The Rokslide Stock Traders Thread

[Marshfly]

Bowhiker says above “I was referring to people assuming they can pick stocks successfully over the long term.”

He also says “ If someone thinks they’re gonna pick stocks over the long term and beat the market,they better understand how stocks work “

I think there was a time when people picked stocks and some people did it successfully and some people did it unsuccessfully. But it was still people making human decisions.

But I suspect an individual picking stocks now is competing against professionals backed up with supercomputers running AI with Phd mathematicians writing the algorithms. No matter how smart individual investors may be, they are playing against a stacked deck. Over the long term, individuals cannot compete against the pro’s

You are confusing active trading designed to generate income and building a portfolio of assets designed to generate growth in the value of those assets. Algo traders are not buying stocks to hold. You are not competing with them. In reality, they WANT you to buy as much as you can so they can borrow those shares when they would like to short them.

Most people think they are the same or at least similar, They are not. This thread title refers to "Stock Traders" but a lot of the talk veers off into investing. They are totally, 100% different things.

That said, I personally do not invest in the market. I trade. Options specifically. I consider my trading a business and run it as such. Any successful trader does. The returns I get from trading make normal long term investing a pointless use of my capital.

 

[cowdisciple]

I don't think Bowhiker and I actually disagree at all, I just wanted to make the point that managing a portfolio doesn't have to be hard unless you make it hard.

 

[Marshfly]

I don't think Bowhiker and I actually disagree at all, I just wanted to make the point that managing a portfolio doesn't have to be hard unless you make it hard.

I totally agree. You don't have to beat the Wall Street pros. You just have to beat the return your advisor is giving you when you include his fees. That's not that hard.

Just remember, it's your money and retirement. It's YOUR responsibility.

 

[cowdisciple]

You are confusing active trading designed to generate income and building a portfolio of assets designed to generate growth in the value of those assets. Algo traders are not buying stocks to hold. You are not competing with them. In reality, they WANT you to buy as much as you can so they can borrow those shares when they would like to short them.

Most people think they are the same or at least similar, They are not. This thread title refers to "Stock Traders" but a lot of the talk veers off into investing. They are totally, 100% different things.

That said, I personally do not invest in the market. I trade. Options specifically. I consider my trading a business and run it as such. Any successful trader does. The returns I get from trading make normal long term investing a pointless use of my capital.

Keep on keeping the market liquid, friend! I do think that for people who really know what they're doing and understand the risks, there's probably a place for some kind of box-spread option trading to be pretty profitable.

Big Ern wrote a really good primer on it, maybe when I retire I'll have the time and inclination to give it a try.

Options Trading - Early Retirement Now

The strategy in a nutshell I’ve written about this strategy in previous posts, most recently in Part 10 and Part 11. But briefly, here is what I’m doing: Returns since 2018 Why 2018? I’ve been trading options since 2011, but the account size was much smaller then, and I ran this strategy and a...

earlyretirementnow.com

 

[bowhiker88]

Bowhiker says above “I was referring to people assuming they can pick stocks successfully over the long term.”

He also says “ If someone thinks they’re gonna pick stocks over the long term and beat the market,they better understand how stocks work “

I think there was a time when people picked stocks and some people did it successfully and some people did it unsuccessfully. But it was still people making human decisions.

But I suspect an individual picking stocks now is competing against professionals backed up with supercomputers running AI with Phd mathematicians writing the algorithms. No matter how smart individual investors may be, they are playing against a stacked deck. Over the long term, individuals cannot compete against the pro’s

Yeah so my view on the quants and algorithmic as well as factor based volumes in todays market is that it provides opportunity for fundamental stock pickers through larger volatility events. Ie oversold stocks become much more oversold while overbought becomes much more overbought in a faster period of time.

And yes anyone managing money should understand what ultimately makes stocks go up.

 

[bowhiker88]

I totally agree. You don't have to beat the Wall Street pros. You just have to beat the return your advisor is giving you when you include his fees. That's not that hard.

Just remember, it's your money and retirement. It's YOUR responsibility.

We don’t disagree haha. I just thought someone had made a comment about 13% being a cakewalk as long as you stay disciplined. Which may seem somewhat true since weve just come out of a period of artistically low interest rates. If anyone can put up 13-15% every year with low volatility well then they have the recipe for wealth creation in the multiples of billions haha

 

[KsRancher]

That's just it, they aren't good at what they do. They managed to convince millions of Americans that 6-8% returns are great and that is marginal. They managed to convince people that "nobody can beat the market" so you can't either but you pay them 1% for the privilege of underperforming SPY. They managed to convince people that holding on to losers without a stop loss point is the only way to go and it's not. It's terrible, terrible advice. They are salespeople and that's it.

^^^this right here.

I have a 401 thru my employer at Edward Jones. Their returns sucks!!! The SPY beats the crap out of them. I have called in several times to try and get all my money put in the SPY. Same answer every time "our policy won't allow that as it's not diversified enough". I finally figured out that those people have no clue. They brag about their "very low fee". They make money off their funds that your money is in by buying and selling their own funds. And it doesn't show up as a "fee".


I have my money if the "highest return" category with Edward Jones and I would be getting 50% more return if it would all be in the SPY. I used to put in 11% and my employer 3%. I dialed my all the way back to the 3% match. I will invest any extra on my own.

 

[5MilesBack]

I know there’s never a bad time to get into the market if you’re in for the long haul.

Some say that, but.........back in early 2000 I recharacterized a traditional IRA to a Roth. They had some weird rules back then and one of them was that you couldn't have income above $100k in the year of recharacterization. Well, I had a boatload of gains in the stock market from late 1999 till mid 2000. I really wanted to sell near the peak. But if I sold them, that would have put income well above $100k, and I would have had to revert the Roth back to traditional. Looking back, selling them near the peak and reverting the Roth would have made more sense. But at the time I just road it out.

Well, if anyone remembers.....2000 was when the dot com bubble burst, and was the Presidential election with the "hanging chad". It took 36 days after the election before it was finalized. Markets don't like uncertainty, and I lost 60% just in those 36 days. It took 17 years to recover back to where my valuations were at their highs in 2000.

So ya.......WHEN you invest does make a difference.

 

[NDGuy]

My 10k share buy of PR hit this am, hoping to swing a nice $35-45k trade. Many O&G analysts have PR PT at mid-twenties now!
Did this Dec.'23 - March '24 for $36k.
Overall would like to see $400k total profit in PR by years end, time will tell. Those early '20-'22 CDEV years were long and tough, but worth the hold!

Who else is still holding or investing in PR?

You were targeting sub $15?

 

[BeaverHunter]

Anyone have any thoughts on UPS. Been down for 8 straight days on no real news. Solid earnings,(obviously down from peak covid craziness) wide moat, great dividend. I like it at where it’s at.

 

[Beendare]

You are confusing active trading designed to generate income and building a portfolio of assets designed to generate growth in the value of those assets. Algo traders are not buying stocks to hold. You are not competing with them. In reality, they WANT you to buy as much as you can so they can borrow those shares when they would like to short them.

Most people think they are the same or at least similar, They are not. This thread title refers to "Stock Traders" but a lot of the talk veers off into investing. They are totally, 100% different things.

That said, I personally do not invest in the market. I trade. Options specifically. I consider my trading a business and run it as such. Any successful trader does. The returns I get from trading make normal long term investing a pointless use of my capital.

Great post…in fact a couple great posts on this page.

After getting my ass handed to me by a couple financial planners back in the 80’s…I have invested my own money. Its easy now with ETFs to both manage risk and be in good sectors going forward.

For years, I had the financial planners tell me I was “Too concentrated in tech”. They just didn’t get the principle that a long time frame lessens your risk.

Ask yourself; what sector of the market will become more and more a part of our lives over time? Its tech…and it has been for the last 30 years too.

 

[Marshfly]

Great post…in fact a couple great posts on this page.

After getting my ass handed to me by a couple financial planners back in the 80’s…I have invested my own money. Its easy now with ETFs to both manage risk and be in good sectors going forward.

For years, I had the financial planners tell me I was “Too concentrated in tech”. They just didn’t get the principle that a long time frame lessens your risk.

Ask yourself; what sector of the market will become more and more a part of our lives over time? Its tech…and it has been for the last 30 years too.

This is true. Before people go all in on the just buy SPY train, they should look at how the index is actually built, what the top 10 holdings are, and how much of the overall SnP return is due to them. (Hint: all of it) You can buy just the winners and leave out the other 480-490 dogs and beat the index easily. Do a manual backtest over the past how ever many years and rebalance that every year as they reweight the index (a lot of people don't realize that even happens). See what that basket did compared to SPY overall. This is just not that hard.

You want to be more diverse than that? OK. Take the top guys in the sectors of the index and do the same thing. This takes like one Saturday a year or every six months.

 

[SquatchHunter]

Anyone have any thoughts on UPS. Been down for 8 straight days on no real news. Solid earnings,(obviously down from peak covid craziness) wide moat, great dividend. I like it at where it’s at.

Shoot. It’s been in a downtrend for like 2-3 years. That being said it’s looking like it’s starting to retrace back to the mid/upper 140s. Might get lucky buying, going back up towards the latest high structure point around earnings and pushing through with good news. Working as a competitor to UPS we are definitely way busier now than we were last year so that would be promising.

Shoot maybe I’ll buy calls

 

[Ucsdryder]

With 25 committed years before retirement how would you balance your portfolio? 85/15? 80/20? 75/25? 70/30?

 

[Fowl Play]

This is true. Before people go all in on the just buy SPY train, they should look at how the index is actually built, what the top 10 holdings are, and how much of the overall SnP return is due to them. (Hint: all of it) You can buy just the winners and leave out the other 480-490 dogs and beat the index easily. Do a manual backtest over the past how ever many years and rebalance that every year as they reweight the index (a lot of people don't realize that even happens). See what that basket did compared to SPY overall. This is just not that hard.

You want to be more diverse than that? OK. Take the top guys in the sectors of the index and do the same thing. This takes like one Saturday a year or every six months.

I overall agree with you, but do think you need to plan through till the end for full tax implication and earnings. In a Roth or other tax advantaged account this is fine. For just straight investing you gotta think about the end game when you come to retirement. If you are super concentrated you are carrying higher risk into retirement. You would likely want to sell and diversify into an index for less risk. Means you are going to realize some serious capitals gains tax. Whereas if you started in an index like VTSAX , yes your returns might not have been quite as high… but at the end you are already diversified. Now you can sell ~3% a year to draw down for retirement and peg a ton of that total capital gains realization into the 0% tax bracket over several years. Can make a huge difference in taxes at the end. Of course you can start concentrate and gradually diversify, add in some bonds at the end, etc. Lots of options. My personal strategy is optimized for a retirement age much before 65 (have reduced cost of living whenever I can). Results vary and heavily dependent on everyone’s different scenario/goals.

 

[Broomd]

You were targeting sub $15?

No, targeted $15.88. Looking for a SP over $18.30..

 

[NDGuy]

No, targeted $15.88. Looking for a SP over $18.30..

Man what a ride that ticker has been

 

[stevewes2004]

With 25 committed years before retirement how would you balance your portfolio? 85/15? 80/20? 75/25? 70/30?

Assuming you mean stocks vs bonds/cash…. With that long to go why not go 100% stocks? I have about 20 left and have been 100% stocks for the last 15 years. Couldn’t imagine the gains I would’ve missed out on had I allocated 30% of my portfolio to something “safe”.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Historybuff]

With 25 committed years before retirement how would you balance your portfolio? 85/15? 80/20? 75/25? 70/30?

85% Bicoin/15% $mstr

 

[sasquatch]

^^^this right here.

I have a 401 thru my employer at Edward Jones. Their returns sucks!!! The SPY beats the crap out of them. I have called in several times to try and get all my money put in the SPY. Same answer every time "our policy won't allow that as it's not diversified enough". I finally figured out that those people have no clue. They brag about their "very low fee". They make money off their funds that your money is in by buying and selling their own funds. And it doesn't show up as a "fee".


I have my money if the "highest return" category with Edward Jones and I would be getting 50% more return if it would all be in the SPY. I used to put in 11% and my employer 3%. I dialed my all the way back to the 3% match. I will invest any extra on my own.

You need to speak with your employer and corporate HR about changing the 401k up. No way you shouldn’t be able to invest in something like an SP500 fund.

The sad reality is, most people are financial illiterate morons, and those morons work for corporations that set these retirement funds up. They get just as blind sided by fund managers as any regular guy off the street. It’s very easy for them to change up


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro