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[Wooster]

I was thinking about it this morning...say £500, but this might only be the eye of the storm, so maybe I'll wait a bit.

How were you going to go about it? Done any research on the options? i.e. http://www.share.com/webp/

[corroded]

to be honest, i have options at the moment so i know a little... the shares i have are worth £1.38, though their real value could be 100 times that if my company sells.

i was thinking more on the line that a little wager, maybe even as low as £50, would get ~$90USD which at current rate... 30 shares... this time last year were trading at ~67USD, highest a few years previous being nearly $96. They've got a bit of security now i think... and £50 gamble could turn into £1k. They were 2.60 a while ago when i was looking, their 3.01 atm, and where 3.45 about half an hour ago... might make a nice surprise in a few years, and at a fairly low amount, it's not a big deal...

tell you what though, if these share options come through from my other place...and i get a decent amount, and AIG are still low i might sink a grand in. i think my dad might want to have a long discussion about that one, but if it comes through on valuation (big if)... and tax isn't as bad (i heard quite good) i should have over 10-15k, and i think a 6% gamble for 10-20k (30-60$ each) is a bad idea. and probably a good idea to try and make the best of a pretty bad situation i've been in recently, and globally to be fair.

(10k before was usd, forgot to convert back lol)

[Wooster]

International shares are tax exempt afik..

How about a WAnK investment club?

[corroded]

heh wouldn't be a bad idea, though i'm not really quite sure how they work really :s

that said, i dont really know how share stuff works really.. even to the exact point of an investment club hehe.

[Wooster]

Same here..but it's doable I reckon. (I think in this day and age you could probably set one up pretty easily online through a broker site)

Any financial wizards in here?

[Vasco]

You need to decide on a risk profile for your investments. Something like:-

20% high risk (I can afford to lose this money but high return if I don't - AIG shares are currently in this area)
40% medium risk (less chance of losing money but lower return)
20% low risk (safe investment with an average 7% - 10% annual return over 5 years)

Then you need to decide on what to do with any dividends you receive, the options are re-invest or take as cash.

You also need to decide what type of investments you are going to buy.  Options are:-
national equities,
overseas equities,
national bonds,
overseas bonds,
futures (I don't recommend these as they are very high risk unless you understand comodities)
property or shares in a property trading scheme,
cash trading or gold,

Then you need to decide whether you are going to actively trade yourselves or use a recognised investment manager as your broker.

I am responsiible for $23 million $NZD of investments for my work but other than what I have written above I know nothing.  The funds are all held by Goldman Sachs JB Were and managed on our behalf.  Luckily I changed broker in Sep last year and cashed everything in to pass it from the old broker to GSJBW.  Whilst doing that the collapse started so we kept everything in cash.  We have only just started bying local shares and some bonds over the last fortnight. We have been very lucky.

[Thermalsig]

Hallcat's pretty familiar with the set up of an investment club. You need someone to handle all the trades. Basically everyone finds a stock they like and do all the research on it and present it to the group and the group votes on it, yes or no and if yes, how much. Need a pool of money to start though. Doesn't have to be much as you can buy partials of stock.

[Vasco]

   bow to the superior knowledge of Hallcat 

That would be a lot more fun than what I do at work.    More hands on and way more educational. 

[Nivlac]

My boss who does a fair share of investing bought 5000 shares of AIG this morning using part of the $15k he made in one night (wachovia bank - bought @ $8 sold @ $22 less than 24hrs later) His plan is long term for the stock - looking for it to hit its previous value of $50+ a share @ $50 he clears $235K and the sweet part is it's money he is rolling over so it would be a zero loss should it fail.

[keasy]

Can I have a mortgagae to buy my home please ?


Do you have documentation proving your income and a favourable credit history ?

Ermmmm, yes ?

Okay,we believe you, we don't need to see it. Here's a mortgage, like we don't give a fuck as we will sell it on to a broker anyway, we made a handsome sum from you. Bet you didn't realise we could invent money from thin air with this ultra profitable ARM/Subprime model didn't you. We can make money appear as if by magic, just like that rabbit the magician pulled from a hat at my kids birthday party.

Ermmm, no. Thanks for the mortgagae though.

Here endeth the tale.

[Nivlac]

Boss told me today that when he sells I will get 5% of the profit  or I could keep that value in stock and see how it goes from there either way it was a real shock when he told me what he was going to do.

[Thermalsig]

Grats, Nivlac.

[Wooster]

That's pretty good of him.

[keasy]

Allow me the to be the first to say it....


Ya lucky fuckin bastard!

 

[Galah]

It wasn't just the loans as I understand it but the futures on the loans.  They were into some serious ramping action.  Now if I have it right it goes somethig like this:-

The bank loans someone $1 as a mortgage on a property
They then sell that $1 debt to a future trader (investor) for $3 and he insures it against default for $8.

The bank is happy as it has made a profit on the loan provided it does not default.
The future trader is happy that he has a deal that will make him money if it does default which he is pretty sure it will do, and if it doesn't he still retrieves some of his risked money back.

Basically it is gambling, the banks bet one way and the future trader/investor bets the oposite.

What happend of course is that the bottom fell out of the property market and the defaults were huge.  The banks couldn't afford to pay the insurance and went bust and the future traders had all these over valued default mortages that they couldn't get their money back on because the banks were bankrupt and the mortgages had all defaulted so were valueless.  Both sides lost big time.

ANd because the banks and Future Traders were using the ordinary investors money to play their little game of chance everyone else lost as well 

It was a system that was detined to fail at some stage but the easy money it was producing blinded the investors to its weaknness which was the heavy reliance on a strong property market.

Thanks so much for the simple and easy to follow explanation - I was struggling big time wondering WTF is going on - other than the little bloke getting screwed again, that's a given.

scary read - makes more sense now I've read Vasco's
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=10265
(actually too long a read - summary is ... $1000 trillion (ie billion billion) is estimated to be hieght of the derivative market a few months ago - $60trillion is worlds GDP - $170trill is world's total assets ( ref http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derivative_(finance) ) - can we say bubble)

funny site http://www.buymyshitpile.com/

and goodonya Nivlac