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Stock picking sources

View Poll Results: You are allowed a single source (and no other information) to determine whether to buy and sel

Management Call

21 56.76%

Price chart for any time period

11 29.73%

Company presentation

2 5.41%

Sell side initiation.

3 8.11%

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04-09-2017 , 08:48 AM

ToothSayer

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Jul 2015 Posts: 13,237

I saw this question on Twitter and thought it was fascinating. Would love to hear what the sharp minds in BFI think.

Question: You are allowed a single source (and no other information) for the rest of your trading/investing career to determine whether to buy or sell any stock. You are allowed no other information. Which are you choosing?

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04-09-2017 , 10:18 AM

Love Sosa

veteran

Join Date: Jan 2013 Posts: 2,308

Management call. Gives you the highest chance of determining whether the management team "gets it" or if they're out to lunch.

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04-09-2017 , 01:03 PM

BooLoo

adept

Join Date: Oct 2013 Posts: 943

management call

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04-10-2017 , 12:24 PM

Morishita System

old hand

Join Date: Jan 2011 Posts: 1,391

Management call. My biggest longs are pretty much 90% based on management call.

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04-11-2017 , 06:48 AM

stinkypete

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Jul 2004 Posts: 15,783

"No other information" is a little restrictive. So we can't get stock quotes and when we buy and sell we don't even know what price we got? How do we know how much money we have after we sell? Do we even know if our order was filled on a limit order? Or are we forced to use market orders?

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04-14-2017 , 06:59 PM

rivercitybirdie

Pooh-Bah

Join Date: May 2012 Posts: 4,707

you do need really basic info and i assume you will get it.

i'd probably go for company power point presentation..

reminds me of a "smart" answer to a recruiting interview: income statement, balance sheet or cash flow statement? whichi is most valuable?... recruit said "notes to the statement". everyone loved the answer but i thought to large degreee you need some statements to make the notes meaninful

fyi, a friend of mine is the one of the kings of "notes to the financial statements" and things like trust indentures.. so i know there is often overlooked gold there. but you really need the statements to complement the notes.

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04-18-2017 , 06:47 AM

Sokz

old hand

Join Date: Feb 2012 Posts: 1,331

Probably sell side initiation. Expect them to consolidate many of the other sources in their report(s). This way you get financial statements, industry trends, most important management call comments etc.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rivercitybirdie

fyi, a friend of mine is the one of the kings of "notes to the financial statements" and things like trust indentures.. so i know there is often overlooked gold there. but you really need the statements to complement the notes.

Statements often get chopped up / recycled in the notes so i guess you can get a fairly accurate view from just reading the notes.

If you could pick any of three pieces of information (country, industry, sales, sales growth%, ebitda, conversion ratio etc.); which 3 would you pick to get the best back-of-the-envelope estimate for a price or value you would like to pay?

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04-18-2017 , 07:54 PM

jb514

veteran

Join Date: Oct 2009 Posts: 2,837

I'd actually pick charts. Pretty hard to trade a lot of fundamental strategies with limited information. I could just be long SPY and long bonds and get similar returns.

With just charts, best case scenario I could still build algos, worst case scenario I'd be able to sit around and wait to hammer a flash crash.

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04-19-2017 , 04:47 PM

cicakman

banned

Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 9,229

lol at sell side

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