Archive for 'Blogroll' Category
Digital Gear Review
17 April 2008Digital Gear Review
Yesterday i bough the Invisible shield as im sick of my bulky acrylic case for my Iphone.
The clear acrylic case served me well but it always picked up dirt in the crevices and was bulky in my pocket the Iphone is big enough as it is.
The invisble shield is this new space age Full body casing for you digital device according to their website
Beauty Pageants, Brain Pageants
27 March 2008Everyone was hard on Janina San Miguel. Not a few months back, contestants of a Miss Teen USA pageant didn't fare much better. Being able to speak english is not an excuse:
Some Sentiments on Sentiments
24 January 2008This market right now is moving on nothing more than emotions. Guess what? It almost always moves on emotions.
- David Bach
The term "investor sentiment" is widely used in financial press. If we zoom in on the word sentiment, the easiest defintion is:
"A thought, view, or attitude, especially one based mainly on emotion instead of reason."
By now, FMers are familiar with the chart showing the cycle of investor emotions. Here's a larger version from a related website (link below):
The words are very descriptive, and capture the general flavor of financial press and trader sentiments at certain times. However, markets are wilder and not as smooth as the graph suggests.
Lessons From A Trading Diary
13 January 2008If I hadn’t made money some of the time I might have acquired market wisdom quicker.
- Jesse Livermore
The ING Philippine Equity Fund, despite its size, was beating the index in the first half of 2007, until the subprime crash hit, prompting it to switch gears and pursue a modified strategy.
For the largest institutional equity fund, to shift from Food and Banking to Mining, and to double Communications exposure, such changes didn't happen overnight, but over a dynamic process that took 12 volatile months. Unlike the retail investor, institutional fund managers will always worry about liquidity in their decision making. As Paul Garcia, who runs the ING Philippine Equity Fund, says, "It is difficult to move when you are bigger than the market's turnover."
Diary Of An Investment Fund (Part Five: Evolving Strategies)
13 January 2008October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February.
- Mark Twain
September 2007
Global markets begin to recover from the meltdown. PSE Index stages a 6.2% rally to recoup YTD gains to 19.8%, effectively rebounding 23.9% from its recent low and now within 5.8% of its all-time high. Daily turnover was thin and foreigners remained net sellers for the month.
Diary Of An Investment Fund (Part Four: Turbulent Times)
13 January 2008If there were no bad speculations there could be no good investments; if there were no wild ventures there would be no brilliantly successful enterprises.
- F. W. Hirst
It's election month. Market sets new all-time high with the PSE Index gaining 6.2% bringing YTD yields to 16.5% while the fund gained 7.4% for a YTD yield of 22.8% The manager writes "following relatively peaceful elections that assured President Arroyo of a stronghold in the lower house." 1Q GDP was suprisingly higher at 6.9%–highest in 17 years. Foreign direct investments soared while inflation remained below consensus estimates.
Diary Of An Investment Fund (Part Three: A Good Start)
13 January 2008“The four most dangerous words in investing are: 'This time it's different.'”
- Sir John Templeton
Starting Point - December 2006
"2006 was A Good Year" states the ING Manager's Report. And good it was. The PSE Index ended the last 12 months up 42.29%, its highest annual gain in the bull run since 2002. The fund beats the index and ends the year with a NAVPU gain of 54.67%, quite a feat considering the fund's size. The rosy outlook for the period is summed up by the Manager's comments: "Prospects are quite positive with fiscal improvements leading to record-low interest rates and a strong Peso, which in turn lay the ground work for a stronger recovery in overall demand and profits."
Diary Of An Investment Fund (Part Two: Following A Fund Manager’s Footprints)
12 January 2008"The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody had decided not to see. "
- Ayn Rand
We should all be so lucky to have an inside peek at a portfolio manager’s playbook. However, I found a way to estimate the trading moves of major funds based on publicly available information. Most investment funds open to retail investors publish monthly fact sheets. Typical content of a fund fact sheet would be key statistics like the following:
In addition to the above, funds also publish a summary of the investments the fund has as of the period end, which can also be found on the fact sheets:
