Every year I go to the Money Show in Orlando, Florida. Thousands attend. It is mostly an older crowd with the youngsters about 40 years of age. I have been saying for years that until you have lost enough money trying to make a fortune you will not become serious about investing. The under 40’s are shooting for the moon and it has finally dawned on the over 40’s (maybe it’s the over 50’s) that they must find a better way to get rich.

The Money Show presents a forum of recognized experts in their field. It may be long-term or short term trading. It could be in stocks, bonds, mutual fund, ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds), oil and gas properties, options, commodity futures, managed accounts and other more esoteric venues.

Each one of the "experts" allows you to listen to him speak (at no charge) to tell you how he has found the secret to stock market success and why you should buy his Holy Grail service. You will receive his (daily, weekly, monthly) market letter for the ridiculously low price of from $250 to $5,000 or more. You may not have found the Holy Grail, but he has.

Almost all of them have a "when to buy" method, but very few have a "when to cash in your chips" method and fewer than that will have any way to protect yourself from losing it all should their Holy Grail method turn into Holy Cow.

The Orlando show occurs in February so every expert has his predictions for the coming year. The only bear I fount was Martin Weiss, but he wasn’t a bull in 1999 either. No one wants to hear dire consequences of a bad year for their stocks so the audience is fed the kind of food they like. Everything is going to be even better this years and with my super software (or newsletter) you will make a better return than ever before.

During the three day show there were 396 individual presentations most of which ran about an hour more or less and then there were the extra charges for having breakfast, lunch, tea, whatever with one of the speakers. And these weren’t cheap. You could also sign up for all day seminars. In the Exhibit Hall there was always an expert giving a lecture with a great slide show on how his Grail (I am getting hesitant about calling it Holy) will increase your portfolio.

Many investors came to see the guru whose market letter they were receiving. Very few of these mavens are making anyone rich, but there are some. My question to them is are they putting their own money on the line or are these results hypothetical? After attending several of these seminars each day with each presenter showing his magic get-rich formula it would seem these folks would go home more confused than when they came. There is no Holy Grail of investing. At least I have not found it nor do I know anyone who has. Do not rely on someone else to make you rich.’ You have to do it yourself.

The real Holy Grail translates into two words - Hard Work.

Al Thomas’ book, "If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

I know there are a lot of you out there who would like to "get even" with the stock market. Many are on the diet of "I hope, I hope". As a professional trader I can tell you that diet will make you very sick.

If you play any game of chance like poker you know you are not going to win every hand. In fact you are going to lose more hands than you win, but at the end of the evening you can still come out ahead if you know how and when to bet and when to fold because it is not always in the cards that you have been dealt.

The same applies to gambling in the stock market. Oh, did I say a bad thing? Al, go wash your mouth out with soap. My broker says buying stocks is "investing", not gambling. And pigs can fly. Wall Street is just Las Vegas East and like poker you can be cleaned out. Oh, you already know that - in spades!

The teachings of Maul Street are that you buy a good stock or fund and hold it forever. They did not tell you that you may have drawn a 2, 6, 10 off suit and there is no way it will be a winner. They never tell you to fold your hand (sell). At least you are not losing money every time a card is dealt. With stocks they deal a new card every day called a price change. If the stock, fund or index you own goes steadily down over a period of time don’t you think it would be wise to fold your hand and sit with your chips?

No, your broker will never recommend this because he gets paid every year you have your money "invested" in something, anything except a money market. It may only be one percent, but the brokerage company can live off that even if you can’t.

I know, you are telling me you are "in for the long haul". What Wall Street genius thought up that one? In this high stakes game you must remember it was to leave with more money than you started and not to go broke or stay even. When the market is going down you want to be OUT, not sitting there every day hoping (and praying) your shares will go up. They won’t. Like poker you have to take a small loss and wait for a better hand which may be quite a while. YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE INVESTED ALL THE TIME. Many times cash or bonds will make more money than owning stocks.

When the market is going down even the best stocks will fall. Understand you are not going to win every pot. Small losses will not hurt you. It is the big ones that can wipe you out. Know the amount you are willing to risk when you buy any stock and fold when that loss limit is hit.

You are not investing to "get even".

Al Thomas’ book, "If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

Because you don’t feel too sure about which stock or mutual fund to buy you decide to become a member of an investment club. Each of the members contribute a certain amount of money each month and then meet to decide what to buy or sell.

It is a nice camaraderie, but what do you know about making money in the stock market? The members decide what services to buy to obtain information on stocks and funds. Certain members will be designated to do research on a particular stock and bring it to the next meeting.

The members become buried in gathering data – doing research and forget that the end result is to make money. It is relatively rare to do any technical analysis. They gather reports from so-called investment analysts at the big brokerage firms. Recently the Securities and Exchange Commission has been investigating the recommendations of their in-house analysts because of the very poor results of their calls. Some have been accused of giving buy recommendations on stocks it was obvious were dogs. Let’s hope the SEC does something besides a slap on the wrist.

We used to have a guy where I was a broker who wrote reports. He was told to do a report with charts and graphs. He said, "OK, do you want it to be bullish or bearish?" He could slant it any way we told him using the same facts and statistics and never tell a lie. The small investor is at the mercy of these people.

One of the greatest sources of information is Morningstar. They have every bit of information that is available about a company and they will sell it to you at a reasonable price. My problem with all this information is there is one important thing they cannot tell you - if I buy it, will it go up?

After more than 30 years in the business I will tell you that all the information you can gather about any company or mutual fund is totally and completely worthless. Trying to pick a winning stock is very difficult so what I do is let a very smart guy do it for me and he does it at no charge. How? Simple. I hire the manager of a no-load mutual fund that is currently going up and I buy that. As long as his fund is advancing in price I will keep it and as soon as it starts down I sell it and find a new smart fund manager who can make money for me.

There is no such thing as a "good" mutual fund. At times they are good and at times they are bad. Good is going up. Bad is going down. If a fund has been advancing for more than 60 or 90 days at the rate of more than 2% per month it will show up on my Buy list. I don’t need to know anything else about it and no further research is necessary.

Show this to your investment club members. A chart is helpful, but the numbers will speak for themselves. The only research your club needs to do is find a no-load mutual fund that is advancing the most in the last 90 days. Forget about 3-year and 5-year performance. What has it done lately? Your club can be a winner every year.

Al Thomas’ book, "If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

al@mutualfundstrategy.com; 1-888-345-7870

Wouldn’t it be nice if you were only in the stock market when it was going up and have everything transferred to cash while it is going down? It is called ‘market timing’ and your broker or financial planner will tell you “it can’t be done”. What that person just told you is he doesn’t know how to do it. He doesn’t know his job.

Even the Federal Reserve wrote an article saying that market timing does out perform the S&P500 index which is one of the best market directional indicators.

There are many advisory services that offer market timing. If you search on the Internet under “Market Timing” you will find them or you may look in various publications such as Technical Analysis of Stocks and Commodities magazine or Investor’s Business Daily newspaper. Once you have found several you will find that some have several buy and sell signals each year and a few average only one timing signal per year. Here it depends upon your personality and your approach to the market.

For the active trader the more signals the better and for the longer-term investor the slow signals are best. You will have to do your homework and will want to send for a trial subscription to their newsletters. You might have to try several until you find one you like.

Instead of subscribing to an advisory letter you may decide to make up your own timing signal. It will take some initial work, but once done you will not have to pay anyone else for the service.

Most of these timing methods use two a simple moving averages of from 50 days to 200 days plotted with the S&P500 Index or the NYSE Composite or the Nasdaq Composite if you are investing in the high tech stocks or mutual funds. Yes, this definitely works with mutual funds. The longer the time of the moving average the less frequent will be the Buy and Sell signals. The signal is generated when the index penetrates the moving average line. When the index is below the moving average and goes through it to the upside you have a Buy and visa versa for the Sell. Nothing complicated.

If you want to piggyback the work of Investor’s Business Daily look at their Mutual Fund Index where they show both a 50-day and 200-day moving average lines. Both of these methods gave sell signals last September/ October. Would your investments have been more profitable if you had gone to cash at that time? Probably. The 200-day line still has you in cash while the 50-day line had a Buy/Sell in January and a new Buy about April 20.

Basically what market timing does is protect you from any big loss in a bear market. The first rule for all smart investors is to protect their capital. If your broker does not know how to do this you need a new broker.

It’s your money. Keep it.

Al Thomas’ book, "If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

al@mutualfundstrategy.com; 1-888-345-7870

Whenever I see mutual fund comparisons in the trade publications and in the financial section of the newspaper they almost always mention a specific fund and tell you how good it is in relation to its peer group. A peer group is a specialized sector of mutual funds that all invest in about the same type of stocks or areas of the world or size of companies or some such categorization.

Does this help you make money?

No.

Why?

You have several dogs. A minature poodle, a regular poodle and a very large poodle. On the outside they look very similar, but in performance they can be very different. In a race with a greyhound they will all lose. In a tracking contest with a beagle they will not be able to find the possum. In a contest with a retriever they will not get the bird as quickly. However the large poodle is bigger stronger and can do more than its counterparts. So what? You have the wrong dog for the job.

When you go hunting you don’t want a poodle you want a pointer, setter or beagle depending upon the prey. When you invest your hard-earned money in a mutual fund you want the best performer for the type of hunt in which you are engaged and that hunt is for maximum appreciation of your investment. Your prey may change form (from a duck to a possum) and as the prey changes so should the animal (fund) you use (invest) also change.

If you had stayed invested in the best technology fund you could find a year ago, the best one in the entire peer group, I can guarantee you have lost money. The sector has lost more than 75% of it value. It makes no difference if you have the best dog of that breed. If it can’t do the job you must change dogs. (Pun intended.)

The important thing to remember when choosing a mutual fund is to find one that is in a sector that is strong NOW, not a year or 3 years ago. When you go back for 3 years or 5 years you will find that there has been a period of time when that sector had or has a very big decline in value. When ANY fund starts down more than 10% to 20% (you decide) it is time to sell it for another fund that is still increasing in value.

When we are in a bear market, as we are now, you may not be to locate one that is going up. Do not listen to any broker who says that a group cannot go any lower. You must wait until you see it increasing in value every week for at least 2 months or more before committing any funds.

You only want to be invested in the best no-load fund in the strongest peer group at all times.

Al Thomas’ book, "If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

Reduce your investing and stock market risks by:

Setting your sights on the long term, patiently riding with the ups and downs!

If you have the time to be patient, you can benefit from time diversification. The more numerous good years for stocks outweigh the bad, pulling your return up.

Thus, if you hold equities for many years, you can expect to realize significant positive growth in your wealth.

Weeding out your laggards!

Don’t be too patient with laggards. This is the management risk referred to earlier. Underperforming the market benchmarks is a big risk to which many people are oblivious.

The more years you remain with a subpar performer, the greater the damage to your nest egg. Weed out funds that have lagged their peers over the past 18 to 24 months.

Avoiding hard-core market timing!

It’s not uncommon for hard-core market timers to move between the extremes of 100% stocks during an up market to 100% cash when their indicators signal a major turning point in prices.

Market timing is especially easy to do with mutual funds. Resist the temptation. Participation in the best up months is far more important than avoiding the worst down months, and the really dramatic upward surges in stocks are unpredictable, of short duration, and few and far between. Market timers risk being in cash when the bull stampedes. Missing out can make a big difference in your long-run returns.

Being disciplined and using cost averaging!

Investing monthly in a specific stock is a great way to build wealth and cope with market ups and downs. Your fixed investments buy more shares when prices are down and fewer at higher levels.

Cost averaging can help people become more disciplined because it encourages investing during market nadirs when individuals otherwise might be too fearful. A particularly good strategy is to double up on your investments when prices are depressed, if you’re able to. This will help enhance your long-term performance, by further reducing your average cost per share.

Copyright © 2005 I.E.C. Haramis

haramis@greekshares.com

http://www.greekshares.com

Ioannis - Evangelos C. Haramis was born in Greece in 1951 and he studied in Greece, USA and in Belgium. He has been active in the stock markets since 1972. Since 2002 he is New Business Development Managing Director at an Investment Bank.

There is so much involved in developing peak performance, that I recommend that all traders have a business plan. We recommend that the business plan cover all of the following areas.

• Your vision.

• Your purpose.

• Your objectives.

• A thorough self-assessment of your strengths and weakness, based upon real trading logs that you collect (if you haven’t done so already).

• A thorough assessment of the big picture of the fundamentals.

• A complete understanding of your beliefs about the market.

• Procedures for getting empowering beliefs and mental states behind you.

• A documentation of your research procedure for developing new systems and determining how to analyze their effectiveness.

• Your procedures for developing and maintaining discipline.

• Your budget and cashflow systems.

• Other necessary systems such as marketing, back office record keeping, etc.

• Your worst case contingency plan.

• System 1 – which is compatible with the big picture.

• System 2 – which is also compatible with the big picture.

• System 3 – which might come into play should the big picture change.

If you have all of those things, then you have a chance of doing well. But this means that your business plan becomes a tool for you to continually use to improve yourself and your trading. All of these topics were covered in some detail in our teleconference on business planning – and you can now get that series on CDs – including some sample plans that I critiqued during the last session.

You will notice that at the top of the list I include "vision." One of the keys to real success in trading is commitment. Before I coach a trader, I look for commitment. Those who are not committed to do what it takes, usually commit financial suicide when they try to be full time traders. Now, I have no idea how to give people commitment. It’s more like something they are born with – not something I can coach.

However, I do have some clues to how you can develop it in yourself. The key to doing so is to develop your vision and purpose. Your vision is your dream life. What do you really want to accomplish, be, and have in your life to know that you’ve done your best? What is your dream life? I’d write this out in detail.

And you also want the purpose behind the dream life. What are the "whys" in your life? This is what gives it the real motivation and commitment. Why do you want the things you want? Write down as many whys as possible. You’ll know you have it correct when you are so excited about your dream life that you must do something right now.

So get started this week with just this one aspect of developing your business plan for trading or investing…start by writing out your vision.

In the unique arena of professional trading coaches and consultants, Van K. Tharp stands out as an international leader in the industry. Helping others become the best trader or investor that they can be has been Tharp’s mission since 1982. Dr. Tharp offers very unique learning strategies, and his techniques for producing great traders are some of the most effective in the field. Over the years Dr. Tharp has helped people overcome problems in areas of system development and trading psychology, and success related issues such as self-sabotage.

Dr. Tharp is the author of three acclaimed books published by McGraw Hill; the New York Times Bestseller, Safe Strategies for Financial Freedom, Trade Your Way to Financial Freedom, and Financial Freedom Through Electronic Day Trading.

He is the founder and president of the Van Tharp Institute, dedicated to offering high quality education products and services for traders and investors around the globe. Learn more and register for his free weekly email newsletter at http://www.vantharp.com

We have two candidates for president that have really different ideas on how to make the economy grow.

Bush believes in the entrepreneurial approach. People should be allowed to invest in themselves. He even wants to let people have some of the 15% that now goes to the Social Security "trust fund". Folks, there ain’t no such thing. All the money the government takes out of your paycheck goes into the general fund and the pols spend it as they choose for "your best interest" provided it coincides with theirs. Am I being too cynical?

Gore believes the government should take care everything and everyone. The more dependency of the people on the government the better because the dependents will look to him for what they need and keep him in office. Forty percent of the people in this country pay no taxes at all.

But what is the important thing that will make the stock market continue to go up? Is Bush better than Gore for the market? Or visa versa? Is a Democrat better than a Republican for the stock market? Or visa versa?

Historically the market finishes the year up 14% when the incumbent party prevails. The Dow goes down 3% when the parties change in the White House. It would seem Mr. Gore would be a better bet. But little George has proposed a plan that would give wage earners the right to put 16% of their payroll taxes into a private investment account. This would certainly fuel the stock market.

Who takes care of those who do a poor job of investing and lose all their money? We are already taking care of them. Did you know the return on investment for Social Security is about 2 1/2%? A money market fund earns twice that. Yes, there will be some who do lose that small personal investment account; however, there will be many more who do well and will have a better lifestyle for their personal efforts. There will be another bear market and all the sheep will be sheared.

Right now the economy is so strong that Mr. Greenspan is doing his best to slow it down. And we are in a strong world economy. Even Germany and France have finally learned that the way to stimulate their country’s growth is to lower taxes. It has been an expensive lesson for them. Lower taxes mean more money for people to spend and invest, both of which stimulate the economy. Democrats needn’t worry that there will be less spending if they should lose the White House as the Republicans know how to spend as well as they do. Cynical again, huh?

When it comes right down to which man will do better or worse for the stock market it is a toss-up. The difference is made in Congress, not in the White House. The president tries to steer the Congress to act on his beliefs. One of the things few people remember - it is best to have opposing views between the executive and legislative branches of government. A Democratic president is balanced off by a Republican Congress. And visa versa.

We’ll just have to wait to see what this next election brings.

Al Thomas’ book, "If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

What a great statement!

I just heard someone use it in the context of personal and financial success and it struck me as a brilliant summary of an issue we raise in the SMG Tutorials.

Fear is a huge issue with a lot of traders. And interestingly, not just fear of failure but also fear of success.

I think there are two keys to taming fear [you can never eliminate it so don’t even try!].

The first and most critical is the one noted above – action. Action can tame fear in an instant. But it needs to be the right sort of action.

If you have a fear of heights, going bungee jumping may not be the best way to address it! But standing on a high bridge is a good first step.

In the same way, if you have a fear of losing your trading account, trying to face it down by putting it all on the line in one trade is not the best sort of action.

But taking considered, appropriate action [like the strict use of stop losses] is a way of taming fear. And getting past the paralysis stage that fear can create.

The second key is focus. By this I mean keeping in the moment and concentrating on the immediate action that is required to move you forward.

If your focus is too broad you can become overwhelmed by the possibilities. Or you might start to worry about things that are beyond your control or simply don’t matter – like what

But when you narrow your focus and remain “in the moment” in regard your trading, fear will be sidelined. The simple reason for this is that you can’t concentrate on two things at once!

And again, this will help overcome the paralysis that can be created by fear.

So if you suffer from fear in your trading - action and focus are the key!

David Chandler

Ordinary People Making Extraordinary Profits!

For a free mini-course on stock and options trading click the following link:

http://www.StockMarketGenie.com

Or visit our blog at:

http://stockmarketgenie.blogspot.com/

The above comments are offered for educational purposes only. We are not providing you with financial advice. We are simply sharing with you what has and hasn’t worked for us personally. If you wish to trade or invest in the stock market you should obtain advice from a registered licensed advisor.

Most advisors will tell you they can beat the market. They may even point to years in which they did. But now you will learn the little known fact that is seldom mentioned outside the financial world. It is very, very, VERY DIFFICULT TO BEAT THE MARKET.

The market in the United States, for the most, part is efficient. In fact the stock market is so hard to beat that most of the professionals do not do it. The only thing an investor should be looking at from an investment point if he/she uses a discount broker is the risk side. They should forget trying to beat the market with one exception.

The fact is that the market in the United States and most of the developed nations’ markets reflect all the known public information in the current share price. That does mean that they are perfectly priced. Far from it, stories such as WorldCom, Enron and others make certainly possible to beat the market with non-public information. The only way to make a superior return on the market is to have insider information, and trading with that is a crime in America.

If you are trying to invest, try not to beat the market. Make long-term decisions and leave beating the market to the professionals.

David Healy has spent years studying finance. He is dedicated to the education of people in finance and can be found at http://www.geocities.com/overlord_77520