Had You Opened Positions in 03: Will It Ever Be This Good Again?

"What fundamentals numbers do you find the most important?"

In the case of Hansen - none.

seriously. I mean, yes... I did the buffet/graham thang. I did look at the balance sheet, blah blah blah. but the #'s were of little importance compared to other fundamental stuff

but fundamentals incorporate far more than #'s. the #'s are what THEY provide to EVERY investor. Kind of hard to get a big edge with that.

What I did was call some friends who promote concerts and surf contests respectively. These kind of patrons are on the leading edge. Many were quaffing Monsters like it was going out of style. The profit margin on these (at that time) $2 drinks are MASSIVE.

Surfers are a big leading indicator. I was wearing Ugg Boots 20 years ago, as a surfer. Quiksilver clothes, etc. too.

I went to several convenience stores. They couldn't keep monsters on the shelves. I asked local kids.

I went to a block party, and the soccer moms had loaded a cooler full of Hansens natural soda, and everybody was drinking it. Hansens smartly marketed Monster DIFFERENTLY from their naturals. The type of health conscious, yuppie and hippie-granola cred that brought their natural sodas success was smartly decoupled from the more "extreme sports" younger set that drank the Monsters. Monster website didn;t even MENTION Hansen

Again, smart.

Beverage industry - growing. Old skool stuff like coke and pepsi taking a back seat to energy drinks, and alternative stuff (like JSDA too)

It was stuff like this that got me in very early, and very cheap. Kind of a peter lynchian approach.

This is also fundamentals. a lot of people equate fundamentals with balance sheets and #'s, in the same way they equate TA with charts and lagging indicators.

There is a lot more to fundies, and this is the kind of stuff I look at. EvERYBODY can look at the #'s. Not everybody is gonna talk to surf team promoters, BMX contestants, etc.

I love stuff like that. Maybe it's cause one of the first books on investing i read was Peter Lynch's and I firmly believe that an edge can be found in examining trendy stuff and looking in fields and products where you have an edge- an understanding of the market
 
Just look at Apple, Phelps-Dodge, Peabody Energy, Marathon, Toyota, AMD, Boeing, or thousands of other stocks.
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I got lucky, I've had Boeing in the portfolio for just over four years now. I wish I'd been less spread out in the portfolio when I bought it too. Hindsight tells me I'd have done quite well had I been in JUST that one. While the portfolio overall has not done bad, there were a couple of emotional mistakes made. But I guess, that's trading... :)
 
if you've had Boeing in the portfolio for four years, that aint tradin'

that's investing

and i've had boeing for ages as well. so props to you.

lurv boeing
 
Quote from ByLoSellHi:

1) What is the most truly undervalued market right now? I've read a lot about Russia as being truly undervalued, despite all the accounting and regulatory teething problems they're having. Are any other specific foreign exchanges undervalued?
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You're a bit late to that market unless you are willing to hold for at least a few years of a pullback. My dad is doing quite well shorting the Russian equities at the moment and he has been trading primarily Russian equities, debt and futures for over 10 years. I keep telling him to be ready for a real bubble via Naz 1999 style but he says it's not time yet and the public is not ready.

The problems are not accounting or regulatory but financial. Their reserve ratio is only 3%, think about that. Add in wolf capitalism and an insance concentration of wealth among a very very small group of people. I would advise TRUE investing, meaning actual production and ownership of true businesses, not just equities. If you really wanna swing for the fences, then you would look toward most of Russia excluding Moscow. I think the real winners will be the ones at the front line, not sitting behind the screen investing through their broker.

I think US is gonna get its last liquidity rally just like 2003. But forget the intraday, that cash cow has been milked out. It's gonna be LBO driven, the next new scam of the paper pushers. Hence overnight leverage which has higher barriers to entry, leaving the average Joe Shmoe daytrader wannabe out of the "wealth creation". The signs are all there, it's just a matter of being able to recognize them.

There is one early undiscovered global market that should experience exponential returns but I would be crazy to blurt it out in an obvious manner.
 
"So, what are the odds of ever seeing this kind of 40 month performance stretch again in our lifetimes?"

Wouldn't that depend on "our" ages. If we are fairly young, the odds are extremely high. If we are 95, the odds are less high. The market is cyclical. When those playing weak hands are buying, those with strong hands are selling to the weak hands, and vice versa. The strong hands contribute the bulk of market volume, when they disappear from the market the volume recedes and prices tend to drift sideways to lower under their own weight. You can see a short-term version of this effect on a daily basis during the lunch "hour" break from 11:30 to 1:30. (Although, curiously, i have noticed that price on the Russell Future tends to drift up, when there is no reason for it, during low-volume lunch hour trading. I suspect this is a result of computers trading with each other, scalping for ticks as it were.) At the moment the market is acting a bit toppy as we have seen higher prices with reduced price-range and lower volume. This is typical of a market that is getting a bit long in the tooth. Before long it will be time for the strong hands to start buying back from the weak hands, at lower prices of course, the stuff they sold the weak hands on the way up. This is not to say that this market is going to come crashing down on Monday morning. Far from it. In the absence of a catalyst the topping process can go on a while, and no one knows, not even the strong hands, exactly when the market will begin the inevitable "correction", pullback, or even next bear phase. But rest assured the market (i.e., the strong hands) will tell you with volume and price action when it's time for a "correction" (Don't you just love those Wall Sreet Euphamisims?) When i want to make some money, i try to trade on the same side as the strong hands (and at the moment i am becoming increasingly cautious about buying as enthusiasm for the current, "once-in-a-lifetime," 40-month bull market reaches a fever pitch. When i don't care about the money and just want some excitment, i've found trading on the weak hand side works just as well. (I'm not talking day trading here, where only what happens in the next few hours counts.)
 
i gotta be the lone dissenter (as often) I don't see what's so fantastic about this current bull market. overall stocks are up maybe 50-75% off the bottom, and russell is up what 125%?
Not only are these increases pretty weak as far as bull markets go (think post 1932 and post 1982) but they are also low returns when you compare them to most other prices. Gold, silver up 150 or 200% off the lows. Crude, natural, copper all up fourfold. In fact, there aren't a whole lot of products that have only gone up 50 or 75% since bottom in 2001 or 2002. even housing is up that much.
So to ask will there ever be another period of fantastic returns like we've had in the stock market over that last few years leaves me scratching my head a bit.
 
Boeing moved into the hold position for me. Initially I thought I'd have it for a few days, maybe even for a monthly play. After a few months I even forgot I had it. So yea, it moved over to the investment column for me long ago. :)
Quote from whitster:

if you've had Boeing in the portfolio for four years, that aint tradin'

that's investing

and i've had boeing for ages as well. so props to you.

lurv boeing
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california is, put simply, a leading indicator

they are in language, various aspects of culture, and in various aspects of commerce

it really is that simple

stuff becomes popular in cali, before most other places, in SO many ways (obviously, there are exceptions)

i have seen it umpteen times in fashion, in sports science, in sports nutrition, in food, etc. etc. etc.

merely LIVING in california, is an edge, if you take a lynchian approach to your investments

otherwise, develop resources to speak to who live there
 
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