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Strategies & Market Trends
January Effect 2003
An SI Board Since December 2002
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Emcee:  Q. Type:  Unmoderated
Low-priced stocks have their best performance, by far, during the first 10 weeks of the year.

Those that move up most strongly have the following typical profile:
* small market cap (< $150 M)
* low stock price (<< $5)
* low RS for last 12 months
* low RS in last few weeks of year, due to tax loss selling
* owned primarily by individuals

The purpose of this thread is to identify stocks that meet these criteria.

I will follow this mechanical timing formula:
* Buy halfway between Christmas and New Years.
* Sell everything by the first Friday in February, or earlier if the January Effect is particularly strong or weak.
This timing is based on historical average charts for low-priced stocks and on my experience in recent years.

I'll avoid:
- companies that are so unhealthy that they could go BK at any time
- BB stocks
- thin stocks

Similar threads I started the last four years were:

January Effect 1999
Subject 24490
My return, net of trading costs, was +11%, vs. nil for the Russell 2000. Here's my final report:
Message 7737621

January Effect 2000
Subject 32350
My return, net of trading costs, was +17% vs. +10.6% for the Russell 2000. Here's my final report:
Message 12781974

January Effect 2001
Subject 50376
My return, before trading costs, was +29.7% vs. +3.6% for the Russell 2000, assuming all stocks were bought on the last day of trading. Here's my final report:
Message 15290866

In retrospect, the optimal time to buy in December 2000 was about halfway between Christmas and New Years Day. By buying one day before the last trading day of the year, my portfolio would have returned +36.3% on paper, as compared to +29.7% for buying on the last day.

Midland, another poster on that thread, posted his picks and reported a return of +111%, net of 1 cent/share commissions, or +94% if all buys were done on the last day of trading in the year:
Message 15296872.
He attributed his superior results to several factors in his stock-picking method:
Message 15297778
He also suggested a volume criterion to avoid thin stocks: 10 day volume should be > 500k and 3 month volume > 200k
The January Effect in 2001 was 5X bigger than typical, according to a news story I read recently; the analyst quoted in that story attributed this unusual outcome to the bursting of the tech-stock bubble early in 2000.

January Effect 2002
Subject 52124
My return was disappointing. Before trading costs, it was -4.2% vs. +2.7% for the Russell 2000, assuming all stocks were bought at the close on Dec. 28 and sold the first Friday in February (returns would have suffered an additional 8.2% if I had waited to buy at the close Dec. 31). Here's my final report:
Message 17002775

Midland whipped me soundly for a second year, fetching a return of +15.7% for stocks purchased Dec. 28:
Message 17003213
He got his best results for stocks priced between $0.40 and $2.00

Note added December 30, 2002:
My picks appear in the portfolio below.
Midland's picks are here: siliconinvestor.com
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666TASR - Wow. Didn't realize the taser market is this big and TASR was that usemi_infinite -3/26/2004
665New thread for January Effect 2004 is here: Subject 54458 Thanks for remindingQ.-12/3/2003
664N Squiggle, will you be hosting a similar forum for 2004?Terry Thomas-12/2/2003
663Sell Your Bonds Thursday November 20, 6:35 pm ET By Lisa W. Hess The Bush teaRockyBalboa-11/24/2003
662at least you didn't sell it at 6 like I did, thinking I was doing well to gestevenallen-11/21/2003
661Wished I had riden TASR all the way to $70 instead of getting off around $20. Isemi_infinite -11/20/2003
660The month going out and most of the things went with the program, except that thRockyBalboa-10/27/2003
659Consumers are loading up on "gamma". Mortgage refinancings rise, so dRockyBalboa-10/1/2003
658Markets are voting with their feet. High hopes in the EUR didn't pan out so,RockyBalboa-10/1/2003
657Numbers, numbers. Something is wrong with the situation now. The EUR is up. ThRockyBalboa-10/1/2003
656<b>Yen's jump has market asking, 'where's the BOJ?'</b&RockyBalboa-9/19/2003
655At the same time the us treasuries rise against all economonic rules (but as I eRockyBalboa-9/18/2003
654The yen weakening stopped after the japanese gave up on intervening in favor of RockyBalboa-9/18/2003
653Uh, we have not seen all time yields in short order, but a broken neck in the 30RockyBalboa-7/30/2003
652Ah, didn't re-test lows after traders decided to send the elevator a story hRockyBalboa-7/29/2003
651Stopped out of the EUR position today after it lost the 1.15 and crashed throughRockyBalboa-7/24/2003
650The EUR has rebounded to close 1.13 that was not a bad thing. Going forward, thiRockyBalboa-7/19/2003
649We almost die at the open,... but now we sail up. The Euro, and its cousin, thRockyBalboa-7/16/2003
648Interestingly enough the currencies are the weakest links. After greenspan todayRockyBalboa-7/15/2003
647Volume is significantly down, volatility decreases a typical sign of the summer RockyBalboa-7/14/2003
646Going forward, this could reinforce the selling of T-Bonds-> <b>Demand RockyBalboa-7/9/2003
645the EUR contract just left 1.13...uh. Nice chart damage.RockyBalboa-7/7/2003
644Eternal hope springs,... there is only a follow through on the EUR's downsidRockyBalboa-7/6/2003
643Crazy. After the devastating jobs report, the EUR perfetly replayed tuesdays actRockyBalboa-7/3/2003
642A silver lining on the Yen front... the japanese made it under 118 vs the dollarRockyBalboa-7/2/2003
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