It's the sixth version of The Swamp. What could possibly go wrong?
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Howard has always preached real estate / home ownership so that's the direction I went.HaulCitgo wrote:Anybody got hard asset ideas? Of course real estate but I'm thinking more like gasoline or guns. Don't like either of those ideas but you could stockpile something. Not a main investment vehicle but to diversify. I could stand to buy a decent shelter somewhere and stash assets. Hope this doesn't make me some sort of hoarder.
I wouldn't stockpile guns because they rarely appreciate in value. But stockpiling ammo could be a gold mine for when the SHTF.HaulCitgo wrote:Anybody got hard asset ideas? Of course real estate but I'm thinking more like gasoline or guns. Don't like either of those ideas but you could stockpile something. Not a main investment vehicle but to diversify. I could stand to buy a decent shelter somewhere and stash assets. Hope this doesn't make me some sort of hoarder.
Wouldn't gold be the best hard asset? Especially if there is ever any kind of massive social breakdown.HaulCitgo wrote:Anybody got hard asset ideas? Of course real estate but I'm thinking more like gasoline or guns. Don't like either of those ideas but you could stockpile something. Not a main investment vehicle but to diversify. I could stand to buy a decent shelter somewhere and stash assets. Hope this doesn't make me some sort of hoarder.
Ammo is a great idea. Come December and January, the NRA and gun nuts will freak people out that Obama is going to take all the ammo so he can stay in power and make it easier to defeat the civilian uprising. WOLVERINES! The inevitable rush to stock up on ammo will leave the shelves empty. You can step in and turn a quick profit.Sabo wrote: I wouldn't stockpile guns because they rarely appreciate in value. But stockpiling ammo could be a gold mine for when the SHTF.
So long as you're willing to be selling ammo illegally that is.The Sybian wrote:Ammo is a great idea. Come December and January, the NRA and gun nuts will freak people out that Obama is going to take all the ammo so he can stay in power and make it easier to defeat the civilian uprising. WOLVERINES! The inevitable rush to stock up on ammo will leave the shelves empty. You can step in and turn a quick profit.Sabo wrote: I wouldn't stockpile guns because they rarely appreciate in value. But stockpiling ammo could be a gold mine for when the SHTF.
Long term, Glenn Beck told me "survival seeds" are the best investment you can make.
It might be interesting for you to look back at our discussion when you began this dialogue. I'm curious as to what I said in 2015 that you would now consider wrong.The Sybian wrote:I've learned a ton working for a company through their IPO. The major lesson, the market reactions bear almost no relation to reality. I get daily Google alert updates, which is mostly market analyst updates, countless ratings systems, and target prices by all the rating companies. Changes in all these ratings don't tie very closely to the reality of the business or price of the stock. The stock opened at 16, and immediately skyrocketed, topping out at 38. Sweet, I maxed out my Employee Stock Purchase Program discounted buy in. I'm watching my contributions triple in value! This is the greatest! All but one "expert" raved about my company, set high target prices from the beginning, and kept raising them. The one guy trashed the company at first, then wrote several pieces saying the market over valued the stock, the business is shaky... He finally admitted he was the only person down on the stock, and that he was wrong. explaining why my company was such a great investment.Shirley wrote:From LinkedIn, it looks like that company is over 15 years old and has fewer than 10 employees. Maybe they are juuuuuust now getting to the fun part of the hockey stick.
Very soon after this guy changed his outlook, the price tanked. Despite destroying expectations in every category, increasing rate of growth/profits and how much we beat targets by every quarter, and outpacing all competitors, the bottom fell out. Our health insurance expenses were over projections for one quarter, due to 3 employees having expensive medical issues in the same quarter. Medical expenses were below projections for the year, just missed one quarter. Within minutes after the earnings call, the after-market trading saw the price of the stock instantly drop $9. WTF? The following quarter, all economic aspects continued grow by a larger percentage than the previous quarter, but medical expenses were higher than projected. Not even a significant amount. Stock went down to $11. Again, WTF??? The stock slowly crept back into the $20s, then we had a major fuckup that got some embarrassing press, and a $1 million dollar penalty from a government agency. The stock price continued to rise.
The entire system is a fucking scam. Our executives have made fucking fortunes. Every decision is geared towards making the numbers at earning calls look good with much less thought to the overall health of the company. I get an update every time an executive or board member sells shares, and they just keep selling off millions of dollars of shares. A couple left the company, so they didn't give a fuck about the long term. Drive up the price, sell off the stocks, jump ship without a care in the world about the future of the company.
So Shirley, my advice, don't gamble any money you would be upset if you lost. Throw in whatever you feel comfortable losing and buy the lottery ticket. Hey, you never know.
Sweet. It's gone up to all of .0093 and it's 'expected to go up.' Probably by experts no less.Johnnie wrote:This is the closest thing to a "Do you guys invest in stocks?" thread, so here it goes:
My supervisee likes to play around with stocks and whatnot and he showed me one of the ones he invested in. It's this company called StrikeForce (SFOR) that makes a security app for mobile devices.
Right now the stock is a penny stock that debuted at .0001 and is currently sitting at .0093. It's been consistently going up slowly over the last couple months. He has nearly 1.3 million shares. My interest in peaked for sure. He's done his research and the stock is expected to go up. He showed me this stock when it was around .0004.
I kinda feel like buying a bunch of this stock right now. He bought his through USAA. Is that the best way to get this? I'm just wondering. What do you guys think?
Absolutely. I thought about the advice you and Howard gave me throughout the process. I'll go back through and analyze your advice. I don't regret any of the money I put in, but I reduced my contribution from the maximum to the minimum when the stock had risen pretty high just before the price setting date. We get to purchase at a discounted rate set by the lower of the price on the first day or last day of the six month period. I still feel this is a better investment than investing in any random individual stock. I am still way ahead in the game, even with the stocks purchased above the current market price. I remember you saying that it's dangerous to invest in your own company, because you think you know how your company is performing, but don't know the big picture only the executives know. The health insurance issue is the perfect example. I knew our sales team was growing and they were destroying expectations, I knew client retention was well above target, but I had no idea about the health insurance issue. I also didn't know that an insignificant metric would put the stock into a free fall.DC47 wrote: It might be interesting for you to look back at our discussion when you began this dialogue. I'm curious as to what I said in 2015 that you would now consider wrong.
This can be true and at the same time investing a large percentage of your assets in your employer's stock can still be a bad move. That's because the alternative you pose is not a very good idea either.I still feel this is a better investment than investing in any random individual stock.
I would never bet on a random stock, just saying that I felt like the discounted price and ability to buy with pre-tax income made it worthwhile. The stock purchase comes directly out of my paycheck, so it probably keeps me from spending as much, and it is money I can afford to gamble with. The most important thing I learned, which I already believed, is that the whole system is fucked up, and the people who control the game make billions at everyone else's expense.DC47 wrote:This can be true and at the same time investing a large percentage of your assets in your employer's stock can still be a bad move. That's because the alternative you pose is not a very good idea either.I still feel this is a better investment than investing in any random individual stock.
It's good that you at least partially realize that your knowledge based on working at your company is only a small part of the relevant picture. You should also realize that 1) major investors know everything you know, plus more about the operations of the firm, and this is fully priced into the stock price (and thus no actual advantage to you); and 2) a large portion of investment returns have nothing to do with the success or failure of firms.
Learning is good. But learning by making mistakes is a lot more expensive that finding credible sources of knowledge and rapidly climbing the investing learning curve in this way. I have lost many millions of dollars through investing. For both myself and others. I have many regrets over my own process up the learning curve, and I have always studied hard. Still, there were things that were right there for me to understand that I could only grasp after making a serious, costly mistake.
The game can have some partially rigged elements without the entire investing world being a losing experience for the 99.9% who are not part of the elite. Some of the peasants will win by chance. Others -- a very small number -- will figure out how to game a gamed system. Just not in the same way that the guys at Goldman Sachs do.The Sybian wrote:I would never bet on a random stock, just saying that I felt like the discounted price and ability to buy with pre-tax income made it worthwhile. The stock purchase comes directly out of my paycheck, so it probably keeps me from spending as much, and it is money I can afford to gamble with. The most important thing I learned, which I already believed, is that the whole system is fucked up, and the people who control the game make billions at everyone else's expense.
The maximum allowable under IRS regs is way below the 5% threshold. I would never put anywhere near 5-10% of my assets in any stock. It's pure discretionary funds that I treat as if it doesn't exist. It's just less money directly deposited in my checking account, so it's like it never existed, and I have a discretionary pool of stocks on the side if I need to pay for renovations or something. The way I view it is forced savings, as I feel like I am earning less. If I lose on the investment, whatever I walk away with is money I may have spent anyways.DC47 wrote:The game can have some partially rigged elements without the entire investing world being a losing experience for the 99.9% who are not part of the elite. Some of the peasants will win by chance. Others -- a very small number -- will figure out how to game a gamed system. Just not in the same way that the guys at Goldman Sachs do.The Sybian wrote:I would never bet on a random stock, just saying that I felt like the discounted price and ability to buy with pre-tax income made it worthwhile. The stock purchase comes directly out of my paycheck, so it probably keeps me from spending as much, and it is money I can afford to gamble with. The most important thing I learned, which I already believed, is that the whole system is fucked up, and the people who control the game make billions at everyone else's expense.
I'm quite cynical on the nature of the investing world, but I'd say you are comparing your company stock option with the strawman of a totally corrupt system. Then you may be choosing an option that has too much risk for the reward, even after considering the discount and tax status.
If you're actually doing this in moderation, it's not a big deal. But I'd define this as investing in company stock (or equivalent) with no more than the value of 5-10% of your total assets whatever the type (e.g., include real estate) and whatever the location (e.g., tax-sheltered accounts labelled as 'retirement' and 'education.') I'd go lower in this range to the extent that you have other elements of your financial plan that are somewhat risky (e.g., health, number of dependents, nature of spouse's career, expected role in supporting parents versus inheriting from them).
Just my opinion.
I meant the regulation capping the amount of discounted pre-tax shares a company can offer an employee through an Employee Stock Purchase Program. There is absolutely no reason for me to even consider purchasing non-discounted shares outside of payroll deductions.DC47 wrote:I don't think the IRS can regulate any rule having to do with investing under a certain percentage of total assets. They have no way of assessing total assets of an individual, as far as I know. I've dealt with several cases where people had way over 10% of total assets in company securities, purchased via a program like you described.
Note that I'm talking about the cumulative total investment in company securities. Not just the amount that is invested monthly (or in some other period) as part of a program.
The real bitch of the tax cuts, is people see their extra $2/pay period before midterms, and won't realize they get fucked on deductions until the Spring. And if the Dems take the House, they will probably blame that on the Dems.
I had a similar rate of return recently, but it's rebounded a bit so it's only down -1.64 percent.Brontoburglar wrote: ↑Thu Nov 01, 2018 12:52 pm My 401K rate of return is -5.42 percent this year wooooooooooooooooooooo
at least the company match makes up for that but ... fuck
Off to go do some insider trading!
I'm also looking forward to doing my taxes now that I own a house. My only saving grace for this year, however, might be the fact that I was in a tax free zone for 5 months so I might not get as fucked as others come tax time.The Sybian wrote: ↑Thu Nov 01, 2018 11:17 amThe real bitch of the tax cuts, is people see their extra $2/pay period before midterms, and won't realize they get fucked on deductions until the Spring. And if the Dems take the House, they will probably blame that on the Dems.
Well shit, this was a trip to go back and read... Not sure why we kept talking past each other. My experiment was extremely educational, interesting, and kind of fun. When the shares hit what I thought was surely a high, I sold half my shares and bought a new car with just the profits. I dropped to the minimum purchase amount, but the price went up another $30+. Not complaining at all. Initial buy-in at $13, stock hit it's high mark at $77 a couple weeks ago. With the price being set at the lower price of 2 dates (plus 15% discount) at the start and end of each 6 month cycle, most I ever paid was $40/share. Still can't understand how this could be a bad idea, especially since, as I said 10 times, it was a negligible investment taken from my paycheck that I don't miss. If I lost the entire amount, it wouldn't have changed my life, as I treat the money as if I don't have it. It's kind of like my 401K, but I can sell the shares 1 year after purchase without penalty. Maybe I wasn't clear that my annual purchase was less than 1% of my total wealth. I don't care how stupid or naive I am (and I fully know I have zero insider knowledge, they stress that constantly), buying a discounted stock with money I would otherwise spend or put in a savings account was a low risk I was willing to lose for the education and fun of following my company as it went public.The Sybian wrote: ↑Fri Sep 23, 2016 12:40 pmAbsolutely. I thought about the advice you and Howard gave me throughout the process. I'll go back through and analyze your advice. I don't regret any of the money I put in, but I reduced my contribution from the maximum to the minimum when the stock had risen pretty high just before the price setting date. We get to purchase at a discounted rate set by the lower of the price on the first day or last day of the six month period. I still feel this is a better investment than investing in any random individual stock. I am still way ahead in the game, even with the stocks purchased above the current market price. I remember you saying that it's dangerous to invest in your own company, because you think you know how your company is performing, but don't know the big picture only the executives know. The health insurance issue is the perfect example. I knew our sales team was growing and they were destroying expectations, I knew client retention was well above target, but I had no idea about the health insurance issue. I also didn't know that an insignificant metric would put the stock into a free fall.DC47 wrote: It might be interesting for you to look back at our discussion when you began this dialogue. I'm curious as to what I said in 2015 that you would now consider wrong.
Even if I lose money in the end, it will be well worth it for the education I've gotten in the stock market.
Sabo wrote: ↑Thu Sep 22, 2016 9:11 amI wouldn't stockpile guns because they rarely appreciate in value. But stockpiling ammo could be a gold mine for when the SHTF.HaulCitgo wrote:Anybody got hard asset ideas? Of course real estate but I'm thinking more like gasoline or guns. Don't like either of those ideas but you could stockpile something. Not a main investment vehicle but to diversify. I could stand to buy a decent shelter somewhere and stash assets. Hope this doesn't make me some sort of hoarder.