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Posted by MartZee August 07, 2009
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Picks 08/03 – 08/07


New stock picks this week:

No new positions this week

Existing & new holdings:

Symbol Qty Last Gain($) Gain(%)
GMCR 3 69.70 -0.90 -0.43
MDRX 19 16.50 15.59 5.23
V 7 69.17 34.44 7.66

Contribution this week: $0

Starting account value = $1,696.52

Account value = $1,704.52 (without margin)

Buying power = $697.73

[tag]Portfolio Gain/loss[/tag] this week = 0.47%

[tag]Portfolio[/tag] Gain/Loss for AUGUST 2009 = 0.47%

Portfolio Gain/loss for 2009 = -22.87%

[tag]Annual Return[/tag] (CAGR): -35.20%


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Posted by MartZee August 04, 2009
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“A bear out there” hysteria


The recession, we are going through, started officially in October 2007. My personal opinion is that it actually started a lot sooner, circa at the beginning of 2007, but that is not the point I want to write about. Recently our economic data are showing some improvement and it seems that we are at the beginning of a recovery. Of course there are careers and branches out there which are still waiting for its improvement process to begin, such as new construction in residential and small commercial industry is still very slow, while housing itself is indicating some improvements.

 

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If the recession started at the end of 2007, it is 17 months since then. Even though many say that this recession is different, it actually is not. When you take a look at the entire history of recessions, you will see, that all are same as the previous. Some are longer and deeper, some are shorter and shallower. But all are exact same and there fore we may expect similar progress during this recession too.

Of course, investors shall be cautious when investing or moving money back into stocks, but there is no doubt we are already marching out of the recession. A few weeks ago I talked to a friend of mine in some party and we discussed the stock market, economic issues and someone joined us with strong words of explanation why there is no end of this recession yet and the worst is in front of us. I was looking at that person with my mouth widely open asking myself a question how somebody can be so skeptical.

Today I have read an article “Why are company insiders selling?” and in the first three paragraphs you can read that the insiders are selling because the bear is still out there and the stock market may fall again. Well it may fall and it will. It has been growing since March 09 until June 12 and then it corrected. The correction was as by books. Since then, it is growing again in a sharp pace so it is obvious that one day it will correct again, but talking about a bear out there?

I remember William O’Neil talking in his book How To Make [tag]Money[/tag] In [tag]Stocks[/tag] when public and commentators are too excited of a bull market it typically indicates its end and vice versa when they suffer from hysteria of a bear market it typically indicates its end as well.

Why I think that this is all hysteria about which O’Neil is writing? Our company decided recently to switch our 401k provider and the new one provided us with the following data:

Post War Bear Markets

Peak Through Duration (months) S&P 500
Cumulative
Price Decline
Price Gain
12 Months Later
05/29/1946 05/19/1947 12 -28% 19%
02/02/1953 09/14/1953 7 -14% 38%
07/15/1957 10/22/1957 3 -21% 31%
12/12/1961 06/26/1962 6 -28% 33%
02/09/1966 10/07/1966 8 -22% 33%
11/29/1968 05/26/1970 18 -36% 44%
01/11/1973 10/03/1974 21 -28% 38%
06/30/1975 09/16/1975 3 -14% 28%
12/31/1976 03/06/1978 14 -19% 13%
09/11/1978 11/14/1978 2 -14% 12%
02/13/1980 03/27/1980 1 -17% 37%
11/28/1980 08/12/1982 21 -27% 58%
10/10/1983 07/24/1984 9 -14% 30%
08/25/1987 12/04/1987 4 -34% 26%
07/16/1990 10/11/1990 3 -20% 34%
07/17/1998 08/31/1998 1 -19% 40%
03/24/2000 10/09/2002 30 -47% 36%
Median 7 -21% 33%
10/09/2007 03/31/2009 17 -47%

NOTE: Dates are shown in US format: MM/DD/YYYY
Source: Zephyr; LPL Financial

As you can see in the table above, recent crisis is same as the previous ones, so there is no need for panicking and hysteria as you may see in news these days. From the history we may expect another bear market in about two to three years (in worst case).


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Posted by MartZee August 03, 2009
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How to create the best investment strategy?


If you were considering investing some money besides your 401(k) plan to boost your savings and making more money for your retirement, you are maybe asking a question right now: how to do it with a small amount of money. In this post I am going to show you how I did it and what strategy I consider the best when investing small money. Later in this post I will also tell you why it is a good idea having another investing account besides your 401k, where you can invest on your own and why you should invest in your 401k only as much as to get your employer match and save the rest elsewhere. I will tell you why I decided to invest small portion of my contributions to 401k just to receive my employer’s match and the rest goes to my ROTH IRA and Investing-trading Account (this blog is a journal of my investing account only, but I am thinking to show my ROTH IRA account either on this blog or start another one).

If you do not have a lump sum of money available for investing in your own new account, you have only one way to go: invest a small amount of money every month. What strategy and what investment vehicles you should chose to start with? This is the most important question ever. You need a strategy, which will save you money on fees and commissions and which will help you to boost your savings, while still be as cheap as possible.
 

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I tried several approaches before I came up with a strategy, which will be the most effective. Originally in my previous post I advocated to start saving in your savings account and after you save some substantial amount of money, transfer them to your new investing account. This approach didn’t prove to be the most effective to me.

I searched through the internet trying to find some feasible strategy and I have found a lot of great ideas and advice from aggressive growth trading, growth investing up to income investing. However, all of the strategies I found had something in common: all expected you to have an account with at least 10,000 of dollars or more and some income strategies even expected you to have 100,000 of dollars or more!

I also found some articles advising investing with small amount of 100 dollars a month. However, all advice I read about this investing approach revealed itself to be extremely expensive for a small investor like you or me.

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Posted by MartZee August 02, 2009
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Market monitor – Sectors & Industries


Last 30 days [tag]performance[/tag] (top 5):

Basic Materials +13.90%  
Financials +9.99%  
Industrials +9.51%  
Technology +9.38%  
Consumer Goods +8.56%  

(Data retrieved from [tag]financial[/tag] websites such as [tag]MarketWatch[/tag], [tag]MSN Money[/tag], [tag]Yahoo Finance[/tag], and others)


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Posted by MartZee July 31, 2009
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Picks 07/27 – 07/31


New stock picks this week:

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc (GMCR)

Existing & new holdings:

Symbol Qty Last Gain($) Gain(%)
GMCR 3 70.44 1.32 0.63
MDRX 19 17.23 29.46 9.89
V 7 65.46 8.47 1.88

Contribution this week: $0

Starting account value = $1,692.93

Account value = $1,696.52 (without margin)

Buying power = $699.61

[tag]Portfolio Gain/loss[/tag] this week = 0.21%

[tag]Portfolio[/tag] Gain/Loss for JULY 2009 = 2.38%

Portfolio Gain/loss for 2009 = -23.23%

[tag]Annual Return[/tag] (CAGR): -35.73%


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Posted by MartZee July 26, 2009
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Opening a new position of GMCR


Tomorrow I am going to buy back a few shares of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (GMCR). I can buy only a few shares since my buying power went significantly down thanks to my last error in money management, but now I have my trades for free, so I can afford it since no commissions will be charged.
Even with small numbers now I still want to play this game by numbers. Tomorrow I will buy 3 shares of this stock.

Today I bought 3 GMCR @ 70.00 and set my stop loss @ 60.28, which equals 3% risk of the portfolio per this trade, and 13.89% total risk per this trade.




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Posted by MartZee July 26, 2009
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Market monitor – Sectors & Industries


Markets broke up heavily this week and DJIA is back above the 9000 level. Will this trend survive? Let’s see, it depends on the news we may see this week, economics data, earnings and sunny days outside…

Last 30 days [tag]performance[/tag] (top 5):

Basic Materials +14.16%  
Technology +11.18%  
Consumer Goods +9.43%  
Industrials +9.41%  
Health Care +8.81%  

(Data retrieved from [tag]financial[/tag] websites such as [tag]MarketWatch[/tag], [tag]MSN Money[/tag], [tag]Yahoo Finance[/tag], and others)


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Posted by Martin July 24, 2009
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Picks 07/20 – 07/24


New stock picks this week:

No new picks

Existing & new holdings:

Symbol Qty Last Gain($) Gain(%)
MDRX 19 16.44 14.45 4.85
V 7 67.29 21.28 4.73

Contribution this week: $0

Starting account value = $1,662.19

Account value = $1,692.93 (without margin)

Buying power = $909.54

[tag]Portfolio Gain/loss[/tag] this week = 1.85%

[tag]Portfolio[/tag] Gain/Loss for JULY 2009 = 2.17%

Portfolio Gain/loss for 2009 = -23.39%

[tag]Annual Return[/tag] (CAGR): -35.87%


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Posted by MartZee July 20, 2009
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Market monitor – Sectors & Industries


Data from last week show that the correction might be over. Some sectors jumped up high heavily.

Last 30 days [tag]performance[/tag] (top 5):

Technology +8.05%  
Consumer goods +6.74%  
Financials +6.42%  
Basic materials +6.35%  
Consumer services +4.65%  

(Data retrieved from [tag]financial[/tag] websites such as [tag]MarketWatch[/tag], [tag]MSN Money[/tag], [tag]Yahoo Finance[/tag], and others)


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Posted by MartZee July 18, 2009
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Picks 07/13 – 07/17


New stock picks this week:

Allscripts Misys Healthcare Solutions Inc (MDRX)

Visa (V)

Existing & new holdings:

Symbol Qty Last Gain($) Gain(%)
MDRX 19 16.00 6.09 2.04
V 7 64.10 -1.05 -0.23

Contribution this week: $0

Starting account value = $1,657.02

Account value = $1,662.19 (without margin)

Buying power = $909.49

[tag]Portfolio Gain/loss[/tag] this week = 0.31%

[tag]Portfolio[/tag] Gain/Loss for JULY 2009 = 0.31%

Portfolio Gain/loss for 2009 = -24.78%

[tag]Annual Return[/tag] (CAGR): -37.03%


Are you interested in Reverse Scale Strategy and see how it works when implemented to even a small account?

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Dividends4Life
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Stock Market Analysis at DeepMarket




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