Jeff, I've found that looking at others' perspectives is the best thing I can do to learn things on stock message boards.
Sometimes it confusing, but one still learns things. One day I mentioned that I was buying an issue that had broken out of an ascending triangle, as classic TA would predict further gains. One of our boardmembers responded that he was selling the same issue because he felt it had now met serious overhead resistance from its previous decline several months earlier. Two different views on TA, two different approaches (he was apparently correct, BTW).
How much will one stock ever be as a percentage of you total portfolio?
Usually no more than 10-15%
Do you do a full buy immediately, or buy in as it climbs?
Full buy with a couple of days, depending on what's going on with the general market
Do you do full exits, or sell in parts?
Usually a full exit; maybe 10-20% of the time I'll exit only half.
Do you daytrade, swingtrade, buy long term or some combo of those?
I used to do some daytrading, but honestly I just don't have the time for it anymore. I didn't do a single intraday trade at all last year. Most of trading is swing trading for several weeks, and a little is long term (multimonth). Except for trades where I was stopped out, my shortest deliberate holding time for a trade last year was nine days.
Thinking back again about the Fortune article, that was a pretty daunting task they were attempting - trying to think of which stocks would be winners ten years away. I don't know many that would even try that, much less anybody that has been right about such picks in the past. Personally, I have a great deal of difficulty even thinking a year away.
Right now I have only five stocks that I have held more than a year, and I've placed more of an emphasis on fundamentals with them than technicals. They are ACR, COH, IACI, SBUX, and longshot SIRI. I also have three LT MFs. Otherwise, I usually have 10-15 other issues on which I attempt to swing trade. |
