Candlestick Charting is one of the most powerful tools in the trading arsenal of any trader. Candlestick Charts apply to any market no matter what you trade-stocks, forex, futures, options, ETFs, commodities, bonds and others. With one simple glance on the chart, you can figure out the sentiment of the buyers and sellers in the market. There are many candlestick patterns that are used as trading signals. Some are simple while others are complex. Doji Candlestick Pattern is a simple pattern that is very easy to spot. It has no body. It is formed when the opening and the closing prices are the same. So, this pattern is all wicks with no stick. It literally looks like a Cross on the chart. So you can easily spot it. But it is very rare as the security opening and closing prices are seldom equal! Doji has some variations. We will discuss these variations in this article!

For a Doji to be created, a trading day must begin and end with the same price. A whole lot of trading takes place during the day but when it is all said and done, the security price is right back where it had started in the morning.

When a Doji is formed with the opening and the closing prices equal, it is a signal that the battle between the bulls and the bears had been a draw during the trading day. Soon, either the bulls or the bears are going to previal. In other words, a trend reversal is about to take place.

Now, a Dragonfly Doji is a unique variation to the Doji Candlestick Pattern. It is formed when the opening, the closing and the high prices are all equal. Something quite rare and unique. So how is a Dragonfly Doji is formed? It is formed when the security price opens. It is traded down during the early part of the day. At some point in the trading day, the price action starts to recover and climb. It eventually closes at the high which happens to equal the open of the day. Something unique!

When a Dragonfly Doji is formed, bears initially decide to rule the market. But at some point the bulls step in and decide to buy again. When the bulls step in, they start pushing the price up. As the bulls dominate the trading day, the security price ends up right where it had started.

The low on this pattern can be taken as the support level because this was the level at which the bears entered the market and started buying. Dragonfly Doji is considered to be a bullish candlestick pattern.

A bearish Gravestone Doji Pattern is formed when the open and close of the day is equal to the low of the day. This is the most bearish of the Doji patterns. A bearish Gravestone Doji pattern signals the start of a prolonged downtrend in the security price.

As said before, this pattern is rare but very easy to spot on the chart. When it does form, get ready for a trend change!

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Master these Candlestick Patterns with this 82 page PDF FREE Candlestick Guide! Get this 49 page Quantum Swing Trading Report plus the shocking Profit Button Report that applies no matter what you trade-stocks, forex, futures or options FREE!

Money has always caused a huge dilemma in many of our lives, subscribing to the best financial newsletters seems to be the only way that you can stay on top of the financial world and all of the problems that everyone is facing. It seems as if things are not going to get any better at the present moment.

More and more people are being subject to unemployment because of the downfall of our current economy, and millions are searching for answers to the despair. It seems as if things are only going to get worse before we can ever see an improvement. The sad part is, no one knows when this so called improvement is going to show up or when to expect it.

According to many recent studies, it seems as if by the time that the current freshly entered workers are ready to settle down and retire they will simply not be able to. It seems as if the funds that many people depend on are going to be depleted. The stimulus package that was given out only protected big corporations and had no true effects on the people as a whole.

The only way that you can ensure that things will begin to look up for you and your family is to being investing early. The best financial newsletters will show you everything that you need to know to ensure that your money is going to justifiable places where it needs to be.

Currently EFT’s are beginning to climb the popularity scale. They bare similarities to the mutual funds that have been utilized for a while now, but have way more advantages. With the EFT’s there is no need to worry about maintenance fees and you do not have to be concerned about getting over taxed from choosing to invest.

It’s crazy that there is more of an expense to be able to invest. Millions of people are investing, yet millions are being subject to extra taxes because of their wise decisions. People that are not taking the correct protocols are being rewarded, that makes no sense in the least.

The best financial newsletters will help you learn all of the hard earned facts that come with investing in your future. Investments are something that you will be able to lean on in this world. Do not expect things such as social security or any other Government funded programs to help you in the future.

The best financial newsletters will take you through the exciting world of finances. They will teach you what you need to do to ensure that the rest of your life is taken care of, regardless if the Government has money to pay you to retire or not.

The best financial newsletters will show you all of the great things that you need to know about investing as well as show you some details of the benefits of doing so. Do not allow yourself to fall subject to having to work your entire existence just to make it, invest now before it is too late to do so.

There will be millions people that feel they have no choice but to work forever. Get your hands on one of the best financial newsletters and you will learn there are ways to get out of that type of predicament.

Go to best ETFs and sign up for their free newsletter to receive the best ETF of the month or find more about their ETF newsletter.

Safe High Return Investments Plano

Property investment has always been one of the most common methods of investing capital & can be a lucrative business option and hence many investors consider it an integral part of their diversified portfolio. It is a long term investment for individuals or families to obtain financial security for their present as well as future. However, you should consider some important points while doing property investment. If you are a beginner, you must look for a profitable property investment. The bottom line of property investment is to find an affordable property that can prove to be highly lucrative for the future. As time moves on, for example with newer media options of television and internet, new trends in property investment are appearing. So, always keep yourself informed about upcoming trends in property market with the help of these informative mediums. Prepare your property for resale and then sell the house quickly.

Residential property investment is the investment that can carry low risk and is not like investing in commercial property where investors have to worry about the conditions of businesses. Property investment loans are not as difficult to get as other types of loans and investing in residential properties can give investors a substantial financial boost. Also check out the history of capital growth rate in the area in last at least 15 years. Make sure that property investment is worth the capital benefit. You must also consider the population growth rate of the locality. If you are planning to invest in property, you need to take advice from experts or you can conduct research on the internet, attend seminars, interact with social groups and then read as much as possible regarding this matter to clear up all your investment doubts. Though the whole scenario of investments is always changing, property investment is still a viable means to enhance your financial portfolio. Because, the more you know about market, the better you will become at finding good property investments.

Wealth Management is classified as an advanced type of financial planning that provides High net worth individuals and families with private banking, estate planning, asset management, legal resources, and investment management, with the goal of sustaining and growing long-term wealth. The main objectives of wealth management are providing families dealing with services in retail banking, legal resources, investment management, and taxation advice goals to sustain and grow long-term wealth. Wealth management often includes further diversifying investments by adding real estate, precious metals, business and other untraditional investments.

Products dealt with in wealth management include stock trading and stocks, investments linked with equity, derivatives and products relating to structured investment, foreign exchange, unit trusts and mutual funds, investments and management of property, etc. Alternative investments with respect to wealth management include art, wine, precious metals, etc. Due to its prime importance, it is advisable to take the help of wealth management company while running a big enterprise. Because a wealth management company helps in growing long-term wealth for achieving long-term profit as It analyzes your wealth management plans including investments, insurance plans etc, calculates the related risks and then it proposes a wealth plan. It may provide many services like portfolio management, investment management, portfolio rebalancing, trust and estate management, private management, tax advice and financing solutions etc.

A wealth management company sometimes also implements some useful financial tools like stocks and stock trading, structure savings products, structured investment products and derivatives, equity linked investments, property management and investment solutions, mutual funds and alternate investment options. These tools provide assistance in making your money grow and provide you long-term investment benefits. Thus, proper wealth management with the help of financial planning can make you gain very fruitful returns on your investments which will have increasing volume each time.

Safe High Return Investments Dallas

For anyone who is interested in investing in the stock market, there are numerous mutual funds that can be worth investigating. When you are carrying out this sort of research, it is best to choose a few different mutual funds. To compare mutual funds you will have to keep various benchmarks in sight. The first one is the performance of the different companies that you have chosen.

This means looking to see how the company has weathered the ups and downs of the stock market over a number of years. While this is not an indication of future success, it will let you know if the mutual funds company is capable of performing well, even if there is no clear indication of the prices of stocks changing. You can find this information in various financial guides.

You will get an idea of how the stock market affects different types of mutual funds from these different data sources and, once you have understood these changes and the way your prospective portfolio is affected by them, you will know which funds are best avoided and which ones are all right to study further. However, it takes more than just looking through financial reviews to compare mutual funds in a meaningful way.

You will also have to see what sorts of costs are listed by the different mutual funds. These expenses will include administrative costs, advertising costs, buying and selling of stocks and bonds and also the types of load costs. As most of these costs need to be borne by the customer, it is best if you research this information thoroughly.

You can find this information in newspapers and on financial Internet sites. However, ensure that you fully understand all of the information that is given, as this makes investing in a mutual fund easier. In addition to these ideas on how to compare mutual funds, you will also discover lots of in-depth articles.

These articles will explain the different terms used in mutual fund articles. You will also be given details about the types of mutual funds that are available on the stock exchange at the moment.

By looking at all of this information, you can make a well-informed decision about which mutual funds are worthwhile investing in. Ensure that you examine all of these facts when you are ready to begin investing. The details gleaned from comparing the mutual funds will give you the best chance for investing wisely in the risky world of mutual funds.

If you are interested in Investing in Mutual Funds or saving at all, please pay us a visit at our website entitled Saving in Mutual Funds Get a totally unique version of this article from our article submission service

Stock investing for beginners is a really challenging task, especially if you investment beginner is someone who doesn’t know anything about the stocks or the companies that issue them. So before you take off and make some plans to invest, here are few things that you should know first.

The most challenging part of stock investing for beginners is to do investment planning. But before you get started with your plans, beginners should get familiar with stocks and the stock market. A stock is having an ownership in a company. When you have stock, you have a stake in that company. Once you become an owner, you can sell pieces of your ownership when you sell your stock and the additional money raised in that sale goes toward the company capital. This capital is used for company expansion or the acquisition of certain assets. Company debts can be paid down as well. Some of the most well known large companies have public listed shares.

What is the stock market? It’s a buyers and sellers auction and the transactions are conducted on various stock exchange sites. The consistent trading causes a supply and demand cycle that basically controls the cost of stock. So if the demand goes up with one stock, so does the price and vice versa.

Now that you know the fundamentals, it is time to start building your investment portfolio. Beginners should always seek a stock broker for mediation. The stock broker is go between with the buyer and seller. Through the broker, you are able to buy several types of investments, stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. This broker will receive a small commission that is included with the total transaction cost. A traditional broker will tell you exactly what your better options versus a discount broker will give you the freedom of making your own choices.

The success of stock investing for beginners is dependent upon how motivated you are to learn the stock market and how well you build your portfolio. It will take some time to start having much success, so expect to win some and lose some. As a precaution for beginners, do not use the money in that you can’t afford to lose.

Looking to find the best way in Investing in Stock, then visit www.investinginstock.org to find the best advice on a free stock analysis and how to trade stocks.

Anybody who has lost money this last year in the stock market may be unsettled. This has been a tough couple of years where almost everyone has come out a loser. The stock market is a place where anybody can look like a fool when it is going down and look like a hero when all stocks are going up.

Even though the market has made a small comeback, it does not guarantee that it will not start to head back down again. This is where you start to wonder whether you are missing out by not being in the market or whether this is just a false upward move before heading back down again. Professional investors have a slight advantage here because they are trained to understand market tendencies and to analyze the market.

Many people have thought about averaging down during this bear market, which just means they would buy more stock of what they already have but at lower prices. That would in effect lower the cost per share of the stocks they have but they would of course have more of them. This is a great thing to do if you can catch the market at the bottom but if the market has further to fall, then you just end up losing more money.

Any expert in the stock market will preach about the importance of stock diversification when you do get back in. What that entails is spreading your bets around on a variety of stocks rather than putting all your eggs in one basket. This is important because you want to protect yourself from picking one really bad stock and then losing most or even all of your money.

If this terrible market environment we have had now though, even those who were properly diversified have lost. Nothing can protect you from losing when the market goes down as much as it has and that is something you must be aware of and accept. Investing in stocks is risky and you should never invest money that you cannot afford to lose. Shortly though, it will be time to get back in the market and those that have strong stomachs will be the ones who stand to profit.

Do you want to learn how to trade stock for beginners? If you would, please visit my site Stock Market For Dummies.

Safe High Return Investments Plano

Bill Gates probably doesn’t invest in mutual funds (funds), maybe because most of his money is tied up in Microsoft stock.  Warren Buffet made his billions by managing investments, so he does not need their help, either.  But, if you have money to invest and don’t really know how to invest and manage an investment portfolio, you should consider investing in mutual funds.  Millions of average investors do.

Keep in mind that mutual funds are designed for folks who want professional investment management at a moderate cost.  These are not short-term investments, but rather are for people with longer-term investment horizons.  Once you have cash reserves in the bank for short term needs like emergencies, you are ready to invest.

 Should you invest in mutual funds?  If one or more of the following apply to you, you probably should.

If you want to accumulate a nest egg for retirement, give these investment packages consideration.  For example, if you have a typical 401k plan at work, most of the investment options available to you are mutual funds.

If you decide to open a traditional IRA or Roth IRA, consider going with a major mutual fund family.  This will give you a wide array of investment options, from safe and conservative to aggressive and growth oriented.

If you want to start slow and learn how to invest as you go, you should invest in mutual funds.  For example, you can set things up so that $100 a month automatically flows from your checking account to a couple of mutual funds within a fund family.

If you want to invest in stocks and/or bonds, but don’t know how to invest in them, join the crowd and do it the sensible and easy way with funds.

If you have a lump sum of money to invest from a retirement plan, a CD that matured or from an inheritance, look no further.  For example, if you leave your job where you had money in a 401k, you can move it and avoid taxes and penalties with a direct rollover to a mutual fund family.

If you are retired and want to earn a higher return with relative safety, try bond funds in addition to money market funds.  When you want to receive a monthly income, they will send you the amount you specify.

If you want an investment in real estate, oil & gas, or gold the easy way, invest in mutual funds and let them deal with the details.

It doesn’t matter if you are young or old, rich or of modest means, conservative or aggressive as an investor.  You need an investment portfolio that contains a variety of investment types.  Unless you really know how to invest and can manage your own stocks, bonds, and money market securities…you should invest in mutual funds.

Finally, if you don’t know much about investing…you’re probably a red-blooded American.  As a financial planner I worked with folks from all walks of life.  Few knew how to invest on their own, so I often recommended mutual funds.

Safe High Return Investments Dallas

Retirement calculators are web tools that help people figure out how much they need to save for retirement. Do you need how much money you’ll need per month? Internet charts can help you a lot when it comes to picturing and understanding different scenarios. All the amounts you get as estimates usually depend on the daily dollar values. Moreover, retirement calculators also adjust the return on investment with a certain inflation rate, usually around 3%.

Some web retirement calculators help people determine the amount of money they will currently need when they retire. Starting from these premises, you can identify the best way to achieve your goals, particularly since improvements in the saving plans are possible. When using retirement calculators, you need to fill in sections or answer questions, but some of them will not apply to your situation, and can just be skipped.

Expenses, pension income and taxes are the basic factors that are used by retirement calculators, because these elements are the most likely to affect your retirement. You can get a very general idea about how much you can withdraw from your retirement plan, and how long the savings can last. There are different retirement calculators and they can be found on many financial web sites that aim at improving retirement saving goals. Even if tools differ according to the software on which they rely, the core methodology remains the same.

Thus, you will start by entering the current income, the anticipated retirement age and the expected annual savings. A maximum of 80% of your current salary is the estimate set by most financial planners. Besides individual factors, retirement scenarios can only be created if several market variables are taken into consideration. Most tools will display the results with the highest rate of success, because this is what people are interested in.

If you are also interested in the ratings given to the various online retirement calculators you can check reviews and detailed features for further information. Any user can in fact give a rating depending on the personal experience with a certain program. You’ll see that retirement calculators are often a topic of discussion on forums that discuss retirement in detail. The thing is that there is also advice available for maximizing the usage conditions of retirement calculators so that you can ensure a more comfortable retirement. Good luck!

To read more concerning financial retirement planning, Retirement Planning Advice, or Investing For Retirement tips, head to my blog for more great tip about Retirement Income Planning, to discover how to start saving and investing for your retirement today.

The options market has caught the fancy of many investors and this is not surprising. The beauty of options is embedded in its very name. You have the options but not the obligation to buy or sell stocks at a given price by a given time. Now for options buyers this option unlike futures limits their maximum liability to the option premium they had paid at the time of buying the options contract.

In’78, Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) began options trading on popular stock indexes such as the S&P 500 Stock Index. The CBOE options trades in multiples of $100 per index point. This is much cheaper than the $250 multiple per index point for the S&P futures contract.

An index option allows the investor to buy the stock index at a set point within the given time period. Let’s take an example. Suppose the S&P 500 Index is at 1100 points. You have a bullish opinion of the market and are of the opinion that the S&P 500 Index will go further up.

There are options Greeks that you need to understand. Time and volatility are two very important factors for an options contract. In case of an index options, what this means is that if any time for the next three months you decide to exercise your call option, you will get $100 for each point the index is above 1150. So you decide to purchase a call option at 1150 for three months for 50 points. In other words you paid an option premium of $5000.

So when an options contract loses value, you only lose the premium that you had paid while buying that contract. In that case you will only lose the premium of $5000 that you had paid to buy the call index option. Now, 1150 is the strike price of the index option. In case the S&P 500 Index does not rise above 1150, you can simply decide to not exercise your call option.

So for you to make a profit with this call option, the S&P 500 Index will have to rise above 1200 point within the next three months otherwise you will lose your premium. Contrast this with S&P futures. Call options are considered to be bullish.

In case the S&P Index had fallen to 1100 point, you would have recouped your options premium. Put options are considered to be bearish. A Put Index Option works in exactly the same way as a Call Index Option except that you make profit when the stock index goes down. If you had bought the put index options instead of the call index option in our example above, every point below the strike price of 1150 would have given you a profit of $100.

Options are highly dependent on the volatility of the market as well as time to expiry. As the options contract nears expiry, its premium starts decreasing. The more the options contract is away from expiry, the higher the premium you will have to pay. But the most important factor is the expected volatility of the market. Now the option premium that you pay is determined by the market and it depends on many factors like interest rates and dividend yield.

Mr. Ahmad Hassam has done Masters from Harvard University. Try these cash printing Forex Signals from heaven. Discover a revolutionary Forex Robot System! This and other unique content ” articles are available with free reprint rights.

Safe High Return Investments Plano

Different Types of Investments: As we said last time, owning a stock is like owning part of a company. As the company rises or falls in value, so does the price of it’s stock. A key distinction is that the value of the stock is not only driven by the fundamental value of the company, but by other factors as well. These factors may include overall stock market trends, domestic versus foreign trade issues, business sector climate, etc. Owning a bond, is like owning part of a loan to a company or institution, like the State of Texas. Bonds typically pay a fixed amount of dividend as the loan is repaid. The bond’s value is determined by the interest rate on the underlying loan, and the current interest rates and trends in the marketplace. For example, who would not want own a 10% bond right now, when the money markets or bank passbook savings accounts are paying 3%? Should the institution or company fail or default on the loan, you could lose all or most of your bond’s value. Large companies or institutions usually issue bonds; so the risk is greatly reduced over owning a company’s stock share. A stock mutual fund, is a group of stocks owned by a fund company to achieve certain investment objectives. Likewise a bond mutual fund is a group of bonds held to achieve a certain investment objective. Mutual funds, in both stock and bond types exist in many styles and forms. Fundamentally they are a savvy collection of stocks or bonds assembled and professionally managed for a specific or combination of investment aims. These typically diversify your investments so that no one particular company can sink your entire investment. The converse is that no one single stock can shoot your mutual fund up to a huge return. Typically each mutual fund focuses upon growth, income, value, large, small or mid-capitalization companies, or a combination of these objectives. There are thousands of different funds and dozens of fund families to choose from. There are also companies that rate mutual funds, like Morningstar (www.morningstar.com ). Some mutual funds use a management team to select and prune stocks in the portfolio, some use certain methods, and some follow the leadership of a single fund manager. You should check these out before investing in a particular fund. An oft-overlooked mutual fund consideration is the management fee or what are referred to as 12b-1 fees. Most fees are in the range of 1 to 2%. Be wary of any fund outside that range. The United States Securities and Exchange Commission can help unravel some of these issues for you. A good starting point is their investor section on mutual fund performance, specifically www.sec.gov/investor/pubs/mperform.htm . They also have a fund cost calculator to help take into account the fund management fees. Some funds are no-load mutual funds because they do not pay a sales person any commissions for selling fund shares. These are typically lower in cost, and if you own them for a long time, they can make a difference in the net return on your mutual fund investment. Conversely, there are loaded funds, which charge a commission when you invest in their fund. These vary widely in amounts, so ask for exact details before investing. Some require you to pay the sales commissions; others add that to the fund expenses. Either way it’s a cost to you. The Vanguard Funds (www.vanguard.com ) are often mentioned as a leader in creating no-load, low cost mutual funds. You will find compelling arguments at their website for owning no-load funds. You should check carefully on overall fund performance including fees when evaluating fund choices. Measuring Risk: Most mutual fund and stock tables and resources will list something called the beta or volatility of the items listed. Beta is a measure of the risk of the security listed associated with variation of the security when compared to the overall stock market. If beta is 1, then the stock or mutual fund varies about the same as the general market index. If less than 1, then the security is less volatile than the general index of comparison, with higher than 1 meaning more risk. Measuring Risk-adjusted Returns: There is also parameter called alpha, which is the market-adjusted return of the security. If alpha is positive, then the security earned a higher return than the relative market index of comparison. If alpha is negative, then the security earned less than the market did. Minimizing Overall Risk: Risks in the future may be reduced in the present only through preparation, planning and actions! We discussed preparation and planning for the future in the last Investment Corner, which is a key risk-reduction strategy. Risk reduction for investing is typically achieved through: • Diversification, • Portfolio Allocation, • Pre-determined buying and selling prices, and • Adherence to personal investing rules. Now let’s look at the first part of risk reduction strategy for investing. Diversification: Diversification is spreading out your investments across several areas to reduce risk and capture growth in multiple places. Diversification is typically done at several levels. At the uppermost level, we typically diversify investments across different investment vehicles, such as cash, stocks, bonds and real estate. By doing this, we reduce several important risks. Inflation can reduce the value of cash on hand over time, which is why smart folks do not keep their life savings in cash hidden in a mattress! On the other hand, inflation can drive down the value of fixed dividend investments like bonds as well. Real estate may rise or decline with inflation, depending upon the health of both the local and the greater economies. Fixed hard assets like precious metals funds (gold) will usually rise on inflation or fears of inflation. Other risks include stock market declines, individual company bankruptcies, and so on…. By not “placing all the eggs in one basket” we lower our exposure to risks through diversification. During broad stock market declines, many folks move assets from stocks to cash or bonds. And of course the opposite during bull market runs. Another diversification notion is that of slicing up your investment by specific growth sectors. Within a specific type of investment vehicle, say Mutual Funds, we diversify across the available growth and income sectors. Typically this is large, medium and small companies, as well as high dividend or high growth type stocks. You also could look into diversifying into domestic or international companies such as Asia-Pacific. At the lower levels of investment diversification are multiple choices within a specific growth target. Most advisors strongly recommend diversification within a stock or bond market holding. If you feel for example that the Internet’s growth will continue or expand soon, buying stock in several companies who offer Internet products would help lower risk of any one company not doing too well. Diversification across several stocks is usually done in simple form through equal partitioning. If for example you had $10,000 to invest, how would you do it? You could place 20% of your total investment amount in each of 5 different Internet stocks as in Table I: Table I –Stock Investment Diversification Stock Name Current Price 90 Day High 90 Day Low Amount Invested ~ Shares Company A $25 $28 $20 $2000 80 Company B $40 $40 $20 $2000 50 Company C $60 $60 $20 $2000 33 Company D $300 $300 $198 $2000 7 Company E $8 $9 $3 $2000 250 By looking at the trading ranges across the 90-day history, you can estimate the risks or volatility of each stock. Do the stocks have the same risks? Do they all have the same growth potential? One approach would be to allocate risks equally, as opposed to allocating investment equally. You would be to use the information in the range of stock trading prices to assess risk and re-allocate your investments as this diversification calculator shows below in table II: Table II – Risk Diversification Calculator Risk Diversification Calculator Investment Amount $10,000 Stocks 5 Stock_1 Stock_2 Stock_3 Stock_4 Stock_5 90-day Max $28 $40 $60 $300 $9 90-day Min $20 $20 $20 $198 $3 Cur. Price $25 $40 $60 $300 $8 Trade Rnge 32% 50% 67% 41% 100% Eq. Amt $2,000 $2,000 $2,000 $2,000 $2,000 $$ at Risk $640 $1,000 $1,333 $819 $2,000 Risk Ratio 1 1.5625 2.083 1.28 3.125 Risk-Red. $2,000 $1,280 $960 $1,562 $640 Adj. Inv.$3,104 $1,987 $1,490 $2,425 $993 If you do not want to do the research and monitoring required for several individual stocks or bonds, choosing a mutual fund may be the wisest choice, with a smaller but usually acceptable return on your investment. The key question you need to answer is not “Should I diversify?”, but rather “How will I diversify my investments?” About YOU The primary things you should know about yourself before selecting among the different types of investments are: I. How much of my time is available to monitor/manage my investments? II. How often do I want to change my investment choices? III. Do I want help and advice from investment professionals? These are important questions you need to answer for yourself. All investment requires some time commitments to monitor and manage. When stock markets or life situations begin to change, you may need to change your investment choices. If your experience level does not warrant it, getting professional help may increase both your results and comfort level. I. Time to manage your investments: Your time is worth money! At least if you can put it to good use in managing your investments… but do not become obsessive with it. Investments take time to grow. Every investment portfolio must be watched and pruned from time to time. You wouldn’t want to look back after 5 years and find that right after your investment choices were made, that the business climate changed and those choices had become poor performers. Two typical uses of your time applied to investment managing: • Weekly, monthly or quarterly checking for: o Stock movements o Business climate changes, o Company news • Annual or quarterly allocation changes o Re-planning or shifting your plans o Pruning and re-diversification o Reallocation of investment amounts Weekly or Monthly Check-ups If you buy individual stocks and bonds, these will need monitoring more often than if you had purchased mutual funds. However, stock and bond funds need attention too, just less often. Some questions you should answer for yourself are: • Can I afford time each week to check investments (Friday night or Saturday morning)? This is important for individual stocks and bonds. •Am I disciplined enough to check my investments periodically? This is critically important, as the business environments are constantly changing. • Can I put this on a monthly calendar and stick with it? Monthly checkups are important no matter what your investments may be… • If I get an automatic e-mail sent will I read it? Many investment houses will do this for all accounts above a certain size limit. You can pool your investments under one roof, usually with savings in cost plus perks for research, quotes, e-mails, etc. Both Fidelity and Schwab are good examples of these services once you reach certain size limits. Quarterly or Annual Check-ups If you are only into mutual funds as investment vehicles, then you need check them only quarterly or annually. After all you are giving up some small amount of income to pay for professionally managed investments, right? You may want to keep up with monthly or weekly news on the investment fund management team, however, as management team shakeups there could cost you. The key thing is disciplined reviews and setting a schedule that you can stick to. Ignorance in this case can be dangerous, so do it together with your spouse or a family member that you trust. As you get good at it, the time required to do these should drop from several hours to perhaps an hour to review all your investments. If you have been keeping tabs on things, it can be shorter still. “Even if you’re on the right track you will get run over if you just sit there!” – Will Rogers. II. Changing your investment choices: The challenge when deciding to change investments is often the emotional content. “We had a return of say 7%, when the broader markets got only 5%”. How did the overall group for your investment vehicle do? Morningstar provides good index comparisons, as do other groups. If your choices did not perform above the class average for 1 or 2 quarters in a row, it’s probably a good idea to consider other alternatives. That may require all the same diligence of researching an investment as you did originally. If you are seriously concerned and need to act quickly, you can always sell and put the proceeds into cash or a money market for a short time while you do the research. III. Getting help from professionals: I have often found the larger funds and investment houses to be a plethora of information via the Internet. They have how-to guides, acronym explanations, and in general some great advice. If however, these seem to complex for you, or you would prefer to seek out a single person with whom to deal, then find a Certified Financial Planner. The best ones should be able to provide references, a track record, and a good deal of services all at your doorstep. These services do not come free and can be in the thousands of dollars to set up your initial plans. Be certain to check 3 to 5 references and interview several planners before deciding. Determine what you pay exactly and what you get exactly after your selection is made. Be certain that they are certified, a place to begin is: http://www.cfp.net/ . Summary We’ve covered a lot of ground in this topic of stock and bonds versus mutual funds. Primarily remember that individual stocks require more monitoring, but can yield higher returns. The same applies somewhat to individual bonds. Newer investors to these may want to start with mutual funds, Money magazine has an annual issue every February that is very helpful and is usually available at public libraries. Finally remember to lower your risks by diversification, no matter what investments you make. Ask yourself the questions we reviewed about your time commitments and discipline for monitoring as part of the investing process. And of course, read-up on the Internet and some of the books listed below. Next time – Portfolio Allocation, Pre-determined trigger points, and Personal investing rules … Self-Study: Some great resources to continue your journey are located on the web. Try visiting these sites: •http://www.greatcompaniesgreatcharts.com/archives/001864.html •http://www.rightline.net/home/gate_rm.html •http://www.investorguide.com/stockfaq.html •http://www.pascoresearch.com/int_alpha.asp •http://www.stockbook.com/Evaluator/ Or read these well known authors and books: • William J. O’Neil: How to Make Money in Stocks • John Boik: Lessons from the Greatest Stock Traders of All Time • John C. Bogle: Common Sense on Mutual Funds : New Imperatives for the Intelligent Investor Additional info from this author may be found at http://www.sbtionline.com

Safe High Return Investments Dallas