Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

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

To: advocatedevil who wrote (56126)	11/22/2001 1:29:40 AM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 70976

You said: "You touch on something that I believe is significant: conviction. It's easy enough to make mistakes and lose money in the market, but losing one's conviction is a sure fire way of blowing it IMO. It's difficult to hold a play that's going in the wrong direction, especially when the caution flags are out, but I think it's important to realize that timing a play is less important than determining the eventual direction of the stock." Excellent point, about the necessity of having conviction. Earlier this year, I was watching NTAP go down, down, down. I liked the company, but thought the stock was absurdly overvalued. So, while I waited for the market to come it's senses and bring NTAP down to a reasonable price, I tried to make some money on the Dark Side. On two or three separate occasions, I bought NTAP puts. I chose the right stock, and I was right about the direction the stock was going in. But I didn't have conviction. This is a very volatile stock, and I got scared into selling my puts, with small losses or small gains. I never had the conviction, to ignore all the daily volatility (which, in this stock, is often 15% or more). I didn't have the conviction to wait patiently, and hold till the stock was setting new yearly lows. So I didn't make money on NTAP puts. I know, when I am building long positions, I have the conviction to hold and buy more, even when the stock goes a lot lower. Repeatedly, I have begun building a position, and watched the stock get chopped in half from where I started buying it, and never considered selling. Somehow, it's different, going long vs. short, for me.