I advocate for low-cost index funds from Vanguard (read more). I rarely pick individual stocks because of the risk and time required to research. This has been a crazy year and the market inefficiencies are too much to ignore. I placed a few small bets back in April:
- American Express
- Cincinnati Insurance
- Southwest Airlines
- Cloudflare
- Store Capital Corporation
Free stock trading has been the industry standard for brokers since last year. New apps and the absense of live sports for online gambling during the pandemic have contributed to gamifying the stock market. Robinhooders and Davey Daytraders have taken over. There is a game within the game.
I am not good at it. I do not like to sell and I have more frustration when my stocks go up big because I wish I placed a bigger bet. I treat this for what it is for me: gambling and not investing. I allocate enough money to this gambling account to make it interesting and not enough that I would lose any sleep over a big loss.
If you are serious about the daytrading game, there is a lot to learn about strategies and indicators. Avoiding the big loss is key. The game is easy with the short-term market going the way it is currently. You also want to consider taxes and fees. Short-term gains (assets sold in less than a year) are taxed higher than long-term gains.
I’ll stick with index funds for my fair return!
Update 2021-07-15: I sold out of these stocks in May of 2021 after holding them for a year. The market was “can’t miss” during this time period. This does not suggest I made a skillful investment—I just got lucky. Time in the market beats timing the market.
- $AXP buy $91.45, sell $154.61 (+69%)
- $CINF buy $53.04, sell $119.52 (+119%)
- $LUV buy $29.14, sell $59.88 (+105%)
- $NET buy $23.39, sell $70.11 (+200%)
- $STOR buy $17.92, sell $33.86 (+89%)