Timing the market isn’t easy. In fact, it’s probably one of the hardest things you can do. There’s no shortage of people who attempt to do it, though. In truth, when the market is expensive, so too are individual stocks. So, naturally, one would like to buy when the market is cheap and sell when [...]
Merger Arbitrage: How it Works (And an Example)
Merger arbitrage was first perfected by Benjamin Graham, one of the world’s first and most successful “value” investors. Although Ben Graham used merger arbitrage in the early 20th century, there is still room to make money on this strategy today. Merger arbitrage is a way to generate an income on low-risk mergers. When a company [...]
CH Robinson: Is Logistics a Logical Bet?
In between your home and everything you have in it is a complex distribution system connecting millions of businesses with billions of customers. Logistics is a complicated but very profitable business. The third-party logistics (3PL) segment is the one which is growing fastest. 3PL firms are in the business of removing the headache of managing [...]
Silver and Gold Streaming: Will the Profits Flow to Your Portfolio?
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Silver and gold streaming businesses are enormously popular with investors. The model allows ordinary investors like you and I the opportunity to own a stake in several different gold and silver mining operations. Silver and gold streaming companies are really just financiers in disguise. In exchange for an upfront cash payment, a streaming company receives [...]
Apple Stock: Future Double or Dying Tech Titan?
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Unless you manage every dime in your portfolio, you likely have very serious exposure to Apple (AAPL). In fact, passive investors who use one of the many S&P 500 index ETFs have as much as 2.65% of their entire retirement funds invested in this one tech company. Apple’s influence on the market can’t be ignored. [...]
3 Ways to Hedge Your Portfolio Gains
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Investing begins and ends with profits, but it should start with protecting your investment capital. Mathematics dictate that losses have a greater impact on total returns than gains. A 50% loss is covered only by a 100% gain; and a 33% loss to a portfolio can only be recovered with a 50% positive return. Hedging [...]
Water Company Stocks: Enough Profits to Wet Your Whistle?
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Water is a business worth more than half a trillion dollars around the globe including everything from infrastructure to treatment. It’s also the most in-demand commodity around the world. Once cleaned, water is necessary to sustain life, grow crops, and recently, bring oil and natural gas to the ground via fracking. In the developed markets, [...]
Home Depot: Real Estate Exposure at a Fair Price
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We’ve discussed here on The College Investor the belief that the housing market is going to rebound. And one of the top ways to play it is to look at home remodeling companies, specifically Home Depot and Lowes. Today, let’s look at Home Depot (HD). Home Depot shareholders are undoubtedly enjoying their rollercoaster ride on [...]
Buffett Grabs His Slice of Goldman Sachs, Should Investors Follow?
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Warren Buffett is finally cashing in on the upside to his famous 2008 rescue of the investment bank Goldman Sachs (GS) in which he bought $5 billion in preferred stock and negotiated a generous bonus in the form of stock warrants. Those 5 year stock warrants have come due, and Buffett’s taking his stake in [...]
eBay: A Sleeping Superstar?
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Make no mistake about it, eBay’s stock (EBAY) is on a tear, up more than 35% in just the last year. While the company may be seen as an “also-ran” compared to Amazon’s online marketplace, the online auction and payment company (eBay owns PayPal) is becoming a leader in online business and payment processing. Investors [...]
The Fundamentals of Mining Stocks: Separating Winners and Losers
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With gold down and mining stocks failing to find funding, your inbox is probably as littered as mine with new and great gold opportunities (if you need a reminder about why you shouldn’t buy gold, just look here: Do Not Buy Gold!). Just the other day I received four emails about mining stocks worth a [...]
How to Judge a Bond Fund’s Performance By its Cover
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As passive funds take a center stage, the number of bond funds on the market is skyrocketing. Most get into passive funds because they can’t be bothered to select individual bonds (i.e. buying individual bonds vs. bond funds), which means that investors have to judge a fund from a very simple cover. I’ll go through [...]
4 Ideas for Following Warren Buffett into Consumer Staples
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Warren Buffett and a private equity partner 3G Capital swallowed Heinz (HNZ) whole, in a big $23 billion deal that some think will lead to activity all over the consumer staples space. As it turns out, mergers and acquisitions can be very good for stock investors. Heinz is a strong, established brand in the slow-growing [...]
Why Recent Mergers and Acquisitions are Great for Investors
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The S&P 500 index is now at a 5-year high and near an all-time high set earlier in 2013. Stocks are off to a fast start, logging a 7.6% return year-to-date, more than one might expect for an average full year. So what’s driving Wall Street? It’s all about the M&A this year on Wall [...]
4 Ways to Interpret A Changing Dividend Policy
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Revenues can rise or fall, profit margins can wobble, and corporate executives can change from day to day, but everyone knows that a dividend is untouchable. The dividend is an institution on Wall Street, with whole funds and investment portfolio built around these cash distributions, and the companies that pay them out. Dividends are more [...]
