| |
| |
|
|
Stocks and Mutual Funds |
|
Is Your Garage Full Of Junk?
I have a 2-car garage. There are nice shelves on one side and a good practical workbench with a vice on the other side. Plenty of room for 2 cars yet I have to be careful when I pull in so I won't run over stuff stacked on each side. Sound familiar? Kinda reminds me of the investment portfolio of many people. Full of junk. If I threw out almost all of that stuff I really wouldn't miss it. For whatever crazy reason I still have a stock certificate of 100 shares for a copper mine in Cuba. You know how much that is worth. Fortunately, I don't have any of those now defunct dot.com company shares. Oh, I did own a lot of technology issues in 1999 and into 2000, but when they started down I put in my stop-loss orders and someone bought them from me. I sure hope he still doesn't have them. Some have no value at all now and others are worth less than 10% of their high prices. I remember Priceline.com when it went to $104 and then took a nosedive to $2.00. I even made a nice profit in the mutual fund Janus 20 that took off from $40 and went to $93. Today it is $37. The Buy and Hold crowd have become the Buy and Prey people. Needless to say your broker did not call you to sell out with a profit. No, he said, "Don't worry the market always comes back". Maybe not in your lifetime. I have not been very careful about keeping the junk out of my garage, but I have not collected many pretty stock certificates that have no value. Once each month I have taken about 15 minutes to see what is going on with my money. That is what is supposed to take care of me when I do not choose to work any more and I know Social Security is not going to be enough. When that bull market was raging I made sure that I was not going to give back the profits I made. I placed following loss limits on each of my securities every month. You really should do it weekly, but I did not seem to have the time. A good friend of mine taught me to place what is called Good 'Til Cancelled Stop-Loss Orders. The are also called GTC stop orders. This has been the difference in my having more money in my retirement account today. If I had not done this I would have less than half of what I have now. Don't let that happen to you. If you have a lot of worthless securities or those that are still going down I think you should give serious consideration to cleaning out that portfolio and putting those funds in a cash money market account until you can find something that will make you some money. You can live with a messy garage, but you can't live with no money in your retirement account. Clean out the weak ones now before they become worthless. Al Thomas' book, "If It Doesn't Go Up, Don't Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he's the man that Wall Street does not want you to know. Copyright 2005 al@mutualfundstrategy.com; 1-888-345-7870
MORE RESOURCES:
Stocks-Mutual-Funds - Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
KISS Formula There are formulas for just about everything, but it has been shown that the simpler the formula or method of doing a particular task the better it works. It has evolved down to KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid. Dont Buy Worldcom! A Guide to Wise Bottom Fishing Over the past few months, several investment professionals have brought up the topic of the down-and-out company of the day and whether to buy now as a speculation. Last year, K-Mart was the big news, and everyone wanted to know whether this was a good stock play. Wal-Mart: Discount Store, Discounted Stock? As GuruFocus updates the stock buys and sells of gurus, Wal-Mart (WMT), the discount retail giant, stands out as the stock with a high ValueRank (7 out of 10). Just recently, Clipper Fund's James Gipson and T. Acapulco - The Stock Market Dives There is a famous cliff on the ocean in Acapulco where experienced divers jump into the sea. It is very dangerous because the water at the base of the cliff surges from a depth of 2 feet to 12 feet. Money, Insanity and Wall Street Money: the most charged word in the planet. It means something to everyone. Why Technical Indicators The fight continues to rage among traders who use technical indicators and those who prefer fundamental information to establish new positions and to exit current positions.The fundamentalist believe in knowing all the facts about a company such as price earnings ratios, sales growth, product margins, management capabilities, cost of production, cash flow, etc. How to Make Big Money Safely in Stock Market (1) Stock Market is Tough Place to Make Any Money ConsistentlyNASDAQ or SP&500 averaged about -6% per year for 5 years between 1999 and 2003. Many individual investors who made killing in the internet bubble period got wiped out during those 5 years. Cash Is A Position I go to the Money Show every year to visit with friends who have booths and are speakers. Then when folks are filing out of lectures I listen to their comments on what I know the speaker has been saying. I Love To Lose Money Well, not really. What I mean is I don't mind losing a small amount when I have to sell a stock or mutual fund that is going down or taking away the profit I have made. The Stock Market - How Just One Question Will Tell You All You Need To Know About Your Stock Broker Last time we looked at the real performance of the stock market (we used the Dow Jones as a reference point) and the apparent performance that makes the headlines and can be seen by a casual look at a chart or "ballpark" figures - briefly; the Dow went up, for example, less than 50 points between April 1999 and April 2005 - essentially 6 years with no growth!But behind that seemingly "becalmed" Dow there were at least 10 significant moves each and every year totalling many thousands of points!But did the Wall Street Moguls, the so-called "Masters of the Universe" make you any money from those huge movements? No.Of course they didn't!Here's how I know. Top 25 Growth Funds On Monday, November 25, 2000 Investor's Business Daily listed on page B1 the Top 25 Growth Mutual Funds for the last 36 months along with their performance for the year 2000 to date. Only four showed a profit this year of 21% and the other three had increases of 12%, 5%, and 5%. Stock Options Trading Strategies - Lean Professional stock options traders use the term lean to refer to one's perception about the directional strength of the stock. When you own a stock option and intend to hold it for a period of time, you are aware that you will probably be holding it while it goes up and while it goes down. Stock Market Investing Odds The greatest stock market myth is the idea that investing in stocks is a form of gambling!The financial markets are often compared to a casino. Put some money on X stock and you might as well be playing craps!If that's your impression, and it's keeping you out of the markets, consider this: If investing is organized gambling, it's one of the rare kinds where the odds are stacked in your favor!Why is that?Corporate profits are the key to understanding the investor's edge. Robert Rodriguez Weathers the Stock Market Robert Rodriguez likes to buy stocks at their lows. When there are not enough stocks hitting new lows, he closes his fund and piles up cash. Successful Trading - Taking Profits - Part 2 Suppose your position has made a big move and you moved your stop to your purchase price as recommended. Then let's say your stock continues to make a big move and now we're asking again the questions we asked back in the first paragraph. Different Types of Mutual Funds This is a guide to the different types of mutual funds. When it comes to investing in mutual funds, investors have literally thousands of choices. Precision Money Management This article describes the model of a natural relationship between trading system performance, trade position size, stop loss settings and profit goals. The model consists of algebraic equations that specify the trade size and stop loss settings needed to meet profit goals over a specified time period for any consistently used trading system for which historical performance data is available. Laws and Efficiencies and Theories of Diminishing Returns The basis of diminishing return discussions surround such simple notions; that when you have a very fast aircraft, you also have coefficients of drag issues. When you are building a quarter mile car and want to go faster you must realize that for every tenth of a second you need to lose 100 lbs. Moving Averages Every day on CNBC-TV they show a 200-day moving average line superimposed on the stock price history. It seems they give great credence to this manufactured line as it represents 10 months of price action. Trading For A Living - Part 1 There can't be many traders who haven't at least considered the idea of telling the boss what they think of him, throwing it all in and going off to trade the stock market for a living. It's a big risk financially, and that uncertainty is what stops most from jumping ship.
|
|||||||||||||||
