Do you invest in stocks?

[Bruce Wayne]

If so do you go with a general index linked tracker fund? Do you track individual stocks or sectors? How do you manage your investment?

[fultron]

I generally prefer mutual funds over individual stocks for diversification purposes. And I use index funds with a good track record like Vanguard. The low expenses give you a head start over funds that do a lot of trading in an attempt to beat the market.

[Fern]

I agree with Fultron, altho i don't rely exclusively on index funds. I do watch the annual fees on the funds but best best is still to go with a well known, no-load fund.

[terry1156]

I've always been a fan of index funds due to the low fees and more often than not preforming better than managed funds.

[34saving]

I'm mostly in no load low cost mutual funds, but I do have a few individual stocks. If nothing else they motivate me to LEARN a lot which (I think) makes me a better investor. (So far only one of my mutual funds has outperformed my stock picks, but I don't expect it will always be that way.)

[jmjj215]

I bought Apple at 34.17 2-3 months ago and sold it at 42 a few weeks after. Wish I would've held it.

I bought it b/c I'm impressed with their products. And my brother (who's been a long-time PC user) mentioned to me on the phone he was thinking of getting a mac. I thought, "If he's thinking that, how many others are thinking that?" So I bought the stock.

I sold because I didn't like how often I was checking the price. It annoyed me to no end. Although I think it hit $50 yesterday - coulda shoulda woulda...

[34saving]

Don't even get me going on Apple! Usually investors are happy when they double their money, right?

[Russell]

After watching less than poor performance out of my index funds over 2 years I finally sold them and bought PSPFX. I've made more money in 4 days than I did in 2.5 years with index funds. These index funds were 'highly' recommended by several finance 'experts' and magazines i.e. VTSMX and VIVAX. - so yes index funds can beat most mutual funds and are cheaper than mutual funds but a good mutual fund despite the higher expenses can still give you better ROI.

Yes Index funds make sense for a lot of people who want to buy and forget but my personal experience with them wasn't encouraging.

I'm eyeing some stocks to buy but they say that when interest rates go up, stocks go down.

Also, where are you guys trading ? e-trade, scottrade etc ?

[jmjj215]

I used sharebuilder - but sells are expensive, I think $15. I'd go with Scottrade.

[jmjj215]

Russell, those prev. returns are pretty impressive:

2001-2005 respectively: -13.5 17.8 99.6 30.4 37.1

What was your criteria in picking this particular fund?

[Russell]

Jesse, you guys probably know a lot more about analyzing a fund/stock than I do. I just looked at the basic numbers/data on Yahoo financial. The previous returns, their holdings, expense ratio, morning star rating etc and it seemed pretty good.

How I found it in the first place ? Well, with the gas prices sky rocketing and people still buying a lot of it I figured the energy sector should do well for at least a few years - just a gut feeling pick

[baselle]

I hold 3 individual stocks as DRPs, and invest through the company to avoid broker fees. (I don't invest much at any one time, so even Scottrade fees will take a bite.) If you think that stocks are going down due to interest rates, then you might just as well play defense and invest in stock that pays you a dividend to hold it.

[jmjj215]

What type of sector would benefit from rising interest rates?

[Dingoluv4eva]

This requires being semi alert to the economy..

buy into 5 or 6 (more if u got more money) different companies.. diversify.

if the economy and market seems strong.. make those 5 or 6 companies, companies that tend to go up a lot.. Chips, internet, etc..
so since the market is doing good, u're not missing the boat.
and u have 5 or 6 of them, so that if one of that hits hard times, u'll be ok.

if the market turns sluggish, like it mostly is.. sell them and put it in 5 or 6 stocks, that fluctuate a bit less.

if the market is bad.. sell those, and buy 5 or 6 stocks, that barely fluctuate at all.. minimize any potential loss.

There is actually an indicator called BETA that tells u, how much stocks flunctuate. U can go buy that.. and also different tricks, like picking the same hot sector and etc..

[Gailete]

We have shares in a mutual fund and our IRAs, but for individual stocks, not until tomorrow when my Sharebuilder plan will be buying about one share of Home Depot. All the money we having been pouring into that store for our construction project, I figured I wanted some back.

I plan on investing most of my $5000 challenge money as I earn it into stocks through Sharebuilder and see how it will grow.

I have been reading a book Eight Steps to Seven Figures by Charles Carlson and through his interviews with 170+ self made millionaires, his advice is to buy quality companies and hold Hold HOLD on to them for years. I spoke with my brother this weekend who is a financial consultant and he advised a switch for our IRA which I will try and set up once I feel better and my brain is back in gear.

Gail

[Russell]

I think just about everyone that's been in the market long enough suggests not to chase the next hottest sector/stock. Yes, I'm guilty of doing this but most of the time you'll get burned.

The widely recommended thing to do is to pick the best stocks and funds you can and stick with them for a long time ignoring the ups and downs of the market. Its very tempting to move your money when you see your picks doing poorly compared to the others but if you're in for the long haul you shouldn't pay attention to the current ups and downs.

At least its the safer way to invest and may not necessarily be the best. Unfortunately, some don't agree with 'buy and hold' and prefer 'trading' rather than 'investing'. After chasing the next hot sector myself for sometime now I've concluded that for someone like me who can't predict which way the market will shift next is better off sticking with investing rather than trading. Others may do well with trading...

A few articles that I really like:

http://money.cnn.com/pf/101/lessons/4/

http://www.fool.com/school/basics/basics08.htm

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/...ng/P117785.asp (start investing with $100)

[jmjj215]

VJW has mentioned in this forum that timing is becoming more of an issue - not just buy and hold.

[Russell]

Yes, Charles Givens' strategy of money movement says to move money based upon where the intrest rates are headed and I've also read VJWs posts with interest because it sounds like he knows what he's talking about but that's just it...I don't know what I'm doing so I'll follow the traditional advice...