I am 26 years old and started to trade in the summer of 2009. Realising the fact that my savings were being depreciated year upon year, I decided to invest in the stock market in order to turnover my money. This is my trading experience to date.
Just three days after deciding to invest in the stock market, I was holding shares in a few companies. This was my first mistake, rushing into the stock market and trying to make money quickly. Looking back, I should I have spent considerable time reading around the stock markets and grasping the basics of shares and the factors which influence them. I would also recommend anyone contemplating share trading to set up a ‘dummy’ share dealing account, where potential investors can try share dealing without actually losing any money. If I had done this, I would have saved a lot of money.
Within the first few months, my portfolio was down and I was selling shares at losses. One of the principal lessons I have learnt is that it is very easy to lose money on the stock market without research. Making money in the stock market is not easy and without research, I would say it is incredibly difficult. During the first months of my trading, I spent no time on research and chased many stocks from the ‘top risers’ list and from tips from the bulletin boards hoping for quick gains. I am still paying for some of these mistakes, as I am ‘locked’ into many shares. Some of these ‘quick gains’ are currently down 30% in my portfolio. I have learnt not to trust everyone on the bulletin boards and learnt that everything posted on these boards are not entirely true.
Watching my portfolio depreciate day by day was very difficult for me. I was always trying to recover my losses and taking wild punts into the ‘Risky / High reward’ category. Some of my other mistakes included, buying a share on a RNS not realising the well known phrase ‘buy on speculation, sell on news’.
Emotions can play a key part in buying and selling. I still have to master this aspect of trading. Controlling these emotions and to ensure they don’t cloud your judgement in buying or selling is a key aspect of trading.
I am learning the hard way, but in some strange way glad to have made the mistakes this early in my journey. Thankfully for me, I have met some great people via the bulletin boards who have helped me a great deal. I have been given support, advice and guidance which have helped me increase my knowledge in share trading. I have witnessed some shocking behaviour on bulletin boards with people attempting to drive prices up or down with lies and false information.
For the past few months, I have been in the process of restructuring my portfolio by reducing, or at times replacing some of my losers with companies where I see future growth future potential. It will be one year this summer 2010 when I started my journey, and I am confident I will be able to turn my portfolio around. I believe in learning from my mistakes and acquiring more knowledge will enable me to become a successful investor.
I have recently discovered http://www.share-exchange.com which contains research resources and some very useful links and information on share trading. The articles appear to be written by very experienced share dealers and private investors and have been of great use to me.
Just three days after deciding to invest in the stock market, I was holding shares in a few companies. This was my first mistake, rushing into the stock market and trying to make money quickly. Looking back, I should I have spent considerable time reading around the stock markets and grasping the basics of shares and the factors which influence them. I would also recommend anyone contemplating share trading to set up a ‘dummy’ share dealing account, where potential investors can try share dealing without actually losing any money. If I had done this, I would have saved a lot of money.
Within the first few months, my portfolio was down and I was selling shares at losses. One of the principal lessons I have learnt is that it is very easy to lose money on the stock market without research. Making money in the stock market is not easy and without research, I would say it is incredibly difficult. During the first months of my trading, I spent no time on research and chased many stocks from the ‘top risers’ list and from tips from the bulletin boards hoping for quick gains. I am still paying for some of these mistakes, as I am ‘locked’ into many shares. Some of these ‘quick gains’ are currently down 30% in my portfolio. I have learnt not to trust everyone on the bulletin boards and learnt that everything posted on these boards are not entirely true.
Watching my portfolio depreciate day by day was very difficult for me. I was always trying to recover my losses and taking wild punts into the ‘Risky / High reward’ category. Some of my other mistakes included, buying a share on a RNS not realising the well known phrase ‘buy on speculation, sell on news’.
Emotions can play a key part in buying and selling. I still have to master this aspect of trading. Controlling these emotions and to ensure they don’t cloud your judgement in buying or selling is a key aspect of trading.
I am learning the hard way, but in some strange way glad to have made the mistakes this early in my journey. Thankfully for me, I have met some great people via the bulletin boards who have helped me a great deal. I have been given support, advice and guidance which have helped me increase my knowledge in share trading. I have witnessed some shocking behaviour on bulletin boards with people attempting to drive prices up or down with lies and false information.
For the past few months, I have been in the process of restructuring my portfolio by reducing, or at times replacing some of my losers with companies where I see future growth future potential. It will be one year this summer 2010 when I started my journey, and I am confident I will be able to turn my portfolio around. I believe in learning from my mistakes and acquiring more knowledge will enable me to become a successful investor.
I have recently discovered http://www.share-exchange.com which contains research resources and some very useful links and information on share trading. The articles appear to be written by very experienced share dealers and private investors and have been of great use to me.
