Sunday, April 20, 2008

I would be better off in a savings account...

Thats right, it has been a horrible year for investing. I have to do my tax return in the next week and I will actually have capital gains to declare and pay tax on. But in 2008, I have a sad feeling that I'll be going back and applying my losses to those 2007 gains.

I've already told you about the big loss that I took on BMO. Right after I couldn't handle the pain anymore, BMO bounced up! While it is still below where I purchased it right now (when I sold it my average cost was $52), I started purchasing in the $60's. When it got to $38 I couldn't take it anymore.

What have I done since then? Well, I've made some good trades but never made back nearly as much as when I have a losing trade. It is very frustrating watching two winners like Visa (NYSE:V) and Yellow Pages (TSE:YLO.UN) do well for me, only to lose 3 times that amount on my Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) short.

Speaking of which, everyone assumes that AAPL is going to blow earnings out of the water on Tuesday. If thats the case, I'll probably have my first margin call and my brokerage account will be screwed! Great! However, I will have to hand it to AAPL if they do. I just do not think they can keep up this growth pace. People who buy Mac's can use them for a very long time. They've already hit the student market - those students are dishing out multiple thousands for another over priced machine. I just don't get it. Hopefully everyone is wrong about AAPL - just like they were when Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) reported earnings.

Speaking of which, I was considering buying GOOG going into earnings as a hedge against AAPL but then I thought that was a dumb idea, ugh, always on the wrong side of the trade lately!

2 comments:

tsxcommentary said...

"When it got to $38 I couldn't take it anymore."

This is my own opinion, when you have a blue chip like BMO, either cut your losses and bail early (because your a trader) or just keep the shares because your a long term investor.

The reality of the situation is that the price dropped to what you think is an unbelievably low price and so you gave up and sold. that is a mistake.

along the way down as the stock dropped, more and more poeple in your exact situation gave up and sold. once all these "shares in weak hands" have been depleted. the shares start to rise again. since there is no more selling pressure from this group of paniced sellers.

This is market manipulation 101.

you already bought a high quality company at discount.

dawger said...

Ya, unfortunately I figured I would get rid of it at $38 and get back in lower. However, the market conditions over the past year made me lose alot of money and I was just so stomach sick that everything I tried to do I lost money. I lost over half of my life savings.

Maybe someday I'll get back into the groove but right now it turns my stomach to even look at the market.