It's Time to Learn...Again

Today I found another blog on simple investing that says: “If you are looking at investing in US equities, what’s not to like?”

The writer, Todd Sullivan, keeps a blogspot with the subtitle: “Successful investing does not have to be difficult.”

I’d like to learn what, “does not have to be difficult” means. Maybe he’s not economically challenge the way I am.

But, at least I was taught too and still believe that you don’t get anywhere without hard work.

Maybe “they” meant certain types of work though because although I’ve worked hard all my life, I surely have not gotten anywhere.

I have not lost anything in stock trading yet as far as year-to-date totals. Still, in four months my year-to-date total, according to my calculations is $50 but my calculations are probably wrong because my discount brokerage house says I’m up $332. I’ll have to ask Jack to help me figure out what the true number is when he gets home.

(Jack is a CFP/stockbroker and it’s all his fault that I’m trying to learn how to do this *wink*)

But back to Todd’s blog. I found it at MarketBeat (did you know there are a million websites out there on this topic?) and according to a summation by David Gaffen, “it’s hard not to react positively to the jobs data.

“‘We have inflation under control, Fed funds were lowered and the economy, based on jobs numbers, is looking less likely everyday to have any chance of heading into a recession…’”

This is good news because I’ve been worrying about all this recession news a lot too but that I’m so new at paying attention to economic news, I have no clue what to think.

For example I just tried to read Robert Kuttner’s testimony yesterday and though I was happy to realize I understood a lot more than I would have a year ago, I still would be hard pressed to write any type of summary on it, never mind an opinion.

But I know enough to know that what Kuttner, an economics and financial journalist, is saying is not good for the country on the whole. Maybe soon I will work through it piece by piece or I will take one element at a time and try to sort through the myriad issues surrounding each point he presented to the Committee on Financial Services Oct. 2, 2007.

So, I’ll save that for another day but would like to note a few comments I found today on a proprietary website chat on investments (therefore, I have no link to provide). A regular there, who is a 30-year trader said, “its very simple stuff...... Traders make it harder than it needs to be ...”

I kind of like that guy because he says a lot of simple things--like being patient and delaying gratification, not being greedy and things like that--things I was raised to believe and which I still believe.

And speaking of interesting tidbits and words of advice, Desi said, “...let tomorrow take care of tomorrow. Enter right, exit safe. Enter wrong, learn.”

Enter is a term used to describe buying and exit is selling. In addition to a topic on not being greedy I think Desi meant that we do the work to learn how to get in and out at realistic places but when we do it wrong, then it’s a time for evaluation, a time to look back and learn from our mistakes.

That can be my analogy for the weekend. Economically speaking, I clearly entered this world wrong. So, now it’s time to learn.


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Other stories that inspired my post and/or led me to links used in above post:

Joanna Ossinger, WSJ: Robust Jobs Data Rally Stocks; S&P 500 Achieves Record Close


Brian Blackstone, WSJ: Employment Rebounded in September as August Decline Revised to Gain