Is the Time to Invest in Banks approaching?

sabretoothtigger

StevieJ wrote: »

They are heavily pricing in the bank being nationalised, I can't see the govt confiscating the Arabs dosh, in addition the Abu Jabi's must have had a look at the books - I may just buy these at 50p :beer:

I take it you did. Ive been virtually kicking myself for seeing a possible turn around but not really capitalising my opinion but retrospect will do that.
I should just be glad I was able to offer a reasonable view it seems now.
Do you not think they've reached their short term top considering 'buy on rumour sell on news' and we're very close to some major news for them

sabretoothtigger wrote: »

More then double normal volume today, they release results in feb. If this market is just operating off pure fear then I guess it would rise when they release these so called good results they have mentioned.

Usually the market would price in its expectations though and companies are obliged to release profit warnings if expectations are wrong afaik
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q/ae?s=BARC.L

Analyst optimism for Barclays apparently rose this month, funny. They are reaching a previous recent low today, a possible turning point or not

Quote:
Day's Range:47.60 - 60.40
52wk Range:47.30 - 505.50
If its just a gamble then a stop loss would be a good idea I guess

Miss_R_4

HEY GUYS.....BARCLAYS HAS HAD THE MOTHER OF ALL RALLIES...thanks for helping me come to the right decision to buy. thinking of going against my original plan of holding them and SELLING them. anyone else thinking of doing that??

sabretoothtigger

Buy and hold is a private investor strategy that is quite often a mistake imo

Much better if you aim to trade at least some of your holding to some extent. If you can buy (and sell) more then once then you buy time

Not much point me trying to convince you because its your money and for all I know stocks will double from here but I'd recommend consistent risk and gain then betting it all which is what buy and hold is closer to


Try googling regular investing, value investing and so on till you get a good general idea of how it helps avoid risk which with 75% falls still possible, thats what everyone should want

http://www.crownfutures.com/Crown/Resources/ScaleTrading/index.cfm

If you like I can maybe find details of a free offer for the 'naked trader' book

it seems before this all kicked off in the beginning of jan barc shares where at 180p( cant really tell precise no from the graph). so i know there is a bumpy ride ahead of lots of dips but hoping to ride it out and hopefully cash in my paper gain.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=18183777&postcount=48

StevieJ

Miss_R wrote: »

HEY GUYS.....BARCLAYS HAS HAD THE MOTHER OF ALL RALLIES...thanks for helping me come to the right decision to buy. thinking of going against my original plan of holding them and SELLING them. anyone else thinking of doing that??

I am holding for the moment, I bought Rio at 1150 sold at 1950 and now they 2478 There have been some good buys around in the last few months Shell 1235 :eek:

StevieJ

tradetime wrote: »

It is probably approaching, like a freight train, the time to invest will be when there are no more threads like this, when all the get rich quick guys have been sucked dry, and you see threads entitled "Never invest again"
That's about time to invest in banks, why would anybody with any clue about investing want to invest in a sector that is being decimated? Fools and their money.
These "Ooooh is it time to buy banks yet " should be grouped together under a thread called "Anatomy of the pauper." Clearly Britain is high on money, high on gamblers, low on IQ.

I did say I would bookmark this thread and refer back, do you sometimes make a post that you wish you hadn't
22/1/08 RBS 11.90, Lloyds 49.1 Barclays 59.2. Just a bit of fun.

Miss_R_4

HEY STEVIEJ- thats what i am scared of happening selling the barc shares and them rising even more. like what happened with u and rio shares. i will kick myself.

but at the first sign of a mojor dip going to cash in my paper gains and start again...monday will be annoying as i wont have access to a computer so I wont have a clue what is going on!!!!!

Miss_R_4

ps sabretoothtiger- i dont believe in buy and hold...forever. thats where ppl go wrong. shares are not ornaments to look at. at their peak this year barclays shares were 184p 12 jan 09. SO I AM WONDERING IF IT IS ACTUALLY POSSIBLE TO BEAT THAT? we shall see.

tradetime

StevieJ wrote: »

I did say I would bookmark this thread and refer back, do you sometimes make a post that you wish you hadn't
22/1/08 RBS 11.90, Lloyds 49.1 Barclays 59.2. Just a bit of fun.

No worries mate, :beer: you said you would at the time, can't say fairer than that.
Guess what, I'd bookmark it again, in for a pound in for a penny, whilst I'd say it's a bit heavily worded, that comes from thread after thread asking about investing in banks (bit like the gold thing a few weeks back) and a few beers, (you'll note the time it was posted) so I can't defend that

However, wording aside, as an investment, I wouldn't touch most banks with somebody else's money, I believe we are far from through this yet despite the market starting to feel all chirpy. From a punt, a wild bet as I posted in reply to someone else around that time it's fair enough, but it's still a big gamble imho, and it really isn't one I'd take and given that I'd feel bad about encouraging anyone else to do it. I've seen lot's of wouldbe traders come and go betting big, it's addictive, you get away with it once or twice, or even let's say you get it right once or twice, it's easy money, so you'll have to do it again, sooner or later the market takes back what wasn't earnt

tradetime

StevieJ wrote: »

I am holding for the moment, I bought Rio at 1150 sold at 1950 and now they 2478

If you're not sure where to sell, why not run a trailing stop and just let it run, possibly wouldn't work for the banks as they're uber volatile and you'd have to run the stop too wide, but should work for other things.

sabretoothtigger

Yea thats what I was going to say, trailing stop loss. Something of about 5% might work but with the banks they are all over the place, it would have worked on friday I think just about and you could then step in manually end of the day and sell some as they ended on a high pretty much

XLF fell on friday which is one to watch in order to roughly predict what happens next.
Barclays is part of the fed bail out, RBS too I think and LLoyds has ADR


You do sound like your operating on absolutes which is something I try to avoid based on previous mistakes Ive made. No one is perfect so we allready know this is a fallacy so be realistic is my aim


If 180 is this years previous high tide mark then that suggests to me 170ish is a fine price to sell some of the stock.
Dont wait for it to hit 180 dead on before it qualifies, round figures have a habit of forming resistance I think, just like everyone uses birthdays for lottery numbers.

Sounds silly but the market is human and when theres this much speculation as well as evening out the odds from private to professional investor it also means less sense to price movements imo

Do not try to gain 100% of the price upward movement. Avoid greed and leave some profit for the guy who buys barclays from you

Also I disagree with selling everything at the top or only buying at the bottom. Buy and sell on scale because we are amateurs here guessing and again just be grateful for what you have.

Unless you previously made a great loss why should you be afraid of the price rising after. (even if this was true, you have to resist your own feelings against the markets)
Consistency of gains (and minimising losses) is much better then being 100% right imo


The account I have lets me sell for a fiver commission so long as its a small deal so I tend to just do that at possible turning points I try to identify like Friday imo.
I often make the mistake of buying all at once unfortunately

SO I AM WONDERING IF IT IS ACTUALLY POSSIBLE TO BEAT THAT?

Not imo but I didnt bet absolutely against or for it so I hope to avoid kicking myself afterwards whatever happens.

Would you buy at 50p or 67p if they fell back, if yes then surely its good to raise the money now towards that or you will end up taking bigger and bigger risks with no profit ever taken

Lloyds is doing an open offer soon, Im told the price will be 38p They are 60 odd now


Another good phrase I hear is 'would you buy these shares right now?' ie. would you buy barclays at 170p

If you can think that clearly without bias and the answer is 'no, its risky' then you have your answer to sell some or not










The Jan Barclays high was set on low volume which means it is not especially significant afaik.
Also Barclays has outperformed xlf and uk banks (top chart) so is already more expensive now then it was in Jan