What Did You Buy Today?

[rapidacid]

Bought the last lot of QCOM to make it a full position.

[Rasec]

What do you guys define as a full position vs a half position? Is there a rule or it's up to everyone to define?

Say I own 10K of stock ABC and 2k of stock XYZ, is ABC a full position, even if I want to buy more and don't want more of XYZ?

[rapidacid]

(09-08-2015, 12:21 PM)Rasec Wrote: What do you guys define as a full position vs a half position? Is there a rule or it's up to everyone to define?

Say I own 10K of stock ABC and 2k of stock XYZ, is ABC a full position, even if I want to buy more and don't want more of XYZ?

Can't speak for anyone else but it's going to be all relative anyways ie. everyone is going to have their own sizing + rules + goals + strategy

In general, a stock is full size for me when my forward 12 month dividends for the position reach $1,000.

Obviously that's not going to be apples to apples because stocks are going to have different dividend yields so you're going to put way more money into KO to reach $1,000 than you are going to put into T or BP to reach the same $1,000.

But that's kind of what I want. An equity yielding 7.5%+ is (in general) probably currently in a bit more precarious spot than KO yielding 3.0% so while I'm willing to take the risk on the BP's to reap the rewards of a high yield, I'm looking to risk less absolute dollars than I am on KO. I'm willing to risk $30K on KO yielding 3.3% but only $14K on RDS.B yielding 7.5% and both will pay me (hopefully) $1,000 in the next year.

When all of my positions, or maybe the majority, reach $1,000 / year in dividends for me then the bar will reset and a full size position will bump to $1,500 or $2,000 / year in dividends.

[hendi_alex]

To me it depends upon your weighting target. I may be very comfortable with REITs and decide to weight the sector 10% via VNQ. An initial purchase to 5% weighting would be a half position versus the eventual target amount. I may be much more skeptical on utilities but decide that I can handle a 5% weighting. I like DUK, its price dips, and 5% weighting is purchased right then. That is a full position unless upon re-evaluation, the sector begins to look more favorable and is worthy of an increase.

I usually use the following labeling rather than full position half position. 2.5% is designated a 1X weighting. That is generally my smallest full position. If I like the stock or sector, then perhaps I'll move up to a 2X weighting. In general, my biggest single stock weighting would have 4X max or 10% and biggest single sector weighting would 20%. For me this system makes it easier to tell relative weightings at a glance.

Don't know about the others, but that is how it works for me.

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Only problem that I see with Rapidacid's method, though not REALLY a problem, is that the weighting scheme gives no help at all in assessing sector allocations and in determining overall diversification.

[rapidacid]

(09-08-2015, 01:12 PM)hendi_alex Wrote: Only problem that I see with Rapidacid's method, though not REALLY a problem, is that the weighting scheme gives no help at all in assessing sector allocations and in determining overall diversification.

Can you expand on that? Not sure I'm following. Obviously it's super easy to breakdown your portfolio into sectors to determine your diversification %'s as well as correlations.

[hendi_alex]

Sure is if one is inclined to do that, especially when setting up the spread sheet. With my ETF theme, tracking weightings is simple enough via visual scan, especially with my very basic weighting system. Do your weightings result from targets, or do they just result from buying blocks of securities which each kick out $1000?

I used to track, calculate, and project everything to death, setting up and using fancy spreadsheets. Now, I've moved mostly to ETF exposure and don't pay much attention to anything other than weighting, sector exposure, average yield, and a few other metrics. One is not likely to out perform the market over time, so ETFs work for me just fine. Much simpler, holds down trading costs, gives near absence of DD, only very tiny individual company risk. Now my focus is more on the macro view and in adjusting allocations from time to time. So far is much simpler with far less angst.

Concerning the super easy part, super easy after the initial set up. For me, the initial setup, even for my simple spreadsheet, was a pain in the butt.

I do like your very concise chart with data, but would be over kill for me.

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[rapidacid]

(09-08-2015, 02:01 PM)hendi_alex Wrote: Do your weightings result from targets, or do they just result from buying blocks of securities which each kick out $1000?

Not from targets. I've left the idea of proper diversification by the wayside for the most part. That's not to say that I'll let things get to 35% Real Estate, but for the most part I'm letting things shake out as they will.

All my positions started in the realm of 1/4 positions. Over time I've honed in on the companies I like and score well in my system to allocate the early money to.

At this point I kind of feel "full up" with my positions, meaning I've allocated my KO dollars and my CLX dollars, and am mostly sorting my existing portfolio by 52-week price ( low to high ) and allocating new funds to stocks currently out of favor. This has the side benefit of higher yield and lower P/E if that's your thing.

(09-08-2015, 02:01 PM)hendi_alex Wrote: Concerning the super easy part, super easy after the initial set up. For me, the initial setup, even for my simple spreadsheet, was a pain in the butt.

I do like your very concise chart with data, but would be over kill for me.

It's all stockrover.com. It's plug & play. Add a ticker, say how many shares you bought at what price and it does the rest for you.

[ronn38]

Added 85 shares of SE on today dip to $27 :-)

[jim]

Added 50 more to EPD (thanks to Goldman Sachs 20 dollar oil call:)

[KenBob]

Topping off STAG in my portfolio and CSCO in my wife's portfolio.

[DRILLINDK]

Didn't buy anything today, but initiated a transfer of funds to my account. Wanted to add more dry powder. I'm not anticipating a Fed rate hike on Wednesday, but I believe the market is set up perfectly for a Thursday freakout and it would nice to scoop up some stocks on sale.

[Rasec]

Same here, ready to deploy a big investment in:

XOM, CVX, TGT, JNJ, PG, T, UNP, UTX, KO, MO and maybe something else.

So hopefully the Fed rate hike will freak the market and not the other way around! :d