"Be fearful when others are greedy. Be greedy when others are fearful."
-Warren Buffett
Intelligent Speculation
for the small investor
My name is Phillip Lyon and I have created this website to help the small investor. My investment philosophy is to invest in undervalued stocks that also have a speculative aspect. My website contains free stock picks and stock market commentary so check back often and tell your friends about my site.
The Stock Market in 2008
Last year I made the prediction that the “market will end the year essentially where it began or down on the year. If the market is up on the year I don’t see it being up very much.” My prediction proved to be prescient as the S&P 500 finished with a 3.53% gain, the Dow with a 6.43% gain, and the Nasdaq with a 9.81% gain.
If you take away the Santa Claus rally at the end of the year, which has now quickly evaporated, my prediction of flat growth would have been proven correct. This is in contrast to most of the stock market prognosticators who where predicting another strong year (15% or greater) even though there were signs of a slowing economy and the housing bubble was beginning to deflate.
This year I have noticed that not many commentators are predicting how much the market will gain or lose this year. I guess they didn’t want to eat any more crow like they did last year. They are mentioning that the stock market is in for another volatile and challenging year. I agree. (more…)
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If you are interested in submitting stories to Value Investing News click here. I am currently registered with Value Investing News and I think it is a good site.
Timothy Sykes Stock Blog
If you base most of your stock making decisions on technical analysis you should check out the stock blog of Timothy Sykes. He provides his personal trading decisions along with trading advice.
He is also the author of An American Hedge Fund which details the wild ride of the hedge fund he started. It has many good reviews so it should be worth a look.
Stock Blogs You Should Check Out
If you like to find free stock analysis and opinions you should check out a couple of other stock websites/blogs that I found.
Stockblogs.com is a directory of stock blogs that compiles “some of the most interesting, provocative, relevant, and useful blogs for investors.” The website has tons of stock blogs categorized into different market related topics.
Investmentquest.net is a blog that provides “unparalleled stock market commentary from a value and contrarian perspective.” You should definitely check it out.
Wizetrade
I haven’t done much research on Wizetrade but I am confident that it doesn’t work for the majority of investors/traders that use it and the marketing of it is unethical at best.
For those of you who have never seen an infomercial for Wizetrade it is a program that shows green boxes (indicating a buy) and red boxes (indicating a sell) as indicators of whether you should buy or sell a stock. The boxes also show a time frame for a trade. After you enter a stock you will see boxes for 1 minute, 5 minutes, 15 minutes, etc. and the boxes will be either red or green. As an example you might see a green box with 30 minutes on it which means that Wizetrade is indicating that the stock is going to go up in the next thirty minutes.
If you watch the infomercial they make it seem like all you need to do is buy a stock when the light is green and sell when it is red and you will make money. However, common sense should let most people know that investing/trading in the stock market is not that simple. (more…)
Technical Analysis
I use a little technical analysis (TA) in my investment decisions but for the most part I think technical analysis is a bunch of nonsense. However, I think becoming familiar with TA can make you a better investor.
Technical analysis is the strategy of reading price charts to evaluate whether a stock is a good investment/trade. Technical analysis is in contrast to fundamental analysis which is the strategy of studying a company’s fundamentals (revenues, earnings, etc.) to determine potential investments.
A lot of traders who hold stocks for a very short period of time (day traders, swing traders, momentum players) use TA as their primary evaluation method for buying or selling stocks. However, trying to consistently predict the price movement of a stock over a short period of time is very difficult, if not impossible. In fact I’ve read an article stating that most day traders lose all of their capital within a year. (more…)
Any Stock Suggestions?
One of the reasons I created this website was to help empower the small investor. I think individual investors who do their due diligence can pick stocks just as well as the so called pros.
Therefore, once every month or two I will have a post dedicated to stock suggestions. If you know of any stocks that you think are good investments feel free to post a comment with the stock’s name and why you think the share price will go up. You can help other small investors by informing them of quality stocks that may not be on their radar.
Is Oil Really Worth $100 A Barrel?
The price of oil continues to drive towards $100 dollars a barrel but what is it really worth?
Every time I read an article about the price of oil it seems the fundamentals of supply and demand are left out. The stories always mention some sort of potential problem that can happen: the potential for a conflict with Iran, potential supply disruptions, etc.
It seems every minor event that is bullish for rising oil is mentioned and any bearish factor is left out. There is always an oil trader or analyst quoted as saying the price of oil is going to go up. However, there is never a discloser about whether that trader or analyst is “long” oil and therefore has an agenda to see it go up.
The actual supply of oil inventories compared to the previous year or future years is barely ever mentioned. (more…)
The 2007 Market at Midyear
At the beginning of the year I gave my opinion that I thought the overall markets would be flat or down on the year. So far I have been proven incorrect as the Dow is up over 8% on the year and the Nasdaq is up 7%.
However, I still feel the U.S. markets have gotten ahead of themselves and they need to take a breather. The economy grew at a 0.6% clip the first three months of the year and the Fed is projecting growth of 2% to 3% in the current quarter. The growth in the economy certainly doesn’t justify the increases in the U.S. markets, especially considering the gains that were made last year. (more…)
The Market Correction
In the past week U.S. equities and foreign stocks have taken quite a beating and in my opinion it was long overdo. The Dow was up 16% last year and the Nasdaq made a run of over 17% from its lows in the second half of the year. The U.S. stock markets kept rising this year even though the economy isn’t growing very fast and the housing market is correcting from its bubble. Something had to give and the result was the sudden drop in U.S. stocks.
One of the catalysts for the drop in US stocks was the carnage of the Chinese market. The Chinese market lost 9 percent on Feb. 27 and the drop spooked investors around the world. Many reasons have been given for the drop in the Chinese market but the main reason is valuation. The Chinese market had a gain of over 120% last year and it is currently a bubble waiting to burst. The Chinese economy has been growing at around 10% a year but that doesn’t justify such a huge increase in the price of Chinese stocks. (more…)