Comments by "Magic Beans" (@Magic_beans_) on "Investment Analyst Reacts to MORE Investing TikToks" video.

And for a couple of them he bought right at the peak. Good news is if he holds onto these companies and they do well, that won’t really matter. Imagine you’d bought into Microsoft at the worst possible price of 2015 but held on. Yes you could have done better, but you’d still be up more than 500% because you were there for all of 2016, 2017, 2018…
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5:00 (Technical analysis of a fake stock chart) - If the reviews were consistent it at least suggests there’s a method to TA, and it could just be that the coin flips happened to randomly create a pattern they’d see as bullish. I think the real gotcha would be if different analysts all gave different reviews, indicating they’re just seeing what they want to see. An example would be the NOVA system that’s supposed to help classify foods as more or less heavily processed. There have been studies where researchers asked trained professionals to rate various foods and there was very little consistency to their responses. That’s the kind of result that tells you a metric is arbitrary or so vague as to be unhelpful.
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1:30 There’s been some research on stock splits and how it affects the company’s value, and the average rally is like 5%. Of course the folks on Wall Street know this already, so the second the split gets announced they buy in, so…
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They usually have an excuse for that. They don’t need the money, they just “want to empower everyday investors to achieve their dreams.”
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Paper trading is a good start, but it still can’t capture the emotional angle when one of your picks gets hammered. I’m writing this in late 2023 which has been a very positive year overall, and I’ve still had several 5-10% drops in a day. - Solar companies that can’t add capacity as quickly because of higher interest rates. - A tech company that reported they “only” expected 18% growth next year instead of the 24% people were expecting. - A retailer whose stock fell because a competitor’s press release got investors spooked about the industry. And then there are industries like biotech where companies could live or die based on a single regulatory hearing.
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Yeah, and if you go back further even retail traders were expected to trade in lots of 100 shares. A starter position in IBM forty years ago would have required something like $12,000.
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Likewise, some places do gradual vesting. For example you keep 20% more of the match for each year you stay, until after 5 years it’s all yours. Even if you just get one year that could be a 10-20% return on top of whatever the market provides.
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Usually, yes. Google was a highly profitable and rapidly growing company before the split, and they continue to be that way after the split. That’s probably at least part of the reason for post-split increases. Which are more modest and less reliable than our TikTok friend would suggest. In the olden days maybe that accessibility thing was true. Companies would often split to keep their share price under, say, $100 because when a typical order was 100 shares it could get really expensive to build a portfolio. (Either that or you bought into a direct stock purchase plan with each company. In that case your order would get batched and executed on a preassigned day each month.)
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7:45 Grain of truth to angry 401k bro: if you have debt with a double-digit interest rate, your investment returns wont keep pace with the interest you’re paying on the debt, so the more you contribute the more you fall behind. In that case it may be worth contributing just enough to get the employer match because that’s a 50-100% extra*, but beyond that focus on the debt. And also yes, at some companies the fund options in the 401k stink. When you change jobs, roll it into an IRA so you can invest it how you want. * Maybe. If the matching funds don’t really belong to you (don’t “vest”) until you’ve been there 5 years and you don’t expect to be, then it’s probably not worth planning as if you’ll get that extra. Just work on the debt and maybe drop a bit into an IRA.
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