Last year, I had a little extra money in my personal account and I added some positions to my Sharebuilder brokerage account.
It wasn’t a terrible move, but last week I sold all my big positions in the account and now own no stocks (except for a few 1/10 of a shares that I might as well hang on too).
Stocks just aren’t my thing. It wasn’t a huge amount (just over 2K), but I found myself checking my major holdings pretty much daily.What a waste.
I’m just not a stock guy anymore. Even if I could get 10% returns year after year, it would not be worth the stress to me. I would always be checking stock prices and wondering if I should sell.
So, I sold everything last week (after the big run up) and I feel good.
Even if I have extra money (that I can’t pay to my mother) in the future, it’s going to go into low risk accounts (t-bills, high yield savings, etc), not stocks.
I don’t have any desire to day trade again. I have the discipline now to be a “buy and hold” investor.
I just don’t want to be.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Hear, hear! I never really allocated my 401K into stocks or even mutual funds. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I was gambling somehow.
I agree. When I started stock picking I was checking my stocks every day, multiple times a day, watching the stock tick up a couple of pennies then back down. I don’t know where my obsession came from! I still have those stocks, but I don’t check them very often. I have the mindset of long-term growth over short term gain.
That’s interesting to hear…. for me, I’ve never been of the “trading” mindset. I don’t check my stocks everyday like that. I’m confident in the stocks I bought. I’ve researched their companies or at least know their products. My holdings went down about 25% in the 2008 crash, but I know most of that is going to come back. Maybe I’m overconfident. But as a result of the crash, I do have new plans in place to divert more of my investsments into “safer” vehicles as a way to help preserve wealth. I’m not waiting until I’m 50 to start doing that.