MikeBobulinski's Blog

Sailed away...

MikeBobulinski — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 09:01:15 GMT

I just returned from sea and was pleasantly surprised to see that my baby portfolio had not only survived without my constant attention, but managed to flourish going from being up 29% to being up 60% on the year. I can't complain about that.

Just before I departed, I had to trim some fat and dumped some of the not-so-stellar performers (or more correctly some poorly timed buys that went south). So I continue to learn, and figure things out.

...

Not quite at a loss for words...rant ahead...

MikeBobulinski — Thu, 27 May 2010 21:53:31 GMT

After reading some of Alstry's posts, one from topsecret09, and a few others I found myself typing up a bit of a rant as a response to one of them. Instead of polluting their BLOGs with my rant, I decided to just take the rant and drop it into my BLOG. Since I am not as prolific at TMF as the folks I have been reading, I imagine this rant will see very little traffic, but at least I got it off my chest.

As the Joker says, "Here....we....go...&quo...

Was their report that bad?

MikeBobulinski — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 09:23:45 GMT

NOKIA announced its quarterly results and missed the mark set by those who follow it. They didn't lose money, they just didn't earn as much as the Street expected them to. The result? Pre-market holds them down by more than $2 (better than 15% off). Ouch!

Fool on...

Honestly...I never thought I'd see or say this...

MikeBobulinski — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 20:43:37 GMT

Alstry is quitting?

I did not always like his approach, his message, or his delivery of said message, BUT I never thought I would see him quit. Even when his predictions did not come to fruition, I didn't expect him to keep his promises to stop.

While I can not say that I agreed with him, I can say without a doubt that he was a favorite of mine and I always learned something from his posts. I might not have liked what I lear...

Interesting thing happened to me...

MikeBobulinski — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 22:32:13 GMT

I made a BLOG entry yesterday regarding how blowing out my Achilles has afforded me a bunch of free time to read. It was a rather short BLOG entry and of relatively little significance with respect to relating to the investing world. I come on today to read...and find my BLOG entry is gone. No e-mail from a moderator regarding the deletion of my BLOG and no evidence that it existed at all. On a site that allows folks like Alstry to say what he feels like...

January hurt....maybe February won't hurt as much...

MikeBobulinski — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:00:43 GMT

January's final weeks caused me to have to rebalance my baby portfolio. Guess that is what I get for bragging about doing so well in 2009. Regardless, the market is a cruel teacher, but my education continues. I got to employ some hard won wisdom in cutting loose some of the positions that I was hanging on to for far longer than I should have. I was able to balance the loss of some of those losers with a small chunk of one of my winners. In the end...

Been a few months...

MikeBobulinski — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:10:50 GMT

Seems like forever since I last posted something here on TMF. Looking at my archive links, it has been about three months. In that time, despite some of the more dire predictions I have read on TMF, I have managed to go from being up 24% to being up 44% in my real life portfolio. I credit that to a lot of reading here on TMF and some educated purchases. Not everything has been as rosey, and I am certain that I could be up a bunch more...BUT...as I have s...

Enjoying the roller coaster ride...

MikeBobulinski — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:58:31 GMT

I find it humorous that the final trading day of the month, the day before Halloween, finds the fear index jumping up dramatically. I also find it humorous that a bunch of bears come screaming to the front of the line calling for the end of all things bull. But from this rookie's point of view, I see a low volume day on the final trading day of the month with a 2.5% pullback as just a function of the correction we have all been waiting on, folks out there taking pro...

Typical...just when I am pleased with myself...

MikeBobulinski — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:17:17 GMT

The market sure has a way of humbling a fellow. I no sooner blog about being one of the little guys and how well I was doing as such, and the market decides to go on a bit of a corrective trend. After a little forced rebalancing of my portfolio and a little de-leveraging to protect myself against what could turn even more ugly, I am now only up 13.5% on paper. I have realized about a net of about 20% in gains over the year, so I am not overly disappointed. ...

Curious about the little guys out there...

MikeBobulinski — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 23:07:18 GMT

A while back, when I started blogging and following TMF, I read a reply that basically put down small investors or folks with very little money to trade with. We were told that trading in such small amounts was a sure route to financial ruin and a good way to lose money. I disagreed with that then and still do today.

I may not be a millionaire or have 100s of thousands of dollars to invest, but I do have a small portfolio that so far has managed...

So what's the story with AAUK?

MikeBobulinski — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 00:37:06 GMT

Not certain, but the best I have heard is that AAUK, Anglo American decided to delist itself and join the ranks of OTC or pink sheet stocks. Not sure why, but apparently, they feel it is a good idea. What I do not know is how the change is going to play out here on TMF. I have not noticed a change in the symbol on my pick, but have noticed that it stopped updating when the change on the market listing took place (it was effective at the close of the market on ...

Discoveries...

MikeBobulinski — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 22:40:46 GMT

During the past couple of weeks, I have been fortunate enough to take some time off from work. Here are some things that I discovered during that time:

1. There is never enough time to get all of the yard work done. I don't care how much time you think it will take, there is always more that needs doing and never seems to be enough time to get to it all.

2. Fireworks are cheap entertainment, even if it is a pain ...

What happened to Legg Mason...

MikeBobulinski — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 16:29:01 GMT

Today, I wrapped up my yard work around noon today, checked the market and was surprised to see Legg Mason on the move. It was up as high as $26.74 (a whole $2.26 above its previous close). The only news release I could find indicated a rating change from sell to hold. I figured, bizarre, but weirder things have been happening in the market these days. So, I packed up the family and headed to the water park. Grew a little bored and decided to check...

Two days running, and I still don't rate...

MikeBobulinski — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 09:58:13 GMT

I guess I upset the TMF computers. This is the second day that I have not received a "Stock of the Day" pick in my CAPS quick stats page. Either I don't rate one, or I ticked off the machine...not sure how, but I must have done something really bad.

CDE and historical trends...

MikeBobulinski — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 11:53:53 GMT

I voiced concern in a previous BLOG posting about Couer D Alene mines and their reverse split. Granted, on the day of the reverse split, I looked like king kong on TMF thanks to a little glitch, but the concern was that most companies that execute a reverse split on their stock in order to make things look better or to get themselves off of the pink sheets, end up trending back to the pre-spli price. CDE is already 4 dollars closer to its pre-split price. Prio...

What a bizarre day for my portfolio...

MikeBobulinski — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:40:26 GMT

Aside from the freakish nature of the market of late, today showed me yet another squirrely side of Wall Street. Today has been a relatively sideways day on the market trading in a relatively narrow band. My portfolio on the other hand started in the red and only got more red as the day progressed. Why is this bizarre to me? We my portfolio includes to "short" positions in SKF and FAZ. My understanding is that these are contrarian plays a...

Where am I going to find...

MikeBobulinski — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 10:31:43 GMT

Where on Earth am I going to find $155,000 to pay my share of this growing debt. (see this article)

Not to sound like Alstry here, but if smart folks at opposite ends of the spectrum come together about something of this magnitude, then it appears that we should all be sounding like Alstry. The fellows in this article are ...

Now what?

MikeBobulinski — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 08:48:44 GMT

Dow passed its 200 day moving average. Granted it didn't exactly blow by it, but it has passed it. The S&P is flirting with 950 and has been at a high relative to November 2008. Economic news, not completely doom and gloom, but something better. Based on what I have read here at TMF Caps and elsewhere, we should be expecting some kind of serious change, good or bad.

Some say that since we have broken through the 200 day moving av...

CDE pushes me over the 95 point mark...

MikeBobulinski — Wed, 27 May 2009 11:58:10 GMT

I am fairly certain that this will correct itself eventually, but the completion of a 1 for 10 reverse stock split on CDE has given me a 785 point gain in one morning. I look like a war hero with all of the lucky charms that one glitch gave me. I picked up the 200, 300, 400, 500 club charms in one fell swoop. I feel like King Kong....

Still waiting...

MikeBobulinski — Wed, 20 May 2009 21:49:49 GMT

DISCLAIMER: Novice point of view ahead...

I have spent the past week or so watching things unfold in the world of the stock market. I have been equally amused and confused by the volatility in the market. Last week, the "pull back" that seemed to occur looked like we might have reached a top or a plateau before moving in either direction. This week, things have been equally volatile, but appear to be trading in a bit ...