Subject: IC940809: Start Investing, etc

From: "Gray Zhu, 800-289-2498, 212-279-6700" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 9 Aug 94 22:36:36 CDT

==================    IC940809: Investment Club  ======================

1. Invest $20000 once or month by month? ............... Gray Zhu
2. Where to find company name with a ticker symbol? .... ????????
3. What are two magazines you recommend? ............... Gray Zhu
_______________________________________________________________________
   (be sure to read the Disclaimer in the end if you have not read)

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1. Invest $20000 once, or month by month? ........... Gray Zhu

> From [email-masked]

>I am glad to see the ICNET in the ifcss.org. I put money in the bank and
>never think about the investment. I got very useful information from your
>message.  If I keep puting my money in the bank, it is losing money in some
>sense. So I want to start to invest the money in the market.  Can you tell
>me how to start the investment? For example, if I want to put $20000.00 at
>one time, or if I want to put some amount of money month by month, which way
>is better?

Glad to hear that you realized the benefit of investing. I suggest most
people start with mutual funds, because mutual funds are baskets of stocks,
one broken egg in a basket does hurt much. As a matter of fact, most of my
100 customers started with mutual funds. Once you get a sense about the
market and can accept the kind of volatility of stocks, you then can
consider buying some stocks. Stocks move faster than mutual funds, some move
upwards, some downwards, they cancel out some in a mutual fund, that is why
mutual funds move much slower. Nevertheless, the market - biggest "mutual
fund" of over 10000 stocks, moved average 12% a year over past 30 years, far
better than the savings. Normal mutual funds contain 20 to 100s of stocks,
which is a smaller sample of the market, you get more or less the market
average, depending on the investment objectives and the manager's skills.

Also, one should diversify his investments. Balance his mutual funds and
stocks among differen industries, difference countries, even different
qualities, and some in stocks, some in bonds as well.

As for the amount is concerned, I cannot give a definite answer. If you have
only $20000 and nothing else, I would not suggest you invest more than
$16000 in the market. If you have $1 million cash, I would say $100,000
investment in one stock is not much. Let's assume you have a networth of
$100,000 and the $20000 is liquid, and you have $3000/monthly disposable
income -extra money, I would suggest you put the $10000 into 1 or 2 mutual
funds initially, and add the $10000 in other times. Also invest your
disposable income monthly. This market currently is volatile (in my
opinion), the dollar-cost-averaging could be perfectly used.

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2. Where to find company name with a ticker symbol? .... ????????

> From: [email-masked]

>Gray, I'd like to subscibe IC-VIP. I decide to get my feet wet into
>stock. Could you also send me John Hancock information. By the way, my
>friend asks me whether there is book to look up for these company
>abbreviations like IBM stands for International Bussiness Matchine. I don't
>have the answer. I know it doesn't do any good to get to know company full
>name, but just for the sake of curiosity, could you kindly give the answer.

Gray: I know S&P stock guide, probably available in book stores. Anybody
knows a computer source? Please. One easy way is call me up, I check for you
from my computer - office computer receiving datafeed, not download-able.

It is important to know the name of the company though. If you make a
mistake, it could cost you money, for example, you might think General
Instrument's symbol is GI (actually GIC), and you wanted to buy General
Instrument, and you tell the broker "buy GI 500 shares for me", and you may
wind up buying GI, which is another company.

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3. What are two magazines you recommend? ............... Gray Zhu

>From: ZHU HAI WEI <[email-masked]>
>Subject: Magazine

>Which one or two magazine(s) you would recommend for ordinary investors, and
>why.

1. MONEY: comprehensive. Most investors read.

2. Business Week: gives outlook of everything, and a lot of investment
   issues. There are company ranking and mutual fund rankings, etc. 

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For specific recommendations and info on IC-VIP, contact [email-masked] 
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