I’ve been completely out of sync the past few weeks regarding the blog portfolio. I am spending a lot of time on my longer term portfolios. Generally, I continue to like large capitalization stocks with strong dividends. I fought every anti-smoking bone, but lost and purchased some Altria (MO). I will share with you that I have initiated significant positions in AT&T (T) and the PowerShares Water Resources ETF (PHO). On Zecco, I have been buying AT&T July $40 calls on dips and flipping them intraday for 10-20% profit after fees. I have to be careful with daytrading limits, because my balance is only around $15k there.
I continue to search for solid plays for the blog, but my traditional well of stocks is too volatile to avoid hitting stop losses on these volatile days. I could extend my stop loss limits significantly, but I still believe the market is in for dip deeper than in February followed by a much slower recovery than we witnessed earlier this year.
As an aside and for a what’s on tap… I have ordered dozens of Annual Reports for the Energy industry and have been getting to know their financials, CEOs, and relative comparisons. It is amazing what great clues and indicators annual reports can be. I highly encourage you to try it. Pull up one of the free annual reports services and order a random report of a completely new company to you (preferably not a OTCBB). Read the annual report and make your own estimate on where you think the company is headed. Be sure to read the shareholder’s letter, not just the company’s discussion of financials included in the SEC report. Then, look-up the stock’s history since the day the Annual Report was issued. I think you will be surprised at how well you can invest with simply the annual report by your side.