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This post is coming up without a plan, just a heads up. I must have been really busy I didn't notice more than two months have passed since my last post here in Orble.
I was thinking of writing about a festival somewhere in northern Philippines where I happened to help organize a promotional event for that telco that has me scurrying about in this country (which was mentioned in my earlier posts), but I guess that will have to wait for a bit more.
I am still traveling about like mad, reason why I woke up early today. Have to prepare for another dash to the airport that will bring me back to Mindanao. Two meetings with two different sets of people await me there, then off to the airport again to go back to Manila, pick up the car and drive 6 hours to another telco event somewhere in the Bicol region.
There is that weather system which picture I uploaded here that makes me wonder whether I should worry about because it is right smack in between my point of origin and my point of destination today June 24, 2009 ( 8 GMT). But it's center wind is only 75Kph with gustiness up to 90Kph (rather tame compared to the previous ones we had in these parts) so I decided not to.
Then my cell phone rang! And it wouldn't stop. I tried to ignore it. Twice. But it wouldn't give up.It was 6:00am! Too early for any important business call. But obviously, nothing is too early for an emergency. The call was from a town official (a councilor) of Looc, Romblon. A woman who runs a local radio station affiliated to the business organization I am connected with.
It was a frantic call.
That weather system I decided to ignore has actually poured a lot of rain in their area and the town is now flooded. There's no electricity and her radio station which serves as a public information center during states of calamity is now submerged!
Their town needs help and the only way they can call the attention of national government officials and make them act fast is (in this country) thru major media networks that cover natural disasters on a nationwide scale.
I hooked her up with the desk editors of DZRH the flagship AM station of the country's larget radio network. I gave her number and they immediately called her up. I hope that helps.
I have a plane to catch so I didn't know what happened after they called her. But this post is not about the story that I just told. That was just the premise.
This post is for anybody out there who is from Looc, Romblon, Philippines who happened to read this. You may want to check on your relatives back home. They may need a little support, be it just a moral support.
Illustration pic. Planes on queue for take off
This post is not really about flying planes or landing them, this is about newbie investing. But for you to better appreciate the discussion here (in case you are interested) please refer to the post immediately preceding this. I guess, I just can't get away too long from airplanes these days (there are two roundtrip tickets in my hand carry bag at the moment and I just deplaned yesterday) thus the title.
I wrote the previous post “Passenger lands a plane” to encourage new investors to continue to personally learn how the maket is played instead of just depending on their brokers. I have nothing against brokers. Many investors need brokers like the way many airline passengers need their airline pilots.
In normal times, the pilots or brokers can take care of their respective charges without much intervention from them. But then, there are instances when the passengers or the investors are forced to make the decisions and that is when personal knowledge becomes of critical importance. Like, you know, when Doug White had to land that plane.
Okay, so maybe those are the extremes. I mean, I ride planes all the time but the only thing I know about flying is what little I can learn from dabbling with a computer flight simulator (game)! But at least, I know there is such a thing as “stall speed.”
Now, going back to investing. Time is gold and, while there are people who believe that it would probably be better if all investors should just stay at the sidelines while all the scary stories are coming out, there are those who believe that they cannot stand still. They go looking for opportunities and eventually make handsome profits – at the very same time when the rest of the world are just too afraid to do anything.
To give an example: While everyone is saying how bad the world economic situation really is, how long the recession will be, why a certain rally cannot be sustained, why it is safer to keep your money under your mattresses, and why the market is still so dangerous to be in, the prices of some stocks were actually going up.
Let's take the case of PSE in my local market. The lowest it went down was 110 in December. By March this year it was at 139 and twice, since April 14 to date it went to as high as 310. Now, what do you think would have happened if you just stayed cowering in fear in one corner? In the meantime, some of the knowledgeable guys have already almost tripled their money!
So you'll say that's probably an isolated case. Fine! Let's talk about AC. Sometime in November 2008 its price went down to as low as 171. By January 2009 it went up to 235 by March 4 it went back to a low of 178. Twenty days later it was back at 227. It gapped down and went to 202 on Apr 1, but on April 17 it climbed up again to 227. If you don't know anything and you just concentrated on the negative stories you won't even know what you missed.
I do believe that a knowledgeable investor would know how to spot those opportunities and know what to do when he sees them.
Illustration pic. Plane abou to touch down at NAIA
Read that AP story that came out on Yahoo! April 13? Here's the link: Really Long Link
Well, I am not re-issuing it. It wasn't mine in the first place. Besides, to be honest, it is a nice story but it is not that spectacular a story if you ask me. I mean, Doug White, the passenger who landed the plane knows how to fly a plane and, therefore, to land a plane – albiet a different one.
Never mind that the plane that landed him in the AP story was not the kind of plane where he logged 150 flying hours. It will be the kind of stuff movies are made of were he an ordinary passenger who has no actual flying experience and yet he was able to land that plane.
So, why am I resurrecting it?
Believe it or not, the reason has to do with the world economic crisis that we are currently experiencing...
Well, it is like this: I am a newbie in the world of investing. Yet, I am convinced that despite all the hardships that has befallen us (no thanks to the Wall Street Financial wiz kids and the former movers and shakers of the humongous failed banks), the fact remains that there is a lot of money to be made in the stock market.
So, what has flying planes and the stock market got to do with each other? A lot, if you ask me, though it was the heads of the auto industry that showed more affinity with them (planes) the first time they went to beg alms from the U.S. Congress.
But then, of course, this post is not really about flying planes. Instead, it is about one's abilities. As the Market Newbie (in Orble) my advocacy is to help eradicate poverty (a very tall order, I know) and convince every single new investor who would listen to learn the ropes of the trade.
I am not saying that everyone should become a pilot (if you get my drift). In the first place, not everyone can be. Okay, I'll admit, one of my wildest fantasies is to be able to fly and eventually own one of those VLJ's (very light jets). But we all belong to different circumstances in life and we all have our own preferences. And imagine how many control tower personnel will go nuts if everyone who wants to fly buys and pilots their own aircrafts!
Bottomline, however, is this: It might be a good idea for anybody who will venture into the equities market to have even the most rudimentary knowledge on stock market investing.
Doug White, in that AP story (in case you didnt read it) had to land that plane because the plane captain died almost as soon as they were airborne!
Sure, you will probably not have the same life and death situation when you are merely investing and you are not doing it while seated next to a maniacal acrobatic pilot who is trying to find out if his plane can pull out in time from a nose dive at Mach 2.
Still, wouldn't it be nice to know what to do when nothing seems to make sense - like when there is a worldwide economic crash? To some people, that will also save lives.
Of all the beautiful places in the Philippines that were initially ranked at the top of the search for the New 7 Wonders of the world (officials were encouraging the voters to support just one for every country), the underground river in Pueto Princesa, Palawan emerged as the only contender from the Philippines.
The underground river is 8.2 kms long. It starts from a lagoon, snakes thru a cave and ends
[ Click here to read more ]
I wasn't supposed to write anything today. I just finished a round of tasks that sent me traveling all over the country and I thought I'll rest for a while... I wasn't even planning on getting out of bed early.
But the blaring sound of a radio set from somewhere was talking about a columnist in Hongkong who supposedly made a racist comment calling the Philippines a "nation of servants." The name of the columnist sounded like "cheap chow
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Breakfast at the airport. Lunch at the airport. Dinner at the airport. Breakfast at the airport. Lunch at the airport. Dinner at the airport...
Those first four words: Breakfast at the airport, used to sound very exciting (to me, at least). It used to come after an almost sleepless night. You couldn't sleep because of excitement. You are going to a new place for the first time and your expectations are high
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I suppose anyone who have seen a World War II movie would have had, at least, a glance of a motorcycle with a side-car.
That kind of contraption had different variations over time in different countries
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If anyone ever wonders how a strange word (tamak) and a concoction (buko-pandan) ended up in the travel section of Orble, here’s my explanation: people always consider travel as part of an educational process...
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First, a warning: almost every story about the world economy that I read these days talks about a sluggish growth, a difficult year ahead or another round of financial crisis.
[ Click here to read more ]
It is just a matter of impression, I guess. But somehow, it looks to me like nature has a way of teaching humans how to take care of nature which eventually benefits humans. Well, of course, all of these could just be a matter of coincidences.
The coincidences I am referring to has to do with the post I made last month about a man saved by dolphins where I provided a link to the original story, and to what has just been published today about a group of fishermen saving a sea cow
[ Click here to read more ]
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Comment by Market Newbie
on PASSENGER LANDS A PLANE
Stock Market Punk
Cases in point: 1.There is a reason why those bank shares that you mentioned are oversold- people have been buying them. There're probably lost opportunities there for those who didn't know what to do. 2. As you said markets don't go down on a straight line - that sounds like "retracements" to me. There would be another lost opportunity there for some who would otherwise already be a little bit of a sophisticated investor. If they understand the equities game.
Another point is this, since the start of the latest bounce in the local market some of the stocks have already made more than 10% increase in prices(profit for those who bought them for the first time at that point). If I am the one who bought them and I understand the "vagaries" of the market as you called them, I will have a better idea on what to do with those stocks at this point and time.