Is the Time to Invest in Banks approaching?

[Deleted User]

Bought barc at just under 52 on friday, for my dh`s sipp and for mine. No specific target as didn`t spend a lot but I have level 2 so will be watching the volumes

gozomark

StevieJ wrote: »

To be honest I did not have a price target more a date target, The minimum holding time would have been the accounts presentation in Feb, today they seem to have pre-empted that. I have no target now.

you should always have upside targets, and really a stop loss as well. On the upside it doesn't mean you have to sell, but its a time to reconsider. Stop losses in my mind should be automatic

[Deleted User]

gozomark, it is better to raise the stop loss rather than have an upside target

latest from citywire
http://www.citywire.co.uk/personal/-/news/markets-companies-and-funds/content.aspx?ID=327220&re=4609&ea=3040

gozomark

eeja wrote: »

Unless you are a diehard speculator, Gozomark, forget shares and buy bonds which are much safer.
Did you know you can get 11% -12% interest 'for ever' if you buy Barclays Bank bonds ?

I was talking about when I was a fund manager

gozomark

kittie wrote: »

gozomark, it is better to raise the stop loss rather than have an upside target

agree, but why not have both ?

StevieJ

I,_Brian wrote: »

The big point in all this to remember is that the best time to invest is when the market is at a low - which is precisely when the markets have least confidence.

Make no mistake, the stock market is stressed and it may yet get worse - but for the long-term investor the current climate is an unparalleled opportunity. You just not to have a sound investment strategy and be able to stick with it.

There are plenty of doomsayers, but I bet any investor here - with the benefits of hindsight - would have loved to invest directly after any major crash, whether the dotcom bubble, 1987, or the Great Depression of the 1930's - the resulting returns would always have been excellent.

And now we are at that point again.

Question is, whether anyone is serious enough to take investment advice from "a bloke in the pub" (as forums inevitably are) compared to making considered decisions themselves.

2c.

One point to note on the 1929 crash it didn't bottom until 1934 five years after the initial crash, not that good a time to invest :eek: so you had a crash that created a bear market, not a good place to be. Then you have Japan, that's another story

Masomnia

I,_Brian wrote: »

The big point in all this to remember is that the best time to invest is when the market is at a low - which is precisely when the markets have least confidence.

Make no mistake, the stock market is stressed and it may yet get worse - but for the long-term investor the current climate is an unparalleled opportunity. You just not to have a sound investment strategy and be able to stick with it.

There are plenty of doomsayers, but I bet any investor here - with the benefits of hindsight - would have loved to invest directly after any major crash, whether the dotcom bubble, 1987, or the Great Depression of the 1930's - the resulting returns would always have been excellent.

And now we are at that point again.

Question is, whether anyone is serious enough to take investment advice from "a bloke in the pub" (as forums inevitably are) compared to making considered decisions themselves.

2c.

Your point about the markets being low is a very good one, and yes there have been few times better to invest than now, just not necessarilly in banks, is all the 'doomsayers' are saying. Hindsight is always 20/20, as the saying goes, so you can't just assume the market is low so you will definitely make a profit. The BPs, Glaxos, Shells, BATs of this world will recover, almost certainly, and are a good long term investment. The banks may not recover, not without nationalization.

The other option is to put money into a fund, the vast majority of which have fallen significantly in the last few months, much lower risk than single stock investing and still good gains to be made.

To be fair, I think it's the bloke in the pub that's putting it about that RBS has a low share price and is a good money making opportunity. A lot of people on here are making sensible investment advice. It is a punt on the banks, you'll either make an excellent return or lose the lot, that's all people are saying, and after B & B and Northern Rock it's right for them to do so.

I,_Brian

Yes, my apologies - I wasn't clear that I meant we were generally at the bottom point in terms of at the bottom section of the bell curve, rather than we had already reached the exact bottom.

I've already posted that I think we're at the start of a bear rally that will last as long as a couple of months, and then come the summer, we'll see markets deflate again.

However, we're still in the general low area, and there's plenty of scope for gains over 10-20 years with an intelligent, rather than knee-jerk approach

ed123_2

...Take a look at Barclays share price today...........

Stavros_3

They were up 73% 20 minutes ago, now falling back