Does anyone here actively play the market?

Just remember, it can be a bit of a scam...they are trying to get you to "move" your money around to get fees and otherwise.
Don't just move it & invest, just to do so.

The key is find the good investment and watch it...just like anything else.

The Dow is about to go over 17K and the S&P hit 2000
but this often doesn't translate into benefits for YOU.

It's just like driving a long drive...you may cruise...but you still have to be aware and watch the road.
I'm not saying don't invest or be paranoid...just drive smart.

This is a good example of what "seems" good...
Retirees Suffer as 401(k) Rollover Boom Enriches Brokers

 

These days, I watch the Federal Reserve like a hawk.
They're the ones who're really "in the know". (**if they're paying attention, like before...but Yellen is not one to take her eye off the ball)

This is a good sign, tapering off of stimulus...it means the economy is strong enough.
Plus it gets the Fed back to the point where it has a tool again to fight. (interest rates)
Also it lets you know what your base rate will be...as most banks base it off this. (their own loans)

Even though the banks love to suck off the minimal tit, this is a good morale boost for stocks and even corporations & mgmt.
It will give them the warm & fuzzies.

Nice to know Manufacturing is chugging along too. (and construction...let get some Infrastructure in there folks!!)
The US is gaining speed. (I think Canada is also)
I wonder about Japan, Australia & Europe....perhaps the BRIC nations too.

I think we should give some cred to those who help bring us out of The Great Recession.
Now we just need some real "trickle-down" going on...not just words.
The lingering lag would disappear if they'd increase the job spout and income...then the public would buy.
Not just stocks...but retail too. (although I am seeing an increase of about 10-20% wage amounts...just not as much job volume as I would like)

 

I'd say more "in the know" than others for the most part.
But like any human endeavor...there will be bias and complacency at times.

Yes, Greenspan lost the eye on the ball...and coasted to the end like a rockstar by luck on timing. His shit stink lingered and was found out.

However Bernanke...got caught with his pants down...but I think he wasn't established...he just came in on 2006 when the shit hit the fan.
Although, he helped get us out of it...kept in there like a trooper. I'm sure he's exhausted.

Yellen still too new to see any real trend yet, but her qualifications are impeccable, most on both sides admire her ability.
But I like the fact she's pushing the rate back up bit by bit and slowing down on bonds.
This gives us back tools to work with, shows confidence which will increase fiscal morale
and is likely to fight "deinflation" which is more a threat than any over-inflation right now.

I'm skeptical of the premise and tone of your noted article...he's not a fan certainly, and from the tone, a raging opponent. (a rare one)
The stats he noted are changes AFTER the downturn in The Great Recession. (from the bottom of the curve and up)
The numbers have to get back up to where they were beforehand at a safe level not bubbled and accounting for inflation.
I wonder what they'd be in comparison to...let's say 10 year trends.

Ex. 17,000 Dow would be the number the Dow was at...if you add in for inflation.
That number and the S&P's...they are not on a bubble, they've growing at a comfortable rate. (It's not hot)
Yes, high society has gained substantially, but they've gotten in early & hard picking up the pieces that others dumped before. (and haven't returned)
Companies if anything aren't running at full speed yet. Funds, they're good...mechanics and revenue, they're lagging.

Running the Fed is a subtle & large thing...it takes a few years to see the results.
I see the authors' comments as reactionary and rhetoric.
BTW...my intuition says that it's a "royal WE" he/she is using for the group...the article reads as written by a single person...not as a group would put out.
I call BS.

 

The Amazon stock I bought back in April at $280-something sure looks nice right now.

Also, something I hadn't realized would happen. One of my investments was in a Brazilian firm (listed here), which paid out a dividend of roughly $7. It was a stock I bought several months ago with a set value that I was going to sell at if it reached (which it did, and I sold for a decent profit, the only stock I've sold so far). My other dividends are all reinvested. Since this one was already sold, I was credited the $7 to my account for the dividend instead. Then I had a little over $1 subtracted for foreign tax. I guess I assumed since it was a US based exchange that any taxes would fall under my normal US taxes.

I'm guessing I won't have to file with Brazil for my $6 profit on dividends.

 

Randomly remembered this thread and thought I'd throw out an update.

I got in on the Alibaba IPO on Sept 19th. It was $92-ish by the time I could get my transaction through. It just busted through $119 a few mins ago. I'm at a gain of roughly 30% right now in about 7 weeks. I put in a stop-loss order at $108.50 so I can lock those profits in if it starts to tank. But tomorrow is "Singles Day" in China. It's a made-up holiday where single people treat themselves like it's Valentine's Day in the US. Except last year they spent $8,000,000,000 doing it, most of it online, and most of the online via Alibaba. Yeah, that's eight BILLION. More than 2.5x what was spent in the US on Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.

That's my best story for this entire exercise.

So far I've purchased eight different stocks. One was the Brazilian mentioned above, which I sold for a decent profit. My plan all along was to only hold it until a pending court decision (they won) and the lead up to the World Cup (they were involved in infrastructure for it), then sell. It worked and I made a few bucks.

Aside from that, and Alibaba, out of the other six, five have been winners so far. The loser I am only down 1.8% since March. The winners I am up 18% since June, 7% since March, 5% since April, 11% since May, and 16% since July. Overall I am up 13%, with varied purchase dates spread out through the year. YTD the Dow is up 8.32%. So I've beat that handily, in much less time. And honestly, all with companies I think are good long term investments.

 

Amazon is up $42/share today.

It's very tempting to cash out, wait for it to come back to earth, then buy in when it gets back down around $300...

 

My wife's great grand-father worked for Mobil, probably back in the 20-40s. I don't know all the details, but they had some employee stock purchasing program available to him. He put his entire savings into Mobil stock. I don't think he made a ton, because he was just a truck driver, but whatever pennies he could scrape together went into their stock. He ended up dying young, but his wife, my wife's great-grandmother, lived to be 96 or 97. By the time she passed away, the stock had split enough that she had several thousand shares, somewhere around $500k/worth. At some point once she got in her 70s or 80s she stopped reinvesting the dividends and started taking it as income. It made for a very nice supplement to her Social Security.

When she passed away it was split up several different ways between her children and grandchildren. I don't know if anyone held on to their portion or not, most that I know of cashed in and did something with the money. Great grand children like my wife got a flat $1000 each, which we used to help fund a nice vacation.

The whole story always tickled me for a couple of reason's. One, because when she was alive everyone knew that Grandma L had a small fortune in Mobil stock, but no one knew exactly HOW much (and honestly, I don't think any of them were money hungry for it, just proud of the story of how it came about). Well, Grandma L always loved me and treated me like I was her own grand child, and around the time we got married there was a family dinner where I was seated next to her. By the end of the dinner she was whispering in my ear about the Mobil stock (she fancied herself a flirt, lol), and even told me exactly how many shares she had. I just had to laugh because she supposedly hadn't told anyone at that point except for her daughter who was her power of attorney.

Two, I remember going with my wife to visit her a day or two before she passed away. She was in good spirits and was even laughing and joking about her own upcoming funeral. One of the grand children was in the room when she was making jokes about wanting them to get a good deal with the funeral home. He said "Grandma, did you see the news today?!? Mobil stock has tanked, it's barely with the paper it is printed on!" She just started chuckling and said "At this point, Mobil can go to hell for all I care."



Regardless, I wish you the best in your investment @omega . Seems like a wise one to me, and took me down memory lane too.

 

I cashed out my 1000 shares of Harley-Davidson (HOG) and put it into BRK.B (I'm going to the meeting this year) and also sold 1000 shares of Apple which I'm just going to sit on the cash for a while. I want to move away from Apple because I'm overinvested there, with about 2/3 of my portfolio in AAPL which is more risky than I like. But I haven't found anything better.

We're also looking at some grass-feeding cattle investments in New Mexico.

I don't have any Amazon, but their model generates a lot of business for fulfillment and transportation. So I hold UNP, CP, UPS, FDX, and DHL DeutschPost.

After selling out of HOG I hold 13 different stocks. I hope that's not bad luck.

 

ooo...I was right on Waste Management (WM) ...doubled its price.

Everyone has got to throw their stuff away...

Didn't do well on rare earths...China's still got the corner.

 

1000 shares of HOG and 1000 shares of AAPL is a little richer than I am playing with. A Berkshire meeting would be interesting, I'm jealous.

 

I went to the Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders confab in Omaha last weekend. Met up with my old investing mentor from Boston. I was presented with the idea that at my level of investing I shouldn't need more than five different stocks. I'm pondering the meaning of that, as I hold thirteen different stocks plus three index funds. Over half of my book is in Apple, the rest spread kind of thin. I think I may be making some big changes in the coming year.