jawn619 Posted June 29, 2015 Posted June 29, 2015 How often do you check in with Mr. Market to see what he's pricing your holdings at? I'm trying to check prices less, and I'm guessing less often is better, but it's been difficult.
adesigar Posted June 29, 2015 Posted June 29, 2015 How often do you check in with Mr. Market to see what he's pricing your holdings at? I'm trying to check prices less, and I'm guessing less often is better, but it's been difficult. Depends on the stock. BRK - Once every 2 or 3 months. Sometimes not for 6 months. LUK - Once a Month. Other holdings - Once a week. Sears - Twice a week. Daily during spinoff/rights. Edit : I selected once a week in the poll.
ZenaidaMacroura Posted June 29, 2015 Posted June 29, 2015 A lot more than I should/would like. (more than 1x per day, unless I'm traveling)
Liberty Posted June 29, 2015 Posted June 29, 2015 Too much. My ideal would be to do something like Guy Spiers and check extremely infrequently and never input my trades when the market is open, that kind of stuff. But I don't have the discipline for that yet. I hope to get there someday.
randomep Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 A lot more than I should/would like. (more than 1x per day, unless I'm traveling) ditto, it is such a hard habit to break, but if you must hold me to a number, I'd say every 30min?
oddballstocks Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 Once every few days. I'd say usually once a week, some busy weeks none.
Pelagic Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 It's hard not to check frequently, especially when you can have something like the SeekingAlpha app with your portfolio on your phone. Stuck at a red light, ok sure a quick look... maybe there's a compulsive stock checkers anonymous group out there for us.
innerscorecard Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I currently check once a day (when waking up in the morning), but am in the process of transitioning to a system where I never check, BUT I receive automated alerts if something warrants my attention (>5% move up or down perhaps). I already know when important fundamental changes happen via SEC RSS alerts (although honestly, prices usually are faster signifiers for this than my RSS feed, but I don't need that kind of speed anyways), so only significant moves in price are important for me to know about, not day-to-day fluctuations.
mjohn707 Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I plan on checking just the one time, right before I die
jawn619 Posted June 30, 2015 Author Posted June 30, 2015 I plan on checking just the one time, right before I die I on the other hand will probably die right after checking a stock's price
randomep Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I plan on checking just the one time, right before I die what for?
mjohn707 Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I plan on checking just the one time, right before I die what for? Last minute estate planning?
ZenaidaMacroura Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I plan on checking just the one time, right before I die what for? Last minute estate planning? hmm I don't like it -such an action is possibly inimical with committing to a holding period of forever.
compounding Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 This particular tendency is one where I don't fully understand the amount of emphasis/discussion that goes on in the value investing world. Is trading because you check stock prices really an issue generally with people that adhere to value investing principles? Or is the argument more that it effects you on a subconcious level and therefore you get a bias towards activity? If the latter, how can you know that the trading was unwarranted and due to checking stock prices? I have thought a bit about this too and I guess altered my behaviour a bit toward the non-checking side. But I have never experienced a great urge to trade from checking stock prices. To be honest I get more urges (for what I fear is unnecessary activity) from researching companies than I do from checking stock prices. These questions seem relevant particularly since checking stock prices clearly has benefits, such as being able to take advantage of volatility in the market place.
Liberty Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 This particular tendency is one where I don't fully understand the amount of emphasis/discussion that goes on in the value investing world. Is trading because you check stock prices really an issue generally with people that adhere to value investing principles? Or is the argument more that it effects you on a subconcious level and therefore you get a bias towards activity? If the latter, how can you know that the trading was unwarranted and due to checking stock prices? I have thought a bit about this too and I guess altered my behaviour a bit toward the non-checking side. But I have never experienced a great urge to trade from checking stock prices. To be honest I get more urges (for what I fear is unnecessary activity) from researching companies than I do from checking stock prices. These questions seem relevant particularly since checking stock prices clearly has benefits, such as being able to take advantage of volatility in the market place. A couple things for me: I partly justify the more frequent checking because I'm young (33) and still accumulating, and still expanding my circle of competence. So I want to be able to jump on opportunities and check new things frequently... But that's not a really good reason because I could get most of the same result without the frequent checking of price action. The reason to avoid it, IMO, comes down to human psychology. It's been shown that we have all kinds of biases that are exacerbated by constantly looking at something, even something random (we do pattern matching, anchoring, loss aversion, etc), and our willpower is limited and can be depleted, especially when we get emotional. Looking at stocks requires the expansion of mental energy (at least for me, maybe it's totally frictionless for others), and it's not a really productive use of that energy most of the time, IMO. But I also find it satisfying, so it's hard to just give up completely...
Valuebo Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 This particular tendency is one where I don't fully understand the amount of emphasis/discussion that goes on in the value investing world. Is trading because you check stock prices really an issue generally with people that adhere to value investing principles? Or is the argument more that it effects you on a subconcious level and therefore you get a bias towards activity? If the latter, how can you know that the trading was unwarranted and due to checking stock prices? I have thought a bit about this too and I guess altered my behaviour a bit toward the non-checking side. But I have never experienced a great urge to trade from checking stock prices. To be honest I get more urges (for what I fear is unnecessary activity) from researching companies than I do from checking stock prices. These questions seem relevant particularly since checking stock prices clearly has benefits, such as being able to take advantage of volatility in the market place. Agreed. With 75%+ of my portfolio in three holdings I can't really afford to only look at prices once a month. I would also have missed many opportunities in the last few months. I'm young (33) Tjeez, old geezer is more like it... ;) But yeah, you're right on the mental energy argument! It can be a little draining both on very good and very bad days when you check every 15 minutes. Life goes on.
Liberty Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I'm young (33) Tjeez, old geezer is more like it... Age is not just about numbers :) As Stephen King said, I have the heart of a small boy... ...and I keep it in a jar on my desk. :-X
CorpRaider Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 WAY too frequently. Smartphone apps. When I was a kid, stock prices were in paper weekly and no cable (didn't subscribe to WSJ). I also just like watching the ticker, it would have been cool to have an old tickertape machine. I found this replica one, I think you can hook it up to a network and load it with paper and it will spit out prices, but was too expensive for such a novelty item. I preferred the CNBC ticker that used to show the trade sizes with the price quote. I also like the old 80's black price/information boards with the little red and green light bulbs.
Guest moneystockholder Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I'm surprised at how many people check it more than once a day. I try and look at it once every couple of weeks. I keep up with the news/press releases of my holdings religiously though.
Cardboard Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 The IPhone or other smart phones is a terrible invention in some ways. I tend to wake up early nowadays or around 5 am, not even wanting to, in order to do what? To take a look at the futures, news and commodities! Then I try to fall back asleep and you can imagine how this goes when everything is in the red! Then when I am finally ready to get out of bed, I take another look at the news and quotes which will setup my mood for the morning... Then I check it multiple times each day and do track my portfolio value at the end of each trading day. Honestly, I think it is very bad. You get stressed and when the portfolio is not at least performing in line with the market, you worry and think about all kinds of solution: not all solutions! It is a problem that I need to fix. I guess at the beginning it was seen as an improvement or trying to be more informed at all times. However, when you do realize that trades are placed faster than you can digest almost any new information then it becomes useless. Cardboard
Hielko Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I'm surprised at how many people check it more than once a day. I try and look at it once every couple of weeks. I keep up with the news/press releases of my holdings religiously though. long term buy & hold isn't the only viable strategy.
fareastwarriors Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I log in to my account couple times an hour at work because it is so easy. I don't make trades too often though. I don't do that once/month like some of you. I know I'm bad. :'(
Guest moneystockholder Posted June 30, 2015 Posted June 30, 2015 I'm surprised at how many people check it more than once a day. I try and look at it once every couple of weeks. I keep up with the news/press releases of my holdings religiously though. long term buy & hold isn't the only viable strategy. Of course. For some reason I suppose I was under the impression that most people on here had that strategy. There's nothing wrong with checking the price on a daily basis, but I do it only when I haven't fully entered into a position. I usually re-assess once every few weeks.
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