How to Buy Stocks
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NYSE summation index – Bear Turning Point to Bull for Sept 2010
Sep 1st
Today was great day with Dow Jones jumped 254.75, or 2.54%, to 10,269.47. Many market advisors are saying that many investors were waiting for this moment.
Also according to the NYSE summation index (you can check out here ) , the falling has been stopped and turned into the positive area. As you can see in the past data, this positive trend may not continue, but if it dose for few days, I think we will see bull trend throughout September.
Also look at the RSI14 value, it is touching near 30 and there is lot of room to go upward.
Today’s jump changed market sentiment, and I would recommend to buy ETF if you don’t have specific stock in mind yet, but want to ride the upward trend.
- Direxion Daily Large Cp Bull 3X shs (ETF) BGU ($44.57 9/1/2010 / $46.88 1.01 +2.20% Now / +5.18% Change)
- Direxion Daily Small Cp Bull 3X Shs(ETF) TNA ($37.49 9/1/2010 / $39.92 1.15 +2.97% Now / +6.48% Change)
- Direxion Daily Mid Cap Bull 3X Shs(ETF) MWJ ($29.26 9/1/2010 / $31.16 0.65 +2.13% Now / +6.49% Change)
- Direxion Daily Finan. Bull 3X Shs(ETF) FAS ($19.86 9/1/2010 / $21.16 0.77 +3.78% Now / +6.55% Change)
But these are volatile and sensitive to the market price , so you should be highly alert and careful. If you wan to be more careful, you can simply buy below ETF and directly play Dow Jones or S&P 500 indices.
- SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF DIA ($102.80 9/1/2010 / $103.98 0.70 +0.68% Now / +1.15% Change)
- SPDR S&P 500 ETF SPY ($108.46 9/1/2010 / $110.25 0.78 +0.71% Now / +1.65% Change)
Happy stock trading!
Goldman Sachs settling with SEC at $550 million.
Jul 15th
I have foreseen something like this when I heard SEC accusing of Goldman Sachs back in mid April. And though that the GS ($145.22 7/15/2010 / $144.84 5.06 +3.62% Now / -0.26% Change)will soon resolve the issue with SEC and the price will be back up at the end of GS when the price was around $145. ( Good Opportunity with Goldman Sachs ) But I guess my call was too soon and the market was down for several weeks and the price was even down to around $130 level.
But today finally I hear the news that I have been waiting for.
Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay $550 million to settle federal claims that it misled investors in a subprime mortgage product as the housing market began to collapse, officials said Thursday.
S.E.C. Settling Its Complaints With Goldman (New York Times)
So the stock was up 4.43% to $145.22 during the regular opening hours and up 5.61% after hours.
At this time, it is quite difficult to tell if GS is out of the woods yet. So I am not sure if GS could do better. We have the second quarter earnings report on 7/20 (Next Tues) morning. If GS would be able to beat the estimates, probably GS can run up some more. But at this time I do not expect too much.
Now the worst is over for European Financial Crisis
Jul 9th
The worst of the recent financial-market turmoil tied to the European sovereign-debt crisis appears to have passed, a top European Central Bank official said Friday. (from MarketWatch.com)
Stocks to buy – IPXL
Jun 28th
IPXL ($20.85 6/28/2010 / $17.19 0.27 +1.60% Now / -17.55% Change) Impax Laboratories, Inc : Impax Laboratories, Inc., incorporated in 1995, is a technology-based, specialty pharmaceutical company.
Their financials is just amazing. Their net income has been growing like crazy. 2010 First quarter income was increase by almost 300% compared to the fourth quarter of 2009. Check out their Google Finance link . Also look at this key ratios. Return on average equity is amazing 180.76%. And it’s P/E ratio is only 7.37. This is a must buy stock. I got some at $19.66 myself about couple of days ago. Click here to view the current detail stock quotes for IPXL.
Here is the graph. It has been constantly growing. 
Impax Laboratories, Inc., incorporated in 1995, is a technology-based, specialty pharmaceutical company. The Company is focused on the development and commercialization of bioequivalent and brand-name pharmaceuticals. In the generic pharmaceuticals market, the Company focuses on controlled-release generic versions of brand-name pharmaceuticals, covering a range of therapeutic areas. In the brand-name pharmaceuticals market, the Company is developing products for the treatment of central nervous system (CNS) disorders. The Company’s brand-name product portfolio consists of development-stage projects to which the Company applies its formulation and development expertise to develop differentiated, modified, or controlled-release versions of marketed drug substances. It operates in two segments: Global Pharmaceuticals Division (Global Division) and the Impax Pharmaceuticals Division (Impax Division).
As of February 15, 2010, the Company’s generic pharmaceutical product development activities included 57 abbreviated new drug applications (ANDAs) approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which included generic versions of brand name pharmaceuticals, such as Brethine, Florinef, Minocin, Claritin-D 12-hour, Claritin-D 24-hour, Wellbutrin SR, Wellbutrin XL, Ditropan XL, Depakote ER and Prilosec, and 52 products in various stages of development. In addition, as of December 31, 2009, the Company had one branded pharmaceutical product for which it had completed one Phase III clinical study and other programs in the early exploratory phase.
Global Pharmaceuticals Division
The Global Division develops, manufactures, sells, and distributes generic pharmaceutical products primarily through four sales channels: the global product sales channel, for generic pharmaceutical prescription products the Company sells directly to wholesalers, retail drug chains, and others; the Private Label sales channel, for generic pharmaceutical over-the-counter (OTC) and prescription products it sells to unrelated third parties who in-turn sell the product under their own label; the Rx Partner sales channel, for generic prescription products sold through unrelated third-party pharmaceutical entities pursuant to alliance agreements, and the OTC Partner sales channel, for sales of generic pharmaceutical OTC products sold, through unrelated third-party pharmaceutical entities pursuant to alliance agreements. The Company also generates revenue from research and development services provided under a joint development agreement with another pharmaceutical company.
Impax Pharmaceuticals Division
The Company’s Impax Division is engaged in the development of brand pharmaceutical products, through improvements to already approved pharmaceutical products to address CNS disorders. The Impax Division is also engaged in the co-promotion of products developed by third-party pharmaceutical entities, through a direct sales force focused on marketing to physicians in the CNS community.
The Company competes with Sandoz, Inc., Qualitest Pharmaceuticals, URL Pharma Inc., Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. and Watson Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Thank you for visiting How to buy stocks.
Zecco.com. Zecco provides quality trading platform with the lowest fee per trade $4.50 and free trades under some conditions.
Best way to Buy stocks – “Zap Trade”
Jun 20th
Many non-professional stock traders just like you and me, we are not logged in or enable access to the stock brokerage web site all the time. But when you read a good or bad news on a particular stocks while you are web surfing and when you try to perform trading, most of the time we are bit sluggish and loose the critical chance to catch the better prices.
Most of the time, when you need to buy or sell stocks, you will need to visit your stock brokerage website and go through all their login process and several clicks to go through pages to reach the final trading page. The whole process requires certain process and dedicated amount of time that it prevents you from acting quickly.
Few days ago, I got an email from Zecco.com from few days ago about their new tool “Zap Trade”.
Zap Trade is a free Firefox plug-in that lets investors place stock trades and get real-time quotes while visiting popular investment and research websites. Here’s how it works:
* Click the [Z] on select sites
* Get a real-time stock quote
* Complete the trade ticket
* Place a trade with Zecco Trading without leaving the site you’re on
Okay, according to the description, I can execute the trading right from the other investment website, such as Google Finance! This was very interesting so I had to try right away since I have been hoping for similar solution for awhile! Basically this solution is Firefox plug-in and requires version 3+.
Now I visited their downloading Zap Trade site, and installed the plugin (Or you can access this menu from the Tools menu from Zecco.com)
Click on the “Agreement” checkbox and then Download button and it will show the above Plugin installation popup window. Once installed, you will need to restart the Firefox to activate the plugin. You can access the Zap Trade popup screen using the pink “Z” icon on the right side of the Firefox status bar. Or you can access the screen from your popular investment website.
Below image is the screen shot of Google Finance. As you can see, when you move your mouse over the stock symbol and if you see the popup icon “Z” showing right besides of the symbol, you can open Zap Trade and perform trading right away. Note that the background color of the stock symbols recognized by Zap Trade is showing as pink. So you can easily notice that you can trade the stock symbol using Zap Trade.
Zap Trade screen shows real time stock trading status including real time bid and ask prices. This would be the perfect stock trading tool you will definitely need.
Here is a Youtube video about Zap Trade that I found.
You can Download Zap Trade Now.
Below is the FAQ from the Zecco.com in case if you have more questions about its capabilities.
FAQs – Zap Trade
What is Zap Trade?
Zap Trade is a browser plug-in that enables you to get real-time quotes and submit stock trades from your Zecco Trading account while you are visiting popular investing research sites.
What are the system requirements for Zap Trade?
Zap Trade currently works with Firefox 3+. We plan to roll out Zap Trade to other browsers in the future.
Which websites does Zap Trade work on?
The Zap Trade plug-in scans and pre-fills your ticket on leading financial/investing websites. Like these portals, news and research sites:
- Bloomberg
- CNN Money
- Google Finance
- MarketWatch
- The Motley Fool
- MSN Money
- Reuters
- TheStreet
- Yahoo! Finance
Zap Trade also works on the public research sections of these brokerage sites:
Zap Trade is also available as custom website implementation. When a website is Zap Trade Enabled, access to the Zap Trade ticket is available to all visitors (no need to download a browser plug-in). The following sites are Zap Trade Enabled:
- StockTwits
If you would like Zap Trade to work on additional investing websites, please let us know by leaving a comment in the Feedback Group.
What types of securities can I trade with Zap Trade?
Zap Trade supports stock and ETF trading at this time. You can select all transaction types available to you in the full Zecco Trading platform, including buy, sell, short, and cover (according to the permissions on your account). Zap Trade does not currently support trading of options, mutual funds, bonds or foreign exchange.
Does it cost extra to use Zap Trade?
No. Use of Zap Trade is free, as is access to real-time quotes. Of course, trades submitted through Zap Trade are subject to the same commissions that you currently enjoy at Zecco Trading.
How does Zap Trade work?
As a web browser plug-in, Zap Trade works by adding special functionality to your Firefox browser. This patent-pending technology detects stock symbols and links on popular investing websites and overlays instant quote and trade ticket controls on top of your view of these sites.
How do I sign in to Zap Trade?
When you open Zap Trade, you may be prompted for your username and password. Just sign in using the same username and password you use on the Zecco site. Note that if you are signed in to Zap Trade, you will also be signed in to the Zecco website. Likewise, if you sign out of Zap Trade, you will also be signed out of the Zecco website.
Are stock trades submitted through Zap Trade handled like my other trades?
Yes. Stock trades submitted using Zap Trade are handled identically to those submitted using the Zecco Trading site.
Is Zap Trade secure?
Yes. Information you enter or access using Zap Trade is protected by the same Verisign SSL encryption protocols used by the Zecco website and Zecco Trading platform.
Is Zap Trade monitoring me?
No. Zap Trade does not track, record or store the sites you visit or any other web browsing activity. Zap Trade simply scans pages of relevant research websites that you are browsing in order to detect stocks you can trade at Zecco Trading. When you launch the Zap Trade ticket, the only data obtained from the web page is the stock symbol, so as to pre-fill the trade ticket.
How do I make sure that I have the latest Zap Trade version?
To ensure the best user experience, we recommend that you keep Zap Trade updated automatically in your Firefox browser.
- In Firefox for Windows: Tools > Options > Advanced > Update and select “Automatically check for updates to: Installed Add-ons”
- In Firefox for Mac: Firefox > Preferences > Advanced > Update and select “Automatically check for updates to: Add-ons”
You can also update Zap Trade manually by going to Tools > Add-ons and click “Find updates in the Firefox browser” (both Windows and Mac).
How do I disable or uninstall Zap Trade?
To disable or uninstall Zap Trade, go to the Firefox browser and select Tools > Add-ons > Extensions. Now select Zap Trade and click Disable or Uninstall.
Download Zap Trade and Enjoy fast and easy stock trading !
Market is Bull till mid July 2010
Jun 20th
I just read an article about forecasting that market will rally into July 2010. It’s quite interesting method of identifying bull or bear . The author is using “NYSE summation index” (It’s a momentum indicator with an excellent track record of identifying short-term turning points in the stock market.) Author is using its MACD chart to identify bull and bear.
The indicator generates “buy” signals when the short-term moving average convergence divergence (MACD) – the black line on the bottom graph – crosses up and over the longer-term MACD line – the red line. Buy signals are marked by the green circles on the chart.
“Sell” signals occur when the short-term MACD line curls down and crosses below the long-term line. Sell signals are marked by the red circles.
And here are the charts of NYSE summation index ($NYSI) and S&P 500 side by side to compare the SELL (red) or BUY alert (green) of NYSE index with S&P 500 charts. It matches almost perfectly.
The recent BUY signal started on Jun 9th (where the Black MACD line crosses up red line) and the author expects the current short term bull trend will continue till mid July 2010.
By the way, you can access these graphs directly from stockcharts.com
His argument is pretty much convincing. And if you want to buy stocks, you might want to consider DIA ($104.49 0.13 +0.12%) or SPY ($111.73 0.13 +0.12%). They are ETF that you can buy or sell DOW Jones or S&P 500 index just like regular stock.
Zecco.com. Zecco provides quality trading platform with the lowest fee per trade $4.50 and free trades under some conditions.
Stocks to buy – CACC, LULU
Jun 16th
Hello, after about a month the stock market seems to run with nice come back for the last few days.
I have a good recommendation for the stocks to buy at this point.
CACC ($46.75 -0.18 -0.38%) (Realtime: CACC ($59.16 -0.33 -0.55% Live) ): Credit Acceptance Corp . With the expectation of better auto buying market this year, we can imagine the great possibility of the growth on this stock. The P/E is not even 10. Click here to view the current detailed stock quote for CACC
Credit Acceptance Corporation (Credit Acceptance) is a provider of auto loans to consumers, using a nationwide network of automobile dealers who benefit from sales of vehicles to consumers who otherwise could not obtain financing; from repeat and referral sales generated by these same customers, and from sales to customers responding to advertisements for the Company’s product. The Company operates in two business segments: United States and Other. The United States segment is its dominant segment and primarily consists of the United States automobile financing business. The Other segment consists of businesses in liquidation, primarily represented by the discontinued United Kingdom automobile financing business. It has two programs: the Portfolio Program and the Purchase Program. Under the Portfolio Program, it advances money to Dealer-Partners (Dealer Loan) in exchange for the right to service the underlying Consumer Loan.
Also if you look at the chart , its price has been steadily increased during the last few month.
LULU ($45.58 1.23 +2.77%) (Realtime: LULU ($35.30 0.94 +2.74% Live) ): Lululemon Athletica inc
This stock has been running higher and higher since last year. Their earnings report are just getting better every quarter. Click here to view the current detailed stock quote for LULU.
lululemon athletica inc. is a designer and retailer of technical athletic apparel primarily in North America. Its yoga-inspired apparel is marketed under the lululemon athletica brand name. The Company offers a line of apparel and accessories, including fitness pants, shorts, tops and jackets designed for athletic pursuits, such as yoga, running and general fitness. As of January 31, 2010, its branded apparel was principally sold through 124 stores that are primarily located in Canada and the United States. As of January 31, 2010, its retail footprint included 45 stores in Canada, 70 stores in the United States and nine franchise stores in Australia.
The Company offers a line of performance apparel and accessories for both women and men. Its apparel assortment, including items such as fitness pants, shorts, tops and jackets, is designed for healthy lifestyle activities such as yoga, running and general fitness. The Company’s fitness-related accessories include an array of items, such as bags, socks, underwear, yoga mats, instructional yoga digital versatile discs (DVDs) and water bottles. The Company also sells lululemon athletica products through yoga studios, health clubs and fitness centers. As of January 31, 2010, it had one franchise store in Canada and four franchise stores in the United States.
The Company competes with Nike, Inc., adidas AG, Under Armour, Inc., Lucy Activewear Inc., The Gap, Inc. and bebe stores, inc.
News from reuter
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUKN1216591820100612?type=companyNews
Now I really feel terrible about the BP ($31.85 0.45 +1.43%) (Realtime: BP ($37.00 0.43 +1.18% Live) ) unable to block the oil flow. The last time I really thought that they could “TOP KILL” the oil flowing , but they couldn’t . That’s when another price drop occurred. The price has pretty much dropped to $30 level now where the price range was in the year of 1997. I personally still think this is a great buying opportunity. But many investors and stock analysts advise to avoid this stock. I also admit that this is highly volatile stock and not sure what’s going to happen soon, so I would not recommend you unless you can just close the eyes and go long with this one.
New ‘Mystique’ Wordpress Theme for June
Jun 2nd
Hello everyone, I dressed up my blog with a new Wordpress Theme ‘Mystique’ directly from wordpress.com theme page. I mean this is one of the best WP theme I ever tried. It has so much of javascript dynamic effects and clean design . The best part is that you can change most of the settings through the ‘Mysticque settings’ under ‘Appearance’ menu of admin interface. I love this ‘Featured Post’ function which shows the featured posts in the upper part of the website, so you can effectively draw attention of the reader.
My previous theme was Simplex. See below screen capture image for the old theme.
Thank you DigitalNature for Mystique
Take the opportunity- Stock suggestion: BP, SCCO
May 21st
Okay, the market hit the near the low February level and finally ended in the positive territory today after 6 continuous days of falling.
There is high chance of bull coming back next week. It’s still dangerous to say that the storm has passed away since market volatility and risks are very high. So even if the bull comes back next week, it would be possible to make bear come back.
Stock trading is all about taking the right opportunity. Buy low and sell high. I believe in long term investment. And I think this is another great time to take the opportunity. It’s important to read the market and act. When everybody is panicked and selling , we should be buying the value stocks. And when others are buying at the top of the price, we should sell them. We may not be able to catch the lowest bottomed price just like the professional stock trader, but I think this is a good time to buy some high quality but under valued stocks.
Now BP ($43.86 -0.72 -1.62%) , the oil company is on the news every day about it’s oil leakage in the Gulf of Mexico. The price has been down –25% since last month. However, note that BP is one of the largest oil companies and I believe that this incident will not bring down the company in the long run. Probably after several months, everybody will forget this issue and their earning report will raise the stock price. The time will come but not just yet. So I recommend you to check out BP stock and monitor its price everyday. If the price goes down further, maybe I would get some of their stocks. Also note the Dividend percentage. It’s 7.66% Isn’t that sweet?
Also I bought some more of the Southern Copper Corporation SCCO ($27.85 1.66 +6.34%) yesterday at $25.74. And today I am happy that I did. Today it ended $27.85.
Personally I believe that we will see the ups and downs throughout the year, but I think the economy is getting better little by little so it will be all good by the end of this year.
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What are the good stocks to buy after Market Freefall and Greek problem? – AAPL, BAC, SCCO
May 9th
Last Thursday (5/6) the Dow Jones went free fall to 9,977 point from the 10,838 opening level. That’s 861 point drop (about 8% ). Fortunately, the level came back right to its normal level and ended 10,520. (Still more than 300 point drop) But it was just scary looking at the chart! I was looking at the Google finance graph, and got really shocked and thinking the end of financial world finally arrived. The whole dropping and returning process took about 20 minutes. Drop took 10 minutes. The lowest point was reached about at 2:48 PM.
Now what caused this error? Did investors really get scared all at once that they sell off all their well positioned long term positions? That may not be the reason. I read from various places big banks and investment firms use special programs with Artificial Intelligent to trade. These programs evaluate various situations, news , technical charts , volumes to determine to buy or sell stocks. It may have gone crazy that they all have the same logic and determined to sell all at the same time. I am not so sure hundred percent, but I think faster and smarter computers are somewhat responsible for what happened. ( SEC Summons Exchange Chiefs to Washington )
The important thing is that I should have not panicked but should have bought some quality stocks at that time. I guess I am just a simple human. So here is the important lesson. Try to capture the lowest price. Don’t hurry. Just wait the price to come. There are various techniques involved to detect the lowest price including RSI 7 methods that I really like. (I will discuss this in some other time)
The financial market is highly volatile and the DOW lost another 140 points on Friday. Dow lost 771 points during last 4 days. The main reason was the Greek and European financial meltdown and everybody reminded of November 2008 US market nightmare. Now everybody got somewhat scared. But I actually bought some stocks SCCO ($27.42 -0.11 -0.40%) and BAC ($16.18 -0.10 -0.61%). Here is my rationale.
Southern Copper Corporation SCCO ($27.42 -0.11 -0.40%) is metal mining stock and has been doing good until mid April and after that , the stock kept falling from $35 to current $27.42. For the other metal mining stocks, the trend were very similar. The RSI7 indicators are very low for daily,weekly and monthly and finally the dividend yield percentage is pretty good. At the current price , the yield percentage is 6.56%
For Bank of America BAC ($16.18 -0.10 -0.61%), I think the financial and banking stocks are pretty much battered by the Greek news and dropped more than they need to be.
The most important reason was that I think that the market will end positively on Monday(5/10) . Because … We have had 4 consecutive sell off days . European government would act to prevent this problem goes crazy (European stock market is terribly down already). And the people will have enough time to think about these events over the weekend and will have clear and calm thoughts away from the dramatic emotional thoughts that they had during the last week.
And my guess is partially right. E.U. Offers $957 Billion Rescue Package . The DOW Future is up 217 points at this time (5/9 10:50 PM) . I know it’s too early to jump to the conclusion and celebrate, but hey I still believe that I got good stocks at low prices. I am kind of regretting not buying Apple AAPL ($235.86 -10.39 -4.22%) stocks,though. They came down pretty low on Friday too.
However , if you are thinking about joining the celebration and purchasing that stock, just watch out tomorrow. This may be a bull trap and one more time the DOW can crash to lower points on the next day just like in the past. This E. U. Offer is only for Greece and there are other troubles ready to go off too in other European countries. So if you are going to pursue on buying stocks tomorrow, just buy limited amount (just in case anything goes bad soon again) and don’t go chasing the flying price . (Set a limit price that you are willing to accept, and don’t go above that to buy the stock)
UPDATE:
After close on 5/10/2010 : Dow 10,785.14 up +404.71 (3.90%). This is amazing!
My portfolio result is better than expected.
I wasn’t really sure that I am going to see this much of green on Monday. So this is very pleasant suprise. However, now I am just bit worried where this market is going through out the rest of this week. It feels like people are getting emotional these days.
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Hello, my name is Chris. I have started stock trading about 3 years ago. I am not an active or day trader but I learned many valuable lessons. I will try to explain what I learned during the times. So please visit again and leave comments! Thank you.
