The Viking Age is a story about courage, preparation, and opportunity. Ironically, those same three ingredients produce outsized returns in microcap investing.
From 793 to 1066 AD, a small group of people from a cold, fragmented corner of northern Europe stopped minding their own business and decided to attack the rest of the European continent. They took its riches, occupied its territory, and reshaped its bloodlines.
Unless your objective is to become a professional FM, finding 3-4 good stocks and chilling and enjoying life should be enough.The whole purpose of investing is- d money works for you. You don’t work for d money. If you are working hard for investing money, you are doing it wrong
We all have losses in the portfolio. It's part of game. Don't turn a loss into a mistake. Mistakes are when our actions or inaction turns a small loss into a bigger loss. It's when you are hurting your returns.
Coincidentally this is also why many successful traders focus on trading the same 2-3 stocks every year. There is enough volatility in a couple things to make a living.These successful traders find the pulse of a company's stock.They know when the heartbeat becomes irregular.
Investor
sentiment is a pendulum that swings back and forth between extreme optimism and extreme pessimism and never sits still. It's on the extremes where the astute investor waits patiently buying or selling.
This week I wrote an article on letting a losing position retreat in allocation and the discipline to not throw additional troops/capital into a bad situation.
It takes as much discipline to not add to a loser as it does to hold a winner.
https://t.co/WHouaF6rJu
“If you personally lent someone money, and they only repaid you half of what they owed you, would you give that person more money? Of course not. Yet we continually do this with our investing, where we average down into things that have a history of disappointing us.”
An article on Jesse Livermore from a 1908 issue of Richard Wyckoff's magazine, "The Ticker."
The Secret of Success
"My success thus far has not been in any sense due to luck, but solely because I started out early to make a life study of the market." — Jesse L. Livermore.
In a recent interview, Jesse L. Livermore, who was reputed to have made a million on last year’s break in the stock market and several hundred thousand dollars in a recent cotton deal, gave a few of the reasons for his success.
"It was not a matter of luck," said Mr. Livermore. "Any one who figures that his success is dependent upon chance, may as well stay out of the market. His attitude is wrong at the very start. The great trouble with the average speculator is, he thinks the market is a gambling proposition. This has been the mistake of most speculators who have risked their all in the stock market. As a result, we see thousands of ruined careers.
"A trader should realize at the outset that speculation is a profession, just as the study of law or medicine is a profession; that certain rules apply to it that are to be studied as closely as if he were a law student preparing for the bar.
"Many people attribute my success to luck—chance. The fact is, speculation was born in me and for fifteen years I have studied this subject closely; you might say I have given my life to it, concentrating upon it and putting into it my very best. The requisites for a successful speculator are: Insight and intuition; one must have a talent for it, must make the subject a study, must acquire experience, and, what is most important, have the nerve to plunge at the psychological moment.
"Many people believe they can attend to their regular business and trade in the market between times. This is a vital mistake. If they cannot devote their entire attention to the subject, they should let it alone. In my own case, I had a craving for this line of work in my boyhood and my success, thus far has not been in any sense due to luck, but solely because I started out early to make a life study of the market."
Over the past 50+ years Buffett has owned hundreds of stocks in Berkshire’s portfolio.He sold most of them very quickly. In fact, of the 230 stocks he owned between 1980 and 2010, 60% were sold in less than a year. He’s owned many for a few years. He’s owned <5% for 15+ years.
Intentions are important in life and in stocks. Here is the difference between trading and investing:
Investing - your intention with every purchase is to hold.
Trading - your intention with every purchase is to sell
"Love is not enough. You can love a man and still lose him. You need respect. You need gratitude. You need peace. Give him those things, and he will never leave. Take them away, and no amount of love will keep him."
In strategic life, winning is often about patience, not aggression.
The smartest move is usually not to “go down swinging,” but to wait until the odds are mathematically in your favor.