American Consequences:
I was 22 and fresh out of university. My father had given me $5,000 left over from a college savings account. His single condition was that I invest it in the stock market.
Armed with a liberal arts education and a few months’ worth of scanning the Wall Street Journal – qualifying me as a grizzled veteran by today’s Robinhood trader standards – I was ready to earn my fortune in the stock market.
Then, like now, tech was hot… Personal-computer (“PC”) companies were the high-growth tech darlings of the market. In particular, PC maker Dell was the can’t-miss FAANG of the day.
But I was young and impatient. I didn’t have time for a boring large cap. So I skimmed a few computer magazines my roommate had left on the coffee table. There, I came across my stock: Zeos International.
It had been named by Fortune magazine in 1991 as the fastest-growing public company in the United States… and had beaten big and slow Dell by rolling out laptops using the latest chip. It even had a palmtop pocket PC on the market.
The clincher for my research process was that the computer magazines were full of Zeos advertisements. Surely, this was a near-guarantee of continued strong sales. There was no online trading back then, so I called Charles Schwab and plowed my $5,000 into Zeos.
Unfortunately, it turned out that Zeos made a lousy product. Its computers broke down frequently, and getting them fixed was next to impossible. Customers were uniformly unimpressed. more here
So many ‘shoulda, woulda, couldas’.
Here is a ‘How to Invest for Non-investors’ I wrote a little while ago. Key = ETFs, buy and hold.
https://2spareminutes.com/investing-101/
my dad was friends w/ a guy named Kelly. they went to school together. Kelly became an entrepreneur & got into local politics. one time back in the late ’60’s Kelly tried to get my dad invested $10k into an up-&-coming business called ‘cable tv’. (yes, he had the cash) my dad laughed & said there was no way anyone would pay for tv when it was free already (this was before bottled water). that company became Comcast, the parent of Xfinity (which owns NBC)
… just think, I could have been a frequent guest on Lolita Island & hobnobbing w/ Hunter Biden …. lmao
And at the other end, I had a friend that tried to get me to invest in ?WebTV?, some simplified-computer-in-a-keyboard using your tv as a monitor. Ummmm…….no.
LCD, generally good advice but ETF’s are a fairly new investment vehicle, and there are hundreds now so which ones?
For the non-investor who has little time or expertise to manage his money, nothing beats a broad-based index fund. And many brokerage firms like Fidelity offer these funds with zero expense ratios.
My worst investment was about 20 years ago when I bought Worldcom, at that time THE no miss stock. Little did anyone know, the CEO, Bernie Ebbers, was cooking the books. He went to prison and the company went bankrupt. Live and learn. Those pukes at Enron suffered a similair fate.
Similar to ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ’s story…
My grandfather allowed a local lawyer to hunt on his farm. My dad would take him and his buddies on hunting trips with his trained bird dogs. In the mid 1920’s the lawyer told my grandfather to invest in a new compay that was selling something called “Coca-cola”. He even offered to lend my grandfather $100 for the investment. That was a lot of money back then. Being the frugal farmer he declined. That lawyer became a very wealthy man many years later, after the depression. My grandfather lived a frugal, but happy life, always wondering “what if…”.
Well, we once invested in a subdivision right before Carter became Pres and interest rates skyrocketed to 22%. Another time we invested in a gold mine in the Pacific that was producing well until the tin horn gov took it over. So that was that. Sticking to annuities.
And then there is Bitcoin. $5,000.00 could be a few million. Of course timing is everything. I remember in the 90’s I turned down multiple recommendations to buy Microsoft. They’ve peaked I said. What a maroon!
My Dad had the opportunity to become partners in the first Coors beer distributor franchise in Montana. My Mom didn’t like Montana and missed her parents….Had to be like 1960 ….that’s the family lore….
When it comes to investing, hindsight is always 2020.
I screwed up when I allowed someone to convince me to sell my Walmart stock many years ago. DUH. That reminds me, I owe him a kick in the balls.
@Rich – ETFs are essentially index funds. Sticking with the basic ones is fine. A fund that tracked Dow Jones Industrial Average from 1981 to present would have made about 9% annually, ups and downs included. Key with my advice is that you set up a simple investment plan with minimal maintenance, and then focus on all the other aspects of your life.
In the 60’s I was a young EE at Johnson Space Center and one of my coworkers quit because he was joining a startup company in the cable TV biz. I tried to talk him out of such a stupid endeavor since a coat hanger would allow you to receive TV for free. Then another coworker was thinking of joining his brother in opening and running quick oil change places. Another idiotic idea when it is so easy to crawl up under and do it yourself. Then there was this tech here in Florida that maintained stuff like our ASR-33s, paper tape readers, etc for a good solid minimum wage and he quit to start in his garage some pulp paper magazines for trading cameras and computers in the 70’s. In short order I read how he built a western themed town on his ranch in Montana and would fly his friends up there in his Lear to party.
I reminisce sometimes about these folks late at night when Im getting shitfaced.
My dad worked for Dumont Fairchild. His co-worker and good friend begged him to go in on fiber optics when it was unheard of. My dad loved his work and declined. He said Marty is going to be rich but dad wanted to keep doing what he was doing. He had a great and happy life.
My Grandpa was a pharmacist and was offered a ground floor opportunity to invest in a new product. It was a hit and it filled up some of his investment goals…..It was Tampax….true…
ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ
50 years ago cable said NO ADDS! I had many friends willing to pay to see TV sans ads!
It turned out to be a “compassionate conservative” lie. Cable has many, many ads. But it was sold decades ago as AD FREE, and sold well
A guy in the Midwest donated $3200 to the Obama campaign and got a $15 Million gov’t contract. Demonrat Politicians are the best investment around.
(see: Pelosi, Schumer, Waters, Reid, Biden, Hoyer, &c.)
Follow the money – why, do you suppose, billionaires like Gates, Steyer, Buffet, &c. are so eager to suck the asses of Demonrats?
Altruism?
Get serious.
Every year the pipeline was delayed, Buffet pocketed $2 BILLION!
Just ONE example.
izlamo delenda est …
‘I wish I listened to what my Uncle said’
“What did he say?”
‘I don’t know- I didn’t listen’
I think we all have those should’ve stories.
My husband wanted to invest in that new Microsoft company in 1989 – 90 but the investment guy we were working with said it was a lousy investment and the company wasn’t going anywhere.
Post depression, my Grandfather, retired, spent his sunset years hanging around the stock exchange in Glendale. One of his buddies asked him if he would like to go in on buying a patch of sand at the beach. My GF politely declined. As it turns out, that patch of sand is now called Balboa Island.
Genentech.
The first company to successfully carry out gene splicing.
I wanted to buy their stock, and have been kicking myself ever since 1976.
I invested $1,000 into cattle futures and made $100,000 in no time. I’m just lucky, I guess.