Fidelity Charitable^sm Honors National Philanthropy Day^® With Strategies to Maximize Charitable Giving

GIVE

Choose the Right Asset

Appreciated Securities
Choosing the right assets to give can help donors maximize their charitable impact. Instead of selling the assets and then donating the proceeds, consider contributing the securities directly. This strategy can provide a double tax advantage – donors may be eligible to claim a tax deduction for the Fair Market Value (FMV) of long-term appreciated securities, and can eliminate capital gains taxes on the appreciation in value of the donated securities. More than half of Fidelity Charitable donations typically come in the form of appreciated securities.

Complex Assets
Many donors have more “complex” assets that may be tax efficient to donate, including non-publicly traded securities (such as private company stock, restricted stock, LLC and limited partnership interests and pre-IPO shares), real estate or other assets. Like publicly traded appreciated securities, contributing these assets directly to a donor-advised fund like Fidelity Charitable can provide maximum tax advantages, and put more of the grant to work for charity as assets are liquidated at low to no cost to the donor. Donating to a donor-advised fund also allows donors to contribute these assets with a single transaction, and then recommend multiple grants to different charities over time. Fidelity Charitable has seen donations of complex assets increase five-fold through the first nine months of 2011 compared to the same period in 2010.

Choose the Right Charitable Vehicle, or Combination of Vehicles
Charitable giving vehicles can range from a check book to a donor-advised fund to a large private foundation. The choice of vehicle depends on your personal situation and philanthropic goals, including how much time and money you would like to devote to managing your giving. Most vehicles can offer certain tax benefits, although the amount of the deduction can vary depending on the vehicle and the item being contributed.

While donor-advised funds and private foundations have often been thought of as an "either/or" decision, many donors are now using a national donor-advised fund in addition to their private foundation or local community foundation's donor-advised fund. This strategy is increasing in popularity, as it enables individuals to use complementary vehicles to accomplish separate philanthropic purposes and maximize tax incentives.

The standard tax deduction for cash donations to a private foundation is 30 percent of a donor’s Adjusted Gross Income (AGI). Donors who want to take a tax deduction beyond 30 percent of their AGI can leverage a donor-advised fund to make additional cash donations up to 50 percent of their AGI.

GROW

Invest Your Charitable Contributions
By using a charitable giving vehicle like a donor-advised fund, donors can advise how their charitable contributions are invested to provide the potential for the assets to grow, which ultimately may result in additional dollars for charitable grants.

At Fidelity Charitable alone, investment pools and the Charitable Investment Advisor Program have generated an additional $1 billion above the contributions received from donors for charitable purposes.

Make the most of your charitable contributions by choosing an investment strategy that takes into account how and when grants will be made. Fidelity Charitable’s online Pool Selector Tool provides a series of questions that can help donors make these decisions.

GRANT

Know Your Giving History
Knowing the amount and charitable recipients of past grants can help you decide where you’d like future grants to be made. In the next month, Fidelity Charitable will introduce enhanced functionality on its web site that will provide donors with a full snapshot of their grant history from the time they established their Giving Account^®. Donors will be able to customize the historical information and view total grant amounts in a specific year, over time, or to a specific organization or charitable sector.

Engage Others in Giving
A great way to carry on your charitable mission into the next generation is to engage family members early on in your giving. Giving to a donor-advised fund helps families build a giving legacy by allowing donors to give other family members the opportunity to recommend grants from their donor-advised fund. Parents are also recognizing the power of setting up donor-advised funds for their adult children to instill the power of giving.

Another way Fidelity Charitable donors can engage family and friends – especially around the holidays – is to give a Gift4GivingeGift^® funded from their Giving Account^® in amounts ranging from $50 to $5,000. Gift4Giving^® recipients may then recommend gifts via Fidelity Charitable’s web site, FidelityCharitable.org, to the charities of their choice.
 

About Fidelity Charitable
Fidelity Charitable is an independent public charity, established in 1991, with the mission to further the American tradition of philanthropy by providing programs that make charitable giving simple and effective. Since its inception, the program has helped donors support more than 140,000 nonprofit organizations