Just Numbers
Reading time: 2 – 4 minutes
When I was a kid I asked my grandfather about the stock market and he told me “It’s Just Numbers!” He told me the whole system was not real and it’s actually a bunch of people guessing what something was worth. He then told me what if all of your friends started to price a bike would they be right? From that point on I always thought the stock market was full of crap but it didn’t stop me from playing. Unlike most people who have some sort of plan I play it off the speculation and hoopla that is created by a bunch of kids trying to set a price for a bike!
As I wake up every morning watching CNBC it’s always interesting to hear people worry about everything in the world effecting their stocks. If Obama skips a CEO meeting they talk about that, if a fruit fly is about to hit bananas they talk about that and if a Holy day is happening in Rome they tell you it effects pasta prices. It really doesn’t make sense how a company like GE can be effected by all these world events when in actuality the value of their company doesn’t fluctuate. Oil that is already in the ground here in the USA shouldn’t go up based on some rebellion in Libya this afternoon.
It’s all numbers that keep changing based on a bunch of paranoid kids. As always I don’t complain about the game but instead play the game. It’s like waiting on gossip to decide if you’re going to see Green Latern this weekend. The numbers in stocks are basically driven by the same gossip that effects a movie star. It’s just the Gossip Kings have better titles like economists, fund managers and heads of capital investment firms.
Overall it’s just numbers and their’s a whole hell of a lot of them to sift through. Maybe I’m just a simple man with a simple plan and that plan is wait for the line to form outside the club before I pay my money. Oh well!
Today’s Stock picks…
Pandora - The internet music company IPO comes out today under the symbol (P). It’s priced to come out at $16/share. They valued it at 10-12 bucks so that should be the lowest it can go when all the hoopla is over.
Facebook – Their IPO is scheduled for January 2012. I don’t know the value yet but it should be a monster stock to own.
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Freeman who do you go about getting stocks? DO you you buy them yourself or use a broker? What broker should a newbie like me use? Just trying to get in the numbers game!!
great post Freeman!!
I use Scottrade as I have been with them for about 5 years now. I don’t use a broker as most of the time I am buying and holding over a period of time. Since everything is cheap I just put about 200 bucks a month into big name stocks like Ford and GE. That way in about a year I have accumulated a lot of good stocks.
A broker probably cost me too much when I am not putting all of my money on the line like that and I am not that serious of a trader to bother them.
@Gallego check out tradeking.com thats who i use. 4.95 commission, no minimum balance, no inactivity fees. if you coming into the game messing with penny stocks then they do charge 1cent extra per share. just do your homework and see which online broker has a fee schedule you can tolerate. with the way technology is now a actual live broker is really pointless.
i feel the same way freeman does, im not heavy enough into stocks to even waste a brokers time and my profits arent large enough for me to even want to pay 1