Best time of day to sell funds?

cattie

I'm sure I've seen this question asked before on this board, but doing a search brings nothing up. Is there a best time of the day to sell funds, only I understand that there's a best time to buy funds which can affect the price you pay. Obviously I'd like the opportunity to sell at a particular time of day if there's a chance it might benefit me.

eskbanker

Assuming you're not meaning ETFs, funds are only priced daily and it isn't possible to secure 'live' pricing, in exactly the same way as when buying, so the only factors to consider are the valuation time for the specific fund and the cutoff time for your platform.

[Deleted User]

Hi,

most funds are priced at noon, so you don't know what price you are buying at, you would need to have your order in before then, it's not like buying shares where you know what the price is and just hit the buy button.

Albermarle

frugalmacdugal said:

Hi,

most funds are priced at noon, so you don't know what price you are buying at, you would need to have your order in before then, it's not like buying shares where you know what the price is and just hit the buy button.

Some are also priced at 15.00 and 21.00 and no doubt other times as well .
Plus you usually have to have your order in well before that time , sometimes up to 12 hours before.
If you have the funds with a big pension insurer, it can take even longer . With Standard Life if you ask to buy/sell on Monday , it happens on Wednesday. 
The idea of funds is really for long term investing , so in the long term these timings will hardly make any difference.

coyrls

cattie said:

I understand that there's a best time to buy funds which can affect the price you pay.

There is no best time of the day to sell as explained above, just like there is no best time of day to buy.  Where did you get the idea that there was a best time of the day to buy?

cattie

coyrls said:

cattie said:

I understand that there's a best time to buy funds which can affect the price you pay.

There is no best time of the day to sell as explained above, just like there is no best time of day to buy.  Where did you get the idea that there was a best time of the day to buy?

I've seen posts where people choose to buy one day & assumed they'd get the price shown at the time of putting in their request to platform, but have paid a little more due to the time delay in actioning the actual buy. Just as mentioned in the replies by frugalmacdugal & Albermarle. I was unsure if the same delay applied when you sold, hence my query.

coyrls

You will never get the price shown (unless there is no daily movement) when you buy or sell funds, as the transaction will take place at a future pricing point.  The price at that point may or may not be better for you than the price shown when you place the order.

Albermarle

 I was unsure if the same delay applied when you sold, hence my query.

Yes it does . Some platforms  offer a fund switching service and here there is also a pricing delay , although they will organise it do you do not have to wait until one is sold and settled before the other one is bought.

coastline

cattie said:

coyrls said:

cattie said:

I understand that there's a best time to buy funds which can affect the price you pay.

There is no best time of the day to sell as explained above, just like there is no best time of day to buy.  Where did you get the idea that there was a best time of the day to buy?

I've seen posts where people choose to buy one day & assumed they'd get the price shown at the time of putting in their request to platform, but have paid a little more due to the time delay in actioning the actual buy. Just as mentioned in the replies by frugalmacdugal & Albermarle. I was unsure if the same delay applied when you sold, hence my query.

As posted above you need to know the cut off time of your fund as it seems all are not the same. It's still difficult as world markets operate at different times of the 24 hour day so movement is always there.
If you load up both the links below and at the top set up to 15 minutes you can see the markets operating outside of the daily hours. This is where some price movement occurs. For example if a UK fund is sold and after 4.30 pm the Dow Jones falls 2% then there's a fair chance the FTSE 100 will reflect similar falls at the 8 am opening the next day. Then there's all the movement throughout the night in the futures markets.
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/stock-market
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/stock-market

Ray_Singh-Blue

These days I only ever buy and sell one ETF which is VWRL.

I can confirm the price varies throughout the day. I usually set limit orders. Sometimes these will be executed at 9am, sometimes at 4pm, or at any time between.

There is definitely a "best" time to buy a fund... When it's CHEAP