On 9/19/2016 10:44 AM, Laeeth Isharc wrote:
> [...]

Thanks for taking the time to post this stuff - it's good reading. Stuff I didn't know.

On Sunday, 18 September 2016 at 16:13:55 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
>
> The basic idea here is to have a buffer for short-term borrowing. For example, for DConf we'd need to plop down some money for renting a conference hall until proceeds from registration roll in. The notion of being able to take a 1.60% APY for that is quite attractive. Sadly, I've looked at IB since and they don't offer any checking or general banking. I'm not 100% sure, but I assume they'd lend money only for investing; they wouldn't allow you to transfer cash on margin into your bank. Does anyone know exactly what the case is?
>

I had some other thoughts on this.

There is a concept in investing called asset liability management. They use it at insurance companies. The idea is that if you have a liability in x years, then you should have an asset whose value you're sure about in x years to match it.

So from the perspective of Dconf, you can estimate what your expenses will be: downpayment for the room and expenses closer to the date. You could represent this as a series of estimated future cash flows at certain dates. Then, you need to think about what kind of investments you would make where you would be sure you can meet those liabilities. So if you need $x to rent a room in Y months, then you might invest in a bond with a Y months remaining such that you will have at least $x at maturity.

You could also plan a few years in advance for the next two or three Dconfs, probably also incorporating some inflation in costs.

Then, you can think about the remainder of the portfolio, knowing that you most significant liabilities are already covered.

On Sunday, 18 September 2016 at 11:16:47 UTC, Mark wrote:
> [...]
> I think you can make 1-2% a year without taking a lot of risk, e.g. by investing in investment-grade corporate bonds with short maturity.
> [...]

Or buying some coca-cola shares.

On Wednesday, 21 September 2016 at 13:47:38 UTC, Andrea Fontana wrote:
> On Sunday, 18 September 2016 at 11:16:47 UTC, Mark wrote:
>> [...]
>> I think you can make 1-2% a year without taking a lot of risk, e.g. by investing in investment-grade corporate bonds with short maturity.
>> [...]
>
> Or buying some coca-cola shares.

That's riskier. :)

On Sunday, 18 September 2016 at 12:39:25 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
>
> Thanks all for answering! Well there is a relatively low-risk option to make some 5%-7% annually by investing in marketplace lending, see https://lendingclub.com/. (Individuals may do the same, too, btw - look into it!) I've been using them since 2013 with moderate amounts. Right now the portfolio's return rate is 5.06% - not to sneeze at. The issue is liquidity, i.e. your principal and interest are returned on a monthly basis over 3-5 years. The monthly schedule is actually nice for the Foundation because it matches the way operations are paid for.
> [snip]


Was reading [1] on p2p lending and reminded me of our earlier discussion.

[1] http://conversableeconomist.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-darker-side-of-peer-to-peer-lending.html