I just sold a terrific high yield bond fund I’ve been invested in for a few years. Why do I say it was terrific?  Because based on my original purchase price, it was paying me a handsome 8.3 % dividend.  And the dividends came out every month just like clockwork.  Also, I sold it for [...]

I recently made a hard decision to sell one of my gold stocks.  It was difficult because the stock was up 125% from where I bought it.  And we always want to hang on to winners. But I was dissatisfied because it paid no dividends.  So I made the tough call.  And I sold the [...]

I made a hard decision today. I sold two gold stocks in my portfolio that I had done well with.  Actually, very well, as I was up 135% on one and 40% on another. And I kind of agonized over it for a bit, although I shouldn’t have.  Selling stocks when you’ve made a good [...]

I’ve been amused with a television ad where one neighbor asks another about his financial retirement plans.  As the other neighbor is trimming his hedge, he replies, rather hesitantly, that he’s shooting to save about a gazillion dollars and he plans to just throw money at it and hope he hits it. The gist of [...]

When you go to an auction, you have every right to expect the bidding to be fair.  That is to say that you think you have an equal chance to place a bid just as all the other bidders do. And it seems reasonable to expect that all bids are sincere bids, i.e. when someone, [...]

In an earlier post we talked about why it’s smart to keep more cash in your stock market account.  This idea runs counter to what most investors think because they always want to be “fully invested.” But we described how Warren Buffett feels much more favorably to cash than the average investor, and that he [...]

Many investors feel they should be fully invested when it comes to their stock market account.  They feel they should have all of their cash working for them. And hey, I get this.  It has a very rational sound to it. But it just isn’t necessarily so.  Indeed, it’s probably a rookie error to do [...]

Sometimes the smart thing to do is to sell your shares of stock. So it’s good to know how to do this beforehand and take the mystery out of the process. I assure you the process is pretty routine and a lot like buying it.  But we’ll walk through it step by step and you’ll [...]

Have you ever looked at your past raises from work and figured what they may be in the future.  In other words, how big your paycheck might be five years from now. Or looked at a social security statement that estimates the amount your retirement check will be at some future date. I think many [...]

Here’s the smart way to let your stock profits run and limit your losses.  I like this method because often, even when your stock has gone down, you cash out at a profit. That has a nice sound to it, yes? So let’s check it out.  This technique is called trailing stop losses, and it [...]