Your Top Five Stock Positions and Why?

[oldtoyota]

I would keep in mind the taxes you would incur on the sale. Capital Gains and the like assuming this is not in a tax advantaged account. Other than that I'm not sure what else you are thinking about when you say "what to keep in mind."

Although I know about cap gains, I figure there are some ins and outs to know about. I should have been more specific.

[matchewed]

There are some things you can do to offset the sale of a gain with the sale of a loss but I'm not confident in my knowledge of it.

[Spork]

If you do not want to track them any longer, I agree that switching to index funds is the route to go.

To add on to matchewed's advice, I would recommend to be aware of which stocks that you have owned for less than one year. Short term capital gains is taxed at the ordinary income tax rate instead of long term rate. For example, if you have owned a stock for 11 months that has gone up by 40%, you might want to consider waiting another month before selling. Of course, there are risks in delaying a sale, though it is worth considering in certain situations.

Thank you. I did not know that. Very helpful!

It has also become very easy to figure out taxes on stocks.  There was a (USA) requirement that went in a while back where the brokerage has to track your tax basis.  Assuming you haven't held these stocks for years and years (and moved paper stock certs into a brokerage account) -- you get a nice, neat report now that clearly states the gains.  It's not like it was a few years back where tracking purchase price + spinoffs + splits + godonlyknowswhat was a royal PITA.

[CompLB15]

My biggest position is BRK.B (Berkshire Hathaway) and will be a 30+ year holding

1. The subsidiaries are in the top of their respective industry, run by best in-class CEO's
2. Has arguably the best investor ever as CEO. Warren Buffett
3. 50 billion cash on the balance sheet
4. 1 billion in free cash flow per month coming in
5.  Bankruptcy risk slight higher than US treasuries.  (i.e. almost none)
6.  Growth estimate on the low end of 8% a year.
7.  Floor price of stock at 120% of Book Value, due to repurchase. 

Berkshire has essentially the same risk as an S&P index fund but with better returns. 

[Reepekg]

My 4 biggest are boring S&P 500, total market, REIT, and oil zero commission ETF indexes, so I can buy them with every spare dollar I can find. Naturally, the first two are about 90% of total stock holdings.

I did think it would be fun to bring up #5 Vestas (VWSYF), a Danish wind turbine manufacturer. One of the biggest companies in DK. I was living there when I saw their stock went from $125 to $5 following the crisis. Nobody was buying green energy when money was tight, but I figured it would pick back up eventually and I rolled the dice on shares that cheap for an established company. The Danes, their pension system, and their government love them some greentech, and wouldn't you know it is starting to claw back up. (Incisive analytical thinking, I know)

#5 was tesla, but I took my $$$ and ran when it got up near $100. $120 today but don't regret getting out.

[tpozywio]

1- Total Stock Market index
2-Mixed Stock/Bonds Index fund
3-Walgreens Stock and options-Some I bought at 10% company discount, some given by company
4-REIT index fund

[Marmot]

My biggest position is BRK.B (Berkshire Hathaway) and will be a 30+ year holding

1. The subsidiaries are in the top of their respective industry, run by best in-class CEO's
2. Has arguably the best investor ever as CEO. Warren Buffett
3. 50 billion cash on the balance sheet
4. 1 billion in free cash flow per month coming in
5.  Bankruptcy risk slight higher than US treasuries.  (i.e. almost none)
6.  Growth estimate on the low end of 8% a year.
7.  Floor price of stock at 120% of Book Value, due to repurchase. 

Berkshire has essentially the same risk as an S&P index fund but with better returns.

Once a company/conglomerate becomes a certain size, I tend to shy away from them (ie Apple at $400 bill). The larger a company is, the harder it is for it to outperform the market. My general rule of thumb is to avoid companies with more than a ~$250 bill market cap.

"If I was running $1 million today, or $10 million for that matter, I'd be fully invested. Anyone who says that size does not hurt investment performance is selling. The highest rates of return I've ever achieved were in the 1950s. I killed the Dow. You ought to see the numbers. But I was investing peanuts then. It's a huge structural advantage not to have a lot of money. I think I could make you 50% a year on $1 million. No, I know I could. I guarantee that." - Warren Buffett

Also, I feel that berkshire hathaway is so large and made up of so many companies that it is difficult for me to understand/analyze.

Also, Buffett and Munger are both in their 80s.

Berkshire is an unbelievable success story, though I think that those buying now are a little late to the party.

[Marmot]

@Reepekg: I'm intrigued by green tech also; I own a solar stock (first solar), the solar company with the best balance sheet imo and only a 10 P/E and most revenue for next 2 years is already signed. I think it was a smart move to sell TSLA at $100; has great potential, though I try to avoid stocks that do not have much earnings as I view valuation as more speculative. On a side note, I wish some coastal US cities would get on the wind turbine bandwagon; the wind turbines off the shore of Copenhagen are impressive.

@tpozywio: Not sure what to think about Walgreens. Once Medicare can negotiate pharma rates, not sure what collateral damage will be to retail pharmacy. The additional people with health insurance due to obamacare should help though.  ~2/3rds of walgreen's revenue is from pharma sales and almost all of their profit. Also, mail-order pharmacy is both an opportunity and threat; will likely put some pressure on traditional brick-and-mortar business model.

[tman]

general strategy: growth without incurring unreasonable risk - never more than 2-3% of my overall portfolio in an initial position in a single stock; also use options, mostly selling covered calls, use etfs also; follow cnbc - money in motion, options action, mad money, random roger blog, barrons subscription, yahoo finance

top positions:

apple - bought years ago at 180 - sold all from 560-606 - bought in again at 398, still holding - a very nice ride

google - bought at 604, sold some at 700m some at 800, still hold some at 900ish

facebook - bought ipo, a rough ride, hope to get out with a profit

vmware - made some on covered calls, volatile stock but slightly ahead

amazon - just took a position recently, stock has been on fire, just won a big gov contract for cloud services

[Hugh H]

general strategy: growth without incurring unreasonable risk - never more than 2-3% of my overall portfolio in an initial position in a single stock; also use options, mostly selling covered calls, use etfs also; follow cnbc - money in motion, options action, mad money, random roger blog, barrons subscription, yahoo finance

top positions:

apple - bought years ago at 180 - sold all from 560-606 - bought in again at 398, still holding - a very nice ride

google - bought at 604, sold some at 700m some at 800, still hold some at 900ish

facebook - bought ipo, a rough ride, hope to get out with a profit

vmware - made some on covered calls, volatile stock but slightly ahead

amazon - just took a position recently, stock has been on fire, just won a big gov contract for cloud services

nice positions… Facebook announced a really good quarter today so IPO price this year is doable.

[LinCO]

Natalej, we are holding the same individual stocks! FWIW

I am reading a little on this board about stocks and a little on The Motley Fool. Obviously very, very different attitudes about stockpicking but definitely the founders of both are into *FUN.*

I am thinking a lot about asset allocation and ROI, and about being more active with my investment accounts. For example, I've left a little in a 401(k) and may go ahead and transfer it so I can have a larger selection of investments. So I did go ahead and buy a subscription to one of the Fool newsletters, and I also opened a Sharebuilder account which MMM recommends.

I'm transferring an IRA to the Sharebuilder and am looking at buying American Towers.