Stopped Out (twice)

Hah, I started a post with an update and forgot to finish it! Didn't realize how bad I was being. I have been slightly active since the last post.

As for NE, well, that didn't work out too hot. We got stopped out at 48.5 on the NE trade. To Ken's point, I think the volume was not strong enough to indicate a buy in a sideways move. Ah well, small loss!

On the other hand, we made another move into Garmin (GRMN) at 114.15. Garmin appears to be very strong financially, is in a strong uptrend. On the day we bought, they just got 3 green arrows. The only downside is that they are not trading at a discount at the moment. Well, that kinda went bust too. We bought right before the NavTeq buyout news hit and Garmin went . . . well, south. I had a stop and got out at 103.79. Another loss. :(

But, in the spirit of getting back on horses, we found another one. This time I screwed up, but we will watch the play. The stock is FSTR, LB Foster. They fabricate parts for many industries, namely rail. Strong uptrend, good financials, good price pattern. Oops, Dave forgot to double check industry. Well, the purchase was made (at 48.01) and a call will go into the coach's on Monday to see if I should vacate the position.

So, let's summarize our progress thus far:

Still holding on AAPL@135.5 (currently at 161.45 or up 19%)
In on FSTR@48.01 (currently at 47.70 down less than 1%)
In on NE@50.85 stopped out at 48.5 (loss of 5%)
In on GRMN@ 114.15 and stopped out at 103.79 (loss of 9%)

Total realized gain(loss): (7.7%)
Total un-realized gain(loss): 4% Yea AAPL!!

First (Real) Trade

Okay, we did our weekly meeting for the first time and only found 1 stock that looked really strong on the 1 year chart, had 3 green arrows and a volume surge. The symbol is NE. As an added bonus, it is trading at a discount according to the valuation. So, we made the move. Log the trade, in on NE@50.85.

So, a quick recap of the portfolio at this point:

AAPL@135.5 (currently at 146.73 or up 8%)
NE@50.85

I started thinking about how I am reporting return. Since size of the position does affect the overall portfolio return, I am wanting to get a neutral way of analyzing my successes. So, for the purposes, of the blog, I'll deal with portfolio yield in terms of trading 1 share of stock without commissions.