Investing General Discussion

Hateyou said:

Take Sanrith advice and read through the last month or two of this thread. Plenty of good advice and like 15-20 companies people have been suggesting that have done well and are stable large companies. Apple, Exxon, Microsoft, Intel, AMD, JP Morgan, Raytheon, CVS/Cigna, Caterpillar, the various airlines, Boeing, Disney, Pfizer, Amgen, Tesla, Docusign.

Since you’re very new to this I’d just pick some or all of those, see where they are compared to the past 52 weeks. If you think they have good room for growth plop down $5k, if you think they’re on the high end, plop down half of that, or none. Spread your money out on lots of different sectors so if one takes a shit (Like healthcare when Bernie was scaring investors) its not a big deal because your energy and stocks are still fine. I’d do the same strategy with ETFs, just spread out between a few and watch them for a while.

Once you get more comfortable start setting limit buys. That’s just setting up the purchase to auto trigger if it hits a certain number like “If AMD hits $45 buy $10,000 worth”. You can do that with selling too, so you can just set things up that way and don’t feel pressured to try to monitor stuff.

Doing simple shit like that will get you more comfortable. Just, don’t try trading on a day to day basis yet. Get comfortable with the process, watch how headlines affect your investments, etc.

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I have a few minutes Mist So here goes...
Disclaimer - the following assumes a long term investment strategy. Some of the instruments below are at/near all time highs. Buying in now means valuations are substantially higher than they were 3 months ago. It could well go down before it goes back up.

First build the basic skeleton of you investment portfolio around two ETFs (some version of the SPY (such as IVV) and QQQ. This is the SP500 and the Nasdaq. For a really long time horizon you can mix in some SPYG (the SP500 growth companies). My main portfolio is 40% in 4 ETFs. Going 50% in ETFs is probably what I would recommend to anyone. In fact, if you went 100% of your total portfolio in IVV and QQQ it would provide substantial long term returns and basically run itself.

Assuming you choose a portfolio with less than 100% in ETFs, put the rest in blue chip companies with exceptionally strong balance sheets. This means low debt to EBITDA, growing revenue and positive cash flows. Avoid gold, crypto, oil and any other commodity. Avoid bonds too.

What do I mean by a blue chip with strong balance sheets? Just like Hate said above...
MSFT
AAPL
JNJ
UNH
AMZN
WMT
JPM
FB
ABBV
AMGN
GOOG
NVDA
LMT
RTX
CAT
GD

All of these companies make more than $5 a share in profit. Avoid companies that make a dollar or two. The reason being there are enough companies making 5, 10, 20$ a share that why bother witcompanies barely making a profit. They are also very concentrated in Tech and Healthcare. Thats where many of the great are currently located. Avoid concentrating in a single sector or two. You need some diversity. I prefer the best couple of companies in at least 4 or 5 sectors.

I avoided big oil companies (XOM, CVX etc) because the energy sector is easily fucked for the next 6 to 12 months. I own it. I advise you to avoid it. Dont put more than 5% of your total portfolio in any single company. So if you go 50% ETF, then max you have is that plus 10 single companies to complement the ETFs. Remember that ETFs are cap weighted. So you need to allocated the percent of the ETFs that hold companies like AAPL and MSFT. If you buy 5% of AAPL and have 50% in IVV and QQQ, then your portfolio is probably closer to 20% in just AAPL since AAPL is the number 1 highest weighted holding in those two ETFs.

Remember the average return of the SP500 is about 10%. IVV + QQQ plus a handful of the above companies should get you that 10% or more on average each year. If you can pull 10-15% each year for the next 20 years or so, consider yourself to have a successful investment portfolio And you probably beat 80% of Wallstreet brokers after taxes and fees.

Mist said:

If this is a long term investment strategy don't I want things that are already down for the year, or more specifically, things that haven't recovered yet?

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I dont think the price of things right now matter if your outlook is 20-30 years. What matters is the quality of the investment, not the price.

Mist said:

If this is a long term investment strategy don't I want things that are already down for the year, or more specifically, things that haven't recovered yet?

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Not in this case. Big oil is in what most feel is a declining industry. The US shale boom absolutely wrecked the global oil economy. This is a great thing for consumers and a really shitty thing for big oil. Trust me, with the absolute myriad of investment options available, avoiding the energy sector isn't going to inhibit long term returns.

wormie said:

I dont think the price of things right now matter if your outlook is 20-30 years. What matters is the quality of the investment, not the price.

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It does if the industry you are investing in is in a long slow death spiral. Consider you same advice about investing in the type writer industry 30 years ago. Or the film camera industry 20 years ago. Sometimes things are cheap for a reason.

Wingz said:

Doing a reverse merger with golden nugget online gaming.

Golden Nugget Online Gaming To Become Public

Tilman J. Fertitta and Landcadia Holdings II, Inc. (NASDAQ: LCA, "Landcadia II") announced today that Landcadia II has entered into a Purchase Agreement to acquire Golden Nugget Online Gaming, Inc. ("GNOG"), a US online real money casino owned by Tilman Fertitta, recognized by both

finance.yahoo.com

Only real competition is Draft Kings right now.

In Depth breakdown more here if you're interested.

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Interesting take. I was enjoying reading the WSB nerds lose their shit about Draftkings but that might be a good buy.

TheBeagle said:

Airlines are still down if energy is too iffy for you. Just wait for a day with bad corona news and take the dip.

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I'll sell you my DAL shares

TSLA opens up almost 2% . This may be the greatest short squeeze in history.

LachiusTZ said:

Wtf is driving it the past few days?

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tsla is a self-driving car.

LachiusTZ said:

Wtf is driving it the past few days?

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They made 2nd quarter production numbers which spiked the price. After that its been the mother of all short squeezes.

TheBeagle said:

Haha I bet your cost basis is quite a bit higher than mine on DAL.

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Indeed. Im at $31. I got greedy when it spiked to $37 a while back and had a sell order at 40$.

Moral of the story: pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered.

Here is some perspective for you. Since the low on 3/23 here is how the Tech behemoths have performed...

AAPL + 77%
MSFT + 57%
NVDA + 123%
FB + 79%
AMZN + 88%
GOOG + 45%

And... i got stopped out of SHLL.

I will keep repeating my mantra to use use stop-loss orders to protect your gains and also to protect you from deep losses.

Ps.. NKLA is in free fall. I guess the vaporware was strong with this one.

Be very, very diligent with SPACS. Set a price to bail and stick with it. They are as volatile as a crazy-sex chick the morning after.