What stock would you buy and why?

[corndog]

If you're willing to watch it really closely, get in and out frequently. Setup some short term moving averages, and try playing the crossovers. Whatever your strategy, try something a little more dynamic. Have fun with it, it's only money.

Edit: Just to clarify, I'm too chicken to take my own advice lol.

 

[Blankpage]

If you're willing to watch it really closely, get in and out frequently. Setup some short term moving averages, and try playing the crossovers. Whatever your strategy, try something a little more dynamic. Have fun with it, it's only money.

Edit: Just to clarify, I'm too chicken to take my own advice lol.

I would trade it frequently if I held it within a Roth IRA but I didn't qualify for one. I would have been better off if I took a couple of months off to keep my income down put these in a Roth and kept the gains.
Should have, would have, could have:|

 

[corndog]

Silly questions for you guys...what's to prevent an institution from dumping a bunch of money into a company, and selling it the next day at a higher price, even though it's inflated because of the amount they invested? In case that didn't make sense, let's say share price is $90, an institution buys ten million shares, which then bumps the price to say $100 a share, what's to prevent said institution from selling at $100 per share the following day? Is the institutions transaction somehow figured into their purchase price to prevent that from being attractive?

 

[Mr.Furious]

Silly questions for you guys...what's to prevent an institution from dumping a bunch of money into a company, and selling it the next day at a higher price, even though it's inflated because of the amount they invested? In case that didn't make sense, let's say share price is $90, an institution buys ten million shares, which then bumps the price to say $100 a share, what's to prevent said institution from selling at $100 per share the following day? Is the institutions transaction somehow figured into their purchase price to prevent that from being attractive?

Your scenario implies that there would be willing buyers for said 10 million shares at the new higher price.

 

[Marlowe]

Because your trades are limited to what's available on the market:

To buy enough, you have to put some huge demand out there, and as that demand hit, the price rises... you won't profit nearly as much as you might think.

Finally, you have the same problem when you liquidate that position, finding someone that's willing to buy enough of it...and when you put that much on the market, the price falls pretty fast.

End result, without overt market manipulation, that doesn't really work.

 

[corndog]

Thanks fellas. Since you can never sell ten million shares in a single split second transaction, that value would drop off as they sold piece by piece. I wonder if institutions do this, but sell slowly over time? An example being something like amazon in Oct. '09.

 

[Mr.Furious]

Thanks fellas. Since you can never sell ten million shares in a single split second transaction, that value would drop off as they sold piece by piece. I wonder if institutions do this, but sell slowly over time? An example being something like amazon in Oct. '09.

Here is some reading you might be interested in: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithmic_trading

 

[corndog]

^^^ Nice, thanks! I had no idea they were so incredibly insane about minimizing lag in their automated trading!

"Spending on computers and software in the financial industry increased to $26.4 billion in 2005."

I wonder what it is in 2010??

 

[Marlowe]

You wouldn't believe some of the shit I had to do for financial customers....



But yes, latency is a concern.

 

[corndog]

So back onto the 'which stock would you buy', I know you guys hate penny stocks, but I might watch APPA.

http://biomedreports.com/articles/m...ed-nausea-drug-fda-decision-is-days-away.html

And if you like bio-medical, keep an eye on the FDA Calendar.

 

[Marlowe]

Not sure I'd buy now, but I'll tell you what I'm still holding, considering I'm mostly out of the market at this point:

UNP.
-snip rest of post-

Hey if you got a set it and forget it, don’t hold back, we’re all ears.

Yeah I saw that one but you might want to consider something not so dependent on the US economy and with more exposure abroad. I don’t feel so confident that the US is going to solve its problems anytime soon. There may still be rough waters ahead.

...what do you think now?

(Sorry, couldn't resist. OP, since you were looking for set and forget investments, hope you listened...)

 

[Entoptic]

...what do you think now?

(Sorry, couldn't resist. OP, since you were looking for set and forget investments, hope you listened...)

Marlowe I can't read through the entire thread but did you invest in this stock? If so, congrats on a good pick and what made you purchase it in the first place?

 

[Marlowe]

Marlowe I can't read through the entire thread but did you invest in this stock? If so, congrats on a good pick and what made you purchase it in the first place?

Of course I did, and for a while, it was the only thing I was still holding.

Rationale is on the first page (first linked post in that reply.)

 

[TheRobSJ]

This thread is two years old. I went through maybe the first four pages and don't think I saw a single recommendation for AAPL. A stock which has risen about $400 a share in the past two years. None of you saw that coming? I sure as hell did.

 

[Marlowe]

This thread is two years old. I went through maybe the first four pages and don't think I saw a single recommendation for AAPL. A stock which has risen about $400 a share in the past two years. None of you saw that coming? I sure as hell did.

It's only doubled once in that time, UNP is up twice that.

You want things that are undervalued; AAPL is not undervalued. Strong, to be sure, but not undervalued.

At the time I started buying UNP they were trading around $34 -- market cap below book value of a company that was generating 400MM+ FCF in a quarter.

So, sure, I didn't expect Apple to tank, but I wasn't about to buy in at that price point.

 

[Blankpage]

Would you go to the Wall Street Journal for motorcycle buying advice?
But since you asked, try: SIRI, HTE, PCX, and AGQ.
Remember nobody knows what direction the market will go or what will drive it there.

...what do you think now?

(Sorry, couldn't resist. OP, since you were looking for set and forget investments, hope you listened...)

Good pick. I took bigger gambles and paid off bigger. I got out of AGQ a long time ago when it went parabolic. I did lose on PCX but it died a slow death and could see the writing on the wall so limited loses.
Still holding SIRI and probably will for a while longer.
Lets be clear this isn't much better than gambling, there is no sure thing and nobody knows where any of these will be in 12 months. Although some are safer bets than others.

UNP looks like it might still have some legs to run

 

[Blankpage]

This thread is two years old. I went through maybe the first four pages and don't think I saw a single recommendation for AAPL. A stock which has risen about $400 a share in the past two years. None of you saw that coming? I sure as hell did.

I sold AAPL a long time ago thinking it had already had an incredible run and back in a couple of months ago. Hope that doesn't bite me in the ass.
Way back then I was also interested in AMT but didn't pull the trigger, missing a lot of gains there also.
Looks like I won't be retiring just yet.

 

[2legs2wheels]

As always, any and all plans go askew. For the fifty year old who invested in the last five years in equities or real estate, the losses may be lifetime, in the sense that retirement may necessitate the sale of assets for income or fixed income purchase. The stock market is a gamble. Cash is a gamble. In a very real sense, the stock market is the biggest and longest term Ponzi scheme ever invented, and depends entirely on new money to keep stock price up. Diversification is your friend. It turns out my best, in terms of annual return, investment in the last decade was an interest annuity. And, of course, if the underlying company has problems (USAA) then it too will.

Diversification using different sets of stocks is no longer an option http://goo.gl/zKBl6 I had argued for different asset classes for the high risk money and one of the was a startup. I am still looking at other areas that provide real diversification.....

 

[xgambit]

lets get some updates people!

ford is doing well for me

 

[mercurial]

I'm heavy in Intel, I think TSMC/Samsung won't be able to get their act together and keep up with them at the foundry level which, along with micro-architecture improvements, should make intel suddenly very competitive in the tablet marketplace and soon viable in the mobile phone space, as well. They are currently priced at a PE of 12:1, so moving back to a strong growth story would probably justify a more "normal" tech valuation of 18:1. Plus, they give you a 3.8% dividend while you wait.