world of buying and selling, and then some...

After deliberating for ages, finally bought the first 2 lots of stocks. First attempt on Monday was not successful, because bid was too low (just like 5 cents difference from sell price). Yesterday, it got through like super duper fast. But that's because the bid was on par with sell price. At closing, it went down 10 cents. Hmm...

Nowadays I do see a lot of those pop-up stalls appearing in the mall to allow people to open their trading accounts. I'm using POEMS. The appeal of stock trading to the masses, in my opinion, is just like gambling. I'm sure there are people who do not really care whether the counter that they are buying is in which industry or whether there is growth etc etc. In theory, for counters with a lot of movement (aka, somewhat equal buying and selling), let's say a person enters the market and buys at price A (which say, is on par with current sell price). Then when price A rises to A+B, then that person will do a sell. If there's another person who has the same mentality as this person, then that person will buy-in and hope to sell at  B+C price. Momentum buying, they say. Others call it, the Greater Fool Theory.

Investing is pretty much related to psychology, the experts had warned. And yes, it wreaks havoc on your emotions as well. Some fundamentals are required. As a newbie, I was quite intimidated by the complexity of the  trading tools. Then, comes decision to make the 'right' pickings. This can be done via publicly available information about the company, forecast etc. Then comes to target setting. How much I want to make? 10 percent? 20 percent? But humans are bound to be greedy, and this target could well turn out as a moving one. Which, may not be good for mental health in the long run. I can imagine if I set a target of say, 10 percent, and when it hits, and if I decided not to sell because greedy and thinks it may rise further. But if the price drops 20 percent right after that decision and remain stagnant of x amount of time, then who is to blame but self?

Let's see what is achievable in this year. Hope to see some positive results from the increased effort in managing own finances.