Hi Jay, out with it: did you buy grandma those 1000 shares?
I remember when I first started investing--July 1995... I barely knew how to use a computer, but I kept seeing these "Intel Pentium" commercials on TV--I thought they were generic somethings (didn't know what a CPU was) compared to whatever IBM had to be selling! So anyway, one day I'm flipping through the channels and I land on CNBC and see that Intel is down like 9 points cause they missed earnings (whatever that meant). I had just began "investing" the week before, but didn't own anything yet... a couple of days later, I bought 100 shares at $67.
So anyway, a few weeks later Bill Gates is on the cover of Time with a lightning-bolt between his fingers. I thought he was Intel's CEO and was all excited. Then I read the article, about him, Microsoft (I had heard the term "Microsoft Windows" and knew it had something to do with computers, but not much else) and something called Windows95 which seemed like a big deal although I didn't know why. So then I called my broker and asked, "does Microsoft has a stock?" He said yes, but cautioned that it was too expensive but anyway I convinced my dad to buy some, assuring him that "Windows95" was going to be huge and that on August 25 when it went on sale, "MSFT would be up 4-5 points easy" (no, it didn't quite work out that way--MSFT opened up about 2, and then Janet Reno said something about the DOJ looking into MSN bundling, so the stock closed down $4). Soon after, I started learning how to use a computer... and here I am today.
-Sal |
