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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (33500)	12/16/1999 5:21:00 PM
From: Robert O	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 70976

What this post is not: A rah rah post after a MONSTER day... although that's tempting ;) What this post is: a contra-tacit reminder to myself and others of what a day like this means. I have touted a buy and hold approach since trying to time AMAT only to give dollars back vis-a-vis bid/ask spreads, commisions, short term gain taxes, etc. Figures from the past on this board have attempted to pooh pooh a buy and hold strategy with such bizzaro hyperbole as quoting the return of the S&P 500 over the last 30 years but forgetting to include dividends as part of the return figure... to worse (if that's possible). Bottom line is AMAT has about a 2 1/2 Beta... why insist on trying to time short term swings when only one day out of the market may cost you 7% of this year's return? Sure we're all tempted to 'cash in' as AMAT appears to hyper-extend, thereby triggering a gain and forcing the uncomfortable question of where to now invest in a better company. What are the stats Peter Lynch uses in those Fidelity commercials ...just 7 particular monster days out of the market in the last like 10 years would have halved your return? Something like that, if anyone knows the exact figure please post it, quite eye-opening.. don't blink! RO