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Strategies & Market Trends : Gorilla and King Portfolio Candidates -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Len who wrote (15282)	1/16/2000 11:13:00 AM
From: Seeker of Truth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

When you're rich enough not to need the day job, as a result of the gorilla game, the problem arises of how do you preserve the situation, i.e. the capital. Well there is an excellent solution to that problem, it's the Gorilla Game. It's very good for preserving capital. Investors in Microsoft 15 years ago certainly preserved their capital:-). I'm finding that QCOM,JDSU,CSCO, etc. are preserving my capital and then some. Right now, bonds will also preserve my capital but if the governments start to undertax and overspend again then inflation will resume and the bonds won't preserve the capital. So I personally will stick with the GG and the two threads of SI that I follow, namely Softbank and this one. You are worrying about a big downturn in the market. If it keeps you up at night you could have two years expenses in 1-2 year deposits. If it doesn't keep you up at night why not stay invested in the market? Nobody can time the market though so many people try. When the market drops ask yourself if science and technology have just been outlawed. If not then await the rebound, which might take two days or two years. Hope this helps.

To: Len who wrote (15282)	1/16/2000 11:30:00 AM
From: LindyBill	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 54805

Are you transferring your investments to bonds, etc that produce income or are you selling some of your capital? If you are selling capital are you not taking a big risk in a market turn? Most people on this thread seem to be retiring when they have 2 mil in the market, and they need about 100K a year to live on. That's 5% of what they have, and they are getting at least a 5 times better return that that in the market. I am, personally, much better off than that, so my risk is even less. The key thing is that most of us really don't need very much, by our standards, to live on. I am simply following the same investments I had in the past, and selling enough stock to cover my income needs. I will pull out about one mil this spring and leave it in cash in my 401, drawing interest. I am basically pulling this off the table, as far as a stock investment, for insurance purposes, in case of a 1 to 3 year downturn in the market. This nonsense, put out by "Retirement Planners", that you should suddenly put your money in Bonds and income stocks, is just that, nonsense! I made my money by investing in hi-growth techs, I will continue to do so, and I am not worried about running out of money. I hit my first goal last June, My second goal last December, and I see no reason why I can't double that this year. If we have a crash, and I don't double, or even have less, so what? I don't need it to live on right now. If you take people like Uncle Frank, Merlin, and myself, and project us out 3 or 4 years, we could live like Kings, if we wanted to. And we are far from the richest people on this thread. I know that I never thought I would have it this good, and I think Frank and Mike would agree with me. A Market Crash, at its worse, would be about 50%, and we could all easily survive the two to three years it would take to come back.

To: Len who wrote (15282)	1/16/2000 11:35:00 AM
From: Uncle Frank	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

>> those of us not yet so fortunate would, I think, benefit from your collective wisdom as to how you are managing an income stream. Are you transferring your investments to bonds, etc that produce income or are you selling some of your capital? A friend of mine attended a seminar which featured the brightest investment minds in the business. The message that came across was, if you've made your money investing in high tech and retired, pull out living expenses at the beginning of each year, but stay true to what got you there - leave your money in tech. On January 10 of this, the first year of my retirement, I withdrew a generous annual paycheck from my portfolio, as befits a successful fund manager, and left the balance in qcom, gmst, ntap, csco, and sebl. Bonds? No way. Why cut down the Money Tree for firewood? uf

To: Len who wrote (15282)	1/16/2000 11:42:00 AM
From: gdichaz	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

Len: OT Sort of. (as you said) (reply here is also) To each his/her own. As a person who retired twice, once at 51 and worked then on some jobs from time to time that I thoroughly enjoyed and hope were helpful to many people, and then retired again from both full time and part time work, this is a very key consideration. And I have my own views on it. But the old saying about not being able to "walk in someone else's shoes" applies. Nothing is more individual than risk tolerance, the family situation, hopes and dreams, and what investment approaches make sense in specific individual situations. Each is unique. I can speak for myself and myself only in my individual case. It applies to no one else. No other person is me. So each situation is different. In my case, after the first retirement I was able to devote more time to learning about technologies as a non technology savvy person but as one who knows a bit about research and analysis. That was extremely important. And that was when I tried to figure out where the trends in technologies were strongest. That was networking in those days. So I bought a basket of networking stocks - which included Cisco and others. All did extremely well. Cisco consistently did the best. I made money in all of them - without exception. But I gradually concentrated on Cisco. That turned out to be the right choice. Of course there was no Gorilla Game book then, but what I did was consistent with basic gorilla gaming as reflected in the book - but not this thread by the way. Since I know something about economics I have leaned much nonsense but some useful ideas. One useful concept is "opportunity cost" - that is that not doing a particular thing has a cost. In investments, not using a basket has a cost. If we were all brilliant and could pick the gorilla (a pretty rare animal by the way) up front, then investing in that one company and that one company only would be sensible. Absent that I thought that it was not - for me.. But again, all this is just for me - in my specific case. Others are in very different situations, and I make no recommendation. They need to make their own choices. Enough for now. Will proceed if there is any interest, will not if there is none. Best. Cha2

To: Len who wrote (15282)	1/16/2000 4:04:00 PM
From: lurqer	Respond to of 54805

OTOTOT Since we're in the middle of a long weekend, I'll hazard an OT post. For those not interested, please immediately click next. Len you have expressed a problem similar to the one I faced a few years ago. As a "cold warrior" my reward for being on the "winning side" was "jobs over". There seems to be two basic approaches to the "problem": 1)"Skim a little cream off the top" of a successful LTB&H strategy. This approach is used by some "well known" members of this thread and has the important prudent advantage of being simple to implement. As a pragmatist, I have a high regard for the simple so the "dance with who brung you" (as it has been described here) is (IMO) the safe solution to the "problem". 2)"Learn a new dance" to obtain the necessary ST funds. In my case, since I had significantly less than half the 2 megabuck criterion mentioned earlier, option 1) was for me not an option. I either had to develop a "short game" or get "a real job". The second option is more hazardous; I am not recommending it to anyone. Moreover, since my natural proclivities are LTB&H, when trading I still consider myself to be a "stranger in a strange land". One (and just one) of the problems with trading is that it requires a different (and sometimes opposite) mindset. Suppose you take a position and something unexpected happens, what's your first reaction? If it's a LTB&H position the winning reaction is to do nothing. Carefully, consider the altered situation and proceed according to the revised analysis. If the position is ST, the winning reaction is to immediately close the position-without spending much time thinking about it. As has been eloquently stated earlier the solution to this "problem" is very personal and there can be no general "one size fits all" fix. Perhaps my background (degree in Astronomy) gave me a leg up on dealing with differing "natural timescale" problems. I wish I could give you fm for ST trading. Reprehensibly, I know of none. Just as there many LTB&H strategies, there are an equally bewilderingly variety of ST approaches. If you consider trying to learn a ST technique that "works for you", I would recommend the following: 1)Read Trading For A Living by Alexander Elder. This book like the fm of this thread can be divided into two parts: the theoretical (the mindset, the framework) and the practical (the implementation strategy). In both cases, IMO, the framework is by far the better part. 2)Do a lot of lurking especially on SI. There are some very successful traders that post here and are quite generous with their time. "Learn from the masters" but of course be prepared to encounter many "toot your own horn" blowhards. Probably strictly mimicking another's technique will not work but your own "twist" on a blend of several may. 3) Expect to go through a "Carnegie Hall" (practice, practice, practice) learning stage. The key is to not "trade" (loose) too much capital for the knowledge that is gained. With all of this said it is still my opinion that "real wealth" (for most people) is built in the LTB&H arena. I only attempt to "pay the bills" with ST transactions, not "make it". No mater what your choice "best o'luck" Not lurking ... just enjoying life. lurqer

To: Len who wrote (15282)	1/16/2000 4:04:00 PM
From: DownSouth	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 54805

Len, I don't mind sharing. 100% of my capital is in my and my wife's IRA's. I am 51, so I will be using one of the little-known methods of early withdrawal without penalty. To do so, one must withdraw "substantially equal payments" each year for 5 years or until age 59 1/2, which ever comas latest. The rules for SEPs are foggy but well outlined in a book by Twila Slesnick entitled "IRAs, 401(k)s & Other Retirement Plans--Taking Your Money Out". My new CPA remarked when she saw me carrying the book in her office "Oh, you got a good book there. Are you sure you need me for this?" I considered that an endorsement.: amazon.com I am also about to set up a Medical Spending Account and use high-deductible health insurance as a protection against major medical expenses while building up an MSA for pre-tax savings which I can continue to build into my old age for medical purposes now and later. I am very happy about this option for medical coverage. The premiums are less than half of conventional private insurance and the ability to use pre-tax dollars to offset deductibles and to use for all medical purposes is great. The ability to build up the MSA over time is very exciting to me. (I doesn't take much to excite me.) I will be doing something FranQ told me about to generate my annual cash for SEPs out of my IRA. That is selling stock, purchasing DIM LEAPS to control at least as much stock as I sold, and using the remaining cash as my annual "salary". Hope this helps. I can't wait to read the other 4 responses you got.