October activity has been limited to reopening a small position in CVX at $118/share. AAPL has some serious positive momentum into the holiday season; I may reopen a position there.
What are your specific investing goals? Are they changing every day, depending on what happened that day? Or do you know that some parts of your life will not change and invest with that in mind?
Some people cannot define their goals beyond "I want to be rich". It is hard to make a specific detailed plan based on such a general goal. In my case, I want to generate safe stable income when I retire for myself but more for my family. I would like to generate $20k in dividend income from companies that have never cut their dividend. I don't believe this is realistic so I will get as close as possible. This means growing the portfolio fairly quickly but without too much risk since I do want to sleep well at night. I will be 51 in a month and have a few years of work left. By specifying what exactly you are trying to do by investing, you are now more able to take the specific GOALS and use them to come up with a PLAN. Without doing this, you are kind of like a day trader....gee, I hope I make some money today in the market. But by doing this, you will understand that market variations need not create a panic and rush to the exit door; you will have clear thinking and a cogent plan to implement with your holdings regardless of pullbacks or dips, in fact you will view dips as rare opportunities to increase your high quality holding which you have worked hard to acquire and collect at bargain prices all along. To summarize;
My Goal-generate $20k/yr income in retirement by investing in companies with a safe and growing dividend. At 4% yield, this would require a portfolio value of 500k. This is not realistic, therefore I will get as close as possible while minimizing risk.
MY Plan-Research and acquire stock in companies with a history of growing earnings and dividends. Companies on the CCC list are good candidates.
Establish a core of 5 companies that are not to be sold unless there is a fundamental change in their business such as a dividend cut or several years of missed earnings. These 5 companies are the anchor of the portfolio.
Add 10 or so businesses that follow the rules I have defined earlier regarding payout ratio, pe ratio, dividend yield and other metrics. One or 2 of these may be faster growers, smaller in size or market cap, younger in age, lesser dollar value per share (~$10 or so), with more rapidly growing earnings and dividends.
Specific buying and selling rules are available upon request.
