Stock Market......

[JRE320]

Is it easy to learn to get into this? What are the basic steps to get you started? Any source that you would recommend that will handle your $$$ and will not charge you an arm and a leg on each trade? Something I wanna play around maybe with a minimal amount... ;) :)

[ConceptEuroMBZ]

Last time I was involved in the stock market was in a simulation in a business class and I lost like $75,000 in 4 weeks:(

[Dr. ///AMG]

Originally posted by ConceptEuroMBZ
Last time I was involved in the stock market was in a simulation in a business class and I lost like $75,000 in 4 weeks:(

Note to self: Don't goto ConceptEuroMBZ for stock advice.

[oggle]

Originally posted by Dr. ///AMG
Note to self: Don't goto ConceptEuroMBZ for stock advice.

Note to self: Go into the stock market and do everything opposite of ConceptEuroMBZ.

[Dr. ///AMG]

Originally posted by oggle
Note to self: Go into the stock market and do everything opposite of ConceptEuroMBZ.

lol

[Rocky]

I work in a stock brokerage company (merrill lynch HSBC) If ya got any questions, just ask me :)

My brother is a wiz at the market. He basically gave my parents some options advice and it paid off my car in 2 weeks :D

Basically..you buy low sell highy hahahahaha but the way the market was, most people where buying high and selling low :D

[pokerface]

doc, what is this kaos doing?

http://images.deviantart.com/emoticons/icon_lmao.gif

[dtmcoupe]

get a subscription of ibd and read it front to back every day, you will learn how to invest. watch market watch, or other shows, they give you valuable insight.

[Sesh]

Best advice? STAY OUT OF IT.
Sesh

[Rocky]

Originally posted by Sesh
Best advice? STAY OUT OF IT.
Sesh

:werd:

[Rocky]

Originally posted by JRE320
Is it easy to learn to get into this? What are the basic steps to get you started? Any source that you would recommend that will handle your $$$ and will not charge you an arm and a leg on each trade? Something I wanna play around maybe with a minimal amount... ;) :)

To have someone (Investment Advisor) handle your money for you is going to cost you an arm and a leg on commissions. You can cut the commissions cost by up too 70-80 percent in alot of cases if you open a discount brokerage account. Discount brokerage meaning you buy when you want and what you want online. It's a self directed trading account. That's the draw back is that you don't get any advice on what to buy and what to avoid.

[Sesh]

OK I am definitely not one to give 'fluff' advice. Rocky above has said it very well what it takes to tradeoff comfort for money.
I'll give you an example:
A very good friend of mine, who lives in MidWest area, researched the Market by reading about it for 4-5 months - I mean EVERY SINGLE DAY he'd read 2-3 books/magazines/special publications/tip sheets, note down the main points, investigate great opportunities, pitfalls. You get the picture.
Soon he opened an account with a large DT company (like E*T***e). In 30 days he was up by $25 K. Not satisfied, he ventured some more. Bought a brand new BMW.
Four weeks later, he was down $30 K + BMW cost.
Six months later he was down $10 K more.
He continued to plug on, got some back, but overall he is now $35 K down!!!!
Can you believe that? And he is one of the luckier ones - I know of one acquaintance who is down $120 K!
The idea is to play for/with your comfort level. Know at the beginning how much you're willing to lose entirely (say $20 K). Set that amount aside for a month, thinking you've lost it. After a month, if you still think you could do without it, go ahead.
Then start with the safest bet - blue chip companies. Buy a small amount, see what happens. If you can take a $1000 loss, go with it. Sell and buy something a tiny bit riskier - right now, metal companies/some drug companies/arms manufacturers are in clover. You may want to check some of them out.
Don't ever buy companies that are trading in cents - cent stocks - they may be tempting because of the potentially huge profits, but they're not worth much. Look for stocks that have a low P/E ratio (Price/Earnings).
Anyway this is a highly rudimentary list of things, and very professional, sound (still, it's all a big gamble) advice is available. Talk to all your finance-area friends, brokers, investors whatever. Subscribe to speciality magazines such as Fortune/Wired/Forbes, among others (such as Money).
All the best!
Sesh

[dtmcoupe]

to the people who think the market is in a "no win" situation

a friend of mine started an inventment company a few months ago, he is an LLC and looks after companys most people have never heard of. In the few months he has been in business he has seen a 23% profit. he has pulled in a few large investors with the guarantee of 6% under 20k and 10% GUARANTEED ANNUAL interest. im not sure how he distributes the profit above and beyond the 6 and 10% but the investors have seen more then the guaranteed interest. there is $ to be made in the market in almost any conditions.

[vader13]

Originally posted by JRE320
Is it easy to learn to get into this? What are the basic steps to get you started? Any source that you would recommend that will handle your $$$ and will not charge you an arm and a leg on each trade? Something I wanna play around maybe with a minimal amount... ;) :)

Just gimme your cash, I will get some rocks and sell em on the corner,,,500% Gains every day..

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by Sesh
Best advice? STAY OUT OF IT.
Sesh

I'd add stay out of it...unless you know what you're doing. Really, before anyone thinks about investing in anything, you need to make a careful examination of your goals. Long term, short term, what is it for, (kid's college education, retirement, or just neeeeeed money) etc. etc. Short terming (or timing) the market will expose you to lots of volatility and similarly lots of risk. With a longer time horizon, the picture historically gets better.

Looking at things from a general perspective, remember that a rising tide raises all boats. Similarly, it's tough to make lots of money in a down market...Not impossible, but it's plenty tough.

Really, I'd suggest taking a look at your entire financial picture and see if personal management of stocks is right for you. As a first and simple step, ask yourself what your debt load looks like. If your debt service costs more than your expected return on investment, that may be your first attack.

There are plenty of books out there to help you determine what may be right for you. And in that research, you can make the final decision on how to go about investing in stocks.

[C280 JR]

let me tell you this....i took the class on business, and stocks were part of it...my teacher knows everything about it, so i asked him since you know so much do you do it, he simply replied NO..no matter how much you know about stocks, its all luck!!

Elvir

[dtmcoupe]

Originally posted by C280 JR
let me tell you this....i took the class on business, and stocks were part of it...my teacher knows everything about it, so i asked him since you know so much do you do it, he simply replied NO..no matter how much you know about stocks, its all luck!!

Elvir

your teacher is a moron :) first of all if they think they know it all they dont know $H!T if they think its all luck they are also stupid....i sould take 5 random ticker symbols and invest in them....or i could spend weeks and months researching 5 good investments...care to guess which would be a better choice. if anyone told me they know everything....or even close to everything about a subject like the market you couldnt get away from that person fast enough.

[Rocky]

Originally posted by C280 JR
let me tell you this....i took the class on business, and stocks were part of it...my teacher knows everything about it, so i asked him since you know so much do you do it, he simply replied NO..no matter how much you know about stocks, its all luck!!

Elvir

:werd:

Luck and timing thses days. I've been watching the markets on my monitor for the past 4 years. Been through the dot com boom and stuff. These past few years has been a speculation market. Now it's a 'news' market. Nobody seems to be relying on historical data and trends anymore. I get people who ask to place trades for a certain symbol and I tell them it don't exist. I ask them what's the company anme and they said that they don't know..they only buying it cause thier friend, mother, uncle's dog told them to buy it. Research doesn't really cut it anymore these days. Welcoem to the new style stock market.

I work in a brokerage company and I don't even invest in the market. Your buddy might be making large bucks while your losing large dollars and guess what. He's makin money off you.

Sure you can make money in the market. It just takes alot of money to make alot of money most fo the time.

You play with nickels, you get nickels.

You play with diamonds, you get diamonds.

I rather take my chances on a game of Blackjack.

[Rocky]

Post count fluffing hahaha

Well, when you buy and sell stocks, one major factor to consider, and especially if you don't have alot of money to play around with, is the price of commissions. Keep in mind that you have to pay a commission on both the buy and the sell.

If your going through a retail broker (full service), and you made $200 if you sell ABC now. The buy would have cost you..say $50 an the sell would have cost you another $50. That's 1/2 of the profit you would have made gone to admin fees.

If you goto a discount broker, it wil only cost you 20%-30% depending on the type of order. Most low fee comissins only apply to market orders with no restrictions. If you want to add restrictions like AoN, On stop, on stop limits etc... they tack on extra fees. READ THE COMMISSIONS SCHEDULE VERY VERY CAREFULLY.

[JRE320]

Thanks guys. I've been told by several friends about investing into the stock market. I know for now it's not really a good time get into it. I never consider getting too serious about it since I know that I would be more confused on how to look after it
Rocky thanks for all the input. I'll just email you if I got any further question. ;) :) :cool:

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by JRE320
Thanks guys. I've been told by several friends about investing into the stock market. I know for now it's not really a good time get into it. I never consider getting too serious about it since I know that I would be more confused on how to look after it
Rocky thanks for all the input. I'll just email you if I got any further question. ;) :) :cool:

Trying to time the market is not a good idea. Listening to the suggestion of friends is not a good idea unless they have an appropriate background. Investment decisions based on emotion get you little. But hey...just my .0173 EUR <--btw, how sad is that!

[dtmcoupe]

the soundest advice i can give you about stock is stay away from "hot tips" from people. theres no point in investing in a "hot new company" espically in the economic times as they are....maybe some young dot com in the mid 90's was a wise choice....but in generali would stay away from a company that dosent have its footing yet. even ipo's can be very risky. research all your trades, and dont be a "day trader" in the literal sense, hold your stocks for a while....if you sell every time your stocks have a down day your going to go broke, but also set limits on how low a stock can go before you sell....dont get emotional about stocks and keep them till they arent worth anything (man if people went to vegas with that mentality they would be better off)

[714guy]

Screw stocks!!!! Buy income properties(i.e. rental, commercial and etc.) , especially in cali. they're always going up.

[scottschoe]

all in all, it's a bit of luck & wise choices. i don't remember where i read the article, but apparently some stock people carefully chose a few stocks, and compared the results with stocks chosen randomly with a dart board. dart board won.

i'm taking the plunge this summer and dumping a few K into the market.....my dad's business partners have told me that vc's are starting to take more risks

[vader13]

Originally posted by 714guy
Screw stocks!!!! Buy income properties(i.e. rental, commercial and etc.) , especially in cali. they're always going up.

Thats what I am doing, I got a townhouse in Aliso I just got and am going to start renting it..I am moving into another townhouse for awhile,,Then I'll rent that also,, After a few years you can have several rentals..Then your set fo life,,Very good advice..

[HdS500]

Originally posted by Sesh
Best advice? STAY OUT OF IT.
Sesh
:werd:
My dad lost millionS

[714guy]

Originally posted by vader13
Thats what I am doing, I got a townhouse in Aliso I just got and am going to start renting it..I am moving into another townhouse for awhile,,Then I'll rent that also,, After a few years you can have several rentals..Then your set fo life,,Very good advice..

Thats how Jerry Buss made his millions. Just imagine owning 200 units and getting just 100 each unit a month, thats $20000 a month X 12 = 240K for doin nothing. That of course take a few decades to acquire but you get the drift.

the best thing i see about apartments or rental property is that all you need is the Down Payment than the tenant pays your morgage.

[So.Cal_Benzo]

Originally posted by ConceptEuroMBZ
Last time I was involved in the stock market was in a simulation in a business class and I lost like $75,000 in 4 weeks:(
hehehe... last time i was involved in the Stock Market was during econ. class in HS. My team finished off making $50Grand. Our tactics was simply to invest in a company where the products that it was selling was at its rise/at its highest demand... and from there on we made money.
We also invested/or bet (i forgot what the term is called, is it short sell? or short something...) that a company will go down. And as they go bankrupt or the value of the company plunges down, we made money out of it.

From my experience, its not as easy as it seems(where i thought at first it was just buying and selling). You have to be up to date with current situations around the world, because it effects the stock market and your stock, and be wise in choosing which stock to buy. All i can say is, don't go into the stock market blind folded. Try to get familiar with it first.. perhaps you could try a stock market online game? When you're good at it, it's easy to make money... but it is true that sometimes luck also plays a role, and you really need to becareful once you're investing big $$.
The stock market isn't something to be scared off, and you shouldn't back away from it. It just takes time to learn and to get familiar as how things go. Oh ya.. one more thing.. its better to invest when the economy is rising.


Good Luck.:)

[W420]

I didn't read this thread cuz it's too darn long, but would share my experience with stock market. I don't know jack about stock but thought I would fool around with it 1.5 years ago and see if I can get really lucky and earn myself a Brabus 5.8 for my outdated car. I didn't put in a whole lot of dough compare to some of you hardcore investor and rich bustahs out there, but to poor me it's still a lot of $$$ cuz I put in 30% of my saving's account.. Half a year later I only got half of the original amount left. WTF. hahah. I got pissed and just left my E-TRADE A/C inactive and don't bother to do anything about it. I haven't log on for I don't even know how long.. Come to think of it, I don't even remember my PW anymore.

I hate advice from friend... I have friends that call themself "expert" and work in a fiber optic company in SF, so supposely his "inside" information told me to mass purchase their stocks when it was about $5. I did exactly what he said and last time I checked it was only worth $0.90.. :rolleyes: Well, he's still my friend cuz I know he didn't do that intentionally and he promised to hook me up with chicks LOL, so it's all good, but deep inside I want to kill him. :D

Well, on a positive note, I completely forgot about it until this thread and that reminds me that I still have some spare money in E-Trade. So I guess I don't have to eat any more cup-noodle that I've been doing and can get myself some McDonalds tonight. :cool:

[Rocky]

Originally posted by So.Cal_Benzo
We also invested/or bet (i forgot what the term is called, is it short sell? or short something...) that a company will go down. And as they go bankrupt or the value of the company plunges down, we made money out of it.

Put options

[So.Cal_Benzo]

Originally posted by Rocky
Put options
sorry... i dont get you... options for what?

[sf280]

Originally posted by So.Cal_Benzo
sorry... i dont get you... options for what?

You obviously do not know much about how the market works and to explain options to you may be it bit difficult

Basically you can buy and sell options on a stock and with these options you can either have "puts" or "calls" Basically they are locking in a price as the seller of the put or call, and it is speculation on the part of the buyer of the put or call

Puts are sold when you are not sure if the stock is going down but you want to lock in a selling price. Calls are when you want to guarantee an upward price.

Lets say you have a stock worth $50 in June. You can sell a call on the stock to sell it at $60 in lets say August. That might cost $1.00 for the buyer of the call. So in August the stock is at $58, well the person bought the $60 option so they do not exercise it, and you just made $1 per share and did not need to sell the stock. Now on the other hand, the stock went to $70 - well you have to sell the stock at $60, so you still made your $10 as it went from $50 to $60 plus the $1 for the options, but the buyer of the option has now made $10 off of the $1 investment. Got it????

Puts are the reverse of this.

And then there is the whole concept of covered vs naked options, and the whole strips and straps and weighted optioning.......

Some fun sites
http://www.optionanimation.com/

an easier one http://www.optionlabs.com/tut1.html

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by sf280
You obviously do not know much about how the market works and to explain options to you may be it bit difficult



C'mon man, you know it's time to have a bnz lecture on Black-Scholes.

[So.Cal_Benzo]

Originally posted by sf280
You obviously do not know much about how the market works and to explain options to you may be it bit difficult

Basically you can buy and sell options on a stock and with these options you can either have "puts" or "calls" Basically they are locking in a price as the seller of the put or call, and it is speculation on the part of the buyer of the put or call

Puts are sold when you are not sure if the stock is going down but you want to lock in a selling price. Calls are when you want to guarantee an upward price.

Lets say you have a stock worth $50 in June. You can sell a call on the stock to sell it at $60 in lets say August. That might cost $1.00 for the buyer of the call. So in August the stock is at $58, well the person bought the $60 option so they do not exercise it, and you just made $1 per share and did not need to sell the stock. Now on the other hand, the stock went to $70 - well you have to sell the stock at $60, so you still made your $10 as it went from $50 to $60 plus the $1 for the options, but the buyer of the option has now made $10 off of the $1 investment. Got it????

Puts are the reverse of this.

And then there is the whole concept of covered vs naked options, and the whole strips and straps and weighted optioning.......

Some fun sites
http://www.optionanimation.com/

an easier one http://www.optionlabs.com/tut1.html

Oh... ok ok. thanks for straightening that out for me.

[CKlasse]

Originally posted by dtmcoupe
to the people who think the market is in a "no win" situation

a friend of mine started an inventment company a few months ago, he is an LLC and looks after companys most people have never heard of. In the few months he has been in business he has seen a 23% profit. he has pulled in a few large investors with the guarantee of 6% under 20k and 10% GUARANTEED ANNUAL interest. im not sure how he distributes the profit above and beyond the 6 and 10% but the investors have seen more then the guaranteed interest. there is $ to be made in the market in almost any conditions.

That sounds familiar. A while back AMEX funds was offering guaranteed 10% annual interest. The profit is distributed normally, they simply give you 10% at min even if the portfolio growth is less than that. Pretty good deal :)

[jl88]

Okay, I feel like I should say something. Half this talk is speculation. The rest is hearsay.. "my friend's cousin's third uncle's stepniece's half mutant brother made money on stocks, so can I!"

The key to success is:
WORK

Simple as that. Find a career which you have an upward path and stick with it for 20 years.

Success isn't easy. And it's not an overnight thing. And don't think you can make millions by trading stocks on etrade while you sit in your boxers eating some coco puffs.

There will always be people that get lucky. Whether its gambling, lottery, stocks, being in the right place at the right time. But being "lucky" is not a business model which will last you 30+ years. If you don't have income coming in every year, you are screwed. You'd be AMAZED how fast you can go through $1 million cash. Investing is fun and all, but don't think for a second that it can be your main income source. You need a career that will bring in money regardless of market conditions, Enron Scandals, wars, etc.

Stocks? Mutual Funds?? PFFT!!! Those are archaic investment vehicles. 2 words: Viatical Settlements

Achieving success is difficult. MAINTAINING your success is even more difficult.

[MB300E87]

Originally posted by jl88
The key to success is:
WORK

http://groups.msn.com/_Secure/0QgDUAuISum6u2wfdema9fwhyOAlJXJi9TafDBLKfReannQobl c!B5DmipjpCs7yrtEab43vwtlHJXnfG8hdglF4DhnyrRD6D9!S !qlD7aJY/bowdown.gif?dc=4675377441288343324

[Rocky]

Originally posted by jl88
The key to success is:
WORK

:werd:

I hate gambling and the Stock Market is just another form of legalized gambling.

[sf280]

Originally posted by Renn 208
C'mon man, you know it's time to have a bnz lecture on Black-Scholes.

They talk about that in the first link ;)

[JRE320]

Originally posted by Rocky
:werd:

I hate gambling and the Stock Market is just another form of legalized gambling.

:werd: :werd:
As they call it the rich man pass time. :rolleyes: ;) :)