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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dale Baker who wrote (18122)	12/5/2003 2:23:09 PM
From: Paul Senior	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 78750

To D. Baker: (long)You have a point there about ETFs & CEFs. I'm not that knowledgeable about them - maybe I should become so. Given that I am holding 35+ financial stocks at this point, my performance going forward might indeed mimic a basket of such stocks in an ETF. I'd like to believe though (and I could be quite wrong here) my cost basis for some of the typical stocks would be lower than the fund's. For example with stocks like C, BAC, AIG, HBC, ABN, etc., although I'll get the same results now going forward as any fund that holds them now does, I hope though that I added each of these shares to my portfolio only at those times when those stocks were at what I perceived to be bargain prices. Also - and I could be wrong here again - the funds don't seem to go deep enough into the sector. For example, in November, I was buying insurance company NWLIA (post 15793) and adding to it (post 15874)when the stock was at lows. In another example, I believed I saw value when I followed you into ACGL. I'll guess that neither of these stocks would be picked up in a CEF or ETF. (I suspect many of your picks wouldn't be in a brokerage's CEF or ETF.) In addition to depth issues, I'll guess the funds don't have the breadth issues with a sector. That is, they just aren't specialized enough. For example, in Nov '02 through March '03 I posted I was buying the auto retailing sector, specifically UAG, GPI and SAH. (Aside, you might recall the thread warning 9/03 you posted from an analyst who said the stocks were topping. He/you were right. The stocks have come down (not yet to those prices of last year though); I'm still holding most of my shares.) As regards the almost oxymoron now of a "good fund", sitting here pondering that, I'd like to keep going doing what I'm doing for the next few years and after that - or if my circumstances suddenly change - I actually believe -from what I can see here (SI) and what I suspect - instead of transferring substantial monies to funds, I believe I'd prefer - and might really be better off - letting YOU manage a decent portion of my family's assets. Paul Senior (Disclaimer to thread: I've never met Dale Baker, never corresponded with Dale Baker other than publicly on SI, have no personal or business relationship w/Dale Baker or to my knowledge his wife/family. I don't even know if Dale Baker is a real person -g-. Also, no disparagement meant to anyone here- there seem to be several posters here who have good money management skills, decent or better stockpicking skills coupled with good risk management, and who exhibit some honesty and integrity - and a couple of them also do manage other people's money or intend to. Maybe some aren't as articulate as Dale, but they are strongly competent nonetheless. -g-And very possibly might make my wife happy by doing a very skillful and better job handling the family's stock portfolio than I or a fund or funds could. )

To: Dale Baker who wrote (18122)	12/5/2003 8:52:50 PM
From: Paul Senior	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 78750

coal: Dale Baker, I notice now your pick of coal stock FDG has hit a new high. The entire sector seems way up now, e.g.: finance.yahoo.com Sorry I sold BTU earlier this year. And VERY sorry I sold NC this year about 30 points ago. Maybe there's still opportunity with coal. If I erred in not jumping back in the stocks earlier on, I'm certainly now feeling I'm too late for the front door. Maybe a back door with coal hauling stocks? I'm looking at railroad NSC - a big transporter of the stuff apparently: nscorp.com!1288553844?origin=content_home.jsp&event=bea.portal.framework.internal.refresh&pageid=Doing+Business&contentId=english/nscorp/doing_business/none1/home/coal.html This stock's also moved up near highs, but so far it's traded in a narrow channel, so maybe (?) there's room for a breakout if/as coal shipments increase. finance.yahoo.com Anybody here with an opinion on this stock or have another possible ancillary way (stock) to play this apparent coal boom?