# For better or worse



## ric371 (5 March 2007)

Ok I took the plunge and put my money where my March picks are, 

I plan to trade these during the month and will post any changes when they occur. and some reasons why I might sell and or buy, I have allocated a bank of $12,049 real money.

 I am already down $286 but what a day on the market it has been, I hope to more than make that up over the next few weeks

I am in no way suggesting that I am expert in this but I am prepared to put my wins and Losses on view to help me and anyone else learn something


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## 2020hindsight (5 March 2007)

ric, can I ask pls, when did you buy?


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## ric371 (5 March 2007)

They were all purchased during today


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## hitmanlam (6 March 2007)

ric, you are a brave man........

Personally, I wouldn't touch the market for the next few weeks.  I don't think the market has quite bottomed out yet.  Very risky business your taking there.  Hope you turn out with some profit.  Good luck!


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## CanOz (6 March 2007)

ric371 said:
			
		

> Ok I took the plunge and put my money where my March picks are,
> 
> I plan to trade these during the month and will post any changes when they occur. and some reasons why I might sell and or buy, I have allocated a bank of $12,049 real money.
> 
> ...




The market has got to have an up day soon, maybe it will be today. Don't think for a minute that its found a bottom though. Are you using stop losses?

Cheers,


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## 2020hindsight (6 March 2007)

ric, until you came up with the title of this thread, I never twigged how much similarity there was between the stock market

..and getting married 

should one propose, for instance, after an upside down cup and saucer, or a couple of pints of champagne?


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## Halba (6 March 2007)

Why are you buying EVE when it has gone ex entitlement? its only going to go down from here...

By the looks of things i don't think you can make a big profit by putting 2k in each stock, some will go up, some will go down, your account balance would do zip

In other words you are paying just brokerage for no reason. Also are you going to make back your brokerage??? $29.95 on the in and $29.95 on the out. You need at least TTS to move 30c in the positive to make money, and that looks highly unlikely!

Best off to take a punt and put that $12k in one oversold stock.


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## tech/a (6 March 2007)

Personally dont think the portfolio will do a lot either way.
Most stocks (In the Portfolio) are not as reactive as others to both up and down moves.
Id say in a month + or - 15% either way.Will do what most else will.
Up and down with volatility.

Of interest how are you planning to profit.

You must (if you have bought them ) have a *plan to extract profit*?
Whats that or is it a case of suck it and see.
If it reached $1000 profit would you sell?
$2000?--Never??
If thats the case how much *loss* will you accept OR will you simply hold indefinately if in loss?


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## nizar (6 March 2007)

Halba said:
			
		

> Why are you buying EVE when it has gone ex entitlement? its only going to go down from here...
> 
> By the looks of things i don't think you can make a big profit by putting 2k in each stock, some will go up, some will go down, your account balance would do zip
> 
> ...




Agree with Halba.
I used to take the same approach, spread money over several stocks but not anymore, now I rarely hold more than 3 stocks at the one time (I think less than 5k is a waste of time, coz its hard to make a decent profit).
When buying small parcels, brokerage becomes significant, and also, its much harder to pick 10 winners than it is to pick 2 or 3.

Wise words from tech/a as per usual.


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## Halba (6 March 2007)

Yep thats my method I go moderately hard at the stocks, and really hard at what I believe to be high percentage plays. I deal with tens of thousands so I guess its a different situation. My drawdown in corrections is quite larger than the overall index however.


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## ric371 (6 March 2007)

Thanks for all the comments,
Stops are set at 10%
Profits I will take when I think a stock will reverse.

I agree with the comment that low volumes are subject to high % brokerage but the plan was simply to look at what happened if I traded the stocks I felt were most likely to finish in the top 10 for March, the $12,000 allocated is only a small portion of my total portfolio around 2% and for he most part I follow only around 10 stocks, in the main medium to long term.

RE EVE, yes that was a mistake and I have exited EVE this morning taking a small loss.

I could have done this exercise on paper but I figured I would make better decisions if some cash was at stake.

As of noon today the total holding was up 2% with WMT leading the way up 23%, lets see what the day brings.


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## mrWoodo (6 March 2007)

ric371 said:
			
		

> Thanks for all the comments,
> Stops are set at 10%



Hi Ric, just a quick one - Placing stops at the 10% may fall within the trendlines of the given stock. ie, you run the chance of getting stopped out purely from 'normal' movement. The market neither knows or worries about the arbitrary 10%. Personally I place stops a bit below trendlines.


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## ric371 (6 March 2007)

mrWoodo said:
			
		

> Hi Ric, just a quick one - Placing stops at the 10% may fall within the trendlines of the given stock. ie, you run the chance of getting stopped out purely from 'normal' movement. The market neither knows or worries about the arbitrary 10%. Personally I place stops a bit below trendlines.




Good point thanks


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## ric371 (6 March 2007)

Day 2
I panicked and sold *EVE* , should have waited as it recovered again this afternoon but my analysis still says its going down. So I took a loss here.
A good day for *WMT* up 38.46% for the day. I am going to float my stop up behind it although my chart says it has more to run.
*BLG* also had a good day up 12.18%. I will also bring up my stop up but a bit tighter as my chart suggests it is running out of steam.
*TTS* could be a problem child tomorrow and needs watching.
PNA had a quite day but looks goog for tomorrow.
PMM was off a little but my chart is positive for tomorrow.
Included in my watch list are 4 other march picks that finished in my top 10
and I am keeping an eye on these,
*AXO* not looking good
*JRV* worth watching
*EME* buy is indicated and I probably will.
*BLR* worth watching.

Even with the loss on EVE my balance has risen by $642 or 5.35% for the day.


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## Tradewinds (6 March 2007)

ric371 said:
			
		

> Day 2
> I panicked and sold *EVE* , should have waited as it recovered again this afternoon but my analysis still says its going down. so I took a loss here.




Great that your giving us a glimpse into your trading habits.....

Can you give us an example on how you analyse your stocks? ie why is EVE going down?


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## nizar (6 March 2007)

EVE is still within the trading channel since november.


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## UMike (6 March 2007)

Halba said:
			
		

> By the looks of things i don't think you can make a big profit by putting 2k in each stock, some will go up, some will go down, your account balance would do zip
> 
> In other words you are paying just brokerage for no reason. Also are you going to make back your brokerage??? $29.95 on the in and $29.95 on the out. You need at least TTS to move 30c in the positive to make money, and that looks highly unlikely!
> 
> Best off to take a punt and put that $12k in one oversold stock.



 True Or 2 stocks of $6k

BTW I bought and sold WMT a few times with around a $4k investment and did extremely well so I 'spose it can be done.


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## ric371 (6 March 2007)

Tradewinds said:
			
		

> Great that your giving us a glimpse into your trading habits.....
> 
> Can you give us an example on how you analyse your stocks? ie why is EVE going down?




I am using The inside trader , "Smart Money Analyser" Some members here are hung up on the word smart money but its only a name. I am also applying some personal logic to the result that I cant quantify.
You can see in the following 2 charts for EVE and WMT that the black line on EVE is heading down showing the size of trades is falling and the blue line is falling with a little kick showing that the ratio of buyers to sellers is starting to show a seller bias.
For the WMT chart the opposite is aparent. 
like any system of analysis there are flaws but I am seeing enough correlation to play with these stocks and when I have back tested the results are impressive, as long as the stock is well traded and showing some volitility.

The program is available on 2 weeks free trial from www.theinsidetrader.com.au have a play and judge for your self


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## Kipp (6 March 2007)

Unlike the old hands in this thread, I think it's alright to sinking $2K per stock (though I've now graduated to 2.5-3K)... when you are just starting out a $500 loss (i.e. 10% of 5K) is prob more than you want to deal with.

More importanntly, why are you paying $29.95 a trade!!!!  There are plenty of brokers out there offering $19.95- Comsec and Avcol for example.... you could of saved $100 already (assuming that at some point in time you will SELL your stocks)


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## ric371 (6 March 2007)

Kipp said:
			
		

> Unlike the old hands in this thread, I think it's alright to sinking $2K per stock (though I've now graduated to 2.5-3K)... when you are just starting out a $500 loss (i.e. 10% of 5K) is prob more than you want to deal with.
> 
> More importanntly, why are you paying $29.95 a trade!!!!  There are plenty of brokers out there offering $19.95- Comsec and Avcol for example.... you could of saved $100 already (assuming that at some point in time you will SELL your stocks)




I do my banking through NAB and also stock trading, my stock trading is linked directly to my bank account which is convienent and makes for quick transactions without having to transfer cash around between accounts.  
As it is usually much bigger numbers than $2000 per trade $29.95 is not an issue


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## Moneybags (6 March 2007)

Hey Ric371,

Thanks for posting up your trades. I will be watching with interest.

WMT had a stella performance today.........how much further are you expecting it to run. 

MB


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## ric371 (7 March 2007)

I have no Idea how much longer but ut is still looking good for tomorrow, I have a floating stop coming up under it so at worst I should clear a good profit if it drops, but I dont think it will tomorrow anyway.


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## ric371 (7 March 2007)

WMT Well we know now how much longer, my stop kicked in at 24 so I still made almost 20% on it over 2 days so shouldent complain. I have attached the SMG Graph for it today and its all down still suggesting further falls tomorrow. the thread on here for WMT is suggesting a fall to around 18, could be right !

I added EME today at $4.26 and it finished up a further .24 and still looks good for tomorrow.

Loking good for tomorrow is JRV and EVE is also looking positive again I might drop my bank on JRV If I can pick it up at a reasonable number before it gets ahead of itself.

Below my trading diary and WMT chart.


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## Out Too Soon (7 March 2007)

Kipp said:
			
		

> Unlike the old hands in this thread, I think it's alright to sinking $2K per stock (though I've now graduated to 2.5-3K)... when you are just starting out a $500 loss (i.e. 10% of 5K) is prob more than you want to deal with.
> 
> More importanntly, why are you paying $29.95 a trade!!!!  There are plenty of brokers out there offering $19.95- Comsec and Avcol for example.... you could of saved $100 already (assuming that at some point in time you will SELL your stocks)




Too true Kipp! I've advanced to 3-5K per trade now & while "the old hands" are losing 5 digit bucket loads with their stop losses I've made a few hundred on BSG & PDN of which I bought yesty & sold today.     
 I'm with Westcrap & @ one stage they were charging me 29.95 instead of 25, that extra $5 cost me hundreds for the few months they got away with it.  
  Don't let them talk down to you,("the old hands"), I'm sure noobs with fresh ideas have a place on this forum. Wouldn't be interesting anymore with just the same old stale ideas.


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## CanOz (7 March 2007)

Out Too Soon said:
			
		

> Too true Kipp! I've advanced to 3-5K per trade now & while "the old hands" are losing 5 digit bucket loads with their stop losses I've made a few hundred on BSG & PDN of which I bought yesty & sold today.
> I'm with Westcrap & @ one stage they were charging me 29.95 instead of 25, that extra $5 cost me hundreds for the few months they got away with it.
> Don't let them talk down to you,("the old hands"), I'm sure noobs with fresh ideas have a place on this forum. Wouldn't be interesting anymore with just the same old stale ideas.




I started the same way, with small parcels just after the May selloff. I didn't start making any money until i used larger parcels as i transferred money into my trading account and the market reversed and continued up. Small parcels maybe ok in a bull market. But everything has changed now.



Cheers,


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## nizar (7 March 2007)

CanOz said:
			
		

> I started the same way, with small parcels just after the May selloff. I didn't start making any money until i used larger parcels as i transferred money into my trading account and the market reversed and continued up. Small parcels maybe ok in a bull market. But everything has changed now.
> 
> 
> 
> Cheers,




Can,

I think its a bit early to call the end of the bullmarket.
Could just be a correction. In my opinion.


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## CanOz (7 March 2007)

nizar said:
			
		

> Can,
> 
> I think its a bit early to call the end of the bullmarket.
> Could just be a correction. In my opinion.




I really hope your right Niz. 

Cheers,


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## Out Too Soon (8 March 2007)

Despite what the doomsayers are saying our economy is strong, our share market may be running a bit hot but certainly not bubbled, avg pe s are low & superfunds etc still have heaps of cash flowing in that MUST be invested somewhere. While I don't doubt the panicers (panickers?  ) may drop us to 5300 in the next month or so I cant see how we wont quickly recover. 
 We could recover so fast that May? 2008 could be the REAL correction that we had to have! (25% drop from 8000 to 6000) now that would hurt more for longer.  

PS you read it here first :


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## ric371 (8 March 2007)

Today was pretty well sideways.
JRV took off early so I backed off and purchased MAE which looked good but dropped 5% on during the day, JRV then finished the day = to yesterdays close the chart now suggests it will drop a little tomorrow. I will need to watch MAE  tomorrow, EME had further gains but may be running out of steam on low volume, I probably should quit it while I am ahead the chart is suggesting it will reverse tomorrow.

Overall I am up 2.41%.


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## ric371 (9 March 2007)

Not a bad day today, I was going to drop EME today but the volume traded made it difficult, still have a sell order in place and will take a profit if I can on Monday, the volume in this stock is to low to really get a feel for the chart;

I did sell BLG at the end of today at .88 its peak for the week and looking at the Smart money analyser tonight I would not be suprised to see a fall on Monday.

Over all for the week I am *up $717 on $12000 * for the week, so much for those that said I could not make a $ on 6 stocks at $2000 per stock, 
I know a week dosnt make a year but annualise this gain equates to 333% PA I would be over the moon if I could do a fraction of that in a year.
So it will be interesting to see how next week unfolds.

Lesson learnt this week was I should have picked the 30c top for WMT it hit that resistance  and bounced off it a couple of times before falling back to my stop. I was just being to greedy still I finished up with a gain of 20% so I am happy


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## nizar (10 March 2007)

ric371 said:
			
		

> annualise this gain equates to 333% PA




I wouldnt count on it.


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## ric371 (10 March 2007)

nizar said:
			
		

> I wouldnt count on it.



 neither would I, but one can dream 

_Hold fast to your dreams, for without them life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly  .            
Langston Hughes 
_


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## ric371 (12 March 2007)

Today was interesting, I wanted to get set on MUR early but may have gotten a bit carried away but after looking at charts again tonight and reading the speeding ticket, I think tomorrow could see some gains on MUR
I have sell flags on PMM and EME so I have added PMM to the sell list, EME had only one trade today so my sell is still in place. as I have over brought on my bank I will wait till I sell someting to fund the next buy.


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## nizar (13 March 2007)

Just curious why did you sell BLG?
Its still in a strong uptrend.
Learn to let your winners run. Using an end of day stop should help avoid those tails.


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## ric371 (13 March 2007)

nizar said:
			
		

> Just curious why did you sell BLG?
> Its still in a strong uptrend.
> Learn to let your winners run. Using an end of day stop should help avoid those tails.




BLG looke to me to be running out of steam so I figured I should put it back in the bank,

It has run on a bit but I still believe it was time to sell and still do, I was also holding BLG in my main portfolio and that will be sold today.

You might like to hold a bit longer and look for the elusive top, me I like to take the profit when I see an ending to a run.


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## CanOz (13 March 2007)

ric371 said:
			
		

> BLG looke to me to be running out of steam so I figured I should put it back in the bank,
> 
> It has run on a bit but I still believe it was time to sell and still do, I was also holding BLG in my main portfolio and that will be sold today.
> 
> You might like to hold a bit longer and look for the elusive top, me I like to take the profit when I see an ending to a run.




Hmmm, taking profits too early was my weakest point in trading. Base your decisions on measured moves, not feeling. This should get you more in the bank.

 

Cheers,


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## ric371 (13 March 2007)

Thanks for that,
After today I may well have been better to take a few more profits out yesterday. mm

I wont have time to do a full report tonight except it wasnt a good day, 
I am going to a Rivkin Seminar, more tomorrow


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## ric371 (15 March 2007)

Sorry I missed a couple of days but here it is and at least we are in overall positive, and much better than I finished yesterday.

I still have a couple of sell orders n place which could rise to meet me tomorrow.


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## ric371 (16 March 2007)

Well another ordenery day and the market still has not found my sell orders but I am still in profit, surley the reversal I see in MUR would eventuate soon, their balance sheed was out tonight may be that will stimulate the market tomorrow,


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## ric371 (23 March 2007)

Well , this week has re taught me ( how many times will it take) that this type of trading is as close to gambling as I want to get, 
I took my eye off the roulette wheel for a couple of days and neglected to leave stops on VMS and MUR so some losses have been recieved, However my charts are still saying that these 2 are about to spike again so I will hang in there and try to get out with little egg on face as possible.
PNA is performing well and I have set a sell at 42.5 believing that this will be close to its peak and could occur today.


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## 2020hindsight (23 March 2007)

Ric
I'd be interested to see two options proceed from here..
a) the first had you set those stops, and lost, and 
b) the second where you ignore the temporary dip, and move on through the valley of the shadow of insolvency, and come out the other side into glorious sunshine.   

PS this is advice to myself really - So often I sell too early.  
good luck either way.  Thanks for being candid with us "warts and all".
Also should be mentioned that you got in pretty low, so it highlights, as you say, the gambling aspect.


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## Out Too Soon (26 March 2007)

2020hindsight said:


> Ric
> I'd be interested to see two options proceed from here..
> a) the first had you set those stops, and lost, and
> b) the second where you ignore the temporary dip, and move on through the valley of the shadow of insolvency, and come out the other side into glorious sunshine.
> ...




Ric, I keep an ASX watchlist of shares I sold @ the price I sold them at, that way I can keep track of if & when I'm "Out Too Soon"  , 80% of the watchlists (3 now) show I would have made more money if I'd stayed in, (2020s' type of investment), of course what they don't show is did I make more money selling & jumping on something else.  I'll have to work that out soon although I keep putting it off as I might not like the answer.


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## ric371 (27 March 2007)

Out Too Soon said:


> Ric, I keep an ASX watchlist of shares I sold @ the price I sold them at, that way I can keep track of if & when I'm "Out Too Soon"  , 80% of the watchlists (3 now) show I would have made more money if I'd stayed in, (2020s' type of investment), of course what they don't show is did I make more money selling & jumping on something else.  I'll have to work that out soon although I keep putting it off as I might not like the answer.




I am the sort of person that once a decision to sell is made I try not to look back, the fundamental reason for selling has not changed.
I think if you try to hard to pick a top or bottom than you will mostly be off the mark, my preferred plan is to set a sell point at time of purchase and mainly stick to it, if it is rising strongly I may hold off or raise my Sell price slightly.

If I do look back at a stock later it will be to look for another buying opportunity, and not to whip my self for not picking the top or bottom, thats just masochistic.


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## ric371 (27 March 2007)

2020hindsight said:


> Ric
> I'd be interested to see two options proceed from here..
> a) the first had you set those stops, and lost, and
> b) the second where you ignore the temporary dip, and move on through the valley of the shadow of insolvency, and come out the other side into glorious sunshine.
> ...




One of the reasons for actual $ trading these stocks is that I have found it to easy to cheat using paper trades, it is to easy on a paper trade to nominate the best price for the day as your selling price and the lowest for your buy price, thus paper trading will always be more profitable than real trading. By putting real money into the equasion and accepting the deal that occurs at yor buy or sell price cannot be fudged, It can be reported fudged but thats another story.
All the trades shown on my reports are backed up with NAB invoices.

Ric


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## ric371 (27 March 2007)

Hooray , we are back in profit after yesterday, still dissapointed in MUR and VMS but both are still pulling upwards so I should have an opportunity to recover most of those losses, 
PNA has paused just below my sell point last couple of days but looks set to hit it this morning, tonight will tell.TTS and MAE ate also looking positive for a profit as well.


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## 2020hindsight (27 March 2007)

ric371 said:


> One of the reasons for actual $ trading these stocks is that I have found it to easy to cheat using paper trades, it is to easy on a paper trade to nominate the best price for the day as your selling price and the lowest for your buy price, thus paper trading will always be more profitable than real trading. Ric



ric well said, (too true)  2020


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## ric371 (3 April 2007)

Another month and more opportunities I am going to continue to post this paper trade with real money, not every day but maybe twice a week.

At the end of March I decided to dump my mistakes VMS and MUR I took my eye off the ball with these 2 and should have had stops in place but I neglected to do so so I paid the price.
I replaced them with RHD on the basis of recent director buys and aparent prospects and my charts seemed to back up the technical 
Today I purchased a real penny dreadfull MBI for .007cents these are swinging 10% either way at present, the Inside Trader chart looks positive and hay they were peaking at $16.00 at the height of dot com and yet they still survive all be it a shadow of their former selves. The company says it has turned around the market seems to have started to look seriously at them again with a fair bit of volume 72 millian yesterday when they peaked at .009 so I took a punt at .007 and picked up a few which then jumped to .008 a nice 14% gain in minutes which could of course become a loss tomorrow. Or then they could become a real company again and perform.


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## ric371 (5 April 2007)

Well , It's the end of the first week in April and despite somm pre Easter sell offs the market is holding and my little portfolio is growing again


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## Kipp (4 May 2007)

Out Too Soon said:


> Ric, I keep an ASX watchlist of shares I sold @ the price I sold them at, that way I can keep track of if & when I'm "Out Too Soon"  , 80% of the watchlists (3 now) show I would have made more money if I'd stayed in, (2020s' type of investment), of course what they don't show is did I make more money selling & jumping on something else.  I'll have to work that out soon although I keep putting it off as I might not like the answer.




Lol... yes if I only we could stop ourselves from tracking a stock AFTER we sold.... I figure if you sell out for 20%+ profit well- you can't feel too much regret really- even if said stock runs another 20% (especially if you've held for <1 month) 
Remember fellas, the banks will only pay you 6.5% for your money (at best) so if you can swing a 10% profit on a trade- you're alrready doing a whle lot better than that.

There were a couple of winners on your list though ric- bummer about PMM & EVE- but Im sure you had your reasons for abandoning ship when you did...


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## disarray (4 May 2007)

i'm with ric and his method. i think day traders, short / mid term traders and investors here all get mixed up with what is a good system and not, and compare to their own trading style against someone elses who has a completely different mindset & desired outcome.

as a flexible, part-time investor i think a scattergun approach makes sense. like ric i buy 5 - 8 parcels of $3k - $3500 each (up to $5k on more expensive stocks), watch it for a short while and sell off the losers taking a small loss and hold onto the winners and cash them in when i think its time. an extra $10k a year based on a $30k outlay is a nice little earner, and quite possible in the bull market. i'm sure bear markets are a different beast but if you can adapt there are should still be ways to make a profit.

for day traders and professionals (the old guard), the stock market is a full time job with large investments, buckets to make and lots to lose. for most of us noobs here i think its a new side business opportunity to supplement the income. its only recently that we have been able to take advantage of the new technology that makes this all much easier to get into and less "cliqued". with the wealth of free information out there as well its easy to self-school.

this forum and many posters in it have provided a great deal of helpful information for which i am grateful, but it is important to note that who they are, how they think and what they trade may be completely different to how other people do it.


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