<p>I've noticed that quite a lot of people at my school play the stocks (with their parents' permission and encouragement...and sometimes, credit cards). Anyways, I was wondering, do you guys do this to? If you do, do you invest in companies you like - ex. Google, clothing shops, etc? Or, do you really research the companies and follow them online or with the newspaper?</p>
<p>Umm, no./*****/</p>
<p>ZOMG, if I had enough money to play the stocks, I'd just get a CD. </p>
<p><em>staying safe</em></p>
<p>I have 2 CDs. You can't do anything to them, so they're pretty boring...</p>
<p>Pretty much. Stocks are pretty useless for me. CDs grow.</p>
<p>If i had enough money I'd invest in stocks. But I don't <em>sob</em>. But talking to people about stocks is a good way to get started. If the person you ask know what's going on just chat about it once in a while to them. Then it grows on you and you become interested and you will take the time to analyze those nasty shape shifting graphs on NYSE.com. But yea...investing is like gambling but a little more safe.</p>
<p>You shouldn't <em>play</em> the stocks. 80% of people who are trained in the market fail at beating it....stick with index funds and you'll get a 10% return/yr.</p>
<p>Im 22 and this fiscal year so far im up $92,345 in pure gains. Stocks are 100% common sense, they are something a ivy league education cant teach. While many think they can, they don't. Schools really dont teach ya much about what you will do. Most IB students such at investing, and most MBA students are even worse. Books smarts does not and never will traslate into street smarts and remember you are buying on the street,</p>
<p>The second problem with this thread is that, people think stocks are a gamble. That is 200% wrong. An investor does not gamble, they invest. A true Investor does not deal with gambling, he only deals with a sure thing. Have I lost money before, yes but I always recover quickly. I don't buy and sell unless I'm 200K times confident I have made a solid choice. For me that is still brief. I only invest in a sure thing, for the past 5 or so years I haven't lost and things are very well. I started at 3K and am now at around 290K to play with. I have gained around 287K in just a few years.</p>
<p>Staying safe is for suckers, staying safe gets you a job making no more than 70K a year and living by the terms of other people. I say screw that, I have worked for another person only 6 weeks of my entire life and never plan to again. Im a Boss not a employee. </p>
<p>As for tips, </p>
<p>You are young if you loose 3K so what you can make that back in a summer. Safety is what keeps the poor poor and the rich rich. Its not for a 20 year old. </p>
<p>if you are 55 and planing to retire then moving into less venerable means is wise, but doing so at 20 is just stupid. </p>
<p>I suggest you invest no less than $2500, this way you can take advantage of free trades offered by many brokers for so many days. I personally use Fidelity.</p>
<p>If you are young staying static is a horrible idea, you don't want to buy a stock in Coke or Pepsi and keep it for 10+ years. Thats for old geezers. What you do is Research, Research, Research. After you Research and are 100% confident Buy the stock and buy as much as you can. Now since you did your research the stock goes up. Right when you get the feeling of it being prime, Sell, Sell, SELL. Sell to all the suckers who are just jumping on, as they didn't research and and getting there news from CNBC. Even if the stock is still going up, you still want to sell it when your gut tells you its prime.</p>
<p>This may be against every person who has given you advice. But I am living proof that it works.</p>
<p>The sum of Thousands of small gains, is always going to be larger than a few large gains.</p>
<p>You want to just catch the hype, and once you sell its time to Research and buy again. </p>
<p>An example, you hear a online rumor Apple is going to release a new iPod on Tuesday. Buy stock in apple at the open or before, once the rest of the scum hears the news on CNBC shows such as squawk box, the packs will come to buy and when they buy thats when you sell halfway into the Bull run, when its prime.</p>
<p>If you have never done this before, id give googles Fantasy Portfolio a try.</p>
<p>I do recommend Fidelity for your brokerage.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Im 22 and this fiscal year so far im up $92,345 in pure gains. Stocks are 100% common sense, they are something a ivy league education cant teach. While many think they can, they don't. Schools really dont teach ya much about what you will do. Most IB students such at investing, and most MBA students are even worse. Books smarts does not and never will traslate into street smarts and remember you are buying on the street,</p>
<p>The second problem with this thread is that, people think stocks are a gamble. That is 200% wrong. An investor does not gamble, they invest. A true Investor does not deal with gambling, he only deals with a sure thing. Have I lost money before, yes but I always recover quickly. I don't buy and sell unless I'm 200K times confident I have made a solid choice. For me that is still brief. I only invest in a sure thing, for the past 5 or so years I haven't lost and things are very well. I started at 3K and am now at around 290K to play with. I have gained around 287K in just a few years.</p>
<p>Staying safe is for suckers, staying safe gets you a job making no more than 70K a year and living by the terms of other people. I say screw that, I have worked for another person only 6 weeks of my entire life and never plan to again. Im a Boss not a employee. </p>
<p>As for tips, </p>
<p>You are young if you loose 3K so what you can make that back in a summer. Safety is what keeps the poor poor and the rich rich. Its not for a 20 year old. </p>
<p>if you are 55 and planing to retire then moving into less venerable means is wise, but doing so at 20 is just stupid. </p>
<p>I suggest you invest no less than $2500, this way you can take advantage of free trades offered by many brokers for so many days. I personally use Fidelity.</p>
<p>If you are young staying static is a horrible idea, you don't want to buy a stock in Coke or Pepsi and keep it for 10+ years. Thats for old geezers. What you do is Research, Research, Research. After you Research and are 100% confident Buy the stock and buy as much as you can. Now since you did your research the stock goes up. Right when you get the feeling of it being prime, Sell, Sell, SELL. Sell to all the suckers who are just jumping on, as they didn't research and and getting there news from CNBC. Even if the stock is still going up, you still want to sell it when your gut tells you its prime.</p>
<p>This may be against every person who has given you advice. But I am living proof that it works.</p>
<p>The sum of Thousands of small gains, is always going to be larger than a few large gains.</p>
<p>You want to just catch the hype, and once you sell its time to Research and buy again. </p>
<p>An example, you hear a online rumor Apple is going to release a new iPod on Tuesday. Buy stock in apple at the open or before, once the rest of the scum hears the news on CNBC shows such as squawk box, the packs will come to buy and when they buy thats when you sell halfway into the Bull run, when its prime.</p>
<p>If you have never done this before, id give googles Fantasy Portfolio a try.</p>
<p>I do recommend Fidelity for your brokerage.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>1) Completely untrue</p>
<p>2) If true I'd love to see a pic of your portfolio, with gains, printed out (you can black out all personal information, stock #'s etc). </p>
<p>3) This is also the WORST piece of advice I've ever seen on CC, and I've seen many bad pieces of advice.</p>
<p>I cant show a pic of my portfolio,that would be illegal for me to do. Hey if ya don't believe ,me, thats ok. More money for me.</p>
<p>It's not illegal to tell someone what you have in your portfolio. Extending from there, it's not illegal to show a picture of the records showing what is in the portfolio.</p>
<p>Illegal? I think not. If you really wanna get your flame across I suggest you make it both believable and back it up with some strong evidence (as opposed to your crappy investment techniques)</p>
<p>I just finished a college economics course and that's pretty much what my teacher suggested.</p>
<p>If you're young be risky and don't be afraid to invest, to invest in a lot of different things and not just in one company - to keep it diverse, when you're old become more conservative because it's harder to make that money back in case you lose it, he also mentioned that you shouldn't seek professional advice from companies because in a perfect market advice won't help you. </p>
<p>I don't know, hrtz seems to know what he's talking about and my econ teacher said pretty much the same things as him.</p>
<p>I trust him.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I just finished a college economics course and that's pretty much what my teacher suggested.</p>
<p>If you're young be risky and don't be afraid to invest, to invest in a lot of different things and not just in one company - to keep it diverse, when you're old become more conservative because it's harder to make that money back in case you lose it, he also mentioned that you shouldn't seek professional advice from companies because in a perfect market advice won't help you. </p>
<p>I don't know, hrtz seems to know what he's talking about and my econ teacher said pretty much the same things as him.</p>
<p>I trust him.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well then one has to wonder why 80% of mutual funds at 95% of hedge funds fail?? Add to this how over 99% of day traders DON'T beat the market and it begins to become a little less certain. Anyone can spout simple economics, like hrtz and your econ teacher, it's another thing to actually make it work. </p>
<p>"Buy low, sell high"</p>
<p>-No kidding.....easier said then done.</p>
<p>Its easier than most folks think, You just need to do your research. Most people don't want to spend the hours doing research, they would rather have another person do it for them or go into an index.</p>
<p>Lax your numbers are plain wrong. While It is possible got a Mutual Fund to do that bad and get away with it, 80% is way to high. Hedge funds are in no way a 95% failure rate, thats just flat out impossible. Do you understand how a Hedge fund works? Sure there are some that go under, but in general across all American hedge funds there is a average of a 20% gain on your money.</p>
<p>As for why day Traders fail at a High rate, thats simple and I have already explained it. They don't do proper research they get there news from aol finance and CNBC. If apple is releasing a new ipod and you just hear it on TV billions upon Billions of others just heard the same news. vs. a Internet or inside rumors that is guaranteed to have a much less of a following. Of course Most day Traders fail, they are buying after the stock already went prime. When the true players are already bearish.</p>
<p>Example Last week on Thursday before close I bought 200 shares of General Cable (BCG) $ 55.14 each. Upon Fridays Open all the suckers started coming in to buy as it was just on squawk box, I sold when it was prime, Mid day at around $58.46. I easily made around 700 there. But this was just 1 of around 30 or so trades I had going at one time. Just on Friday I made around 7K</p>
<p>It may be shocking or very different than what Suze Orman tells you but it works. Alot of truly great investors have done the same.</p>
<p>If I lost alot of money on General Cable, ya know what so what Im young and have a lifetime to remake it.</p>
<p>You, I know nothing about the intricacies of finance, and I can tell that your advice is... not very good.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Lax your numbers are plain wrong. While It is possible got a Mutual Fund to do that bad and get away with it, 80% is way to high. Hedge funds are in no way a 95% failure rate, thats just flat out impossible. Do you understand how a Hedge fund works? Sure there are some that go under, but in general across all American hedge funds there is a average of a 20% gain on your money.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This is actually funny to read because it is COMPLETELY WRONG. 95% of hedge funds do go under....you just never hear about them. 80% of mutual funds (managed by people with years, and I mean YEARS of experience on wall street) go under....do you think they don't research their stocks? What the hell, do you think the people who work at mutual/hedge funds just pick stocks out of a hat? Your attempt to sound well versed on financial matters is noble, however your information is completely wrong. Like I said, if you want me to believe you why don't you take a picture of your portfolio and post it here, you can black out everything that is confidential....it's not illegal (you saying it is just shows how much you know about finance).</p>
<p>If you're interested in investing, try Motley Fool CAPS.
No real money is involved, and it's good for getting a sense of how to win in the stock market before actually jumping in. Plus, tons of great tips.</p>
<p>fantasy stocks on facebook is awesome</p>
<p>Yah, I actually know friends in college that use stock gains to pay for tuition. And I even know one guy who does it in my high school and has huge gains (made over $55K, mainly off apple and other tech stocks)</p>
<p>Personally? I did stocks when I was a kid (like 8) since both my parents invest. They taught me the ropes and let me have fun with $2000. i made a lot off Qualcom, then it all came crashing later on hahahah.</p>
<p>I still read up on it, but i've moved into Forex now. It's a lot more liquid and the market has greater potential if you have experience. </p>
<p>As for doing stocks as a teen? Depends. You have to see if you have the common sense. Just look at CNBCs MBA challenge. Both teams in the finals (Yale and Texas) sucked it up on the stock market. It's not something an Ivy League education taught you--even conflicting with previous knowledge you might learn. (FOr example, at the LEAD Business institute this summer our MBA professor told us that technical analysis was very unreliable and proven inaccurate, while my friends and I have been successfully using it as a main indicator for entry point this whole time--go figure)</p>
<p>motley fool is an excellent website. I would try and going on some small forums too, because while 90% of the people are idiots, the other 10% find pure gems while no one is looking there (especially in penny stocks).</p>
<p>it takes common sense. It takes business, social, and political savvy. And it takes creativity (in interpretation for looking at formations such as cup and handle).</p>
<p>If you do invest, do it with a large amount, otherwise you'll never feel that pressure and you'll crumble when you invest more.</p>