Most recent sales of star performer Sino Hua-An Int'l

Reflections on record earnings this month trading stocks

This month, despite two thousand point drops on the Dow Industrials that threw Asian markets into mayhem, albeit only for a few days, I manage to pip the record month achieved in August '17 ; both reached records on the very last day of the month, with August's take squeaking past the old high in August '14 by 130, while the Feb '18 record came today, the 28th and the last trading session, edging out the former by under 300.

The latest high comes six months after the last, with a gap of three years between the one previous to it and an astounding 17-and-a-half years between the Aug '14 record and the one before it ( Feb '97)

So exactly twenty-one years, or roughly a generation, spans the earliest record month and the latest one.

So much has changed since that first high, when I was still an undergraduate speculating with hot money belonging to someone else. Back then, I paid little attention to fundamentals of stocks, preferring the seemingly more exact 'science' of technical analysis.

The Asian Financial Crisis swooped in like a plague later that year and changed promisingly bright day into dreadfully dark night, eventually wiping me out, earlier record profits and all!

I'd like to think that after 21 years of getting felled & dragging myself back into the game(3 times I might add), that I am a better and more accurate stock picker than I was back then.

But mercifully, the market teaches me to be humble on a daily basis, usually in the sense that stocks I 'felt' were going to jump just stagnated while unobserved or undetected stocks instead rocketed into the Top Volume or Top Gainer lists, leaving me feeling envious or rueful.

However, having so many years of experience allows me the practiced habit of quickly brushing the negative emotions aside and focusing on the next gem that will give me a nice income in the future.

In 2018, I'm especially wary of the year going the way of 1997, the mother of all stock market lessons for me, and so I'm fighting hard to keep my cash levels close to the six-figure mark, or 16% of my portfolio while attempting to ferret out as many dividends from as many Grahamian or near-Grahamian companies I can lay my hands on.


Having this year already reach 68% of the full-year income in 2016 and 72% of the full-year income in 2015, on top of the first two months earning 2-and-a-half times last year's take in Jan/Feb(bear in mind that last year was itself gratifyingly a record high year) and more than handily double 2014(the second best year on record)'s corresponding first two months is a great morale booster, but it has the distinctly dangerous tendency of making me slide into complacency.

This year, I promise myself to be far less flippant with my investing capital than even in the near past, to be incredibly patient with my prey, and to stick through any debilitating bear markets that may eventualise!

MMM Investor Survey

   


 
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
   
  
  
   
  
  

  
  
  
  
   
  
  


  
 
 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 
 
 
 







 

    


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   2. What is your age?  

  

   

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   3. How many trades have you made in all your stockbroking accounts in 2017?   

  

   

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   4. What is the average duration of your holding in a stock?  

  

   

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   5. Which do you think is the BEST description of investing in stocks?  

  

   

 Gambling in a casino

 Making quick money on insider news or rumours

 Roughly guessing the direction of a stock price  & making money off it

 Buying a share of an undervalued business, expecting it to increase in future

 Earning a return to beat inflation by choosing superior businesses trading below fair value
     

  

     

 


 

  

   6. How nervous do you get when a stock you've paid $10,000 or more for drops more than 10% within a week after purchase?  

  

   

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   7. Who do you most feel like blaming when your investment loses some of its value?  

  

   

 The person who gave you the buy tip

 Your stockbroker who let me buy it

 Mostly yourself
     

  

     

 


 

  

   8. What do you think is a fair membership fee for a club which provides you with the tools to become a consistently successful full-time trader/investor every year for ten years?  

  

   

 Free

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   9. What has been your average trading size in the past one year?  

  

   

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 $5001-$15000

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   10. How much time do you spend looking for information on a stock BEFORE you buy it?  

  

   

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Reverse Head & Shoulders in M'sia Marine & Heavy Eng

Conservative target is 1.00

Stock Trades 7th Jan 2018