tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-162853972011-12-14T22:08:26.516-05:00Sharing the experiences, knowledge, and challenges of a beginning Canadian investor. My goal is to become educated and effective at maintaining healthy personal finance habits, with a focus on eventual wealth building. The goal of this page is to offer up my investing ideas, issues, and my portfolio, and allow the reader to learn from them, evaluate them, and hopefully discuss them.Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.comBlogger601100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-741163745016428812007-11-18T16:20:00.000-05:002007-11-18T16:29:19.864-05:00

As I wrote recently I purchased 35 shares of Wachovia. Since that purchase at $44.50 the shares have dipped as low as $38.05 on continued panic regarding the mortgage market deterioration. I decided to add 20 more shares to my position, and have reduced my cost basis now to $42.33.As I noted before I am in some respects trying to pick the bottom of this hurtin' that has been put on financial

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-42675224034123618592007-10-30T19:05:00.000-04:002007-10-30T19:13:49.699-04:00

Sirius Satellite Radio released earnings this morning (Remember, until last week I owned some Sirius).They announced that losses had reduced from 12 cents per share in the 3rd quarter last year to 8 cents per share this year. Also, subscribers increased 50% over the same quarter last year.To me, this sounded like good news, yet the stock was down 9% to $3.29 today. It made me feel great that I

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-10081779559556738372007-10-25T18:53:00.000-04:002007-10-25T19:44:45.762-04:00

Wow, can you believe I haven't posted here in more than a year? I can - I haven't been actively investing, as I've been adjusting to my new life as a working stiff (I know, lame excuse).Anyhow, I thought I would drop by with an update of my holdings.First of all, I sold Microsoft months ago for an 8% profit overall including commissions (nothing to brag about considering I held it for a whole

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1146936634187293272006-05-06T13:26:00.000-04:002006-05-06T13:30:34.196-04:00

Obviously I have completely neglected my blog for a looong time. The fact is I haven't had time to focus on my investing, and thus I haven't had any new thoughts to contribute. I have happily watched visitors continue to come here, so I hope people are still enjoying some of my older posts.Unfortunately as I've passively sat back and watched my investments, I've had to watch some of them drop

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1134787819291649212005-12-16T21:48:00.000-05:002005-12-16T21:59:44.683-05:00

Well, it's been a mixed couple of weeks. The gains that were making me feel good in both my stock holdings are pretty much gone, but all my mutual funds are into positive gains.Coach has continuously dipped since it peaked at a new 52-week high about 20 days ago. From a profit of 9.93% back then, I now sit to make 1.65%. I am still feeling good about Coach though (the company and the stock), and

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1133281473010259332005-11-29T11:18:00.000-05:002005-11-29T11:35:20.663-05:00

Today I purchased TD US Index mutual fund with the capital and profit from my former holding, CIBC Energy. TD US Index is an index fund which tracks the S&P 500. As stated before I wanted to stay away from sector-specific funds (like the Energy funds), to remain more diverse and not risk devastation at the hands of fluctuating commodity prices.When I looked around for a good diverse Canadian

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1132947297287020262005-11-25T14:15:00.000-05:002005-11-25T14:36:50.283-05:00

Coach [my new favourite stock ;)] continued building on Wednesday's gains today, climbing another 1.95% today in shortened trading hours. My profit (including commissions) now stands at 9.93%, after holding the stock for 2 1/2 months.Profit = (($36.64/share*40 shares)/($31.88/share*40 shares + $58 commission)-1)*100=9.93Now I guess I need to think about when to sell it. Because it was debatably

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1132772395072083092005-11-23T13:55:00.000-05:002005-11-23T14:00:40.640-05:00

Coach is up over 3% so far today, after Standard & Poor's featured the company in their Outlook newsletter as one of the top 10 stock picks for the remainder of 2005.I purchased my 40 shares of Coach at 31.88/share, thus my profit if I sold now (including $58 comission for buy and sell) would be around 8%. That makes me feel great.Now I need to get back to finding a mutual fund to replace my CIBC

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1132330351802630372005-11-18T11:08:00.000-05:002005-11-18T12:26:43.423-05:00

Well I finally sold my CIBC Energy Mutual Fund today, and made off with 14.3% profit. I purchased on July 26th at $31.792 per unit, and sold today at yesterday's closing price of $36.331 per unit.One nice thing about mutual funds is that the price is not updated throughout the day. I built a Yahoo portfolio with the top ten holdings of this mutual fund, so I can watch it during the day. The fund

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1131887490248081142005-11-13T08:05:00.000-05:002005-11-13T08:22:46.946-05:00

"Microsoft's stock has been treading water for years". I've heard that more than a few times. Basically MSFT has traded between $30 and $24 for a couple years. But that doesn't really mean that the price of Microsoft has not changed for years. As I discussed before, the true price investors are willing to pay for a stock is the Price/Earnings ratio. This consideration applies to any stock, of

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1130951502474398802005-11-02T12:08:00.000-05:002005-11-02T12:11:42.486-05:00

I haven't posted in a while, as I've just been letting my stocks do their thing without observing too closely, and I've been investigating the possibility of purchasing a used car. It's a big investment, which is probably not an 'investment' at all. I'll just need a car anyways to get to work when I graduate.As for my two stocks (Microsoft and Coach), they've both been climbing since their

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1130449916462343352005-10-27T17:44:00.000-04:002005-10-27T17:56:41.716-04:00

The rough market we've seen so far in October continued yesterday and today. Although Coach posted earnings better than expectations on Tuesday, it closed today around the same level as Monday.Today Microsoft posted earnings for their fiscal first quarter after the market closed. Read more here. Including a one-time charge of 2 cents per share related to the settlement with Real, the earnings

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1130241939983151392005-10-25T08:05:00.000-04:002005-10-25T08:05:39.993-04:00

What a nice way to start my morning... unless I'm missing something, this should give the share price a boost. Coach First-Quarter Profit Rises: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance: "NEW YORK (AP) -- Coach Inc., the high-end handbag and accessories maker, on Tuesday reported its fiscal first-quarter profit surged 54 percent, lifted by robust sales and improved operating margin. The company also

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1130164697952936362005-10-24T10:34:00.000-04:002005-10-24T10:38:17.956-04:00

I'm watching Coach (NYSE-COH) closely today (and pulling my hair out), as Merryl Lynch downgraded it from Buy to Neutral this morning. It has already dropped more than 5% on the news, but recovered to around $31/share presently, down 4%.This is not what I wanted to see after a good week of gains last week, and awaiting tomorrow's earnings announcement. I have my fingers crossed for a good

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129901084384346822005-10-21T09:14:00.000-04:002005-10-21T09:26:37.050-04:00

I am anxiously awaiting earnings announcements from Coach(NYSE-COH) next Tuesday, and Microsoft(NASDAQ-MSFT) next Thursday. As I mentioned before, this is the first round of earnings announcements since I have owned these stocks (since I have owned any stocks in fact), so it's definitely got me nervous.Both stocks are not in a great position for me. Coach has rebounded nicely this week, and sits

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129829671581979582005-10-20T13:33:00.000-04:002005-10-21T08:32:51.306-04:00

... I'm trying out some new blog formatting, so far on the main page only. I wanted to make it a little more unique, and a little less dark, but I'm not sure I've got a color combination that works yet...Ok I like this one I have right now, I think we'll go with this for a while. I liked yesterday's until I saw it on my laptop, so who knows I might hate this one later too... maybe I'll just go

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129765390910149242005-10-19T19:30:00.000-04:002005-10-19T19:43:10.916-04:00

I've learned a lot about the stock market this year, but I think I have more to learn about analyst's estimates. For instance, Google reports 3rd quarter earnings tomorrow after the market closes. I read the earnings preview, and it contains some interesting statements that had me questioning the logic of analyst predictions:ANALYST TAKE: "We believe Google will report (third-quarter) results

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129600907614115852005-10-17T21:53:00.000-04:002005-10-21T09:09:10.153-04:00

I thought a little more about whether to deduct my RSP contributions for the tax savings [see this post to get caught up], or to wait until a future year. I am in the lowest tax bracket of ~24%. I'll graduate late next year and be in the higher bracket of 34% in at most two years.I contributed $5000 to my RSP account already this year, but I don't need to use the tax deduction until I want to.Use

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129557679863887752005-10-17T09:58:00.000-04:002005-10-17T10:01:19.870-04:00

The 18th Carnival of Personal Finance is now up, hosted at My Money Blog; I have a post featured once again this week. Be sure to take a look around at My Money Blog; it is becoming one of my favourite personal finance sites.Carnival of Personal Finance description:"...a 'Carnival' is a weblog post that brings attention to some of the week's most interesting and informative blogger-written

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129479954761726372005-10-16T23:48:00.000-04:002005-10-21T09:11:46.266-04:00

I explained the different investment accounts I have in one of my first posts. One is, of course, my 'retirement account'. RRSPs, as they're called in Canada, are Registered (i.e. tax exempt) Retirement Savings Plans. When you move money into your RSP, you can reduce your income for the year by that amount.But I'm only 24, and I'm in a low tax bracket; is it advisable to use my RSP? Well, I've

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129405077654688732005-10-15T15:55:00.000-04:002005-10-21T09:13:29.430-04:00

Well, it's been a bad couple of weeks for my portfolio, as I already posted about my stocks. My mutual funds have been hit pretty hard as well. When I posted my first ever quarterly performance review on October 3rd my RSP mutual funds were up 6.93% and my discretionary account mutual funds were up 5.63%.Now my RSP funds are up 3.3% and my discretionary account is up 0.31%. The worst performers

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129174573480022012005-10-13T17:17:00.000-04:002005-10-13T17:18:12.986-04:00

I've started looking at my venture into investing as part of a broader mission of personal financial health and overall self-improvement. I've already begun to change the way I think, as I've learned what it takes to prepare for retirement (... and I'm still a student). I'm going to attempt some self-improvements in other areas as well.I've even taken a goal-oriented step and added a new sentence

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129170908917067292005-10-12T22:47:00.000-04:002005-10-13T08:26:29.600-04:00

My two individual stock holdings, Coach (40 shares) and Microsoft (90 shares), have performed consistently poorly since I bought them. I obtained each in the past few months, so I am nervous for my first round of earnings announcements in the next couple of weeks. I am probably worrying over too short a time frame, but they're my first stocks, so it would be nice if one of them had climbed,

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129133284767547202005-10-12T21:06:00.000-04:002005-10-13T08:29:00.463-04:00

Everybody seems to like or dislike a stock based on their own system of requisites. Of course there are opposing schools of though on stock valuation (i.e. growth vs. value), but I thought I would highlight some of the other reasons people believe in certain investments, for better or for worse.Cash Flow - In finance terms, the value of any investment (be it a stock, a real estate or small

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1129070214699690592005-10-11T18:31:00.000-04:002005-10-11T19:18:35.886-04:00

I mentioned in a previous post that I want to establish a formal budget for myself. I consider this an imperative step for both short-term financial health and eventual long-term wealth building.I've begun to think of it this way: there's no point working hard to get extra gains out of your investments when you haven't yet taken the time to trim unnecessary spending. Increasing savings by

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128957218245616982005-10-10T11:02:00.000-04:002005-10-12T13:24:56.966-04:00

The 17th Carnival of Personal Finance is now up, kindly hosted at Hello, Dollar; I'm happy to say one of my posts is featured this week.Carnival of Personal Finance description:"...a 'Carnival' is a weblog post that brings attention to some of the week's most interesting and informative blogger-written articles on the topic at hand. It is a showcase of weblog posts, submitted by their authors or

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128797736064939072005-10-08T14:45:00.000-04:002005-10-09T09:57:45.830-04:00

I picked up the October issue of MoneySense yesterday (it seems to be a good mag). In the Ask MoneySense column I learned that buy and sell commissions on stocks are deducted from capital gains for tax purposes:Q. "Can you claim trading commissions on your taxes?"A. "Not directly, but you still get a tax break for your trading fees. That's because you can deduct from your capital gains the fees

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128724277034935112005-10-07T18:28:00.000-04:002005-10-07T18:53:02.313-04:00

My investments got hammered this week, making it the worst week for me since I began investing. I mean to say it was the worst week for my stocks, not for me. I was lucky enough to be busy with school, and able to ignore the market a little. I find it extremely hard to stop checking my holdings sometimes during the day. My rule that I keep reminding myself of is if I have no intention of selling

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128646282006602582005-10-06T21:36:00.000-04:002005-10-07T18:58:26.623-04:00

I don't mean to turn this into a Tech industry blog, but I'm very interested in the *war* going on between Google and Microsoft (being a tech-junkie, as well as a Microsoft shareholder). Read on if you're interested.Google showed that there is a ton of money to be made in search. Microsoft then made the choice to go out and try to take some of that away from Google. They didn't have to, but

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128442132270482822005-10-04T12:04:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:11:46.503-04:00

Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT) dropped 2% this morning after announcing they have called off plans to launch an online music store. This is one day after I purchased 50 shares; you can't precict the news of course.The chart looks like an example of the efficient market, with the price correcting 2% immediately after the news was released. The problem with that is it implies that 2% of the value of

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128396249054095282005-10-03T23:08:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:10:43.633-04:00

Well, here is my first quarterly investment performance review for July/August/September. Keep in mind my first investments were purchased July 19th, so I didn't actually invest for the whole quarter.Checking Account - Current cash balance: $2095 (not investment money)RSP Mutual Funds - Gained 6.93% (click image for details)Discretionary Account Mutual Funds - Gained 5.63% (click image for

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128372092381364782005-10-03T16:41:00.000-04:002005-10-12T13:23:43.390-04:00

This article from The Motley Fool underscores some of the mistakes a relatively new investor is likely to make. This particular investor totally underestimated the effect commissions would have on his returns, as I tried to emphasize in my "Fees, fees, fees" post.1 Year of Investing [Fool.com: Commentary] October 3, 2005:"'That's right, I forgot about commissions. This will be a recurring theme

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128352443523281482005-10-03T11:14:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:13:25.480-04:00

This article made me feel good; it backs up what I've been thinking and my analysis has been saying about Microsoft.Investing - The Value Case For Microsoft - FORTUNE:"The Value Case For Microsoft - Yes, it has problems. But do the math, and the onetime growth king looks like a buy. By Fred Vogelstein"[p.s. I'm hoping my order for 50 additional shares of Microsoft will be going through soon; it's

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128349266835347072005-10-03T10:18:00.000-04:002005-10-03T10:26:01.733-04:00

Here is a screenshot of the Microsoft analysis I mentioned earlier:As I mentioned the analysis is very positive. Although I don't particularly believe or endorse the high target price the sheet came up with, it's worth noting that Microsoft is better than the industry in 14 of 17 categories(!). I am confident in the quality of the company, despite all the seemingly negative internet commentaries

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128214333372252142005-10-02T01:20:00.000-04:002005-10-02T01:23:33.840-04:00

A lot of people get it wrong with credit cards, and accrue debt. Credit cards are simply convenient 'at-the-register' loans with extraordinarily high interest rates. They're designed to allow people to easily build debt so that the company makes big money on interest (good idea!).I am lucky enough to say I've never paid a cent in credit card interest. In fact, I almost always have the cash to

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128179649898930652005-10-01T11:01:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:14:11.630-04:00

One of the most important ingredients for successful investing (not that I know from experience) is having well-defined investment goals. It's one of the things I had at the forefront in my thoughts while I was reading about how to invest, but it's the easiest to forget about once you get into the exciting investing part.I was reminded by a couple of investing blogs I read: The Dividend Guy, and

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1128111366661844602005-09-30T16:04:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:15:34.543-04:00

As I've noted for a while, I want to find a new stock to purchase. I put all my free investment cash into US dollars at a great rate of 1$ CDN=$0.85 USD. So I have $1400 US that I want to put into a US stock.After looking at several stocks and not finding anything to my liking, it finally occured to me that a good thing to do with that money is to buy more Microsoft. I already own Microsoft (

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127949461779456452005-09-28T19:14:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:16:27.436-04:00

It might seem like a stupid question; you may think the answer is obvious: a combination of earnings, predicted future earnings, management quality, etc, etc.But what explains stock charts for different companies that move in tandem? I own shares of Coach (NYSE:COH), and I've considered purchasing Chico's FAS (NYSE:CHS) for a while. It's quite interesting to observe the similarities in their

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127769592257767862005-09-26T17:24:00.000-04:002005-10-12T13:27:00.993-04:00

I have continued looking into a stock to buy, and today I put Wal-Mart through my Stock Valuation Spreadsheet. [Besides those stocks mentioned last week, I've now also considered Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ), and I am looking more into the Health Care / Pharmaceuticals industry] The verdict from my spreadsheet is that Wal-Mart is definitely not a buy (Click on the image for full-size):Once I saw

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127572557014104702005-09-24T10:45:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:18:47.386-04:00

My two stock holdings, Microsoft and Coach, have had their ups and downs this week.Coach, Inc. (NYSE-COH)Coach took some pretty bad losses early this week (along with the whole consumer discretionary retail sector), down well below where I bought it. By Friday however Coach rose over 7.5% (!) from its Wednesday low of ~$30.10, up to $32.42. I own 40 shares at $31.88.See 5-day chart (click for

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127192615939601472005-09-22T09:07:00.000-04:002005-09-22T09:09:32.806-04:00

I want to share my investment tracking spreadsheet. I experimented with several forms and concepts for worksheets to help me effectively track my returns before I settled on this. I'm quite happy with it.Sheet 1 (use tabs at bottom to switch between sheets) simply tracks all the money I've fed into my investing accounts, and the current account values, and calculates my returns.Sheet 2 has an

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127330494224041472005-09-21T15:16:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:20:54.463-04:00

The stock market has been down steeply yesterday and today (yesterday started bad and got worse when interest rates were increased in the US). This week has been very bad for my stocks - Microsoft and Coach are now both a fair bit lower than where I bought them.I am still in the market for a new stock, and today was probably a good day to buy one. With the major drops in the market, you might say

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127234276146251962005-09-20T12:45:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:21:52.976-04:00

I still have my $1500 USD to invest in a new stock, and last night I started considering Wal-Mart (NYSE-WMT). Today the stock is trading around $43.87/share, just pennies above its 52-week low.The trailing Price/Earnings ratio is 17.30, and the projected P/E is only 14.6, compared to over 18 for the industry. So that makes Wal-Mart look like a value stock. Also, the projected PEG (Price/Earnings

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1127191484751711512005-09-20T12:06:00.000-04:002005-10-04T18:22:44.096-04:00

Here are a couple other books on investing I've checked out recently (see my 1st recommended books post).The SmartMoney Stock Picker's BibleI was at Chapters, thinking about grabbing an investing magazine, when I noticed this book for $4.99 on the Bargain Books shelf. I didn't expect much, and how could you be disappointed when you get the whole book for cheaper than a copy of Smartmoney magazine

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126738297352180012005-09-18T17:52:00.000-04:002005-09-24T10:57:50.166-04:00

I've struggled a little when evaluating stocks with organizing all the information that should influence the decision to buy or not. You want to be thorough when going through the information that's available, but it's hard to sort it out in your head. Being an engineer, I wanted a nice way to organize all the quantitative aspects of a stock choice, to make it easier to compare a company to its

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126893735856906392005-09-16T17:25:00.000-04:002005-09-16T17:24:32.156-04:00

Right now I have more than enough money in my checking account, and my emergency cash reserve ($10,000 in Money Market mutual funds), so I need to decide what to do with $1500 cash sitting in my discretionary investing account. I've decided to contribute more to my RRSP (registered retirement savings plan), to reduce my taxable income for the year.I can either contribute the $1500 directly to my

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126830203715690562005-09-15T19:26:00.002-04:002005-09-15T21:12:12.160-04:00

If you've seen 'Jim Cramer's Mad Money' on CNBC, odds are you either love him or hate him. I find him entertaining, and I try to catch the show a couple times a week (mostly for the entertainment value).I do think it's funny (and possibly fitting) to see him referred to as the "Jerry Springer of Wall Street" from time to time. It makes me kind of happy to say that I watch The Morning Call and

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126735733045002602005-09-14T17:57:00.000-04:002005-10-15T16:00:18.246-04:00

I think the performance of my mutual funds yesterday exemplifies the potential benefits of diversity through different types of investment vehicles. As I pointed out when I explained my fund holdings, I have mutual funds in not only stocks, but also bonds, and real estate (through a Real Estate Investment Trust fund).Discretionary account: RSP account:As you can see, each and every one of my

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126652374983951042005-09-13T18:59:00.000-04:002005-10-15T16:02:07.223-04:00

My second stock purchase was Coach, Inc (NYSE – COH) – 40 shares at $31.88/share, on September 6th. Therefore, including $58 commission (buy + sell), the stock must appreciate to $33.33 for me to break even. It has been up since I purchased, and closed today at $33.Company description:Coach, Inc. is a designer, producer, and marketer of accessories for men and women, including handbags, business

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126546916735820812005-09-12T13:41:00.000-04:002005-09-12T13:41:56.763-04:00

When Google (Nasdaq – GOOG) first went public a friend asked me “what do they even do to make money?”.  I didn’t follow the stock market at the time, and I didn’t know the answer for sure – “I guess just those little ads” I said.  And the fact is that 99.9% of Google’s revenue does come from those little ads.  So there are the usual risk factors associated with that online advertising stream of

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126368054273821022005-09-10T12:00:00.000-04:002005-09-10T15:20:29.266-04:00

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/0,,SB112484195945721307-iI70ia22lcLXd7VmPaKkBZxfIFs_20060824,00.html?mod=rss_freeThis Wall Street Journal article is interesting - Google announced recently that they would sell $4 billion worth of their own stock on order to raise some capital. For what? Well, according to Alan Murray, it's a simple case of cashing in on plainly overvalued stock.

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126359878984914142005-09-10T10:10:00.000-04:002005-09-24T11:00:16.096-04:00

My first stock purchase was Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT) – 40 shares at $26.93 (US) a share, on August 12th. With $29 commission the cost was $1106.20.The P/E of Microsoft where I bought it was 23.94. It was way below other internet companies like Yahoo! (P/E ~40) and Google (P/E ~85). But of course Microsoft has many other revenue streams beside internet (unlike YHOO and GOOG), including the amazing

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126214518296512502005-09-09T05:21:00.000-04:002005-10-15T16:07:10.133-04:00

Once I had my mutual funds for a few weeks, I felt the itch to get into stock purchasing. I couldn’t help it… going out and picking a winner is too tempting to resist, even when armed with all my knowledge of the efficient market, and the fact that the overall market beats over 65% of active stock managers every year.I used to watch Jim Cramer’s Mad Money pretty much daily. It is certainly an

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1125852157510383552005-09-08T12:12:00.000-04:002005-10-15T16:04:17.420-04:00

Since I first started getting the ball rolling with investing, I’ve been surprised by the seemingly endless number of fees that exist to make profit for the banks and investment houses. It was legitimately confusing, even though I took the time to read all the appropriate paperwork. If an effort is not made to minimize fees whenever possible, they can substantially diminish the returns of any

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126173505182003062005-09-08T05:49:00.000-04:002005-09-15T20:48:29.956-04:00

RSP Account:Direct Investing (Discretionary) Account:For the first time, all of my holdings have positive overall gains. Even my Real Estate (REIT) fund, which immediately dropped after I purchased it, has worked its way back into positive returns. Note the Gain/Loss (%) column, and note that all of these were purchased on July 19th or later, of this year. So in less than 2 months Altafund

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1126134282961372152005-09-07T19:04:00.000-04:002005-10-15T16:05:39.026-04:00

Most of the investing blogs I’ve found are focused on stock trading using technical analysis. Technicians, or chartists, are investors (maybe traders is a more suitable name) who read stock charts to find buy and sell signals. Many technicians buy and sell stocks without even knowing what the company does. It follows from the methods that technicians are not long term investors, as they will jump

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1125844802113578732005-09-04T11:10:00.000-04:002005-09-04T16:52:19.160-04:00

The screenshot below is my portfolio for my RSP account, as I track it on Morningstar.ca (for free). These are all "No Load" mutual funds, meaning there is no fee to purchase or sell them. Keep in mind however, as I neglected, that both your bank, and the bank issuing the Fund, likely have penalty fees if you sell a mutual fund within 90 days of purchasing it. Furthermore, there may be fees from

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1125849448993040612005-09-04T09:53:00.000-04:002005-09-04T16:53:57.413-04:00

The first hurdle when I wanted to begin investing was understanding the account structure (and fee structure) offered from by bank, TD Canada Trust. In order to carry out my investment plans I opened two accounts:Direct investing cash accountBasic self-directed RSP accountIn early July I didn't really even understand what an RRSP (registered retirement savings plan) was. It is basically just an

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1125801129052315632005-09-03T22:23:00.000-04:002005-09-04T16:55:29.286-04:00

By summer of this year I had $18,000 in my bank account, and I knew the bank was making money off me because of my lack of investing knowledge. I was getting ~0 % interest. That thought, combined with a new interest in entrepreneurship and learning what it will take to be rich :) in the future, motivated me to begin reading about investing.The first book I read was, appropriately, Investing for

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16285397.post-1125796913324748112005-09-03T21:15:00.000-04:002005-09-04T16:57:28.673-04:00

Hello, thanks for stopping by my blog. First things first, introductions... I'm a 24 year old Mechanical Engineer from Windsor, Ontario, Canada. I am relatively new to the investing game, and so I have been meaning to start a blog where I could post what I am going through... learning to invest and going through the paces to get up and running can be quite involved... and then you have to worry

Ginsbergnoreply@blogger.com0