I had promised that I was going to start my own thread regarding stock investments and the markets. So many things have happened since last time I was here and I really do not feel like sharing my knowledge. But a promise is a promise and there have been few people that have emailed me and supported me.

This thread will deal with investing in the stock markets. I will not discuss individual stocks but discuss ETFs like SPY, DIA, IWM and QQQQ. The one good thing about trading ETFs compared to individual stocks is the the ETFs provide instant diversification among similar companies within the same sector.

I will post more as we go along, regarding entry-price, profit-target and stop-losses. I do not think that any ETF is good or bad. It is good only if I'm making money and bad if I'm losig money.

If you have not been in the market so far, please read this as an information piece only rather than my recommendations. There is risk involved and you should know how much risk to take on any position.

Any suggestations, comments and criticisms are welcome as long as it is market related. If this thread gets out of hand and we start discussing off-topics, I'll stop posting.

Have a happy new year!!!! May 2007 bring you and your family lots of joys and riches.

Here is my stockpick: LLTC, currently at $31.30. Buyer Beware!!! Do your own research.

I went with AZL today. I will check LLTC though.

If LLTC goes below $29, I'll take my loss otherwise I'll keep on buying. $30 has been a huge support. It bounced off $30 three times in thelast 6 months.

Yes, Linear technology is good and they do have a huge gross margin and make profit all the time. But dont expect much of a upswing because of the growth limitation.

My pick: cell,sndk

Just my Two cents worth of advice to all Investors and "Wannabe" Investors:

NEVER LISTEN TO OTHERS WHEN IT COMES TO INVESTING , DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH ON STOCKS , STICK TO TIME TESTED PRINICPLES OF VALUE INVESTING, IF YOU FEEL THAT I THIS IS TOO HARD, INVESTING IS NOT YOUR CUP OF TEA,

true nepali kai.

In LTTC's case. I expect it to crash this time. I bought it once. I can see a touble top forming. I also see a descending triangle and high volume everytime it hits support. Volume has also been declining.

I hate AAPL. I bought a nano today and the SOB reveals a hot new cellphone!

SPEAK OF "WTF" scenarios!

Nepali Kai: What makes you so qualified to give advise? Tell us some of the value picks then.

Here's another pick: SVNT. It is down today but worth buying. You can wait for it to come down to 12. Take your losses if it goes below 9.

While I agree with "doing your own research" i think it's not such a good idea to let time increase your money. With some markets active 24/7 like forex and futures, people need to be more aggresive. There could be more recessions etc and intermediate term inflations- a time when putting money in banks may not be such a good idea.

I think everyone should be active in both making money and managing it. As far as stock picks are concerned, you might wanna say that to Warrenn Buffett. Millions of his listeners bought the stocks he adivsed to buy. However, the irony is that he did ask them to buy and hold.

However, even Buffett is an active investor, he's moulded his tactics too. Markets weren't as liquid in those days as they are now. News didn't travel as fast.

Even for somewone with millions of dollars, active trading is a boon.

Example? Yesterday- Apple.

well eminitrader , i dont have a CFA or a billions to show for my investing principles , but i certainly have accomplished the first Rule of Investing , " I HAVE NOT LOST MONEY " , and regarding stock picks that you have asked for , that itself shows you are a novice in investing , coz my picks may not be suitable to you or any one else , that's what i CIRCLE OF COMPETENCE is in value investing , find your COC and you will see plenty of value stocks lying around ,

REAGRDING eminitrader post , here is my 2 cent of advice to all new to investing:

1. DON'T go for FOREX and Options unless you are comfortbale with stocks for at least 5 years , these are razor sharp , you will LOSE MONEY , just check how many options trader and forex traders make the richest list , i can thnik of only one , GEORGE SOROS , and he was an exception

2. DON'T think active trading is a way to go , only people who will benefit are your brokers ,

3. and regarding picks like apple , HERE is the MANTRA " BE FEARFUL WHEN OTHERS ARE GREEDY AND GREEDY WHEN OTHERS ARE FEARFUL" , every one is ramping up tech stocks and healthcare right now , stay away from these ,,

Nepali Kai: You thoink I'm a novice. Look at my previous post where I've posted my P&L. I just don't want to show off here but your ignorance amuses me.

Here is 1 of the link. Scroll down,

http://www.sajha.com/sajha/html/openthreadall.cfm?StartRow=41&PageNum=3&forum=2&threadid=39624

Actually active trading is what is the best. Active means short term. Short term means holding equites not more than two hours. Two hours believe me. I dnt care what portfolio or sing stock theory says, but my theory is when you look the stocks trend and but it and sell it as soon as the prices goes down. It has been my best strategy. Believe me, I had about 15 transactions last week, and I made money on all. I mean the lowest one was 12 bucks too. Mst of the stocks go way up after I sell it and I feel bad, by the end of the day, they would come to the same point n what i sold for or even down then I sold for. Then I feel good. Overall, dont be too greedy as Emintrader says but follow your instinct, dont follow others. Most people follow others thats why the market sentiments are there for and what dictates the prices at the end. This is not a Dow Theory but very practical Nepali theroy.

Nepali Kai: If you think Value Investing is not for everyone why are you telling people to look for value? George Soros is the only one you can think of. Have you heard of Bruce Kovner? Bruce has better returns than Soros. Soros biggest bet was when he shorted GBP. Soros was excellent in the 80s but now there are better traders. Google Paul Tudor Jones, Steve Cohen, Eddie Lampert, Michael Marcus, Ed Seykota, Richard Dennis, Larry Hite and one of my heroes Tom Baldwin. There are just a few names that I can think of now, there are plenty more.

The other thing that I've done here is mention the price that I got in, I'll tell people when to sell and if the selling price > buying price, there is no reason to complain. Either put up or SHUT UP. I'm not selling anything here. I'm just tellling people how I do it and if they follow and make money they don't owe me anything at all, similarly if they los I don't owe them squat.

looked at the links you gave , and am suprised , have loads of info there , so i must concede i am in a wrong thread , but dont get me wrong , " Value investing is for every one , but the value stocks you seek are different ,

and looking forward to see your name and everyone elses in near future in the superb list your provided ,

No problem man. I don't recommend forex at all to new people, actually I don't even recommend stocks. If you can't spend some time researching stocks let a professional manage your money. The thing I'm trying to show here is how to identify a trend and take full advantage of it. Right now the trend is up, so it is time to buy. My picks are a long term pick. I think those stocks will double in 6-12 months but ther is always a chace that the market would turn down so I have suggested that if the stock falls bu $x, sell it and tae your loss. I used to work in a small hedge fund and now I'm on my own. I had found that most of our picks about 50-60% would be wrong and we would still make money because out win $ was way bigger than our loss $.

no offenses to you eminitrader , you might have made a bucket load of money , but our differences are on the principles of investing , i hope that you have started this thread to educate newbies and even oldbies in to the world of investing , what you have done for you may be right for you , and what i have done may be right for me , but lets not promote hoaxes , you wrote in your previous post "The thing I'm trying to show here is how to identify a trend and take full advantage of it" , there are no trend in the market , the market is a indepedent, dynamic entity that doesnt follow a trend , if it followed there wont be any mutual fund whose return lagged the index , no investment turned sour , no bubbles like the 2000 one , and most of all every one would be millionare ,but that doesnt happen ,

so lets educate people with facts and not hoaxes , THERE IS NO TREND IN WALL STREET

tero kakako Bau,

are u joking man ? how can u make money trading so many times.. u said earlier u made $$$ by following trends and selling at a high and u even boast about trading 15 times last week.

dont forget to count transaction costs and commisions when u buy & sell stocks. these transaction costs will kill any small profit u can make.. also it is impossible to make money selling buying stocks like day trading.. unless u have like $50,000 budget to day trade.

but my guess is your trading budget is prolly $ 2000 since im sure u are not a fulltime stock broker and u have a real 2nd job.


just my 2 cents.
-lato

this thread was started by eminitrader to give trading ideas to people, not value investing, not how to diversify, KEYWORD: TRADING.

While value investing has its own glory this thread is for TRADING.

Please let him do his job. Traders need to know as much fundamentals as "value investors" do. They need to read market cycles, hey also need to have a good grasp of sectors and all sorts, I'm sure eminitrader is good at those. Even if he is purely technical, let him spread his knowledge.

So value investors, sit back, relax and if we lose money laugh at us, if we don't learn.

ok?

thank you.

hey time traveller ,

" his thread was started by eminitrader to give trading ideas to people, not value investing, not how to diversify, KEYWORD: TRADING. "

ARE YOU SURE ,CHECK EMINI"S FIRST POST :

" This thread will deal with investing in the stock markets"

" e one good thing about trading ETFs compared to individual stocks is the the ETFs provide instant diversification among similar companies within the same sector."

Emintrader, commission and transactions fees are same, i use scottrade, its just takes out and only reports net proceed both ways. All costs is already included in costs itself. My money is not much but I just do it for fun and I do about 3 transactions a week. One on the retirement account and the other one on simple account. I mean 15 was meant for the whole month.

Thanks Iminitrader for starting this thread!

Guys,
Here are some international ETFs you may want to check out....

LDF
VWO
FXI
IFN

Happy trading!!!