Investment "Logic"

Notes: Stock Ratings: 1 = buy at current stock prices, 2 = buy on a 5-10% dip in stock price, 3 = sell on a 5-10% increase in stock price, 4 = sell at current stock prices to raise cash.  Ratings are based upon 12-18 month outlook on stock direction and not necessarily related to moves I make due to financial positioning. T oday I filled my core position in Citigroup, adding 50% of my previous position at $47.  Frankly, I can't help but feel a little wary.  However, that was my price point and I was sticking to it in the face of the current market danger I'm facing.  I wanted to pick up more because the price has been such a long-term floor, and with rising interest rates and a strong jobs number that makes people predict there will be more hikes to come, the long-term upside is hard to resist.  The challenge has been that the market (stocks and bond) are indicating the economy is weakening and that rate hikes can't continue.  TBV for the company i...

Notes: Stock Ratings: 1 = buy at current stock prices, 2 = buy on a 5-10% dip in stock price, 3 = sell on a 5-10% increase in stock price, 4 = sell at current stock prices to raise cash.  Ratings are based upon 12-18 month outlook on stock direction and not necessarily related to moves I make due to financial positioning. The events over the course of this week is forcing me to go back and perform a review of this stock.  As of this writing, the stock has fallen almost 14.3% in the course of 4 trading days.  What's going on?  What are my risks?  Is this a buying opportunity or do I need to get out of Dodge?  I'm going to put my best effort forth to answer that. First, let's figure out what's put us in this position.  The first thing to note is that the stock closed at $9.68 on Tuesday.  It's now down about 10.7% since then ($1.04).  So while the primary market indicators are down to begin with, this stock had a particularly strong ...

Notes: Stock Ratings: 1 = buy at current stock prices, 2 = buy on a 5-10% dip in stock price, 3 = sell on a 5-10% increase in stock price, 4 = sell at current stock prices to raise cash.  Ratings are based upon 12-18 month outlook on stock direction and not necessarily related to moves I make due to financial positioning. I wanted to take some time to overview my portfolio's performance for 2015, then have a brief conversation regarding the holdings I currently have and my future plans as I get a clean slate to start anew and attempt to outperform the performance of the S&P 500 index.  Before I begin, I want to establish some common thoughts throughout this post.  First, all gain/loss percentages discussed are based upon either feedback from my portfolio tracking software or by pulling up tickers on the Morningstar  web site's performance tabs for YTD or 2015 numbers on performance.  Numbers I state have the chance of being off a...

Notes: Stock Ratings: 1 = buy at current stock prices, 2 = buy on a 5-10% dip in stock price, 3 = sell on a 5-10% increase in stock price, 4 = sell at current stock prices to raise cash.  Ratings are based upon 12-18 month outlook on stock direction and not necessarily related to moves I make due to financial positioning. The purpose of this discussion and review is to analyze the trades I made in 2015 - what went bad, what went well, and what's still undecided.  Hopefully we'll be able to glean some lessons from the experiences I've had and use those to become better in 2016 - so let's dig in.  Below are all of the trades I made this year.  I'm going to try to break things down stock by stock, not trade by trade, but I'll do my best to keep all of this straight. Trades Made in 2015 I'll start with the easiest topic to discuss, which was my "win" with NPS Parmaceuticals (NPSP).  As I went into the year, I was up significantly o...

This will be my last portfolio summary posting for the year due to the holidays and my focus around organizing a year in review posting. I expect to be back to my normal schedule by January 8. This was quite the interesting week, that's for sure.  It bubbled and boiled for the first two days in anticipation of the announcement out of the Fed.  On Wednesday, we had our crescendo as stocks launched off of the actual announcement, and then things fizzled out and fell off the table on Thursday and Friday, only for the major indices to  end up lower on the week by 0.3%.  Fortunately, my portfolio fared a little better, ending the week up 1.6% thanks mostly to Honewell and Isis Pharmaceuticals.  Honeywell surged higher early in the week off of their investor conference call.  Honeywell's in-line guidance for 2016, while other companies, like 3M, are guiding lower.  The improved price from ISIS came from no new news, while they did announce t...

It's been a disastrous week for this average Joe's portfolio.  As the market has taken quite a hit, with the S&P 500 down 3.8%, my portfolio has taken a 5% hit.  The biggest losers were Isis Pharmaceuticals, Citigroup, and Honeywell.  Before I get into those particular holdings, let's talk about the overall market.  The hit the market is taking is very much in line with the strong November employment numbers we got last Friday.  The numbers were so strong that since then, we've heard various Fed members making comments that we are as good as assured to see a rate hike - likely a quarter point - resulting from Wednesday's Fed meeting.  It's these realities, in combination with the downturn in the energy markets (primarily oil) that the market is reacting to.  A raising rate environment is a whole new investing environment than I've been working with for the last 5 years.  A rising rate has a number of impacts.  First, the US Dollar typ...

With a holiday shortened week, there wasn't a lot really going on.  Trading was light on volume, and events were virtually non-existant.  We have entered a period of time in the market that has been heavily weighted towards positive gains, though not huge gains.  We see more geopolitical turmoil again, though not enough to make energy surge higher.  Retail in the US is strong, but only in pockets as warm weather makes for difficult apparel sales.  Housing appears to be strong and there's the looming interest rate discussion coming up as well.   The only big event coming in the week ahead will be the November jobs results, which will be announced on Friday.  There will be other government numbers published through the week to keep an eye on, but they typically have little impact past a day or two's worth of trading.   Notes: Stock Ratings: 1 = buy at current stock prices, 2 = buy on a 5-10% dip in stock price, 3 = sell on a 5-10% increase...