June Update - My First Loss (-7.3%)

Well, it was bound to happen sometime. My shares took a loss.

Why? Well, I shouldn't have sold, but I saw a deal happening. This could be huge - or it could be a learning experience. There's a company called Sino Forest, which buys and sells tracts of forest in China. They were hit hard with a report with allegation last week of faking their holdings, and essentially funneling cash out of the company.

The firm that released the report was shorting the Sino Forest stock, and they were a brand new firm. But it spread virally and the stock crashed big time, losing 70% in two days.

I'm betting based on my research that the allegations are unfounded. As of right now.... I've lost 50%. But I'm holding. Here's to my pride and investing skills.

Stereotaxis Stock Update

Just a quick update today. A couple days ago I bought a position into a US company called Stereotaxis. After announcing their quarterly earnings, the stock plummeted, even though the report was good. I invested in 320 shares at $3.50, using up most of my buying power. This feels like my most risky investment so far, but it feels like the market has hit a bit of a lull, so I'm taking a chance. One thing that could favour me is that the Canadian dollar is high, and so if that retreats, it will allow me to do a bit of currency trading by default.

Once I sell my position, I'll let you know how things went.

Mid-April Update (+18.2%)

I decided to make a sell-off of my Ivernia shares Mid-April. True to my predictions, once the news of the mine shutdown left the news, the stock rebounded upwards. On a large upswing day, the stock traded heavily, and so I felt it was time to move my position out, due to my rule of withdrawing when the stock is hot.

For this transaction, I gained about an 18% return over 2 weeks, making it my best trade so far. Now that I have a little more capital to work with, it should be a little easier to gain more (and lose more). At least the $10 per trade fee becomes less of an issue.

So far, it looks like the rule of investing where others are fleeing seems to be the right way to go. We'll see if that holds up long-term.

I'll update again when I invest into a new stock.

A Thousand Dollars - April 2011 (+2.4%)

I'm trying a little experiment this year - taking $1000 dollars and investing it into the stock market. I've limited my input to that amount, because I don't want to get caught up in a stock market mentality right now.

I know that perhaps now is the wrong time to invest, as we've just experienced a year of solid gains. However, I believe there are bargains to be found at any time of the spectrum, and we will see if this holds to be true. Who knows - I may end up with quite a bit less than I started with.

A couple of little rules for myself:

• I'm going to be all or nothing. I'll be bidding on one stock at a time. No room for diversification, especially since I'll be paying about $5-10 per trade.
• I will invest where others are running away from. Where there's fear, I'll wait until the worst is over, and buy up.
• I will not invest in companies I haven't done research on. It's important to know if a company really is tanking because of internal issues, or if public perception is undervaluing the stock.
• I'll be updating my blog every trade, even if I gain or lose. This is primarily a research experiment.

For this month, I'm investing in Ivernia. Their stock price plummeted 50% over the last week due to a safety incident in a mine in Australia. I believe that the stock is undervalued due to public and media pressure, and once the mine reopens, the stock will return upwards. I'll give an update on where this goes in the next month.