<p>Read a Random Walk Down Wall Street. Then Read Fooled by Randomness. </p>
<p>All the other stuff is junk. If you want to beat the market, it's really a full time intellectual endeavor. By definition, the average person can't beat the market. </p>
<p>I have beat the market, with low volatility, for quite some time. But it's an obsession, and requires a full time investment into refining my systems/methodology...there is no quick tip that will let you passively beat the market. </p>
<p>So-build a balanced portfolio based on index funds. 70% domestic/30% foreign, with 85% devoted to stock and 15% devoted to fixed income. That's the textbook answer. </p>
<p>Now, because you're young....you may want to do some venture capital style investing IF it's a real interest to you. Meaning, buying small cap companies without a lot of analyst coverage that YOU think will do well in the future. But if you don't understand financial statements, or the time value of money, or probability theory, then just use the textbook allocation I described.</p>
<p>This looks like the bounce that everyone was waiting for. I did a little daytrading and had a good time but I'm not holding techs overnight. Some of the commodity stocks got whacked today came back hard putting in what should be a needle bottom (or morning star). Looks like quite the short squeeze right into the close today.</p>
<p>BTW, my trading platform at the office is part of my five monitor system. One monitor is dedicated to displaying 60 realtime charts of various companies in a variety of sectors. Another monitor is for trade executions and email. The other three monitors are for work. I think that trading without streaming charts is trading blind.</p>
<p>I think that the most successful trading systems out there are based on the Turtle Trading approach. I think that the approach can be found on the web. Someone described the system and then said that there are very few people that can use the system as emotions get in the way. The most successful traders that I've seen use trending systems along with volatility and sentiment indicators. And, of course, they lose. But they win more than they lose and that's the best you can hope for.</p>
<p>Why would you recommended shorting to someone inexperienced to investing. The problem with shorting is that the stock and just keep going up and up and your loses can be infinite. When you are long on a stock the price can only go to zero so you already know the most you can lose.</p>
<p>There seems to be a lot of bad advice circulating through this thread...I have a simple question...who is the greatest investor of all time? If you guessed Warren Buffett your right. The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham is the book that helped shape his investing career.</p>
<p>Also, I would recommend Zecco Trading because they give you 10 free trades a month as well as like 5 dollar trades after that.</p>
<p>DON'T SHORT...it can really burn you like the guy said above.</p>
<p>Your best bet to make money is to look at companies that make a product that will be utilized for a long time, have great brand recognition and have good management.</p>
<p>If you can handle volatility the key to "vast wealth" is small cap value stocks. The reason being that the largest stocks are covered by innumerable sources so its doubtful that the stock market will prove to be inefficient; however, if you look at stocks that aren't widely covered there is a far greater chance the market will be pricing them wrong and you will be able to get them at a discount.</p>
<p>Currently, I'm looking at AYR, an aircraft leasing operation with 90% exposure overseas, BBSI, a human resources outsourcing company, and BOLT, a company that produces underwater mapmaking technology with a large portion of market share. </p>
<p>Also, I think large stocks such as AXP, GE, KMX, and USB are all stocks that have the capability to produce great returns once the Bear Market is over; however, I feel that current macroeconomic conditions will continue to punish these companies for the time being.</p>
<p>If you short a stock and it goes up and up and up, you won't have infinite losses. You will get a margin call from your broker and they will close you out and potentially send you a bill.</p>
<p>The greatest trader of all time was Jesse Livermore.</p>
<p>If you think that Warren Buffett is the best, then just buy Berkshire Hathaway. I trade the A shares and B shares from time to time. Berkshire is down about 20% from the 52-week highs. Warren basically said that things weren't going to be great at the last annual meeting. One benefit of owning Berkshire is that you get to go to the annual meeting in Omaha.</p>
<p>I just closed out a trade that I initiated yesterday morning. One of my favorite oil companies is PVX which has an 18% dividend yield when I first looked at it. I'm not sure what it is now but it's probably more like 10%. The trading range has usually been in the $10 to $12 area. Every once in a while, the stock gets panicked and it drops like a rock. For about an hour. Then it blasts back up like a rocket. I've observed this behaviour for many years but it doesn't happen that often. Yesterday morning, my wife was telling me that oil was going to collapse, that it is in a bubble, that China is going to cut back on consumption, etc. When information hits the average person and causes a panic, that's often a good time to pile in. Similar to the poster that advocated shorting stocks. When everyone and their brother thinks that it's time to short, look out for a massive short squeeze. And we had a massive short squeeze yesterday.</p>
<p>At any rate, PVX was up 4.15% this morning so I closed the trade out for about a 5% gain. It was only a few thousand shares but not bad for a few laughs. My guess is that it will go up another five percent but it may take a little while to get there.</p>
<p>But it helps to have a feel for particular stocks that you like so that you can take advantage of certain situation to get a good entry or exit. PVX is a Canadian energy trust. They typically buy up wells that aren't profitable for the majors on the cheap and run them dry. Kind of like scavengers.</p>
<p>Anyone who doesn't cover their position after losing what they feel comfortable with shouldnt be playing the stock market. You can lose a lot of money shorting, but only if you are too careless to cut your losses at 10-25%. I'm only 15 so i'm not looking for long term investment, i'm only looking for volatile stocks that are "fun" to me.</p>
<p>Personally, I love playing a good penny stock that has news or hype. For example i've been playing GETC.PK for several months now. I bought at .15 sold at .20, bought at .24 sold at .32, bought at .34 sold at .31, bought at .31 sold at .4, bought at .40 and have been holding since (it's now at .49).
I cannot afford to lose large amounts so I cut my losses very early and retrieve my gains at 10-25%. I do not believe the best in companies, in fact I believe most pinksheet companies are frauds, until they are on the big boards ( nasdaq, NYSE, AMEX, ect...)</p>
<p>To the guy who didn't believe 90-95% people lose money in the stock market, go look it up. I've read countless number of stock books and the occasional newspaper article. The few books i've read recently that restate these statistics are An American Hedge Fund, Practical Speculation, Day Trade Online, and How to Make Money in Stocks. At first I was very much like you, ignorant to the fact that so many people lose money in the stock market. Later I believed</p>
<p>I invested 10k in 9th grade in stocks. 4 years after it was 47k. I'm a pro.</p>
<p>Short term is definately the way to go if you have decent amount of money. If you don't long term is the best. Playing around in the market is kind of danegerous right now but if you know what you're doing and trade only short-term, you can make some serious money. As the economy is getting better, invest alot for long term. You'll be rich. It's really common sense and researching/knowing about the company you are investing in.</p>
<p>"I invested 10k in 9th grade in stocks. 4 years after it was 47k. I'm a pro."</p>
<p>Never confuse genius with a bull market.</p>
<p>"Short term is definately the way to go if you have decent amount of money. If you don't long term is the best. Playing around in the market is kind of danegerous right now but if you know what you're doing and trade only short-term, you can make some serious money. As the economy is getting better, invest alot for long term. You'll be rich. It's really common sense and researching/knowing about the company you are investing in."</p>
<p>I have a friend worth nine figures. He has a short-term portfolio and a long-term portfolio. He posts his calls online. His long-term portfolio is based on fundamental and technical analysis. His short-term portfolio is based on technical analysis. He is truly remarkable at buying or selling the bottom or top, riding the trend, and then peeling off the gains or getting stopped out. The interesting thing is that it is so hard to follow his trades as he frequently buys when everyone else is in panic mode and selling when everyone else is euphoric. His approach sounds like turtle trading to me. Or a variant of it.</p>
<p>But I'm a pro, sadface :(. I actually initially invested in Time Warner, what a mistake. I barely got like 10 dollars off of that and then I invested in microsoft. after a while when it was around 33 dollars ( i bought it for like 21) i sold it, when it went back down to 28 i bought it again and sold it again for like 32. And then I invested in NYX. Since nyx is kind of like a reflection on the economy, the prices flowed up and down like a sin graph. So when everyone was selling i was buying. when everyone was buying i was selling. but yea i think i might go into investment banking/management, still deciding between that and med.</p>
<p>Go to the library and peruse Value Line for a few hours. Follow their advice and buy whatever they tell you. Usually works out (esp. in the long run).</p>
<p>Joe Kennedy (JFK's father), who made a huge fortune in the stock market, said that in 1929 he knew it was time to sell everything when a shoe shine boy tried to give him a stock tip. Wonder what he would say about a time when 9th graders consider themselves stock trading pro's.....</p>
<p>I did good at fake stocks in personal finance. I doubled my money in 2 weeks! I don't know if I really want to invest right now. I can't make up my mind.</p>
<p>contrarian investing is definitely profitable, if you pick the correct times.. but most people (especially inexperienced) would have a hard time doing that</p>