Author Topic: Name an investment you made that didn't work out  (Read 5928 times)

ChpBstrd

  • Walrus Stache
  • *******
  • Posts: 6662
  • Location: A poor and backward Southern state known as minimum wage country
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #50 on: November 23, 2020, 07:45:28 AM »
When I was in my late teens, going to junior college, working two jobs and still living at home, I bought a krugerrand. I put it in one of my mom's dresser drawers for safekeeping. We had a party at our house and when I thought to check on my shiny gold coin the next morning, it was gone, never to be seen again. I can't remember what it cost (google says $175-ish), but it was a huge loss at the time. Google also tells me it would be worth just over $2k today. I suspect whoever swiped it did not keep it. Perhaps they have similar regrets.

I've always suspected that one of my siblings told a neighbor kid and there was collaboration in its disappearance. I'll never know.

In the end, it was an inexpensive lesson, but it sure didn't seem so at the time.

At least you were protected from hyperinflation for a while.

simonsez

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 1576
  • Age: 37
  • Location: Midwest
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #51 on: November 23, 2020, 12:33:27 PM »
3) we often peddle the impression on this forum that everyone is a stone-cold rationalist who came out of the womb investing in index funds, which clearly isn't true.  People on this forum often came to passive indexing precisely because early forays bombed spectacularly.  If someone is new to investing, they could see passive investing as naïve or stupid from unseasoned investors when the opposite is true.  We know active investing is hard from experience.
#3 is me but I didn't invest until I had a 401k in my mid-twenties.  It seems like many who have "learned lessons" started off younger and may actually still be better off having by and large kept at it while adjusting.  I would also wager that those who start earlier and/or actively pick probably allocate a higher proportion to investing at least as young adults.  I could be wrong on that hypothesis and it would be hard to collect data on it.

Thanks for posting OP, very interesting indeed.

J Boogie

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 1531
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #52 on: November 25, 2020, 10:51:11 AM »
I have matched the Nasdaq this year in my fun trading account, but I would have done far better if I would have avoided getting drawn into the tanker during the contango moment back in Spring.

I also lost money on getting trying to jump the gun on PLTR by buying the SSSS SPAC prior to the direct listing. SSSS shit the bed and has since recovered a little bit. So perhaps I didn't lose much after all, but I sure felt stupid about buying the overbought SPAC instead of just getting more PLTR.

My PLTR pick doubled but unfortunately I trimmed most of my position after I had a 50% gain.

celerystalks

  • Bristles
  • ***
  • Posts: 342
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #53 on: November 26, 2020, 05:53:28 PM »
I have matched the Nasdaq this year in my fun trading account, but I would have done far better if I would have avoided getting drawn into the tanker during the contango moment back in Spring.

I also lost money on getting trying to jump the gun on PLTR by buying the SSSS SPAC prior to the direct listing. SSSS shit the bed and has since recovered a little bit. So perhaps I didn't lose much after all, but I sure felt stupid about buying the overbought SPAC instead of just getting more PLTR.

My PLTRpick doubled but unfortunately I trimmed most of my position after I had a 50% gain.

Yeah what is going on with this? I bought 100 shares a few days after listing at $9 and it has more than tripled..

brellis1vt

  • 5 O'Clock Shadow
  • *
  • Posts: 76
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #54 on: November 26, 2020, 06:34:16 PM »
Yieldstreet and Peerstreet.  I tried to diversify away from stocks and these investments firms have not been good investment methods.  In both I have loans in default/foreclosure with limited updates from the companies and money in limbo for years (I can't get some of my money out and don't know when I will be able to.)  I also don't know how much money I will lose.  These companies want money for investments but don't care about you making money.  Stay away.

J Boogie

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 1531
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #55 on: November 30, 2020, 10:01:04 AM »
I have matched the Nasdaq this year in my fun trading account, but I would have done far better if I would have avoided getting drawn into the tanker during the contango moment back in Spring.

I also lost money on getting trying to jump the gun on PLTR by buying the SSSS SPAC prior to the direct listing. SSSS shit the bed and has since recovered a little bit. So perhaps I didn't lose much after all, but I sure felt stupid about buying the overbought SPAC instead of just getting more PLTR.

My PLTRpick doubled but unfortunately I trimmed most of my position after I had a 50% gain.



Yeah what is going on with this? I bought 100 shares a few days after listing at $9 and it has more than tripled..

FOMO is my guess.

It seems like the one of the last companies like this that will come around - Paypal Mafia alum Peter Thiel is a co-founder, fellow co-founder Alex Karp is still CEO, uses cutting edge "big data" where data analysis seems to be decades behind (govts and other large bureacracies). They acquire customers (takes a lot money) and basically never lose them. Kind of the perfect recipe for an insane run-up and ridiculous valuation.

I got paper hands when I remembered hearing Thiel talk about how they timed their Paypal IPO and exit perfectly to avoid getting crushed by the dot com crash. I thought oh man he timed it perfectly again, I should take my profits. Should have HODL'd :)

ouroboros

  • 5 O'Clock Shadow
  • *
  • Posts: 6
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #56 on: December 01, 2020, 11:44:10 PM »
AAPL bought a 10 shares at $20 circa 1998, sold for a couple dollars of loss after my best friend told me not to own a company just because you like their products.

TMTA - bought about $200 of Transmeta, way ahead of its time, an ARM-like processor in the early 2000s that was way faster and more power efficient than anything on the market. Too bad they went bankrupt, held their stock until it got delisted.

POT - Potash circa 2007 during a shortage, made and then lost a few thousand, but about broke even.

XIV - (luckily by this time had discovered MMM and 95% of my portfolio was in VTI) but I thought I was really smart in 2017 and with 5% of my portfolio invested in XIV, went up several thousand, I bailed the day it crashed for a scratch. I realize now how lucky I was to get out without a loss. Never again.

norajean

  • Pencil Stache
  • ****
  • Posts: 602
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #57 on: December 02, 2020, 06:09:33 AM »
What is the point of this thread?

OP here.  Honestly this thread went even better than expected.  I've LOVED reading all the responses. 
As to the why...
1) because I just love the topic of investing in general
2) we learn a lot more from mistakes than success (which just makes you overconfident)
3) we often peddle the impression on this forum that everyone is a stone-cold rationalist who came out of the womb investing in index funds, which clearly isn't true.  People on this forum often came to passive indexing precisely because early forays bombed spectacularly.  If someone is new to investing, they could see passive investing as naïve or stupid from unseasoned investors when the opposite is true.  We know active investing is hard from experience.

What have you learned that you didn’t already know?

J Boogie

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 1531
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #58 on: December 02, 2020, 10:10:54 AM »
What is the point of this thread?

OP here.  Honestly this thread went even better than expected.  I've LOVED reading all the responses. 
As to the why...
1) because I just love the topic of investing in general
2) we learn a lot more from mistakes than success (which just makes you overconfident)
3) we often peddle the impression on this forum that everyone is a stone-cold rationalist who came out of the womb investing in index funds, which clearly isn't true.  People on this forum often came to passive indexing precisely because early forays bombed spectacularly.  If someone is new to investing, they could see passive investing as naïve or stupid from unseasoned investors when the opposite is true.  We know active investing is hard from experience.

What have you learned that you didn’t already know?

Geez Nora! Even if there are no lessons to be had we're on a forum just having fun bragging and commiserating :)

Sometimes its valuable to have colorful illustrations of what you already know theoretically, especially as our news feeds include stories of newly minted millionaires who went all in on TSLA, BTC, MRNA or what have you.  On reddit's wall street bets forum, if you only see the gain porn you'll be far more tempted to start trading options boldly. But when you see the loss porn you get a bit more sobered up.

There's a guy Ben Felix on youtube who provides a nice young professional and academic polish to the age old Jim Collins common sense advice. He constantly pours cold water on anything that isn't total market index fund investing.

HeadedWest2029

  • Bristles
  • ***
  • Posts: 316
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #59 on: December 02, 2020, 10:50:30 AM »
Exactly.  This was mostly for fun and it's delivered for me.  Feel free to peruse other threads if you don't like talking about this sort of thing.  As for what I've learned specifically, there were a few crowdsourcing or private investments that I've been tempted by in the past, and still tempt me to this day.  It's helpful to hear others pipe up who have direct experience with stuff like YieldStreet, Prosper, etc.  I started the thread with Prosper because a lot of these P2P or crowdsourcing websites tout the annualized returns since inception, but my experience is that most of the performance gain was frontloaded to the early days before things have trailed off considerably (so I find their quoted historical performance a bit disingenuous).  If that stops someone from going down the same rabbit hole, then all the better.  Plus, there's a stock picker in me who just likes to talk stocks.  I didn't mention it earlier, but in my stock picking days I invested in GT Advanced Technologies because they totally changed their company to supply the material for the iPhone screens.  The stock price kept going up and then Apple informed them they wouldn't be using their product, the company declared bankruptcy, and the stock went to zero.  I learned a lot from that experience and it makes for a good story when a person getting into investing starts asking me about stock picking ideas.

EricEng

  • Pencil Stache
  • ****
  • Posts: 605
  • Location: CO
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #60 on: December 03, 2020, 09:56:07 AM »
Helmerich and Payne Inc HP Stock, lost 80%. Bought at $85/share and now hangs around $20.
Bought on recommendation from financial magazine (not my usual source) while looking for some diversity in my investments outside tech.  Bought at peak in 2016 thinking energy and mining stocks would improve under new president.  Ended up diving and just staying way down for multiple reasons such as energy glut.  Lesson learned was beware picking stocks outside sectors you don't have much knowledge of.

Thankfully this is my only terrible stock pick and now represents such a small amount I just hang onto to it as a reminder.

talltexan

  • Walrus Stache
  • *******
  • Posts: 5344
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #61 on: December 04, 2020, 11:14:20 AM »
I thought coal would thrive under Trump and had a stake in $ARLP for a while. Loved that double digit dividend yield, and capital appreciation was about even. Got out when I decided stock picking required more attention than I could give, and...turns out they've fallen from $18 to below $5.

YYK

  • Stubble
  • **
  • Posts: 140
  • Location: Scattered disc
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #62 on: December 04, 2020, 01:58:09 PM »
I thought coal would thrive under Trump and had a stake in $ARLP for a while. Loved that double digit dividend yield, and capital appreciation was about even. Got out when I decided stock picking required more attention than I could give, and...turns out they've fallen from $18 to below $5.

Is there any coal company that is doing well? I had the impression that coal was long in decline anyway because of competition from gas and renewables, and not even a pro-coal administration was going to be able to turn that around.

Proud Foot

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 1160
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #63 on: December 09, 2020, 02:18:09 PM »
Helmerich and Payne Inc HP Stock, lost 80%. Bought at $85/share and now hangs around $20.
Bought on recommendation from financial magazine (not my usual source) while looking for some diversity in my investments outside tech.  Bought at peak in 2016 thinking energy and mining stocks would improve under new president.  Ended up diving and just staying way down for multiple reasons such as energy glut.  Lesson learned was beware picking stocks outside sectors you don't have much knowledge of.

Thankfully this is my only terrible stock pick and now represents such a small amount I just hang onto to it as a reminder.

I got into HP in 2015 when it was right under $50. I am still holding onto it and will continue for the time being.

My biggest loss is GE. Got into a small position early in 2015 right before everything started going south. Currently holding as the cost to sell is too large of a percentage of my balance. Totally written it off and am just holding to see if I can get any spin off activity or they are able to get things turned around.

MustachioedPistachio

  • Stubble
  • **
  • Posts: 224
Re: Name an investment you made that didn't work out
« Reply #64 on: December 09, 2020, 02:29:21 PM »
I funded 99.5% of the equity for a vacuum repair and retail shop that also had a decent central vacuum installation and serviceable client base...with my ambitious, strapping, handy, and supposedly industrious younger cousin.