” violation in effect for 90 days

- 1 “liquidity violation” in effect for 90 days

As I said, none should prevent me from trading with settled cash - but any additional could cause me to be banned from trading. Since I’m still waiting for 4 more checks to arrive (3 for the Traditional and 1 for the Roth), I’m on “pins and needles” here. Fido’s says their refusal to remove the restrictions is because they are from violations of SEC regulations. I’ve searched for similar reported problems online - but found only one (from a semi-literate poster) that went up last week. I’ll share FWIW.

https://www.reddit.com/user/DistrictFinal5222/

Comments

  • Here's a little more info:
    Freeriding

    In a cash account, an investor must pay for the purchase of a security before selling it. If an investor buys and sells a security before paying for it, the investor is “freeriding” which is not permitted under the Federal Reserve Board’s Regulation T and may require the investor’s broker to “freeze” the investor’s cash account for 90 days. During this 90-day period, an investor may still purchase securities with the cash account, but the investor must fully pay for any purchase on the date of the trade.
    https://www.investor.gov/introduction-investing/investing-basics/glossary/freeriding
    See also:
    http://personal.fidelity.com/products/stocksbonds/content/cash-restrictions-free-ride-violations.shtml

    I would guess that the restriction would not apply to exchanges within a fund family, because these are executed as a single trade through the distributor. But exchanges across fund families are technically two trades, so you would not be able to place the second trade until the first trade settled. Likewise, buying and selling ETFs are separate transactions so a purchase of an ETF would also be restricted to settled cash.
    A cash liquidation violation occurs when a customer purchases securities and the cost of those securities is covered after the purchase date by the sale of other fully paid securities in the cash account.
    https://www.fidelity.com/trading/faqs-trading-restrictions

    If I understand this violation correctly, it happens when you sell a different security to cover the cost of what you purchased, as opposed to a free ride violation where you sell the same security to cover the cost. It sounds like this happened because the price of the funds went down, so Fidelity not only sold the funds purchased with bounced check money but also some other holdings to make up the shortfall.

    I can find very little on Fidelity's site about restrictions due to a "bounced check violation". All I can find about bounced checks is in (among other places) their CMA agreement:
    If a deposited check or ACH does not clear, the deposit will be removed from your account, and you are responsible for returning any interest you received on it. ... In addition, if we have reason to believe that assets were incorrectly credited to your account, we may restrict such assets and/or return such assets to the account from which they were transferred.
    https://www.fidelity.com/bin-public/060_www_fidelity_com/documents/customer-agreement-cash-management-account.pdf
  • Wow! I just transferred in-kind our entire Roth IRAs for my wife and I. Hope we don’t encounter similar problems. So far it seems to be going smoothly but we didn’t buy or sell any funds. All were direct transfers in kind.

    We’ve had our accounts with TRP for more than 25 years. We decided to move everything to Fidelity for simplicity and because their customer service is much better. Every time I call TRP I get put on lengthy holds. I like their funds but I can still own them through Fidelity with better service and options.
  • We’ve had our accounts with TRP for more than 25 years. We decided to move everything to Fidelity for simplicity and because their customer service is much better. Every time I call TRP I get put on lengthy holds. I like their funds but I can still own them through Fidelity with better service and options.
    Same here. Somehow TRP customer support has falling behind other large brokerages and the pandemic does not help. They need to hire more people and upgrade their hardware and bandwidth in order to stay competitive in this business.

    Fidelity provides the best balance of what we need online or speaking with a live agent. My asset transfer experience from TRP to Fidelity was done electronically and took 2 weeks for in-kinds transfer.
  • edited June 2021
    @hank : thanks for telling your story. May it help others when making transfers.
    I can't believe that Fido didn't warn you about the use of funds from your three (small) checks. Recently CD matured & was deposited into a different bank. At that time I was informed that funds from the check weren't available for 8 days. Any deposits from checks , with a limit of over $5400 (?) had that attachment placed on them.


    Keep us informed, Derf
  • edited June 2021
    Hi Sir hank

    Sorry for the loss and frustration
    We moved everything from (bad trading acct) to Vanguard 3.5 yrs ago, funds over 500k. The process took sometimes over few wks/ repeated phone call, reprocessed loss paperwork, but overall process was painless but stressful.

    Do you think you may consider writing to Tpr managers/ or ceo levels. Perhaps may consider retribution/partial paybacks for the loss. Tell them you mean business and give them bad ratings to your family members friends colleague/ investing forums/ business beaureau.

    They may loose more business if they do not compromise /meet half ways with your situations

    Good luck
  • Yes, @hank. Keep us informed. I have thought about moving my money. All (ALL!) of my IRA stuff is with TRP. And a new brokerage account with them. In a different thread, I shared my own frustrations with TRP, but none of it comes close to the bullshit you've had to go through. So much for convenient, seamless, modern electronic processes. Jayzuz.
  • Funny, I wrote a lengthy message to TRP through their website, explaining my reasons for transferring our accounts to Fidelity. However, the message wouldn’t send due to yet technical glitch on their website. I gave up. Money speaks louder than words, so I presume they realize that customers are leaving them for greener pastures.
  • edited June 2021
    @Tarwheel. I was pretty blunt with the guy from TRP that I had on the phone yesterday. He told me he'd share my feedback. I suppose if I just screamed and hollered, that would not count as "feedback," and would not be shared. I made him stay on the line with me while I unhooked one bank account from my sweep account, and attempted to connect a different one. "Technical issues" prevented the thing from going through. That's the message which popped-up. ... Only, wait! When I attempted a 2nd time, the fabulous webpage gave me the option to add my wife's name: not to the TRP account, because she's already there as the joint owner. No, it was an option to add her name to the bank account I wanted to connect to the sweep acct. ... THEN it went through. And THAT is NOT a "technical issue." I just love it when even MACHINES lie to you. And no one cares. ... Wifey is the "primary" joint owner of that new bank account I was wanting to connect. By adding my wife's name in the process of hooking that new account to the sweep, I figured out in reverse what the issue had been!
    Comedy of errors. Not to mention inadequate staffing. This is to say nothing of the fact that TRP has contracted-out to another outfit, the job of doing what I wanted to do. (So the agent told me!) Along the way, there are "security" questions that must be answered--- and QUICKLY! But some of those "security" questions were not even about ME. They were asking me about my BROTHER'S age. I have a pretty good idea, and it's a good thing I guess-timated correctly. Anyhow, along with all the rest of the aggravation, I find THAT aspect of it all to be highly reprehensible.
  • hank I'm sorry to hear of your situation and appreciate all of your contributions to this board ! I've done enough of these ACAT transfers, so that I have to have procedures set in place.First, I verify that the in-kind funds are carried by the receiving brokerage. Then, I try to transfer as few in-kind assets as possible, usually reserving the in-kind procedure for closed funds or funds with a large minimum. I liquidate the mutual funds that I'm not transferring prior to starting the ACAT transfer. Ideally for a full account transfer, I'll be transferring 1 or two funds at most and transferring the rest in cash. I don't worry about having funds out of the market, since ACAT transfers take 4 to 5 business days at the most, and the most important thing for me it to grab the assets from the relinquishing brokerage as soon as possible. I will be unfortunately using this procedure in the next week, as my newest brokerage is causing me unnecessary headaches.
  • ...And another quick item: the one single stock I own (in a very small quantity) closed at a share price of $2.91 at the end of the day today. But TRP shows it at $2.95. There's only one word for that: WRONG. I bought those shares using my TRP brokerage account, for ZERO fees. Is the zero-fee aspect actually worth it, though? Ticker: ENIC.
  • To the OP, that sounds like a horror story. I am planning to in-kind transfer a TRP mutual fund (custodial IRA) to Fidelity. If I transfer all the assets in the account, will I be charged an account closing fee? TIA.
  • msf
    edited June 2021
    Schwab seems to have the clearest description of violations and how they can/must be treated by the broker ("creditor" in the regs). The rules come from Regulation T, and in particular §220.8 covering cash accounts.

    https://www.schwab.com/resource-center/insights/content/stock-settlement-why-you-need-to-understand-t2-timeline

    I found this part interesting:
    Extensions

    At Schwab, if you fail to make payment on a purchase of stock or deliver shares for a sale of stock within the designated time frame, you will receive a notification asking that you take action.

    If you fail to act upon notification, industry regulations require that Schwab either request an extension, or buy back or sell out the position, as well as mark your account with a freeriding violation. Your account may also be placed on a 90-day settled-cash restriction, or incur more severe penalties, including account closure or removal of electronic access. Again, Schwab clients can request a one-time exception (i.e., once in the life of the account) to remove the restriction.

    Schwab doesn't grant extensions for trades in retirement accounts (IRA's, SEP's Keogh's, etc.), or accounts with existing trading restrictions.
    I suspect that Schwab doesn't grant extensions in IRAs because of the stringent law against borrowing in IRAs. But that wouldn't seem to preclude waiving the 90 day restriction imposed.

    Reg T itself says:
    (d)(1) Unless the creditor's examining authority believes that the creditor is not acting in good faith or that the creditor has not sufficiently determined that exceptional circumstances warrant such action, it may upon application by the creditor:
    ...
            (iii) Grant a waiver from the 90 day freeze.
    Certainly there are exceptional circumstances here. If the freeze is important to you, it's worth poking Fidelity about their applying for a waiver.

    All of this is bringing back memories of a vaguely similar experience I had with Fidelity. In an IRA I set up an auto purchase of a TF fund. I set the amount to be the available cash in the account. The system permitted this order to go through even though there was a $5 TF added. (Fidelity says that "If the cash needed to fund your automatic investment is not available in your core position, your scheduled transfer will be skipped", so this should have been caught.)

    "Fortunately", the purchase was for one of the few OEFs with T+2 settlement. I worked with Fidelity and they agreed that if I were to sell $5 of another holding the next day, a fund with T+1 settlement, that would cover the shortfall. Both trades would settle on the same day.

    According to Schwab, that still constituted a liquidation violation:
    If an option or mutual fund is sold the day after a stock is purchased, a liquidation violation will be charged even if the proceeds settle on or before the purchase settlement date.
    https://help.streetsmart.schwab.com/edge/1.22/Content/Unsettled Funds.htm
    Fidelity never informed me that I had committed a liquidation violation.
  • edited June 2021
    Thanks folks.

    Today (Saturday) is the first time in 10 days I’ve logged in to my Fido account when the news wasn’t worse. Actually improved overnight. Possibly, the discussions with 3 different reps yesterday helped. Notably, the earlier mentioned restrictions now apply only to my Traditional IRA. On the Roth & non-retirement accounts they’ve disappeared.

    @msf questioned the “bounced check” restriction. While not posted to my account, it was related to me by a rep at Fido’s trading desk after being transferred to him with some fund specific questions. I do believe it’s on file there - but is likely such an infrequent (and serious) infraction that it’s not mentioned elsewhere. The “free ride” likely refers to the small position I’d opened in a favorite stock (mostly for fun) that was sold by Fido only 1-2 days later.

    Fido mailed me copies of TRP’s 3 bounced checks. They were written on an account at Mellon Bank of Delaware. They are stamped: “Return to Maker - Reason S”.

    Here’s a copy & paste I pulled from my Traditional IRA at Fido this morning:

    Free Ride Violations – 1 Violation in last 12 months
    Good Faith Violations – None in last 12 months
    Liquidation Violations – 1 Violation in last 12 months


    Hoping to buy back into those mutual funds and the ETF next week. The stock was temporarily depressed when I bought it. It’s bounced back to the point now that I likely won’t buy it again.

    FWIW (unrelated): I’m sharing a link to a 2020 informational piece at Fidelity regarding their dollar “threshold” as to when a round trip in one of their funds is likely to get you into trouble. That’s an area I’ve been trying to nail down as I do tend to increase / decrease exposure to certain positions fairly often. If the (monitored) threshold really is $10,000 (as their memo suggests) that’s good news for a lot of us.

    https://www.fidelity.com/bin-public/060_www_fidelity_com/documents/mutual-funds/2020-08-31-Excessive-Trading-Policy-Web-Post.pdf


    PS - Try to be kind when talking to the reps at TRP. It’s not their fault things are so off the rails there. I actually apologized Thursday to a young lady after raising my voice in frustration. Her kind response assured me I was being tame compared to some of the interactions.
  • edited June 2021
    zigster said:

    - To the OP, that sounds like a horror story.

    - I am planning to in-kind transfer a TRP mutual fund (custodial IRA) to Fidelity. If I transfer all the assets in the account, will I be charged an account closing fee? TIA.

    It feels like “to Hell and back”.:)

    Re your question. It’s $20 at TRP for each closed out account. However, they only applied it to my 5 “liquidate all shares” orders ($100 total). The “transfer in kind” orders were not charged. I wish I’d had the foresight to combine the 3 shorter term bond funds (via exchange) before submitting the paperwork. Would have saved $40.

    During my estimated 7-8 hours on the phone with TRP over a week (counting hold times) I tried to shame them into reversing the $60 in fees on the 3 transfers for which checks bounced. Said they’d “call back”. (But I’m not holding my breath.)
  • We just completed a transfer-in-kind from TRP to Fidelity for our Roth IRAs. There were about a dozen separate accounts because TRP created an account for each mutual fund, for some odd reason. We were not charged any fees, and the funds showed up in our Fidelity account in about two days. No shares were sold. We initiated the transfer through the Fidelity website and it was very easy using their on-line forms. The only hassle was having to enter and double-check each account number.

    We also rolled over our 401K accounts from old old employer about the same time. That was much more involved because the accounts were invested in proprietary funds with Prudential. We had to sell all of the shares in both accounts and get them to mail checks to Fidelity using overnight service. That process took 3-4 days and we lost some money due to market fluctuations but I’m glad to have it over with. Now all of our investments are with Fidelity, making them either to track and manage. It will really help when we have to start making required minimum distributions in a few years.
  • To Hank, thanks for clarifying my in-kind transfer question. While I may still invest in some of TRP's better (open) funds, it will be simpler to consolidate within one brokerage. While not suggesting any (stress) equivalency with your situation, I experienced two examples of where persistence paid off in the face of front line customer service ignorance/poor training. I was given a penalty/interest bill for something that was not clearly covered in the regs. I appealed and paid what I believed was the correct (i.e. much lower) amount. Then, despite hours and hours on the phone, customer service stood firm until . . . I escalated to a manager and pointed out that I had remedied my situation months before and had already proved it, she immediately did a u-turn and I was in the clear. Prior to speaking with the manager, customer service seemed either not to understand the regs and/or perhaps were poorly trained. The second example was with my phone carrier which changed its terms to make its service much more expensive. I called and informed them that I would have to terminate my service. I mentioned that I had been a faithful customer for 10 years and that to replace me will cost them more than keeping me. At first, the CS person balked. Ten minutes later, she called back and informed me that they had reinstated my account for 3 months of service at no charge. Hang in there!!

  • edited June 2021
    Not to beat a dead horse to death here ….

    But, does anyone know (or have an opinion) on whether a company like TRP really cares whether or not you own funds directly from them? It’s occurred to me that those AUM figures take into account assets in the funds they run - not necessarily under their roof.

    Quite possibly they view the client interface, particularly live phone reps, as an Achilles Heel they can do without. I recall much better personal service 10-20 years ago. Easier to get through to a supervisor as well. Obviously, the phone reps at TRP are (often) poorly prepared for the variety of concerns they need to field. Hard to fault the employee if not qualified for the job or given the tools / authority they need.
  • If I recall correctly, TRP is a publicly traded company. It could be that large investors are pressuring the company to cut costs, leading to the decline in customer service. We invested directly with TRP for 25+ years, and their service has definitely declined in recent years.
  • From @hank: PS - Try to be kind when talking to the reps at TRP. It’s not their fault things are so off the rails there. I actually apologized Thursday to a young lady after raising my voice in frustration. Her kind response assured me I was being tame compared to some of the interactions.
    ****************************************
    Yes, I completely understand that.
  • msf
    edited June 2021
    There were about a dozen separate accounts because TRP created an account for each mutual fund, for some odd reason.

    My understanding (read: no citations, I could be in mistaken) is that until sometime in the 80s(?), each mutual fund investment at any company was treated as a separate account with a separate account number. Similar to buying stock directly from a corporation. Two different companies, two different accounts.

    I don't know about other companies, but in the 90s(?) Fidelity grouped these separate accounts together under a single "T account" number. It reported the accounts together on a single statement under a single T account number. But on the 1099 each fund still appeared as a separate account with its own divs and cap gains. (Contrast that with a brokerage statement where there's a combined set of figures for all the holdings.)

    I looked at an old 90s statement and an old 90s 1099 to confirm this.

    You can still find traces of this at Fidelity. On this Fidelity page describing direct deposits, click on the "Mutual Fund Account" tab in the middle of the page, and then look for "T account number".
    https://www.fidelity.com/tax-information/direct-deposit

    Whether the accounts were technically separate or not mattered. Until a few years ago, one could perform one 60 day transfer per IRA account each year. (Current law is one 60 day transfer, period, each year.) If your IRA accounts were separate, you could do a 60 day rollover of one, then later decide to do a 60 day rollover on another.
  • @msf : Is there a good reason you have kept 90's statements ? I have some also, but soon will be gone !
    Just wondering, Derf
  • So long as one has an open position in a taxable account, I feel it is important to retain some proof of purchase price. One may need all the monthly statements because there are no trade confirmations for reinvested divs.

    If one has been reporting sales using average cost, one needs all purchases and sales (even though one may have sold off many of the oldest shares) because the average cost is affected by any shares that were ever in the account.

    I've scanned everything, so space isn't a problem.

    I actually do have a taxable investment going back that far (acquired via UGMA). But the real reason I hold onto the statements is to come up with trivia like this:-)
  • @msf : Thanks for the come-back. Now days paperless has been the push.
    Derf
  • hank I don't think TRP cares where you buy their funds. They saw their AUM stalling out and allowed Vanguard, Schwab and Fidelity to sell their funds etf. Apparently E-Trade and TD Ameritrade weren't generating enough sales, so they opened fund access to the Big 3. Now if Vanguard and Fidelity would expand access for their funds, I wouldn't need 4 or 5 brokerage accounts !
  • edited June 2021
    carew388 said:

    I don't think TRP cares where you buy their funds. They saw their AUM stalling out and allowed Vanguard, Schwab and Fidelity to sell their funds etf. Apparently E-Trade and TD Ameritrade weren't generating enough sales, so they opened fund access to the Big 3. Now if Vanguard and Fidelity would expand access for their funds, I wouldn't need 4 or 5 brokerage accounts !

    Thanks @carew388. There were brief times in my discussions when I thought I detected some animosity (maybe cultural clash is a better term) between the 2 firms. T Rowe wanted to keep me as much in the “fog” as to what had happened. Fido, on the other hand, seemed more open about what they knew. I’d say Fido’s mailing me copies of the bounced checks (unsolicited) sorta confirms that.
    Tarwheel said:

    ”If I recall correctly, TRP is a publicly traded company. It could be that large investors are pressuring the company to cut costs, leading to the decline in customer service. We invested directly with TRP for 25+ years, and their service has definitely declined in recent years.”

    I’ve often wondered how that public ownership might play out - if at all. Assumed it would be on the fund management end. Likely it’s playing out instead on the client service end. Hard to think of any company where the client-customer end of the business hasn’t deteriorated. Humans are expensive to maintain due to their propensity to eat, along with the need for shelter, medical care, etc. A lot cheaper to have computers run the show - even perhaps at the cost of losing some business.

  • I think there is definitely a rivalry between Fido, Vanguard and even Dodge & Cox. From what I can tell ,Vanguard and Dodge & Cox funds are the only funds that Fido charges a $75 transaction fee to purchase !
  • “Now if Vanguard and Fidelity would expand access for their funds, I wouldn't need 4 or 5 brokerage accounts!”

    Interesting comment. I’m spread out across 1 brokerage now + 3 fund companies. In retrospect it was a mistake to let most of that pile up at TRP. For many years I held a kind of reverence for them. I know some disagree, but spreading it out a bit seems like a good idea. I’ve toyed with getting something going at Schwab. I’ll wait and see.
  • edited June 2021
    carew388 said:

    I think there is definitely a rivalry between Fido, Vanguard and even Dodge & Cox. From what I can tell ,Vanguard and Dodge & Cox funds are the only funds that Fido charges a $75 transaction fee to purchase !

    Vanguard and Dodge & Cox choose not to pay distribution fees to be included on a brokerage firm's platform.

    "Brokerage firms, for their part, have scant incentive to make it any easier to buy Vanguard products. Not only does Vanguard compete against their funds, but Vanguard has never paid for fund distribution. Fidelity and other brokerage firms have long chafed at Vanguard’s refusal to pay for distribution. Some fund companies pay more than 0.15% of fund assets to be on Fidelity’s platform, for instance. Those fees are increasingly important to brokerage firms as expense ratios decline and investors migrate out of actively managed funds to low-cost index products."

    “'Vanguard doesn’t compensate us for the services we provide,' a Fidelity spokeswoman told Barron’s. 'That’s why there’s a higher transaction fee for its funds,' she added, referring to the $75 fee that Fidelity charges to buy a Vanguard fund, well above its normal $49.95 rate."
    Link


    N o M a r k e t i n g C a m p a i g n s

    "Another important distinguishing characteristic of our firm is that we rely primarily on word of mouth to sell our Funds—you have never seen an advertising campaign for Dodge & Cox.
    We neither pay for distribution nor pay brokers to sell our funds."

    Link
  • Schwab's platform fee discsloure to 403(b) plans includes:
    Transaction-Fee Funds (“Fee Funds”)

    As set forth in the Commissions and Transaction Fees section of the Charles Schwab Pricing Guide for Individual Investors, Schwab charges clients a transaction fee for the purchase or sale of certain funds that are not included in the Schwab Mutual Fund OneSource® program. Some Fee Funds pay Schwab an annual fee usually equal to $20, but sometimes as high as $30, per customer position, typically subject to a quarterly minimum of $7,500 per fund. Rather than paying a per-customer account fee, some Fee Funds choose instead to pay Schwab an asset-based annual fee of up to 0.25% of the average assets held at Schwab.

    When adding a new fund to Schwab’s platform, Fee Funds also pay Schwab a one-time establishment fee, which Schwab may waive. The amount of this fee generally does not exceed $10,000 for the first fund added and $2,000 for each new fund after that. To the extent any of these fees are paid out of fund assets, fees are included in the fund’s OER and are indirectly borne by the fund’s shareholders
    https://www.schwab.com/public/file/P-5358937

    Fidelity used to have a similar disclosure, but about 4 years ago switched to an "infrastructure" fee that obfuscates the cost. It recently won an appellate ruling that this was legal.

    In any case, as @Observant1 stated, the $75 fee is applied to funds that won't pay for shelf space. In addition to D&C and Vanguard funds, Fidelity also charges $75 for some Schwab funds, including SNXFX and SWTSX.
  • +1 I'll be breaking in a new brokerage, Ally, this coming week. Ally has no ntf funds: every no load fund purchase is charged $9.99, but apparently there are no load-waived funds either. Obviously, I won't be purchasing JABAX or MDLOX there, but their policy could be useful for funds like SVARX OSTIX DODIX etc. I'll provide details later after my account is funded and I've actually made some purchases.
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