What shares to buy & Why?

Keaydian, never mind watching it! I have an even better strategy - buy now, go away (preferably for as long as possible) and come back to discover with a shock that it has plummeted in your absence! (I managed this in just two weeks, having bought a unit trust right at the top of the tech boom, before going to South Africa for 11 days. When I got back, my investment was down 26%!)

You live and learn.

Come on guys let me know whats shares you hold & are worth buying

Angel, please refer to the threads to which I make regular contributions (including but not limited to NOP, BLR, VOG, SOLA, VLK, RDG, RIFT, HNR, AAU - in most of them I have at some point summed up why they might be worth investing in. I recommend that you don't rely on me to tell you when or what to buy as you'll then be wanting me to tell you when to sell, and I have been known to be wrong on both counts!

I also suggest that if you're determined to invest right away, then you should start with smaller amounts (1,000 is ample for many stocks at this stage), in about six or seven companies and play a wait-and-see game, as you then won't lose your shirt in case things go pear-shaped. Save the big bucks for when you have acquired a few battle-scars and can truly say you know what you're doing (as I pointed out earlier, for a slow learner like myself this only took about five years!).

Please by all means feed back any questions about individual stocks on the threads, as that will help to settle issues of when might be the right time to invest and why.

By the way, everyone seems to love GOO at the moment. I'm not in but you may consider it worthy of your attention. However, please, please, please do not invest your entire worldly wealth in this or any other stock as things can go wrong even with the "surest" of "sure things" (and there are no certainties in the oil game!). If you don't believe it's necessary to be cautious, a quick glance at the two-year charts for NOP, VOG and especially SEO might help you to understand, as in all those cases there will be people who bought at the top of the mighty peaks and sold at the bottom of the troughs or who are still holding on and self-medicating with Valium.

Investing is a world in which anything can and will go wrong and it is foolish to think otherwise.

Look at me - preaching again!

All IMO, no guarantees and PDYOR.

ERX.. dont miss out

PS - I should point out that most of the stocks I invest are quite rightly categorised as "high-risk". This happens to be the way I like it, but for the amount of money you may be thinking of investing, you'd be well advised to limit these to a small proportion of your overall investments. It's a sobering thought, but May's little market correction this year meant that many of the stocks I'm into dropped by around 30% - although I'm glad to say I took steps to limit my exposure.

You may as well pay on one of those 0907 numbers for todays racing tips and stick it all on those. The returns are likely to better than the tips for stocks you get on these boards a lot of the time.
Back to the racing post.

Just to illustrate, on one stock already mentioned on here, look at the professionals recommendations for SEO. They have tipped it as a buy, all the way down from 30p, and last week they tipped it as a sell, since when it has climbed.
No short cuts. DYOR. What is selling in the shops? Which shops? Which gadget is everyone talking about? What crazy piece of legislation is the government bringing forward next?
From that ask yourself; Who will benefit most from this? Then research like crazy.
Alan

Thanks soul traders,

I have 100000 which i want to invest in stocks & i already have 4 BTL properties also most of my money is in high interest saving accounts.
So i dont mind high risk shares

Al, strangely enough that just about sums up Peter Lynch's approach on "One up on Wall Street". Good advice, good book!

Having said that the pros get it wrong, I took the approach of giving a lot of my money to the pros on a discretionary basis, and kept a bit back for myself for the fun of self investing, in higher risk stuff that they would not touch. But even so, I have a fair bit of that in Bluechip and midcaps.
With an extra 100k I would do the same again. About 85k to redmayne Bentley or Brewin Dolphin on a discretionary basis and another 15k or so to play with.
Its worked for me.
Alan

Angel, you will mind high risk shares if you lose the lot. Although I take the point that you are clearly spreading your assets and have made some sensible investments. So why spoil it by getting carried away on the stock market?

When I was young(er) and dumb(er) I bought that Unit Trust I mentioned. Right at the top of the technology stock boom in 2000. I invested 7,000 as an ISA, convinced I was going to make my fortune as the market at the time seemed to have no chance of falling. Six months later I sold for a 54% loss. Had I hung on for another couple of years I'd have lost 85%. Obviously that wasn't really big money, but the mood I was in meant it could esaily have been a lot more.

If you're determined to play right away, then I'd say take ten grand, invest it no more than 1,000 at a time and watch it for a year or two. That way you can learn and have the fun factor of being in the market without putting serious amounts of your capital at risk.

Remember it is far more difficult to recover losses than it is to make them in the first place.

Maybe you've got so much money that 100K is a drop in the bucket, in which case good luck to you, but most people don't and with careful management the kind of sum you have could turn into a considerable fortune.

Good advice, Al.

Dont you just hate rival threads, GO TO.

http://www.moneyam.com/InvestorsRoom/posts.php?tid=9585#lastread

Driver, this isn't a rival thread; this one's about pulling the new kid's pants down :o)

Hmmm.
I feel a bit of a wind-up happening here.

Apologies, Al; the inevitable consequence of my having given so much serious, well-thought-out and downright sensible advice is that my unruly sense of humour has to go and spoil it all by making me make a comment like that.

But given that this is what might happen here, especially if our new friend spends too much time in the company of one who likens himself to a starchy, tuberiferous vegetable, then I think there is merit even in my jest.

Wasn't meaning you, ST. I was thinking this thread and its sister are littel more than a wind-up.
So much good advice and still a delight in asking the same questions.
alan

okay, Al, I get you now (having another "slow" day, I'm afraid!).

Agreed. My round, I think - I'm in need of a little liquid refreshment after all that!

ERX

Gene therapy frees men of cancer

Mr Origer is now clear of his cancer
Two men have been cleared of deadly skin cancer using genetically modified versions of their own immune cells.
For Mark Origer, 53, the treatment destroyed his tumour, enabling him to attend his daughter's wedding.

The US National Cancer Institute team in Bethesda has also shown it can manipulate immune cells to attack breast, liver and lung cancers.

The modified T cells persisted in 15 other patients treated, but their malignant melanomas remained.

We've identified T cell receptors that will now recognise common cancers

Lead researcher Dr Stephen Rosenberg


Q&A: Cancer gene therapy
Before the experiment, the patients were expected to only live for three to six months because their disease was so advanced.

Tests showed the genetically modified T cells used in the new treatment became specialised tumour fighters, the journal Science reports.

Although only two of the 17 people with advanced melanoma who received the treatment were completely free of cancer 18 months later, experts say the results are extremely exciting and proof that this new therapy can work.

How it works

Dr Stephen Rosenberg and his team isolated T cells from the cancer patients and multiplied them in the lab.

FIGHTING CANCER WITH GENES

1 Blood taken from patient
2 T cells infected with virus to carry key genes into them
3 DNA from genes helps cells develop receptors
4 Modified cells injected back into patient
5 Receptors target cancerous cells to be killed

Next they used a virus to carry receptor genes into the T cells. These receptors are what enable the modified T cell to recognise specific cancers - in this case malignant melanoma.

When the modified T cells were transfused into the patients they began to attack the tumour cells.

For at least two months after the treatment, the modified cells made up at least 10% of the patients' circulating T cells.

The scientists are now looking at ways to enable greater numbers of the modified T cells to survive.

Dr Rosenberg said: "We've identified T cell receptors that will now recognise common cancers."

Disease free

For Mark Origer, 53, the treatment completely eliminated his skin cancer and another tumour on his liver shrunk enough that it could be removed surgically.

These are preliminary but promising results

Professor John Toy of Cancer Research UK

The treatment meant he was well enough to attend his daughter's wedding last year. Last week, doctors pronounced him completely clear of cancer cells.

Another man, aged 39, was able to clear the cancer that had spread to his liver, lymph nodes and lung.

Dr Michael Sadelain, director of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre's somatic cell engineering laboratory, said: "This certainly is a significant technical advance."

But he said the technique would need improving so more patients could benefit.

The success of this approach in two patients shows promise, however 15 patients did not respond to the treatment

Dr Edel O'Toole, British Skin Foundation spokesman

Professor Savio Woo, from Mount Sinai School of Medicine, said the treatment should now be tested in more patients.

Professor Robert Hawkins, professor in medical oncology at the University of Manchester, UK, said the results were very exciting.

"It seems to be effective, but it does seem to need improvement," he added.

Dr Edel O'Toole, consultant dermatologist at the Centre for Cutaneous Research, Barts, and British Skin Foundation spokesman, said: "I think that the success of this approach in two patients shows promise, however 15 patients did not respond to the treatment suggesting that further work is needed to optimise this approach for all patients, which could take many years."

Professor John Toy, medical director at Cancer Research UK, said: "These are preliminary but promising results.

"It's important to realise that we are not looking at a 'miracle cure' for all cancers."

Malignant melanoma is the most serious type of skin cancer with 8,000 new cases per year in the UK and approximately 1,800 deaths.

http://www.wallstreetreporter.com/interview.php?id=18589&player=wma