Friday 16 October 2009

Never subsidize losers with winners.

Rather than take the medicine -- the loss -- they hold on to the losers and sell their winners.
 
They never learn my rule:  Never subsidize losers with winners.


Sell the losers and wait a day. If you really want them, go buy them back the next day. I also am certain that you never will.

Eject the losers and the winners will lift the portfolio.

It is the percentage of time that most of a portfolio is invested in rising stocks that determines how good performance will be. Eject the losers and the winners will lift the portfolio.

An exception to every rule. This applies particularly to value investors with long term horizon. Instead of blindly selling the losers until all you have are winners, you should really look at whether the fundamentals have changed for the stocks. There may indeed be a good reason for the relative underperformance of Stock B – e.g. poor management or grim industry outlook. However if nothing has changed and you thought Stock B was good value when you first bought it, it must be an absolute bargain after dropping an extra 50%! Shouldn’t you be buying more instead of selling?

No comments: