Mark Cecchini, CFP®

@L_Cincinnatus_ $20,000 but have gone as high as $40,000

@markcecchini What’s the minimum fee?

typed this up for someone recently and thought I would share >> Why have a high minimum dollar fee? << Most importantly, I never want you to feel like your assets are “stuck” with us or that you’re under pressure to consolidate everything immediately. There will always be valid reasons to pull money: a home purchase, college expenses, funding an outside investment, or simply spending it. It’s your money, always. The minimum annual dollar fee means our fee doesn't crater if you take large withdrawals from managed accounts, and we can continue to serve you in the same capacity as always. It also allows people to get in the door under the right circumstances without having $2,000,000+ of liquidity. My hope is that my clients never feel beholden to keeping assets with us for any reason. Additionally, a large part of what I do for clients has nothing to do with managing investments. This fee covers everything from liquid portfolio oversight and rebalancing to retirement planning, estate planning, charitable giving, account consolidation and cashiering, company stock coordination, tax coordination, and scenario modeling. Lastly, this fee level allows me to keep the practice intentionally small and bespoke. Fewer clients means more time, more attention, and a higher level of service for everyone in the practice.

Things I'm obsessed with when I meet with clients: 1. Why are we meeting, and what I'm asking of them in advance 2. That they have a big say in the proposed agenda for the season 3. Approximately how long the meeting will run and whether they have a hard stop 4. When will we aim to meet up next 5. What should happen in between this meeting and the next

just reviewed a frontier lab paystub with an $8 million line item on it. don’t see that coming through payroll very often.

people that tell me they are really good with money but they don't understand personal or business income taxation and couldn’t tell me what’s on their tax returns for last year

Thanks! <$50mm just applies to the size of the company’s balance sheet when the shares were acquired by the oroginal holder (typically founder, early employee, or VC) Secondary sale could happen at any point, typically Series B and beyond (for a founders it’s typically being bought by existing investor/fund to grant some early liquidity)

@markcecchini Hey Mark, great content. Quick question, am I understanding correctly the company has to be smaller than $50m? If so, who are the class of buyers in the secondary market? Middle market PE firms?

A founder client of mine sold $2 million of his shares in the secondary market last year. He is about to file his 2025 taxes and pay ZERO taxes on the $2m of cash proceeds, all of which is all considered capital gain since his basis was essentially $0 His shares fully qualify for QSBS (Qualified Small Business Stock) treatment, which excludes up to $10 million in capital gains for qualified situations It's a nuanced section of the tax code that’s highly relevant for tech startups

@wealthMAinsider I can promise you that I’ve never been called tall in my life

@markcecchini Guy looks tall… and short (next to rocket)… Amazing!

New client commitment to end the week from a great guy with 8 figures in certain popular aerospace company (and an incredible story on how he earned it) You can just do things.

my money’s on Emerging Market

have yourselves a day Philadelphia

@lindsay__stamp Nice! Ngl these kind of days are really hard for me Much harder questions to ask when you can’t blame things on work

A couple times a year I take PTO & simulate my life as if I’m financially free. I sleep in, grab a bagel sandwich & a coffee from my favorite breakfast spot, go to the gym, then hang out at home & do whatever I want. Today is one of those days & I’m ready for it to be my reality!

@Jack_Raines Didn’t have this one on my bingo card ngl

Cliff Asness thinking Palmer Luckey is a burner account name is hilarious

@darrelltalksfi Great way to go. Important to also acknowledge that not all 401k plans are good stewards of capital! Money might be better deployed in IRA with full investment universe.

My wife’s employer just switched 401k providers. She had 3 options for her old account: • Roll it into an IRA • Roll into the new 401k • Leave it where it is Most people pick the IRA. More investment options, easier to manage. But we rolled it into the new 401k. That way we can use the backdoor Roth strategy. If she were to park pre-tax money in an IRA, the pro-rata rule kicks in. And every backdoor Roth conversion would get partially taxed. The new 401k keeps that pre-tax money out of the IRA entirely. Clean conversion. No tax surprise.

@KurtSupeCPA Nice one!

ME: The IRS has a plan for your IRA. You are not going to like it. THEM: What do you mean? ME: At 75 they force you to take money out whether you need it or not. THEM: My accountant says it is too late and I should just keep taxes low. ME: Low taxes this year or low taxes over your lifetime? Those are not the same strategy. THEM: He has done my taxes for 25 years. ME: Does he model your RMDs? THEM: Not really. ME: You retired at 62 with $2 million in your IRA. At 7% growth you never touch it for 13 years. At 75 that account is worth $4.8 million. Your RMD that year is $196,000. Add $90,000 in Social Security and other income and you are over $328,000. You are in the 24% bracket pushing toward 32% and deep inside IRMAA Tier 2. Higher Medicare premiums every year with no way to fix it after the fact. THEM: Those thresholds adjust for inflation. ME: At 2% annually your IRA still grows four times faster. The brackets move slowly. Your account does not. THEM: My accountant never showed me this. ME: You just retired. This window opened today. Strategic Roth conversions right now change everything about what 75 looks like. THEM: How much time do we have. ME: That depends on how long you wait to start. This is not financial advice. Consult a qualified financial professional before making any financial decisions. The scenarios described are hypothetical and for illustrative purposes only.

@TheGarpInvestor Wow!

With the recent run up, I've gotten my first official 20x bagger on a stock. Bought $1,380 of $GOOGL while in college in 2012. Now worth $30,671 Let's hope this is only the first of many!

@ContrarianCurse seconded have to be using both in parallel right now IMO

Hadn't used GPT in months, now subbing to both cause Claude is so throttled Output is extremely HQ. 5.5 is a massive breakthrough and it isn't spoken about enough how much faster ChatGPT is vs Claude

text teams outlook gmail twitter college friend group chat high school friend group chat wife friends group chat family group chat snapchat instagram nanit linkedin microsoft authenticator authy okta bank alerts apple watch 2FA text 2FA email 2FA magic link 2FA face ID

What's a "double-trigger" RSU? It's a restricted stock unit (typically for a privately held company) that vests according to a pre-determined schedule but does not become taxable until a liquidity event occurs 2-trigger points: 1) vest 2) liquidity event You’ll only owe taxes once the company's shares are "liquid" in some fashion and you can actually sell those shares to access cash. ..but it also means you pay ordinary income tax (not capital gains) all the way up to that FMV "single-trigger" RSUs vest and are taxed at the same time (most public company RSUs follow this method, plus some late-stage private cos)