Pretty straight-forward method, but takes time. I keep several Yahoo portfolios of stocks I am holding separated into differerent subjects -- autos, finance, take-overs in progress, clothing, oil/gas, oil/gas servicers, shipping, real estate, etc. I also sort all my brokerage portfolios during market hours by % gainers, % losers, largest dollar gains, largest dollar losses.
I rarely do any in depth research of any stock before I buy it ... nor afterwords. I generally just use metrics to determine a candidate's suitability. I'll take lots of small tracking positions, with a view that I'll just see how they do over a two year holding. If/as I learn more about a company, I will add shares if there's positive, affirming knowledge. I have several set-and-forget stocks - Visa,Costco, Altria, Am Express, etc. (I understand -now too late) that I should've not forgot them, but instead should've been adding to them over the time I've held them. I tell myself at least I have some shares though.)
If a sector is down I will accumulate shares in a basket. I find I've no skill in determining which stock in a sector will outperform all the others, if the sector comes back. Could be the dominant company or could be the most leveraged, or could be the worst performing historically. I'll just try for an average ok return if/as the sector comes back in favor.
Beside metrics, I sometimes believe I can tell which businesses can/will/should do better two/three years in future, but that currently there's no or little interest in them. For example, uranium is one area. I've been holding uranium shares for two years, waiting. My idea is that since I can't tell what stocks will prosper if/as demand increases as I suspect, I will just sit (or try to sit) with a basket: uranium itself (Sprott Uranium), uranium miners, uranium refiners, uranium etfs. Here I rely on business news, q report summaries/analyses, and scuttlebutt to track what's progressing or not with uranium demand/supply and the related stocks. |
