In today’s world who doesn’t want to be rich? There are several ways of making some quick dough; one is to queue up for one of those reality shows on television and the other more viable one is to put your money in some smart investment.

If you explore the investment market, you will find several options that can make your money grow for example savings accounts, trusts and property market.

But none of them is as lucrative as the share market. Now if you are wondering as to why you must invest into stocks, here are a few reasons:

. No other investment promises such big and quick returns as the stock market.
. Shares are liquid assets, which can be easily sold or bought, and you can even sell a portion of it. Moreover, this entire process of selling and buying shares doesn’t take more than a few seconds especially with online stockbrokers available.
. You can easily determine the worth of a particular share investment by checking the share market results in the daily newspaper. The entire activity is not half as hassle prone as getting your property valued.
. In most cases shareholders also enjoy great tax benefits on the profits they earn.

Now that you are convinced about the worthiness of a share investment, you must now strategise as to how you will go about investing your hard earned money into the stock market. With so many online stockbrokers now available, you no longer have to queue up outside a stockbroker’s office. You can sell or buy shares online also.

As an online stock trader, your homework is to first analyse your own savings and risk tolerance and then study the stock market for a potential investment. A good online stock dealing strategy is always simple and practical. With consistent study, you will be able to gauge the buying and selling signals with ease and reap good benefits out of your share dealings.

One smart way of dealing in stocks is by spreading your money over several types of investments. This reduces your risk to a huge extent, because if one type of investment doesn’t do well, then you can always bank upon the other.

Despite the fact that shares yield great returns, still at the end of the day it is a gamble. So, before you invest into it you must first assess your immunity to risk and only after thorough study of the stock market should you venture into it.

Seek.uk
Nidhi
http://www.seek.uk.com

Yesterday I received my monthly issue of MONEY magazine. This issue has the special feature called ?The Ultimate Investment Club? that highlights their picks for the top mutual fund managers. Let?s see how their members made money for their shareholders.

My readers know that the only thing that counts in my book is performance and performance means they make money and do NOT lose money so I went back to preview their record since these experts took over. When you see the results of this club you will be glad you did not go on any camping trips with them. Here are six who manage stock mutual funds.

As we go along you must keep in mind that fund managers get paid for the amount of money they have under management and not on how much they make for you.

MONEY magazine has given them titles. I will not mention their names, but will give you the fund along with the stock exchange symbol so you can look it up on the Internet at www.bigcharts.com.

?The Survivor? who manages Seligman Communications Fund (SCICX) since it was founded has seen the share price start at $35 and rise to $54 only to fall back to $15 today. He is surviving with your money, but you are not.

?The Value Master? of Legg Mason Value Trust (LMNVX) sure doesn?t know when the value has run out. Under his tutelage the fund has gone from $45 to $78 to $43.

?The Maverick? of CGM Capital Development (LOMCX) has been thrown by his horse. Share price in 1976 started at $10, went to $43 and is now $18. Tough ride for the shareholders.

Now we come to ?The Bargain Hunter? who took over management of Oakmark Select (OAKMX) in 2000 when the market was at its peak. It was $22 and went up (!) to $37 and is now trading at $32. He is the only winner in the group. Congratulations.

Another loser is ?The Opportunist?. This guy should be getting his buy recommendations from cab drivers. He could not do any worse for the Strong Opportunity Fund (SOPVX). It started at $45 and has nothing but a downward journey to its present $29.

For the Brandywine Fund (BRWIX) we have ?The Growth Guru?. The only thing that grew fat was his wallet off of your money. He took over in 1998 at $45 and it went down to $22 in 1999, then up to $53 and is now $20. Actually he can only be given credit for the advance from $45 to $53.

In all fairness to these losers I did not include any capital gains or dividend payouts which during the few good years they had may have been very good, but probably not good enough to keep you at ?even?.

There are all kinds of clubs you can join, but obviously this is not one for you. When you see advertising for various mutual funds or how wonderful some fund manager is please look beyond the hype and check out the performance.

Al Thomas’ book, If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It! has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

1-888-345-7870; al@mutualfundstrategy.com

Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a bucket of ?money. Money? They are continuing to fill their bucket with stocks without any consideration to the value of these equities. They are not worried at all as they are buying ?safe? mutual funds.

Everyone knows mutual funds are safe. Jack and Jill know they don?t know how to pick good stocks so they leave that to the fund manager. He is an expert.

When you look at the long term record of 99% of the mutual funds you will see that expertise has been sadly lacking. I hate to remind you of the 2000 to 2003 period, but I must. In fact I must tell you it is going to happen again. Now you want to know when?.and so do I.

And that is the problem with almost every fund manager. As long as the market is going up they can?t do much damage to your account, but when it rolls over and heads down they have no idea how to invest when a bear market is in progress. Not a single one of them will acknowledge that cash is a position.

Cash is a position? They are in shock. Of course they are. If brokerage customers put their money in a money market account while the market is falling it means they do not make any commission at all and if they recommend this to their customers the brokerage manager will fire them because he won?t make any money either. ?Keep your customers fully invested or I?ll show you the door? is the manager?s comment.

You must learn when to sell. Any fool can buy, but it is the wise man who knows when to sell. To see the condition of the overall market one of the best indicators is the SP500 Index. Your broker compares everything he does with the SP500 because it is a broad base of 500 stocks that are widely traded.

The finest indicator is the SP500 Index. Draw a 40-week chart of the closing prices. If you don?t know how ask your broker. He will tell you. Write it down and save it. It is very simple. Have him set up a 40-week Simple Moving Average to appear on that chart. Look at 5 years worth of prices. Immediately you will see that if you are in the market while the 40-week MA is going up you are making money and if you are out of all your positions while the index average is going down you will not lose money. It doesn?t get any easier that that.

Jack and Jill can fill their pail as the market is going up and need not spill their accumulation while they walk confidently down the hill holding their bucket full of cash not equities.

Al Thomas’ book, If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It! has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Copyright 2005

A long time reader wrote in asking if you get more bang for the buck buying an out of the money option, or a deep in the money option on a stock that makes a big move. Interestingly the answer isn’t perfectly cut and dry. Let’s look.

If you buy an in the money option, that option will indeed track the movement of the underlying stock more closely than an at the money option. The Delta or measure of value is much higher, so when the stock moves, the option tends to move also.

If you buy an out of the money option, the stock can actually rise a bit, and yet your option could actually fall. How? When an option is out of the money, the entire value of the option is simply based on time. For instance, lets say the XYZ company is trading at 50 bucks a share. The September 60 dollar call options are 75 cents. That 75 cents is all time value considering the fact that XYZ is still ten dollars shy of the strike price.

So, it’s quite likely that XYZ could move up to 52 dollars a share, which is a two dollar move, and yet the September call option falls to 50 cents. Why? We have come closer to the expiration day, and some of the time value has eroded.

In a deep in the money option, a 2 dollar stock move could be as high as a 1.95 move in the option. So, looking at it like that, standard theory says that deep in the money options will move more on a big stock move and for the most part you can consider that to be true. But there is always the exception, and if you look at percent returns, that’s where things really get screwy.

Let’s say you bought September 25 dollar calls on XYZ. You paid 29.00 for them, considering that XYZ is 50.00 a share, you are already 25 bucks in the money and they are charging a 4 dollar premium over that for time. Now, XYZ announces that it’s cured cancer and runs to 90 dollars a share. Your call option is going to soar. At very minimum it’s going to be worth 65 dollars, and more likely over 70. So, you’re return is quite nice right? Right. In fact you’ve made somewhere north of 124%.

But, lets say you had those XYZ out of the money 60 dollar calls for just 75 cents. If XYZ ran to 90 those calls would be worth a minimum of 30 bucks, if not 35 ( depending on how much time was left) Now look at the percent return. It’s 3,900 percent.

So, here’s the deal. For the most part, deep in the money options will reward you more frequently and with more gains than at the money or out of the money options. But, in those rare events where a home run gets hit, an out of the money options bought for pennies will far outperform any in the money options.

You’re better off buying deep in the money and using smart trading strategies. But occasionally it’s a lot of fun to be able to say I made 2000 percent on my latest trade! Think about it.

The Stocks2Watch? newsletter has been published since 1998.

For a FREE report on HOW TO TRADE FAST, enter your email address at:

http://lb.bcentral.com/ex/manage/subscriberprefs?customerid=12826s

The cyclical bull market, which began in March 2003 (or October 2002 by some estimates), within the structural bear market, that began in March 2000, was fueled by monetary policy. The FOMC began an easing cycle in January 2001 when it lowered the Fed Funds Rate from 6.50% to 6%. The FOMC continued to lower the Fed Funds Rate, until it reached 1% in June 2003, and kept there for a year. In June 2004, a tightening cycle began. The Fed Funds Rate reached 5.25% in June 2006 (to neutral from accommodative), and then the FOMC paused in August for the first time in over two years. Consequently, there has been a great deal of speculation that the tightening cycle is over (a restrictive stance won’t be taken) and perhaps an easing cycle will begin in 2007.

Below is a daily chart of NYSI (red line and right scale) and SPX (black line and left scale). NYSI made lower highs, while SPX made higher highs over the cyclical bull market. Currently, NYSI is near the top of the downtrend line, which indicates SPX is near an intermediate-term top, although NYSI pinpoints lows better than highs. Below the price chart is the NYMO 50-day MA, which is at a level similar to recent SPX intermediate-term tops. However, sentiment indicators, including the CPC 50-day MA (above price chart), which fell from an all-time high, and AAII and ISEE (not shown) show a great deal of pessimism, which is SPX bullish. It seems, almost everyone is expecting SPX to fall.

So, monetary policy and intermediate-term technical indicators are market bearish, while sentiment indicators are market bullish. Also, mid-September through much of October is historically the weakest market period. Consequently, there are major mixed signals. Nonetheless, the intermediate-term uptrend will turn into a downtrend at some point before the end of the year, if it hasn’t turned already. Given December and January are bullish months, there may be an intermediate-term downtrend in September through November. However, sentiment indicators suggest an SPX trading range, although a quick rise to 1,350 and/or a capitulation below 1,200 shouldn’t be ruled out. Unfortunately, there’s little clarity at this point.

Free chart available at http://www.peaktrader.com Forum Index Market Forecast category.

Arthur Albert Eckart is the founder and owner of PeakTrader. Arthur has worked for commercial banks, e.g. Wells Fargo, Banc One, and First Commerce Technologies, during the 1980s and 1990s. He has also worked for Janus Funds from 1999-00. Arthur Eckart has a BA & MA in Economics from the University of Colorado. He has worked on options portfolio optimization since 1998.

Mr Eckart has developed a comprehensive trading methodology using economics, portfolio optimization, and technical analysis to maximize return and minimize risk at the same time and over time. This methodology has resulted in excellent returns with low risk over the past four years.