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

To: Paul Senior who wrote (35430)	11/27/2000 8:19:54 PM
From: Uncle Frank	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

>> There are people here who've made $millions (and maybe have been able to hold onto those dollars) by buying the few G&K stocks. So it has worked. That's a fact. >> But now, I'd guess it's not working so well for most people. You're using a very short baseline to make that determination, Paul. In point of fact, no investing approach has worked very well since April. >> On this thread today, I see too much investing inexperience, too much margin and too much concentration. I see a mixture of newcomers and oldtimers offering their personal experiences as object lessons for others. >> Too much of people who don't seem to have read or understood ANY basic books on investment. That's a bad assumption. Virtually everyone posting here has read the Gorilla Game at a minimum. If you follow this thread for a while, you'll see that we read widely, and recommend a broad range of books on investing to newcomers on a regular basis. >> Perhaps it's participating or following this thread too closely -- getting sucked into the enthusiasm, the inevitability, and superiority, and logic of G&K stocks and the people who know so much about the companies discussed herein. We believe in identifying great companies, Paul, and that investments in them will yield better returns than the broad market. >> Coming to believe thread readers are a team of friends, confidants and comrades. I confess. I believe that is the case. >> All a very, very risky way to sustainable long-term investing profits, imo. Would you care to propose an alternative? uf

To: Paul Senior who wrote (35430)	11/27/2000 8:35:02 PM
From: Mike Buckley	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

Paul, I was with your refreshing viewpoint but I also have some glaring differences with it. I especially agree with your assessment that it's best not to try to get $15,000 to do the work generally required of $100,000. The most important disagreement I have with you: Spot checking the thread Spot checking this particular thread will lead you to wildly misleading conclusions in my opinion -- whether positive or negative. As demanding as the task might be, reading either the last 15,000 posts or the first 15,000 posts might be more worthwhile to the average investor than reading any single investment book on the market. If you're wondering, I've read all 35,000. There are people here who've made $millions (and maybe have been able to hold onto those dollars) by buying the few G&K stocks. So it has worked. But now, I'd guess it's not working so well for most people. It depends on what you mean by "now." If you mean this year, you're right. But if you've read the manual, you know that it's worked very, very well for most people who held onto their gorillas over long periods of time as the manual suggests. Ultimately having had the positives and pressures on this thread prevent taking a response to declining G&K stock prices. Over long periods of time, Gorilla stock prices haven't declined while the companies' CAP remained intact. If you disagree, show me an exception. But please be very, very careful about the watchwords at the core of Gorilla Gaming -- "over long periods of time" and "while the companies' CAP remained intact." How do most people buy their custom made suits and luxury cars and 5 bedroom houses? Well, ya got me there. I dunno. I don't buy custom-made suits and I don't live in a 5-bedroom house, or a 4-bedroom house, or for that matter, a 2-bedroom house. In fact, life became pretty comical when I had 15 people over for a party and the one toilet stopped working. Did I mention that I don't buy custom-made suits? And while I do own a luxury car, I bought it when it was three years old. It's seven years old now and I just bought a piece of leather so I can have the hole in the the driver's seat fixed. I apologize for my sarcasm about all those truths, but I really do go nuts when people start measuring wealth or proof of investing knowledge in terms of material possessions. End of rant. --Mike Buckley

To: Paul Senior who wrote (35430)	11/27/2000 8:40:03 PM
From: tekboy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

yes and no. First off, just because one is someone "who maybe want(s) to be too quick and too rich in their investing" doesn't mean that one hasn't "read or understood ANY basic books on investment." I've read and understood pretty much the entire basic shelf (the advanced shelf is still sitting there unread), but have just been too immature and impatient to follow good advice. As for this paragraph, Spot checking the thread, I see people who say they've used margin incorrectly or failed to take gains when they could have. That's only the surface mistake that they talk about. What could be a deeper mistake? Perhaps it's participating or following this thread too closely -- getting sucked into the enthusiasm, the inevitability, and superiority, and logic of G&K stocks and the people who know so much about the companies discussed herein. Coming to believe thread readers are a team of friends, confidants and comrades. So staying with people who only concentrate on a few, few technology stocks which all have similar characteristics (and so excluding any other type of investing), of reading of similarly situated people who use margin, options, sophisticated stuff and then coming to believe that's the way to do it, the normal way, the way of successful people, and the way it should be done. Ultimately having had the positives and pressures on this thread prevent taking a response to declining G&K stock prices. I think you're jumbling together lots of different stuff. For example, remarkably enough, threadsters are a team of friends, confidants, and comrades. Nothing wrong with that, and in fact the opposite--it provides an opportunity to learn from and bounce ideas off people one trusts. And as for the people who use margin, options, and other "sophisticated" stuff, they usually screw up, as the comments and jokes note, so anybody with half a brain would learn the proper lessons (don't play with fire) rather than get suckered into following the crowd off the cliff. Most of the thread regulars, meanwhile, stress the virtues of good old-fashioned LTB&H of unmargined common, not the more extreme sports. Finally, there's an inconsistency in your position. You imply that we are all victims or enablers of a suboptimal non-conservative groupthink, and yet you also imply that the optimal and conservative strategy would have been to take some unspecified activist "response to declining G&K stock prices." I would venture to suggest, on the basis of that basic investing shelf, that there is no consensus position as to how to respond to stock price declines if one is in good companies for the long term, and that if anything the truly optimal and conservative approach is to trust one's own DD and remain inactive. In the end, the people who have made the mistakes are, as David Bowie put it, quite aware what of they're going through, and don't need sneering reactions to their Maoist self-denunciations. tekboy/Ares@whoseportfolioisgoingthroughch-ch-ch-ch-changes.com

To: Paul Senior who wrote (35430)	11/27/2000 9:41:07 PM
From: Joshua Corbin	Read Replies (7) \| Respond to of 54805

On this thread today, I see too much investing inexperience, too much margin and too much concentration. There are excellent points, IMHO. While we all recognize that this is better than 99% of all stock boards, this isn't paradise. My calculations have me reading about 18,000 messages. I've seen some helpful insight, clarification and insight on Moore, but I've also seen: -- The QQQ as a substitute for the broker's money market sweep. -- LEAPs as long-term investments. -- The claim that "Gorilla stocks are the only sure things." -- People jumping to buy stocks as if Project Hunt was the gold standard. -- People fussing and fuming because they didn't sell QCOM at 200 - or buy it all back at 55. -- That TFM/TRFM is the best investing manual for utter newbies. -- Unprofitable companies as Gorilla candidates. On this thread I see plenty of talk about margin, options and market timing. I don't see anybody talking about, say, going to BuyandHold.com or Sharebuilder to open dollar cost averaging accounts. The people who are holding seem to be those who already have substantial capital gains. Is this investing for the long term or just another brand of speculation?

To: Paul Senior who wrote (35430)	11/27/2000 11:17:24 PM
From: kumar	Respond to of 54805

Paul, Thank u for describing your lessons. I learn, just as I do with almost every post here. My personal perspective : I bought (for the 1st time) some CSCO stock in 1998. I'd have been tempted to sell it at a gain, in late 1999. By then I had realized the power of CAP & GAP by reading & understanding the manual, so I am still hanging on to those shares. I have no reason to regret my decision. cheers, kumar PS: Millions is NOT me.