There Goes the Neighborhood
Revisionist History
Oprah Master Class
How I Built THis
Corner Office from Marketplace
CNBC Options Action
Interesting Fact
Stock ownership among baby boomers is concentrated among that generation’s wealthiest members. The top 5% (in terms of net worth) own 77% of all equities owned by the entire boomer generation.
Reference:
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/insights/article/baby-boom-retirement-112013
Credit Card with Chip
Came across this latimes article about which financial institutions offer credit cards with chips on them. A lot of countries in europe require the chip for credit card purchases.
The winner:
State Department Credit Union – no annual fee, no foreign transaction fee.
Stock: Purchase QIHU
QIHU
Reason:
Sold my google shares so had cash not at work. Instead of reinvesting in GOOG, went with QIHU as it’s suppose to be an emerging threat to Baidu. Research mainly consisted on IBD stock rating and reading articles about them. Is this going to a long term or short term play not too sure. Probably should asked some people I know in China exactly how much momentum QIHU really has. Well I’ll see how its results are on 5/20.
Stock: Reflection on GS
Had setup a sell limit order for GS and it got executed 5/14. Forgot what price I even had the sell limit at.
Reason for sell:
GS has really lagged the S&P since I bought it. Originally it was a diversification play but of course buying it right around the financial crisis was not a good call. Now, I’m not comfortable with owning GS outright as I’m not sure exactly what business they’re in plus the stress test result. I think financial institution are a bit riskier play these days. Plus owning Berkshire gives exposure to GS anyways.
Final Numbers:
Bought: 5/11/10 @ 142.25
Sold: 5/14/13 @ 151.53
Total Return (incl dividends + commission): 9.5%
Return based on Stock Price: 151.53-142.25/142.25 = 6.52%
Return vs S&P: -37.75%
Conclusion:
Failure. S&P returned ~44% during the exact same time period. And that is why I need to make sure my individual stock picking is only a small % of the overall.
15947 Atkinson Ave. Gardena CA 90249
Talk about a hot market. Looks like this will be at least 9% over asking price. Albiet listing price was a bit on the low side. Here’s a timeline of this house that I put an offer on.
4/12 House listed at 399K
4/15 Went to look at the house.
4/16 I put an offer on the house at 426K 20% down,
4/17 Received a counteroffer with the contingency of the next offer at 434K or best and final.
4/18 My counter offer was at 436K.
4/19 Reply from seller’s agent:
The Sellers selected another offer that was a bit higher with larger down payment also.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Gardena/15947-Atkinson-Ave-90249/home/6541079