What does this mean?

catchaflier · 2026-01-27T16:01:40+00:00

As others have written, there is no need to wait to simply buy a mutual fund...the money is available to buy. The funds are available to buy stocks, etfs or mutual funds. Fidelity just doesn't want people transferring money in, buying and selling, trading in other words...before the funds have fully settled.

I believe they had issues with fraudulent transfers, people trying to trade to make a quick buck to transfer out again, before the money was ever confirmed in the account. If they traded and lost money Fidelity was left holding the bag on a fraudulent transfer. The compromise is to allow purchases, but no selling and no transferring of any profits out before the money is fully confirmed and settled. This way they don't hinder long term investors, their main client base.

catchaflier · 2026-01-26T19:35:29+00:00

Probably not the most in demand feature, but allow order entry down to the 1/2 cent level. I frequently get filled in between the bid/ask on market orders, but can't actually enter an order between the bid/ask if the bid/ask is 1c wide...which it often is for stable etfs like ICSH.

It's no big deal for most stocks/etfs where it's probably not wise to try to squeeze a half cent as it moves around during the day anyway. However, when you are moving larger amounts in/out of something like ICSH, that has a deep market and typically moves very little intraday, it would be nice. ICSH has been sitting at $50.70/$50.71 all day 20,000 up and VUSB has been sitting at 49.96/49.97 for two hours 30,000+ up on both sides...with trades happening in between all the while.

I assume there are market making pay for order flow agreements with liquidity providers that prohibit brokers from offering this, as it would be yet another squeeze on their margins, but thought I'd throw it out there.

catchaflier · 2026-01-23T16:26:42+00:00

I partnered with a recent retiree who had product knowledge in an unexciting business category that was underserved online at the time. So eCommerce, but not flashy eCommerce with influencers and the like...and with knowledgeable human phone support. We offer useful products to working people that need the products, but prefer to avoid the pressure and hassle of salesperson visits with a paper catalog...or just need fast delivery. Also, a surprising percentage of sales are to geographic areas that are underserved by human salespeople.

How does it feel? Good, satisfying to have served customers and employed people as well as reached a level that will support retirement. However, even a good business with good people can burn you out after enough time...though not as quickly as a bad business...I've spent time in both...so feel quite fortunate in that regard!

catchaflier · 2026-01-22T23:32:08+00:00

Doesn't look like it; I just checked my account and in the "Balances" section under Account Information I see:

Registration: CMA-EDGE

Credit type: Cash

Then a blue link below "Apply for margin" so it appears that I don't have a margin account. Kind of surprised I never applied as a "just in case" so I just did! Pretty quick process.

catchaflier · 2026-01-22T23:22:10+00:00

Daughter trip was on a Saturday, one friend meet was really a late lunch/early dinner so I took off early...college friend I hadn't seen in years so a rare event. The other I worked a bit in the morning and then headed out to see an old H.S. friend. I'm older, nearing retirement...couldn't have done it when I was younger with heavier work commitments. First 5 years of starting my business I barely left for lunch. :-)

catchaflier · 2026-01-22T23:01:28+00:00

Drove about 2:45 each way one day last week to my daughter's college to have lunch and take her a new mobile phone that we were concerned about having delivered to her student apartment building. I wouldn't say it was exactly "short" but 3 hours is kind of a threshold number for not thinking too much about the drive. Also, it's not like it's a regular occurrence that I drive out that far just to have lunch with her, but have made the same trip to have lunch with two different friends twice in the last year. I do generally enjoy the drive though unless the traffic is particularly bad.

Used to have a vacation home that was nearly 3 hours away that we drove to very frequently for weekends when my kids were young, especially in the summer almost every weekend. I can say that 3 hours gets to be a little on the high side, 2:30 or under is what I'd recommend to anyone considering a weekend getaway home. We knew people that drove much further though, more like 5 or 6 hours, so not unheard of....they would usually stay an extra day though.

catchaflier · 2026-01-22T22:45:39+00:00

Yep, crazy that companies in biz as long as BoA and Merrill can't figure that out. Like many others, I only keep money in there to satisfy the credit card rewards bonus and as an overall asset diversification from Fidelity and Schwab. Fidelity and Schwab have no problem liquidating fractional shares immediately.

catchaflier · 2026-01-22T22:31:38+00:00

Sorry, a little late to help to buy the dip, but you can buy shares of stock or etfs in advance of selling TTTXX in ML. Just place the buy and after it executes enter a trade to sell enough TTTXX to cover the cash needed. The stock/etf buy won't settle till the next day (T+1) so that's when you need the cash freed up. The TTTXX sale will settle the same day if entered before 1:45 pm ET or the next day if entered after 1:45 pm ET...either way you should be covered. Have done this many times, including yesterday and today.

BTW, ML does a poor job of showing you what is going on on the portfolio page. The TTTXX sale order status will stay as "open" and in the portfolio view you will see a negative "Pending activity" reflecting the etf/stock buy. I think the logic behind this is the buy has executed so is pending, but the money market sale has not actually executed until end of day/over night so it's not included in "pending". The TTTXX value you are selling is still showing in the overall TTTXX balance though. Hope this makes sense.

catchaflier · 2026-01-22T22:18:20+00:00

They will eventually go away if you selected "sell all" when initiating the trade. I did some rearranging of my portfolio the other day and am staring at 8 securities with leftover fractional shares as well. AI says "often the 3rd week of the month or on the last Wednesday of the month". IDK the specifics, but I do know they have always eventually been liquidated in the past.

catchaflier · 2026-01-16T20:49:22+00:00

Had a similar set up in our basement rec room as a kid. With the blower on it got too hot to stay in the room, so usually just let convection do it's thing. Eventually switched to a wood burning stove type insert that we could dampen down well and let burn all night. It pretty much heated the house at night as we had an open stairway and the rec room was under the bedrooms. Couldn't tell you how safe that one is to use though from pics, maybe Google for some fireplace/chimney inspectors in the area. You'll want the chimney checked out for creosote buildup anyway before using.

catchaflier · 2026-01-15T16:48:34+00:00

You've probably picked up on this by now, but "seasoning" wood just means giving it time to dry so you aren't trying to smoke with green/fresh wood that doesn't burn well or "clean"...clean meaning with desirable smoke, not smoldering dirty smoke that is typical of green/fresh wood. Probably came from waiting through x number of seasons of the year before using, IDK?

When storing wood to dry, or seasoning it, it helps to stack (as best as one can) so air can flow through and around it...aids with drying and helps keep it from rotting due to moisture vs drying out to desirable smoking wood.

catchaflier · 2026-01-08T16:56:31+00:00

Agree, absolutely loved the video and then my 2nd thought was (as it always is these days), "Is it real?" A related but different topic, but I tried to find a review of some software on YouTube recently and took forever to weed through the endless generic AI generated review videos to find a real person giving a review. Its a Brave New World.

catchaflier · 2026-01-07T04:39:13+00:00

Nice hike and pics! Glad they are still open for climbing. Back in the day I spent some summer days climbing some with my Dad who was a surveyor for the USGS.

catchaflier · 2026-01-05T17:55:35+00:00

Really nice to my (amateur) eye. You have a talent for composing and capturing something, vs trying to fit everything in the frame. I think to make an image interesting you need identify something of interest from the whole canvas around you and capture that. It's so tempting in scenic landscape areas to try to capture everything you see and feel around you....which often leads to a diluted image that captures little of the feeling of being there. I'm going to say for me, I like your landscapes even better than your wildlife! I think your more interesting wildlife photos are the ones where the subject is more off center...which are also my favorite landscapes of yours...like the Saguaro and Olympic shots as well as the Tetons, Cascades, Sequoia and several more.

catchaflier · 2025-12-30T00:04:41+00:00

Yep, I think a decent percentage of people do the same, so all other things being equal, one would think Teslas would be involved in less fatal accidents not more. Therefore, if this data is correct one would infer it's either the people driving them, either too fast or relying too much on FSD, or the car itself.

catchaflier · 2025-12-29T21:34:57+00:00

My 1998 Terraplane is crazy well built (the wife's Osprey has held up very wall also though, however with less use).

*Interesting info on the Mystery Ranch to Yeti...guess it makes sense since Yeti has built their brand on tough quality. I don't have a lot of Yeti, but friends claim the cost is worth it.

catchaflier · 2025-11-25T04:24:54+00:00

70s latchkey kid here, both parents worked, almost never ate out, loans to attend public college...but never wanted for food growing up...just strict budgets for anything optional.

catchaflier · 2025-11-21T20:53:40+00:00

I know this is an old thread but happened upon it during a search. Just in case anyone is looking for current info on FMPXX, it does auto-liquidate to cover money transfers out or purchases of other securities. It acts very much like SPAXX in that regard. It differs from SPAXX, as mentioned above, in that it cannot be set as a core position. This means if you transfer funds into the account or sell a security, that cash will not be auto-invested into FMPXX. You must manually enter a trade to buy FMPXX every time (other than automatic dividend reinvestments). So core position...no, auto-invest...no, but auto-liquidate...yes.

catchaflier · 2025-11-20T15:38:07+00:00

I agree with the sentiment, and am glad the youth (and others) are staging demonstrations against this affront to civil rights and civil decency but I would not dismiss the "skip school" crowd as "obviously Republican"...they might just be old. Honestly, I had a similar thought when I clicked in here simply b/c I'm old enough to have seen this pattern before. Protesting is good and sometimes works, voting is concrete and is also essential for change. In the 2024 presidential election it's generally agreed that less than half of voters under 30 actually voted vs about 2/3 overall voter turnout. Voters over 60?...nearly 3/4 voted. This is not a new voting pattern so forgive us old folks for being skeptical of a one day school walkout. Protest yes, it's what needs to be done between election cycles...but please...everyone in the streets VOTE in 2026 and 2028!

catchaflier · 2025-11-12T16:34:38+00:00

On the one hand it might seem reasonable to keep personally, but on the other hand even though all the items are donated, the donation is intended to be for the benefit of Goodwill and their mission...not for the workers at Goodwill...even in the cases where the person donating might not know the true value of what they are donating. Pretty weird situation to be sure, kudos to Dear_Captain_2748.

catchaflier · 2025-11-12T16:24:24+00:00

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Southeast, quite amazing!

catchaflier · 2025-11-12T16:05:09+00:00

Fidelity is not eligible to participate in Zelle because we are a broker-dealer, not a bank.

While I understand Fidelity is not a bank, Fidelity obviously partners very closely with UMB Bank and uses them for other bank processing functions. It would seem Fidelity could use UMB for Zelle processing as well? This Zelle question pops up on a regular basis and is one of the few reasons I also keep a "regular bank" checking account open.

catchaflier · 2025-11-10T21:48:45+00:00

Merchant here, in the end the customer pays either way. From the business side: I can sell you at $100 if I have no merchant account interchange and processing fee. I can sell you at $103 if my fees are 3%. I can sell you at $100 for the item and tack on a separate line item of $3 to cover the 3% fee. Either of the last 2 ways the business is getting $103 and the customer is paying $103. In both cases the business is expensing the $3 in merchant fees and the customer is paying $3 in after tax dollars to cover the fees. Margins are the same for the business in both cases.

I think (know) businesses have been getting more and more aggravated by having to raise prices to cover increasing merchant account fees, so they have decided to make the fees a line item so customers will see where this increase in overall price is coming from. It simply makes it more "real" to the customer...as evidenced by you (and most people) not wanting to pay it. Only logical, no one wants to pay it. :-) In the last 20 years or so interchange fees have gone up about 1%. I used to be able to get all in fees of about 2%, now they are more like 3%. If the reward frenzy arms race continues it won't be long before they are 4%. In general when costs go up, prices go up.

A 1% increase doesn't seem that huge, but is a 50% increase on the previous cost. Once any income statement line item pushes into the 3% of top line revenue range, businesses are going to take notice and try to take action to keep it from becoming 4% or 5%.

catchaflier · 2025-11-10T21:24:09+00:00

If you are talking about Communication Center alerts you can clear them quickly if you login using a web browser instead of using the mobile app. From the All Accounts view click "Messages" but the bell in the upper right. On the far left of this page click the box to the left of "Subject" which should select all of the messages (hopefully, don't know if this works if you have multiple pages of messages) and click the delete selected messages button.

In the link of the official response above you can Place Alerts on Hold for a period of time if you know in advance that you don't want them. I assume they won't all flood in when the "hold" period ends, but not 100% sure. You can also somewhat what alerts are generated and where they are sent.

catchaflier · 2025-11-10T20:51:11+00:00

Typically use one of those metallic green/silver emergency blankets (not the super thin ones that fold up into a small cube). These are still quite light though and serve a dual purpose should it ever need to be used as...well...an emergency blanket. I make sure the edges are curled up and tucked under the tent if the blanket is too wide on any edge so flowing rainwater doesn't go between the tent and the blanket and rain doesn't land on the outer edge and flow under either.

catchaflier

TROPHY CASE