Tax-Aware Investment Management: The Essential Guide

thought provoking and honest book. good book

One of the most important and distinguishing characteristics of investing for wealthy individuals involves the impact and complexity resulting from taxes. Doug Roger's book, Tax-Aware Investment Management - The Essential Guide, should be the instruction manual of choice for those interested in minimizing tax drag for themselves or their clients. As an investment advisor / planner, one focused upon tax-aware best practices, I support Doug's work and have designed elements of it into my philosophy as well.Unparalleled government deficit spending and budget shortfalls at all levels of government will require higher tax revenues and unfortunately, high wage earners and the wealthy are certain to be impacted disproportionately. Thoughtful, tax-aware planning and administration by tax, estate and investment counsel is essential and will no doubt grow in importance as the value-add (as much as 2 or 3 percent annually) of this discipline becomes known. I am convinced that better investment advisors will embrace his proven practices and concepts over the next few years. Tax-aware investment management should be an essential part of a serious investment advisor's disciplined process and Doug's book is the best guide I know of.

I have yet to meet a prudent investor that thinks the government would do a better job of spending the money that the investor has accumulated, than they would do spending it themselves.Doug Rogers' Tax-Aware Investment Management guide is timely. Doug gives you questions to ask your advisor. He provides a historical prospective while injecting humor. Doug even synthesizes the implications of taxation on investment results in a readable fashion.Wall Street serves institutions (they live in world of relative "better than the benchmark or at least awfully darn close to it so they can keep their job" performance evaluation.Private clients are often sold what institutions bought 5 or 10 years ago. The individual investor's best interests would be better served by thinking about this topic before, during and after they invest. You can only spend what you have after tax, after fee. I suggest you invest some time in thinking about the wisdom that Doug shares.

This book could/should be used as a handbook for investment professionals considering tax aware investing. Doug has compiled years of research, insight and practice into a concise "manual" to shed some light on this complicated,and ever-changing aspect of investment management. Billions of dollars are needlessly lost each year from investors' portfolios because investment professionals fail to consider the impact of taxes when constructing and managing investment portfolios.The book is very well written and organized. Hopefully, more people will realize the importance of taxes on portfolio performance and be drawn to firm's who can add value by having the knowledge and the ability to "play the game". This is especially true in a low return environment where the tax burden can have a meaningful impact in overall returns.