Emini futures, or simply eminis, are smaller-sized contracts of “full-grown” futures contracts that have been around for decades. Unlike the latter that have been traded on physical exchanges, eminis have always been traded electronically, allowing retail traders with access to the Internet to compete against institutional traders from the comfort of their homes or home based offices.

Trading emini futures can be a lucrative occupation. But it requires a solid preparation. It may takes months, sometimes years before you become a consistently profitable trader. Yet since the rewards are certainly worth this prolonged effort, every day sees new traders launching their day trading careers in the hopes of becoming one day financially independent.

Success in this field is certainly possible and this author, if he may say so, is one example of this. Speaking from the perspective of someone who has been in the day trading trenches for over 5 years, I have some pretty good news for those just starting in emini trading. Listen, folks: it is now much easier to make progress towards your ambitious goal of becoming a consistently profitable trader than it was when I was a rookie. This has much, if not most, to do with technology, one very useful and important element of which are easily available trading simulators that these days render trading conditions in a respectably realistic way.

You can and should use them before you ever start trading with real money, in real time, facing real challenges of an emini day trader.

There are quite a few good simulators for emini trading currenly available to emini traders, the best of them being probably NinjaTrader. One of the main advantages of NinjaTrader is that it can be used with most emini futures brokers out there. What’s really nice about this simulator is that it gives you a very comprehensive statistics of your performance, such as the number of losing trades, the number of winning trades, the average profit per trade, the average loss per trade, the percentage of winning and losing trades plus a host of other, even more complex characteristics that could be of particular use to those working on their mechanical emini trading systems. NinjaTrader also allows you to trade live, so once you have mastered trading eminis in a simulated environment, you can use the very same platform for trading them for real.

NinjaTrader is not the only such a simulator, though. If you have an account with Interactive Brokers, a very popular online broker that lets you trade not only futures but also stocks, bonds, and Forex, you can use Zeroline Trader, Bracket Trader, or Button Trader as your simulators. And some other, lesser known, simulators are available for traders of Interactive Brokers as well. All of them are three, but unlike NinjaTrader, they can work only with the Interactive Brokers trading platform.

One should hovewer be aware that simulated trading of eminis, or any other trading vehicle, for that matter, is not exactly the same as live trading of these instruments. One very important element of live trading is almost completely absent in simulated trading. I am talking here about emotions.

But if you cannot make money on a simulator, when emotions are added to the mix in real trading, it’s rather unlikely that you will be able to make money in actual trading. Keep this in mind and try to do your best job on a simulator to be confident in your trading skills before you start trading eminis with real money.

Flip through the newspaper these days and you will find advertisements with the words ‘money’, ‘wealth’, ‘rich’, ‘million’, ‘debt-free’, ‘financially freedom’ or ‘retire early’ printed in big, bold letters.

When it comes to talking about how to invest and make more money, there is practically any topic that can be held at a seminar. Topics range from options trading, property investment, forex trading or stock market investments.

To understand why the seminar circuit seems flooded with audiences, just put the numbers together. Say, the price of a seminar is $4,000. At $4,000 per registrant, 100 participants will ring up $400,000 for the organizers over a three or four day period.

However, few people will pay over $3,000 for a seminar without seeing what’s in store. So, you have the free or low-priced previews, most of which last for two to three hours. Industry players note that, actually participants of the seminar will pay for the freebie previews and advertisements, which are factored into the seminar price.

While seminars may be a quick and condensed way to obtain training and information about investing, there is also a wealth of information available at a cheaper price in good old books. With authors becoming speakers like Robert Kiyosaki, there may be some redundancy for those who have read the speakers’ books, but most of the materials in the seminars are new.

Most books are diluted. Authors don’t want to get themselves into trouble, so they avoid stating certain things in print. However, you can make certain points in seminars. There are also additional benefits such as networking and gaining membership in an investment community for participants at his seminars.

Attending seminars cuts the learning curve tremendously and it may be more effective than reading a book. The three-dimensional approach in a seminar as opposed to reading books or listening to an audio tape may work out best for certain people. You may read something but the experience is different when you hear the speaker saying it with conviction.

Since one has to pay so much money, one has to select wisely the right investing seminar to attend. With so many seminars out there, how do you know which one is right for you? It’s important to do research on the speaker and the seminar because just about anyone can hold a seminar. A good way to find out the credibility of the seminar and its organizer is to ask around. Talk to past graduates and the organizer should be able to give you some references.

The seminar should contain aspects you can relate to and apply to your situation. Some investing strategies that work well in the US cannot be applied in other countries because of different tax laws or certain products that aren’t available.

Another important aspect to look into is the speaker’s profile. Often, the speaker advises based on his past experience and accomplishments but anyone can make a claim to being rich and then hold a seminar. Therefore, find out who the speaker is and if necessary, ask for proof.

It’s also important to do research on the subject of the seminar. Advertisements would normally paint a pretty picture but does the investment vehicle suit your risk profile? Investors should be cautious of advertisements and seminars promising high or guaranteed returns. Such claims are likely to be misleading as every investment comes with some degree of risk.

Normally, you wouldn’t know the contents of a seminar because organizers wouldn’t give the game away like that. What if the contents fall short of expectation? For some seminars, there is a money-back satisfaction guarantee. However, just going to seminars itself doesn’t make a difference. You must apply what you have learnt.

Real estate investing in 2010 vs. stock investing in 2010 and beyond is interesting because real estate and the stock market might not move in tandem. Investing in real estate now takes many forms; and going forward the debate between real estate investing vs. stock investing might favor the former. Here’s my reasoning, and the solution I prefer.

REAL ESTATE INVESTING

Both the residential and commercial sector were on fire going into the year 2007, with rising prices fueled by cheap money and easy lending practices. Then reality and a financial crisis hit and the bottom feel out of the market. For real estate investing in 2010, the jury was still out. Many properties were selling at 2003 prices.

STOCK INVESTING

Equities (stocks) were on a roll going into 2007 as well. Then the stock market fell over 50% by early 2012. Equities then sky rocketed over 50% in a matter of several months. In early 2010 there was an 800-pound guerilla in the stock investing arena: had the stock market gone up too far too fast? Were equities headed toward another big fall?

REAL ESTATE INVESTING vs. STOCK INVESTING

I believe in buying AFTER a steep price decline in any market… not after a big run-up in prices. That’s why I favor real estate investing in 2010 and beyond, plain and simple. Now, if you’re like me you like to eat your cake, and still have it too. By this I mean that I don’t like the hassle and lack of liquidity that comes with owning real property. At the same time, I don’t want to miss out when property values come roaring back.

The beauty of stock investing is the instant liquidity advantage. You can buy or SELL stocks over the internet in a matter of seconds at fair market price. Can you make an investment in properties and do that? The answer is that yes, indirectly, you can. Here’s how it works. You buy stocks called exchange traded funds (ETFs) that invest in a portfolio of commercial-properties companies. These companies own and/or manage commercial properties like office buildings, apartment complexes and shopping centers.

When you buy shares in one of these funds you own a piece of the action in commercial real estate. Historically, as the industry goes, so goes the value of the shares of companies that invest in the sector. Two such funds (ETFs) have the stock symbols IYR and VNQ. If real estate investing gets hot these funds should take you along for the ride. If not, you can sell out your position over the internet for a commission of about $10. All you need to play the game is a brokerage account with a discount broker.

You can invest as little as a few hundred or millions of dollars in the comfort of your home or office. Change your mind at will, because you can add to or sell out your position with the click of a mouse.

Investing these days can be a risky profession, but that does not mean you can not still profit from it. The key is to learn the basics and the more knowledge you have the better prepared you will be to start your investing career. We have three of the things that you will want to know before you think about putting any of your hard earned money down.

Assessing risk is the first thing you must do when you’re considering investing your own money. Each type of investment has different risks associated with them. If you want to have a greater potential for return the risk of losing your investment will be greater. Lower returns on your investment means a much lower risk as well. The risk you take will be up to you, but the key is to know what type of risks your willing to take in your investing needs.

Asset allocation is another area that you will also want to take a close look at as well when you’re starting out to invest your money. Asset allocation is how assets are distributed through classes such as stocks, bonds, and cash. Depending on your investing time frame the allocation of your assets could vary from others you know. This is one of the great things about investing you get to say how things are done and allocated.

Diversify your investments is something many people just starting out do not understand. Instead of putting all your eggs in one basket it is better to stretch your investment over stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. This way you diversify your portfolio and if one area struggles you can still profit from other areas of your investing.

There are plenty of investing software packages available in the market that one can choose to make his things simple. But due to the numerous investment software packages that are available in the market, the investor often finds difficulty in choosing the right software that caters to his needs. Following article delivers some useful insight on how to select the right kind of investing software.

It is obvious that there are plenty of investment styles but the only aspect that makes an investor successful is to keep in an organized, disciplined manner. To employ these characteristics, one should have an investing software package that is efficient enough in delivering the desired results. Following are a list of features that one has to look for in finding an efficient investing software package:

1. A software that can help you organize your trading by preparing the reports and help you in monitoring your portfolio

2. Software that can present complex information visually in a way that can be easily analyzed. The software that can check the stock status and analyze the trends, area of resistance and support.

3. Software that can implement and test your trading plan and perform the risk assessment: the investing software has to build and test the trading plan to manage several discipline trading rules such as “when” and “where” to enter/exit the market. The software also has to calculate the money needed to run the project.

Almost all the above features are offered by all the investing software packages. So it is obvious that one gets confused in selecting the right kind of software that caters to his needs. Of all the investing software found in the market, FAP TURBO is considered the best option by many. The reason is that the software delivers 96 percent of success rate in its operations.

FAP TURBO is a stock trading robot that runs on your machine. The software does the trading automatically and doesn’t require you to search for the trades all day. The other appealing feature with FAP TURBO is that unlike other investing software, it works both when online and offline. The traditional investing software has to have access to the internet for their operation. Failure of access to the internet can either stop their operation or deliver weird results. On the contrary, FAP TURBO employs a different approach. FAX TURBO makes use of a forex hosting service that helps it to host itself on the server-enabling an ease of operation even when one has no access to the internet. A forex hosting service is a service that lets other forex software/application to be hosted on its domain and enables it to operate in full length.

Getting used to FAX TURBO is very simple and easy. It has a tutorial section that one can make use of to get acquainted with this investing software. The tutorial section has several 3-7 minute videos explaining how the software works and on how to setup the system. Moreover, FAP TURBO comes at an unbelievable price of $149. It also comes wrapped with a 60 day guarantee period affirming the user of its operation and stability.

No matter what type of investing software package you purchase, be sure that it caters all your needs. Do not cling on to high-end software that does not even benefit you by any means. Be wise in making your choices and happy investing!!

Earnings Per Share (EPS) refers to net income (profit after tax) divided by outstanding shares. Appearing on income statements, it shows us the earnings of the company after all expenses have been paid off and adjustments made for all depreciation of assets.

As a result of accounting gimmicks, the earnings of a company can be easily manipulated. Therefore, if an investor just focuses on EPS, he may misread the value of a stock and end up making bad investment decisions. However, it will be much harder to manipulate the cash flow statement even tough it can still be done.

High quality EPS refers to earnings that are a relatively true representation of what a company actually earns. Increasingly, cash EPS is being used to evaluate earnings. Also known as operating cash flow per share, it gives us the net effect of the inflow and outflow of money in a company’s day to day operation. A cash flow statement breaks down cash flow into operation, investing and financing. A good company will normally display a growing trend of higher cash EPS against EPS.

Cash EPS measures the net operating cash flow of a company on a per share basis. A higher cash EPS implies that the business is getting more inflows than outflows. Even tough getting more cash inflows doesn’t necessarily mean that the business is making a lot of profit, basically, if a company is consistently getting excess operating cash flow, the business is surely generating extra cash from its sales after deducting all required payments related to the sales. The excess cash can be used to buy new assets, repay shareholders in the form of dividends or reduce outstanding bank borrowings.

Investors need to be extra careful when a company’s EPS is positive but has negative cash EPS. A negative cash EPS means the company has more operating cash outflows than inflows. It also implies that the company may have high inventory that isn’t selling or receivables that aren’t being collected. This requires extra financing either from shareholders’ money or banker’s loans. If this situation persists for a long period, shareholders or bankers may stop financing and want to be repaid.

Conversely, if a company has negative EPS but has positive cash EPS, investors need not be too worried about the losses incurred. Certain financial experts also define cash EPS as ‘EPS plus all non cash items’ like amortization and depreciation. Even though a company’s income can be affected by depreciation, amortization and other non-cash exceptional items, it can still generate positive cash flow from operations. If the company has zero borrowings, the extra cash flow can be used to reward shareholders with higher dividend payments.

It will be good of can compare a company’s cash with its own historical trend or those of other companies. Due to the cyclical nature of certain industries, investors shouldn’t be too worried about a temporary negative cash EPS when the whole industry is on a downtrend.

Investors will have a better picture of a company’s performance when they analyze the difference between the trend of cash EPS and EPS. If a company’s EPS and cash EPS are growing higher and cash EPS is always higher than EPS in most periods, this shows high quality in EPS.

Cash EPS is a powerful tool to use in determining the quality of a company’s earnings. Companies with a growing stream of cash EPS are better investments than those with higher EPS growth but negative cash EPS. Investors may be rewarded with higher dividend payments from the excess cash. However, if cash EPS is always lower than EPS, investors need to investigate whether it’s only temporary or due to high trade receivables, which may later result in high bad debts.

You might’ve been wondering what is the difference between Investing and Trading, or you might’ve been asking yourself: “Am I an Investor or a Trader?”, or you might’ve never even realized that there is a difference in the first place. In this article I will explain the difference between Investing and Trading.

The definition in it’s most basic form is:

“Investing is the attempt to make money over a LONG period of time”

“Trading is the attempt to make money over a SHORT period of time”

Now the question is: “How long is a LONG period of time, and how short is a SHORT period of time?” The answer is: “It’s up to you!”

What does this mean? It means that you might consider 6 months to be a long period to hold on to one stock, so you’ll call it Investing, and someone else might consider 6 months a very short period of time and they’ll call it Trading.

But for the sake of uniformity we’ll adopt the following rule:

“If the duration between opening and closing a transaction (i.e. buying and selling a security) can be measured in days or weeks then this is Trading, and if the duration can be measured in months or years then this is Investing”.

Trading:

Usually Traders are only interested in looking at the price chart of a specific security or currency (usually Candlestick Chart), they look for identifiable patterns, or for areas of supply and demand to determine their entry point, and they do the same thing to determine their exit, they stay in one transaction for any duration between a day (or less) and a few weeks, they take a closer look at the market on a daily basis, to check whether their trade is still valid or if it’s time to close it.

To be a trader you need to be very familiar with technical analysis, as well as updated on market conditions, and upcoming events that might alter these conditions.

For instance if a company has it’s “quarterly earnings report” coming out in a couple of days, you might want to keep a close eye on that, either as an opportunity to enter a trade or maybe to close one that is already open.

Traders, can be either “Scalpers”, “Day Traders”, or “Swing Traders”.

Scalpers open and close a transaction very quickly, in a matter of seconds or max a few minutes, looking for small profits, but they execute dozens if not hundreds of such trades a day.

Day Traders hold on to their positions longer than Scalpers but they never keep any open trades for the next day, they close everything before the end of the day.

Swing Traders hold on to their positions for days or weeks.

Figuring out the type of trader you are is very important to your success. It’s very important to be honest with yourself, there is no good or bad style, it all depends on your personality, the style of trading you adopt must match with the type of personality you have, otherwise you’ll be living in conflict, and this can only be damaging to your trading account.

Investing:

On the other hand Investors rely heavily on the fundamentals to decide to buy or not, and while Traders can make money in an UP or DOWN market, Investors can only make money when the price is going up, because an investor’s decision on whether to invest or not in company XYZ is based on the fact whether he believes that this company will grow and expand in the coming months or years. If so then he will buy shares in it.

So how do Investors decide on what company to buy shares in?

Like I previously mentioned, they rely on the fundamentals. What does this mean?

It means they read the financial statements that are released by this company (Quarterly and Yearly), and they try to find out as much as they can about the inside operations of this company, about it’s management, about their future plans, about their competitors. Basically they try to see how healthy the company is and if there’s room for growth. This is called Value Investing.

These are the kind of fundamentals that investors are interested in to assess a potential investment.

Investors don’t really care about the small daily fluctuations of the price, they believe that if a company has a high intrinsic value, then it’s share price will follow over the long run, so they try to buy the companies that have high value and selling at a bargain price.

I hope that this article clarified the difference between Investing and Trading.

On a personal note, I believe that every Wana-be-Trader or Investor should do a very thorough self assessment to find out exactly what kind he is, and what are his strong suites that will be critical in choosing his style.

For more information about Investing and Trading you can visit http://www.investment-education-diary.com

Feel free to publish this article on your website, as long as you post a link back to my website “Investment Education Diary”.

It frequently comes as a surprise to people, but I’m not a gambler.? In Vegas, I’m not going to hang out at the Blackjack tables or the slot machines.? In fact, you probably won’t see me in the casinos of the hotels at all.

I’m an entrepreneur so I’m certainly no stranger to taking big risks on a frequent basis.? It’s part of the job description and I’ve not only learned to tolerate it but embrace it. ?

But when I look at taking risks in business and gambling, they feel nothing alike.? In Vegas, the house wins… always.? In business, however, I can stack the odds in my favor and make it far more likely that I win.

Okay, I’m rambling.?? This article is supposed to be about day trading so let’s get to that.?? The way most people play the day trading game is like most people gamble in Vegas.? They get a “feeling” that next big score is coming if they just stick with it.? However, professional day traders don’t trade on whims and feelings.? They take calculated risks where the odds are in their favor.? While only 5% of day traders ever make money, those who do it well, can make a fortune.

Low Risk Day Trading

If you want to becoming a day trading winner, then read on and I’ll give you three simple low risk day trading strategies to put you in the 5% that do succeed.

1) Get A Clearer Picture Of The Market

A lot of people get a little too myopic when they’re entering their trades.? Let’s say you’re using 5 minute intervals to enter trades.? You should also be looking at 30 minute and 1 hour intervals as well to make sure you can see what’s happening. ?

2)? Try Again Tomorrow

I love this quote. “Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says I’ll try again tomorrow.”? You need to make sure that you’re not risking too much on a single trade that could potentially prevent you from being able to “fight another day.”? Professional traders never risk more than 2% on a trade and always have a stop loss in place.? Learn from them and do the same.

3) Trend Trading

Scores of millionaires have been created using this very tactic.? It’s how you get rich in day trading.? Follow the trends and ride them until they reverse. ? Sounds simple, right?? Don’t let the simplicity fool you, it works if you just follow a proven system.

Why is investing so important? Investing is the vehicle that drives your goals to reality, especially for your retirement. If you just put your money in a regular savings account, chances are it isn’t going to grow to the amount you need to retire successfully. While there is a great deal of risk associated with investing, if you understand your risk and manage your investments regularly, investing can be the difference between retiring and not retiring. However, many of us are terrified of investing, therefore, we are either not investing at all or not investing properly. Follow these guidelines to make investing as simple as possible.

For amateur investors, mutual funds are the way to go. They offer diversification, professional money management and ease into the actual mutual funds with low minimums. The chief complaint against mutual fund is their fees. This can be managed by sticking to no-load mutual funds and keeping your expense ratios low (below 1.50%). Individual stocks need ongoing monitoring, which most of us don’t have the time to do. Also, most stock portfolios are not properly diversified. If you do buy stocks, stick to companies that you know well and plan to hold on to for a long time. Make sure they are part of a diversified portfolio.

It is very important to pick your time frame (when you want the money) and your risk level. Make sure both of these are aligned with your goals. For example, if you want the money in less than five years to save for a down payment on a house or a vacation, you should keep it in very safe investments, like a money market account. Whereas if you want the money in twenty years or longer (i.e. retirement), you are able to take on a bit more risk. Your risk level is determined if you are conservative, moderate or aggressive. Think about recent decisions you made in your personal life and apply this to your investments.

Regardless of your risk level, you need to be diversified. This means spreading your money over different types of investments, therefore, spreading your risk around. How you spread your money among different investments is called your asset allocation plan. To keep your investments as simple as possible, limit your portfolio to no more than five mutual funds. You can also choose one Lifecycle or Target Retirement Date mutual funds. This is one mutual fund that provides a diversified portfolio based on when you want your money. Most mutual companies offer them.

Even if you have a financial advisor, you should know what is going on and understand what you own. The more you know about your investments, the better your relationship with your financial advisor will be. On an ongoing basis, take charge of your investments and learn more about them. You can do this by taking a course, opening your statements, reading a book, reading the business section of the newspaper or investing articles on websites. Magazines like Money, Smart Money, Kiplinger are geared towards people that are not in the financial industry and are fun to read. Start with the cover article; don’t try and read the whole thing, just spend 10 minutes a week. It will be much more manageable and you will enjoy it!

Written by Galia Gichon

DOWN-TO-EARTH FINANCE

(Copyright Down-to-Earth Finance LLC 2006)

We touched briefly about common investing pitfalls here. Here is a more comprehensive list. Some of it may happen to the more experienced investors as well. This serves as a guide for Novice Investors:

Investing with debt. You should not invest when you still owe a lot of money in your credit card. Credit card interest can run to as high as 20% while in the long run, investing in the market indices can give a 10.1 % return historically.

Not Starting Now. By now, you should have known that compounding works its magic in longer time frame. The sooner you start, the longer time you let compounding do its magic and the larger your savings will be at retirement age.

Investing based on stock tips. Stock tips are just that, tips. It is supposed to help you invest but not giving you a shortcut. Doing your own due diligence is an absolute must even when you get stock tips from the so-called professional.

Investing for the short-term. The easy access of internet makes it cheaper for small investors to buy stocks online. However, short-term trading is not going to work, no matter how small your commission is. It is extremely hard to predict short-term movement of stocks. Traders come and go and those that stay seldom beat the market in the long run. Furthermore, what do you prefer? Spending a few hours each week and making a 14% return on your investment? Or spending 8 hours a day where the odd of beating the market is slim? ?I would prefer to spend just a few hours a week, of course.

Buying stocks because the price is ‘low’. Yeah. That’s right. It is tempting for a lot of people. They figure, if a $ 1 stock can rises a few cents, they will make 20 or even 50 % of their investments !! Sure, you can. But the reverse holds true as well. With a few cents of movement, you can lose 20 or even 50% of your investment !

Investing in sectors you have no clue of. Biotechnology and RFID sounds cool. However, unless you are really really familiar with it, there is no reason to invest in it. You may know how Voice Over IP works, but do you know how does the company make money? If you don’t, then you should stay away from it. There are hundreds of other companies that are easier to understand than how gene works.

Checking your stock price often. You read today’s newspapers and you go straight to the stock price section. You arrive at the office and the first thing you do is going to Yahoo! Finance website. You went home and the first thing you do is turn on CNBC and check your stock price. Get the idea here? While you may check your stock quote anytime you want, but your time may be best served by doing other things. Finding the next best investment opportunity is one such thing.

Paying Too Much Attention to Past Result. A stock just drop 20% in a week and you figure, hey it is cheap. It has a P/E (Price over Earning) ratio of 7 ! Isn’t that cheap? Err…it depends. If you were talking about forward P/E, then of course the stock is cheap. But if you were talking about trailing P/E while your analysis shows that this company will never turn a profit ever again, then the stock is not cheap. An example would be looking at a type-writer company during 1980s.

Lack of Diversification. Investing in one single stock can make you rich. Imagine if you have put all your money on Yahoo! in 1997. It can also break you. What if you have bought into Enron stock instead? I believe your most important investing goal is capital preservation, not capital appreciation. Once you have picked a solid company, capital appreciation will follow.

Over diversification. Contrary to lack of diversification, Over diversification will give your portfolio a mediocre return. Furthermore, having 500 different stocks on your portfolio will cost a significant amount of commission. The ideal portfolio in my opinion should consist of between 7 to 15 different stocks.

Ignoring Insider’s Activity. Insiders are generally people with ownership of a company and who know the inside working of a company. While insider selling may not be negative signs, a spike in this insider selling may spell trouble. Insider buying on the other hand signals a vote of confidence for the company.

Buying Stocks On Margin. While using margin can enhance your return in a rising market environment, the reverse occurs when your stock price drops. As always, the most important goal of an investor is capital preservation, not chasing the highest return.

The Desire to Be Fully Invested. While having all your portfolio fully invested is a good thing, sometimes keeping cash is a better thing. I would prefer my money to earn a 0% return rather than buying a stock that lost 50% in value. Therefore, if you cannot find a good stock to invest, keep the cash.

Investing without knowing technical analysis. ?We believe in investing for the long haul. However, it does not mean that we blindly buy any stocks that look undervalued. Supposed a stock A is undervalued at $15. If technical analysis predicts a steeper fall, would you still buy it? Of course not. We would rather buy the stock A at a lower price if all else remains equal.

Unrealistic Investing Goals. ?You heard somewhere that TravelZoo (TZOO) rises 20 fold in 2004. That’s right. 2000% in a year. So, you figure, if you can pick 9-10 stocks and one of them rises 20 fold, then 50% annual return for your portfolio is a conservative goal. Well, not really. Think about this. Let’s say you start investing early with $ 1000 investment. If you can maintain 50% annual return for the next 35 years, your $ 1000 will grow to $ 1.46 Billion. Sure, you can have a good winning streak of 50% return for several years. But the odd is, you won’t achieve that for 35 years in a row.