Live and Let Di

It's MY Fantasy!

Wow!!! Only 1 day and I'm up $52 in my Fantasy Stock Portfolio! Meanwhile, I exercised my prerogative as the creator of the fantasy and decided to add $10,000 fantasy cash to my account so that I could buy stuff that comes up along the way.

Amy, my BFF from college if you are a newcomer, upon returning from a visit to her daughter at college in Boulder, CO, suggested investing in ANY PIZZA PLACE WITHIN 5 MILES OF A COLLEGE CAMPUS! My family has really enjoyed Domino's since they changed their recipe and have great specials, so I have put Domino's on my "watch list" to potentially buy.

Kip responded on my FB page with one letter, C. I thought, "Citigroup? Is he serious? Financial institutions in this market?" But, I looked at it and could see the "wisdom" of his recommendation, so it, too, is on my watch list.

Here is the status of the Fantasy Stock Portfolio. It's set up on the Google Gadget, Portfolio Monitor by GFarry, which I have been using for a while now and just love. If you have Google as your home page, go ahead and try it. You can even put my Fantasy Stock Portfolio information on it and watch with me. Or watch and if you see something crazy, let me know in case I'm doing something important like having coffee with Kim or having a facial, and I miss it!

 I think we're going to see some spikes in the market today because the headline on the Business page in the Raleigh News & Observer is "Earnings Picture is Rosy." Now, shhh...let's keep this to ourselves, because I kind of feel like this is insider information since I'm one of the few, the proud, the last of the newspaper readers.

OMG...do you think it's going to eventually become politically incorrect to read the actual newspaper? Like, come on, you tree-destroying, self-absorbed, throwback...read it online! Mmmm...just doesn't feel right with my coffee and Raisin Bran.

Di

Fantasy Stocks

I know this is two in one day. I want to stress that this is an anomaly. I don't want to build the expectation that I will blog daily, let alone twice a day. Because then I will think that you are judging me when I don't post every day. I judge myself pretty critically, so I don't want to assume the judgment of my millions (OK, tens) of readers.

Just so no one accuses me of creating my stock portfolio retroactively, here it is, based on the price at the close of the Market yesterday. What I am trying to accomplish here is to study more closely my investments, what my trade triggers might be, etc. Should I trade based on graphs, volume, percent increase, decrease, etc. I am going to adhere somewhat to the "rules" of: 

How to Make Money in Stocks: A Winning System in Good Times and Bad by William J. O'Neill

This book was recommended by my stock guru, Stacy. One of its basic tenets is that if your stock drops 7%, sell. If your stock gains 20% sell. There are lots of other suggestions about buying and selling, but that's one of the easiest to follow. Stacy told me there's an old saying, "Bulls make money. Bears make money. Pigs get slaughtered." Well, I haven't quite held to that on my real account and it's worked out OK with me because I made some good picks on some companies that are really growing. But I still know it can bite me in the ass any time. So here, I'm going to go by the rules. 

How did I pick my stocks? Well, mostly by stuff I've read in the newspaper which is why many of them are "local" in some way to the Raleigh, NC area. I was lucky to start doing this with our 401Ks at the right time. Not because I'm some guru and can predict such things, but because I just felt like I had been thinking about doing something with our stocks and decided to start at an opportune time.

Date	Name	Symbol	Shares	Price	Total
04/29/10	Cree	CREE	27	$75.990	$2,051.73
04/29/10	Ford	F	75	$13.250	$993.75
04/29/10	GlaxoSmithKline	GSK	26	$37.440	$973.44
04/29/10	Inspire Pharm	ISPH	151	$6.770	$1,022.27
04/29/10	Red Hat	RHT	65	$30.619	$1,990.24
04/29/10	Talecris	TLCR	105	$18.840	$1,978.20
04/29/10	Verizon	VZ	34	$29.129	$990.39
					$10,000.00

So, if you have stock picks to suggest, post a comment. Hopefully when I rapidly gain 20% and sell, I will be looking for something in which to invest my winnings, I mean gains.

I'll post occasionally...can't commit to "every Tuesday and Friday" or "every third Wednesday" or something. It will be pretty much when I feel like it.

DiHi - Di Housewife Investor