Investing Data
Mall Floor Plan

The DJIA average is available at http://averages.dowjones.com/ and the historical charts are at:

1990-1999 1980-1989 1970-1979 1960-1969 1950-1959 1940-1949 1930-1939 1920-1929 1910-1919 1895-1909

We have a different view of the world. There is a phrase out there "figures never lie but liers figure". It really is a shame that so few people are literate in mathematics and able to translate between math and the spoken word. So rather than trying to apply tea leaf reading techniques based on numerology, cycles, or the length of the male skirt or lack there of, we think in terms of balance. There are items that apply to everyday living and if a balance is present between those items then we have a metric to reasonably predict some potential future. If the balance is broken, that is also a predictor.

The following chart plots the DJIA, Corporate Profits, Gross Domestic Product, Personal Income, and Consumer Price Index for the past few decades. The numbers are scaled to the DJIA. In other words, a constant value was added or subtracted from each plot. This moves the curve up or down but does not change its shape.

Source Data Compliments Of Federal Reserve Bank

This chart shows us that GDP and personal income have been tracking each other for a very long time. It also shows that there is some relationship between Inflation (CPI) and the DJIA. When inflation was running rampant in the 70's the market DJIA (light blue) really took a big hit. I know, we all know that! It also shows that as inflation has subsided, the market has really gone up considerably. In fact it has broken through the GDP and personal income curves. During this time corporate profits have also significantly increased. Those corporate profits are also coincident with the massive downsizing of the recent past; cashing in of assets so to speak.

This analysis is available for purchase. Read on.

What does all this mean? It means that we are probably in for some changes. A curve not present on this chart is the cost of new housing. Again, we are looking for balance between the items that are used in every day living. How much did we make, how much did corporations make, how much did the government make, how much does it cost to buy a company, how much does it cost to buy a house, and how fast is our money devaluated. We think the market in general has caught up with the inflation of the 70's and the cost of a new home. This leaves us with picking the winners and losers in the next market. If you did not make your million in the past few years, you have a problem.

Which companies will survive, grow, prosper, or become insanely huge and rich? Wow, what a tall order. Looking at the historical data of the DJIA is not a nice sight. There are years when people lost 80% of their assets in the market. In other words, companies went out of business. If you were lucky enough to pick Xerox, life was good for you in the 60's. However, there were some pre 1930 relics, barely surviving that bit the dust in the 60's and 70's.

We know, This really stinks. This requires work and luck. It would require work and luck even if you did not learn this new reality. Let us explain. Assume the market continued its wild hay ride for the next 30 years. You put your 401K in the market and rode with the hay ride. You say great! However, if everyone else puts their money in the market they will be sitting on the same bundle. If everyone makes a killing in the market in the next 40 years and they sit on lets say $50 million, what do you think the price of a car will be? Price of bread? Price of housing? You see the object of investing is to separate yourself from the pack. The reality is that if you are not in the top 1% you will never be able to retire unless you already make a great deal of money.

Enough of this depressing stuff...

OK - So Where Do I Begin?

Step A is to get a copy of poincast on your PC. It is free and it is the closest thing to TV or radio, but it really provides a great deal of information about companies. Download Pointcast.com and get it working at home and at work.

You are part of an industry. That means you know something that most investors in that industry do not know. Find the companies in that industry, including yours, and start to compare them. Add these companies to your poincast setup that you downloaded and installed on your PC. Start reading the articles associated with those companies and look at the other info poincast provides. In addition, book mark the yahoo.com financial page and the infoseek.com (go.net) stock page. Also bookmark this page you are reading, CassBeth Investing Data.

Enter your stock symbols in yahoo and start clicking on the links. Start with the chart, then check out the news, then the profile. Then enter the message board on yahoo for that stock. Don't ever take any advise from a message board, however read it. Once in a while there is wonderful information about the company or a really great link that expands your horizons. Use infoseek to get quarter by quarter financial information. That information is also on poincast, but sometimes they do not match. That is a warning. Double check all your important information that drives you into a decision.

After about a month open an account with an online broker. We recommend E-Trade. There are other brokers and you can find them above, but we like E-Trade. Put a small amount of money in the account. While the money is transferring and you are waiting, play the etrade game. That will get you familiar with the tools. When you are ready, make your investment.

HELP !!! What do I Buy

We can't help you with your final decision, but here are the things that we consider. First of all you need to decide if you will invest based on fundamental data or technical data. Fundamentals are things about the company, such as: what does it produce, where is it located, what is its plan, how are they growing, what are they investing in, how do they hire people, how big are they, etc. Technicians ignore all the information. Technical analysts only look at the stock price over a period of time. They do not care about company strategy, its management team or anything. They just look at the stock price and use various mathematical formulas to guess where a stock price is headed.

We primarily focus on the fundamentals and occasionally look at the technical data before a buy sell decision is made. The fundamentals that we examine are:

• Market Cap: This is how much money it would take if you wanted to buy the entire company now. We like this metric because we know how to comparison shop for clothes, cars, furniture, houses and other stuff. We know when we see a good buy. Market cap is a very powerful metric. If a company has a large market cap, like $100 billion, what do you think the chances are that the market cap will go to $200 billion? In other words for the stock price to double, the price of the company needs to go from $100 to $200 billion. Hum, don't know about you, but by the time a company reaches $100 billion we think all the money has been made. On the other hand if you start with a small company that only costs $1 billion and you think it will change the world, your investment could really grow.

• The Product: If we love the product, others may love it, but not necessarily. The product needs to be compared with growth. If growth is 100% per year, then these guys have a good product.

• Growth: We measure growth in 2 ways. The first is the number of new customers and the second is the increase in gross sales (revenue). We don't care about the PE or earnings (profit). When you are talking about a few hundred million in sales, anyone can suck out assets and show a great profit until there is nothing left. The object is to find a company that is growing and investing to capture the market. Bottom line is we invest 10 cents on the dollar. That is right, we expect to make 10 times on our money within 5 years. There is an old rule to business. It will be wildly successful for 5 years or it will flop. In those 5 years the business will grow 10 times its current size. After that, it becomes a new business again, with a new strategy, and it again either flies or flops. What you are really doing is looking for people who are creating something from nothing. They are creating wealth in its purest form. That is very hard to do, but it can be done as exemplified by MSFT, CSCO, INTC, DELL, GTW, etc.

• Stock Price: We look at the stock price and buy low based on the moving averages. Pointcast has this blue line that is an excellent indicator. All stock prices cycle. Do not buy at a peak. Click on the moving averages or look at poincast. We need to confess, that because of this strategy we missed buying AMZN when we first detected it. We are currently invested in AMZN, but our entry point is 5 times higher.

• News: We read the news related to the company on pointcast and on yahoo. The news gives us insight into the industry and the company strategy. It also gives us a look at the management.

• Strategy: We know the company strategy based on news releases and company annual report. If we can imagine more than the management is executing, then we avoid the company. The management is brain dead. These guys and gals must have a vision far beyond what you can comprehend and they must articulate it so that it is visible to the world.

• Location: Its sad, but we look for location. Its ok to start in the south, but if you are going to be #1 or #2 in todays global markets you need to be in the key centers of the USA.

• Industry Reaction and Company Resilience: Its sad, but when a company comes along that starts a revolution, it creates many enemies. The enemies are the old guard that are incapable of changing with the times. Occasionally the old guard wins temporarily, and a great company is destroyed using tactics that are not taught in business schools. But in the end, you can't stop progress and the on rush of technology. Eventually the new way is reborn in another new company that survives, prospers, changes everything, and becomes the dominant player, until they become part of the old guard. Companies like IBM, AT&T, GE have recognized this and have survived all these decades because they eventually shed their internal old guards and bring in the new.

We only invest in new companies that we think will become fortune 500 companies. That means they become #1 or #2 in their market. Our investment must return a minimum of 10 times over 5 years. In other words a:

• $100 million dollar market cap becomes a $1 billion dollar market cap company

• $1 billion dollar market cap becomes a $10 billion dollar market cap company

• $10 billion dollar market cap becomes a $100 billion dollar market cap company

A home run would be to start at the beginning and finish at the end. Quality is key. We look for anything that does not smack of fortune 500. Poor press releases, small thinking, asset stripping, fly by night appearance, poor advertising, and of course flawed products. Just 1 item will throw a company off the list. That includes a poor web site.

Everyday is the start of a new day. Don't think it is too late or you missed the boat. Do your research and make 1-3 small investments of perhaps $1,000 each. Follow them for 6 months. If you want to sell and move on to another company, then do it. If you did lose money, remember to sell before December 31 so you can get a tax break. In fact wait till December to sell. The markets tend to rise as grand parents buy stocks for their grand kids and the big money manipulates the markets to show good end of year mutual fund returns. What looks like a mess in the summer or worse in October might be a good return by December.

Never ever buy on margin. Remember, investing is not about making 10% per year. Investing is about buying 10 cents on the dollar, or making 10 times on your money over a 5 year period. If you fall into the trap of trying to get 10% per year you will use margin accounts to convert 5% returns to 10% returns. That is a flawed strategy. This is not interest on a CD. If you want to get 10% per year, then buy into a few good mutual funds.

In case you did no get it, we will repeat the message. We are trying to take $1000 and convert it to $10,000 dollars in a small time frame, like 5 years. Almost everyone can spare $1000. Invest a $1000 dollars in each company using your etrade account. The cost is only $20 dollars. Take a few years to spread that money across a few very high quality new companies and one or two of them will execute three 5 year plans that will yield the 10X return. That means $1000 becomes, $10,000, becomes $100,000. You will know if you have a winning horse in your first year - within 6 months. At that time you can increase your investment to perhaps $10,000 or more, but never bet money that you need on the market. If at the end of the year all your horses are duds, you are only out a small amount of money. Re-evaluate your strategy. Claim your losses and try it again, but pick only 2 stocks. 

Remember, you are investing, not gambling, even though we talk about horses. You are a business man or woman and this is your business. You should be on top of it, love it, and know why it will grow. When you vote your proxy, take it seriously. It is your company. But know when it is time to move on. Unlike a small business owner, you can sell your business when the world changes and you have made your money.

It is the best of times and it is the worst of times. Putting money in the market is very dangerous as shown by the averages on the links above. You are not buying into the market. You are believing that there is a future for your kids and that new companies will create a wonderful new future.  In the process you will prosper.  The market could go down or sideways for decades, but new companies will be born and their owners will become rich. For the first time in history, you have access to information that can help you to identify these new leaders. The internet is not a fast talking salesperson trying to make a commission. The internet is not a small collection of magazines with paid advertising. It is truely a very valuable tool that can help you to gain control of your financial future. It may indeed be the last step in the evolution of democracy, where you are in full control of your money.

GOOD Luck and Invest Wisely

The Best Financial Management Links On Earth

CassBethVator™ Mall Floor Plan CassBeth Portal CassBeth Malls Faster Access ElizAndra FredsSpot OuterSpaceShopper GiftsToHumanity MartianShopper EarthlingsUnited Clothes & Jewelry Clothes Galore allé Fine Jewelry Shoes For All Womens Clothes Mens Clothes Kids Clothes Accessories Wazzo Old Navy - Target - Nordstrom - Lands' End - Gap - etc Other Shops Toys Games Galore Video Games Porcelain Dolls Bears Tools & Home Improvement Gardening Gourmet Cooking Sporting Goods Electronics Galore MP3 Internet Music Players DVD Players Digital Cameras to Film Camcorders VCRs CD Players Nintendo Sony Playstation Sega Office Supplies Computers Printers Scanners Software Music CDs DVD & VHS Videos Hollywoods Greatest Movies TV Shows Dr Who Videos Alien and UFO Media Red Dwarf Videos Star Trek Videos Book Store University Books College SAT Prep Books Cellular Phone Needs Photography Holiday Gifts Electric Trains BEARS Weird Surveys Travel Help & Specials Stock Investing FREE Greeting Cards Stained Glass Tiffany Stuff Limoges Collectibles Russian Collectibles Button Dolls General Cassbeth Home Shop Entrance Search Order Now Order Guide Info Kiosk Services Customer Service Join Cassbeth CassBeth Cyber mall Software Site Map