EOD Update (13 August 2007)

Song: 最熟悉的陌生人 (Zui Shu Xi De Mo Sheng Ren) By: 萧亚轩 (Xiao Ya Xuan, Elva)



Decided it was a good point and time to increase my stake slightly in APB today. However, did not want to increase total exposure (and number of stocks in portfolio), so had to make a tough decision to cut something out. In the end, I decided to cut out my CYMAO at a small profit. Acquired in end-June/early-July 2006 at 1.04 and 1.05, this counter subsequently went as high as 1.89 on 20th Nov 2006. This translated to a gain of 80% in 4 1/2 months, but I did not take any profits. It subsequently corrected to 1.59 before touching 1.88 again on 24th Jan 2007. This was my second chance to at least take some profits (I know what they say about a stock failing to make a new high and forming a double top), but again I did not sell even some to lock in some profits.

Partly due to the global correction starting end-Feb 2007 (started by steep China sell-off), it went as low as 1.29 before rebounding back up to 1.78 on 3rd May 2007. The next day, 4th May, it touched 1.78 again before failing to break through and closing flat at 1.76. On 7th May (the next trading day), it closed a further 6c down at 1.70, fully retracing and going below the 3rd May bull bar which formed the recent high. Did I see this and sell out the whole thing now? Nope.

In hindsight of course, all this seems crystal clear now, but at that time I must have been either too lazy or too dumb to see the signs. I had built up a portfolio of timber-related stocks and was so confident with the sector fundamentals going forward that I didn't bother to review individual stocks regularly. The rest of the story is downhill all the way, resulting in me throwing out the whole thing at 1.20 today (a mere 14.8% return over 13 months, at least it's much higher than FD rates, but that's no excuse).

It might probably rebound now from this level. If it does, then serves me right for mucking around with the market. This also shows that even if you're lucky enough to buy correctly most of the time, you still need to know how to sell right too, otherwise at the end of the day, you're still a schmuck.

Latest purchase:

APB: +5,000 (1.91) ... Total 10,000

Latest disposal:

CYMAO: -8,000 (1.20) ... Balance 0


/ichithekiller