Small Time Blog

Smalltime Model Portfolio's First Purchase

by Bradley Voight on 10/28/13

In an effort to show my trust in the markets, my first purchase will be the Twitter IPO. After the Facebook IPO was wrought with problems and smelled of typical wall street hyjinks, many market talking heads said that the mom and pop investor (me and you) was burned for the last time and would not come back to be scorched again.

With $150 to start I won't be able to get many shares but if I am able to make 35% - 40% in a day or two, I will take the cash and have more to work with. I am going to have to trade too make this $150 grow. The Smalltime Model Portfolio will consist of companies I have chosen based on their long term prospects, but in order to generate more cash to buy the 5 or 6 companies I want to hold, I am going to trade using some of trading knowledge I've gathered over 2 years. The purpose of this account is for the reader to learn along side of me, not for me to instruct anyone. I do feel as though I have learned enough that I can be of some help by showing the readers what NOT to do from the mistakes I've made and learned from. Patients is the name of the game in investing. The trading side is a little different. Both are better undertaken after much study but trading requires on the fly decision making and some basic understanding of stock charts. When you trade you need to know the price history of the stock you are trading and the ranges that the price has been known to fluctuate in. From here you need to be up on all the latest company news including news about the state of the company's finances so you don't get hit by a hidden balance sheet boogeyman. Knowledge is key in the investing realm and Smalltime thinks that the internet gives the home investor an edge that he/she was unable to attain prior to online trading.

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Personal Portfolio Update 10/25/13

by Bradley Voight on 10/28/13

From here on out I will refer to this as the personal portfolio. This account is held with Scottrade. Our new portfolio will be called the Smalltime model portfolio on the Tradeking trading platform, started with $150 in scrap metal money. Alright on to the personal portfolio update.

KR 50 shares @ 43.42.......................$2171.00

STKL 196 shares @ 10.83...................$2122.68

SIRI 100 shares @ 3.749......................$374.90

RVLT 175 shares @ 3.32.....................$581.00

SGLB 3000 shares @ .145..................$435.00

AXPW 700 shares @ .1231...................$86.17

Share Total..............................................$5770.75

Cash........................................................$452.58

Total......................................................$6223.33

Original Investment...................................$5382.73

Performance to date............................... +$840.60 or 15.6%

Kroger and Sun-Opta continue to be the big winners. (RVLT) Revolution lighting is a very volatile stock. It is prone to 10%-12% swings in price on any given day. I still firmly believe in the story of the company so I will ride the roller coaster until the story turns sour. After a bad quarter, (SIRI) SiriusXM backed off from $4. To help with my cash raising effort, I sold 75 shares of SIRI @ $3.90 for $285.50 after commissions. I still like the long term prospects for SIRI so I'll keep the 100 shares an hold pat.

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Portfolio Update 10/18/2013

by Bradley Voight on 10/20/13

After another good week I am starting to build a new cash pile. I sold 500 shares of SGLB for $86.52 and I sold a Kroger $42 strike call option October expiry for $74.49. I bought the Kroger option for $29.50 so I made a profit of $44.99. So here is this weeks update:

KR 50 shares @ 42.28.......................$2119.00

STKL 196 shares @ 10.46...................$2050.16

SIRI 175 shares @ 4.045......................$707.87

RVLT 175 shares @ 4.17.....................$729.75

SGLB 3000 shares @ .171..................$513.00

AXPW 700 shares @ .1241...................$86.87

Share Total..............................................$6206.65

Cash........................................................$167.09

Total......................................................$6373.74

Original Investment...................................$5382.73

Performance to date............................... +$991.01 or 18.4%

The broader market is rallying on the government shutdown fix but it is a temporary band aid and we can expect more volatility in the marketplace in just three short months. In the meantime the stocks in my portfolio all have been benefiting from good news. I picked these companies for their future prospects and each one will be held and added to until the story changes. That is a great lesson I learned from Peter Lynch, each company has a story. You learn all you can about what has happened in the past for each story, then you keep up on all new developments via the conference calls each quarter. When the story turns sour you sell and go to a company with a better story! So far the stories all look good for the companies I own so there is no reason to bug out now.

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Smalltime's Tradeking Model Portfolio Coming Soon!

by Bradley Voight on 10/14/13

I have opened a new account on TradeKing.com I did some research and thought that Tradeking was a very inexpensive and easy to use platform to start our model portfolio. This account will be funded entirely by funds accrued though my Smalltime scrapping operation, which has been featured in some videos that are posted on the site also. I hope to deposit at least $150 to start. I was able to open an account in which I can deposit funds later with no minimum required. This will prove to anyone and everyone that you don't have to be rich to own stocks which is just one of the hundreds of bullshit excuses I here from people on why they can't invest. There is no excuse not to participate in the market with today's technology. It is easier than playing fantasy football!

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Portfolio Update 10/14/2013

by Bradley Voight on 10/14/13

This portfolio is my own personal account and I am posting the progress (or lack thereof) as an example of how easy it is to research, buy, and sell stocks online. Here is this weeks update.

KR 50 shares @ 41.71.......................$2085.50

STKL 196 shares @ 10.00...................$1960.00

SIRI 175 shares @ 3.88......................$679.00

RVLT 175 shares @ 4.26.....................$745.50

SGLB 3500 shares @ .14..................$490.00

AXPW 700 shares @ .12...................$84.00

Share Total.............................................$6043.00

Cash.........................................................$47.50

Total......................................................$6090.50

Original Investment...................................$5382.73

Performance to date............................... +$707.77 or 13.14%

The only move this week was I bought 650 shares of SGLB @ .12 + $7.39 commission for a total of $85.39. Those same 650 shares are worth $91, almost enough to cover my inbound commission.

As an example of how much I need to make to break even I would have to take into account what I have to pay to sell, which would be $7.45 or so. I would need the price of SGLB to hit 15.9 cents to break even (650 X .159 = 103.35 -14.84= $88.51($14.84 is the buy & sell commission total). I would actually make just over three dollars in this scenario.

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