crystalclear

NEVER save potatoes for next years crop......but on a similar note

make your own wine and beer, jam, picallili etc. saves a fortune that you can then flush down the stockmarket drain LOL

crystalclear
Stampduty currently 1/2% on the purchase only
Rgds
opto

As at - Friday 21st of May 2004
Position	EPIC	Company Name	% Change	Users
1	EEN	Emerald Energy	285.71	pistolpete2
2	CFP	CFA Capital Group	230.19	Soulretro, hilary
3	CYC	CYC Holdings	215.38	al100
4	DAG	DA Group	164.58	BLAND2, Rkencars
5	AFD	African Diamond	143.24	dlpm, Wendy D, axe79, Terra99
6	BGY	British Energy	142.70	DOMINGO
7	IBL	International Brand Licensing	119.40	ticker
8	ATV	Antonov	118.18	depeched101
9	IDN	IDN Telecom	105.56	keeplosingwoman, amana
10	PCI	Petroceltic International PLC	102.61	porky, sinead33, Testex, griffon

Superrod

The girlfriend does the gardening so I am no expert but where do potatoes come from if not from the year before? There is no such thing as potato seed that I am aware of, its the 'eyes' of the previous years potatoes that throw off shoots that grow the year after while the old potato withers, isn't that so?

Return on investment seems to be about 1000%, ie 10 spuds for every one planted, tax free.

So it seems to me the stock market is a better investment than planting potatoes if

1. you don't own a reasonable patch of land,

2. food costs are insignificant compared to the return on your shares.

For somebody with 5000 to invest a year's food bills could be say 50 weeks * 20 = 1000, ball park figure, and one good share like my pet Antonov in his 5*1000 would give a return say 100%, ie 1000.

So we are talking risky stuff in the stock market compared to a pretty safe return. I'm not saying don't do the stock market, I'm here myself. But take the easy riskless returns first. 100%-ish on Antonov and hopefully more to come is not going to happen as regularly as a potato crop.

Newby1066.

With your background, why not stand as an Independent candidate for Houses of P. or even THE EU. Pays good, rewards high and there is plenty of free time to concentrate on the Stock market.

Seriously though, with your background, initially concentrate on finding companies in electronics, education etc. which is related to your knowledge. (Stick with things you know about, rather than talk or hear talk about.) For you buying a company is similar to a farmer buying a field, it is generally worth to him, only what he can produce from it, or rent it for.

Sometimes he may plant a good crop, sometimes a bad crop, sometimes it rains when it shouldn't. At the end of the year he hopes to make more than what he could have made on it if he had invested in a bond or bank account.

The same goes for a company, it is a good company when it is either earning more that the current interest rate + inflation or has the potential many times over to do so. (That is the gamble or risk factors come into play.)

Read Jim Slaters books Basic books on the ZULU PRINCIPLE. I think these contain good basic knowledge of company fundamentals and written in a very clear, quite entertaining way.

Get Technical Analysis for Dummies by Barbara Rockefeller. This like the other Dummies books is well written and not overplaying the bases, concepts or results from TA.
(I dont know a lot about charting or its principles but since using Moneyman and reading this book for the Fourth Time (I am a very slow learner) I have become fascinated by some of its concepts and I think charting will become more and more useful for me, in finding trending shares and timing buys and sells.)

Also, if you buy shares, which have a good fundamental analysis, and a good trend you will be less likely to by a dud, if you are following the graphs, and also buy and sell at a more appropriate times.
Once in profit, which covers dealing costs ie. spread and contract charges and 0.5% (double this if you are going to buy another share) set a sensible automatic stop loss which, protects your profit for next time. (Sometimes you will curse the stop loss, but if you look at the end of the year, probably you will thank your self for doing so. Egs. BPRG, RTD, TFC ETC.)

Setting the correct stop loss is the problem.

Initially, if you wish to trade in and out, use the bigger companies with smaller spreads and larger Normal market sizes. Follow their trends. (Smaller but more reliable gains, which mount up over the year.) (If you made a mistake on the Fundamentals you are more likely to recover or at least get out with smaller losses.) (Cut your losses and let your profits run.)
Aim to make 50% or more a year, but be satisfied with 10 15%.
I personally use Comdirect and Barclays for dealing and though I was a little disgruntled by Barclays initially, after it took over C Schwab, but now I am more satisfied.

Dealing costs for both are about 12.50, with Barclays the fees drop to 7.50 after a certain number of deals.

Both companies have good research facilities and Comdirect allows automatic Stop Losses. Barclays is said to be introducing these within the next few months. (GOOOOOOD)

Another tip is plonk some of you kitty in ISAs. It simplifies your tax returns and if you are lucky save you some capital gains in the future. Unfortunately, this prevents you from trading AIM and OFFEX Gambles with this money. (A SIPP (Comdirect) will allow you to trade a greater variety of securities, and you have immediately gained 20+ % on your initial investment, the problem is you cant get at the money until you are ?55 and then only 25%. (There are, I believe, some fiddles around this.)

Bear in mind what ever you do in life should be fun, the stock market is a game and the more you read the more you think the greater will become yours skill and hopefully rewards. I have found and still find it fascinating.


THE OTHER THING IF YOU SEE A SHARE TIPPED, CHECK ITS FUNDAMENTALS, WAIT AND SEE, FOLLOW THE GRAPHS FOR A WEEK OR MONTH or LONGER. IF THE SHARE IS GOOD NOW, IT SHOULD GOOD THEN!!!!! You will have lost nothing and if it is good and you buy later you will only make a little less.

A good software package for analysis, I think along with others is Sharescope although COMDIRECT DOES have good online Graphics but I think Broad Band is necessary to make it useful.


DYOR




Now I would like some help.


I have of recent started flirting with Data Mining Feature of Sharescope, filtering on various criteria for shares which may be useful at some time in the future. (Watch and Wait.)

My problem is that I am beginning to use more and more PEs,ROCE, ROC, PEG, etc. as a method of evaluating companies, but the program at the moment does not provide "norms" or "averages" values for the different Sectors.

Does anybody know of an Internet Site from where I could extract this information? Or have other Ideas where it can be gained from without having to key it in from FT ETC.

Fred1New - company refs evaluate each company against the market in general and against their own specific sector. Contact me and I will mail you an example. They don't actually give the underlying numbers but an 'at a glance' comparison.

I too would be interested if anyone can give a source for the underlying data.

Newby1066 - If you drop me a line I'll talk you through the practicalities of running an account as best I know how. (I'm not punting for your business)

Regards

38

38, thankyou, Have E-mail you. But think I have a solution.

Buy/Sell antique silver cutlery.Capital virtually guaranteed i.e.low downside/
high upside.
rgds aj