Investing 102

[GregWeld]

Here's - to me at least - a CLASSIC example of using your own sense for investing.


If you drove down the major retail street in your home town -- which of those businesses would you likely "think" was doing well -- and which of those would be of the least interest to you. We've discussed this before... but todays news/articles just highlighted this for me once again.

This article about SEARS...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/100361253


The news is mostly uninteresting. BUT -- when I drill down on the article -- it shows a PER SHARE LOSS.... and when I couple that with something I would ask myself before investing ----- "WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME I WENT IN TO A SEARS STORE?" WHERE IS A SEARS STORE? vs - When was the last time I was in a Home Depot or Lowe's or name some other retailer...

Put a different way --- how many of you have had to "manage down" in your lifetimes? It's a difficult job to CUT expenses and cut everything to the bone... versus manage your finances etc when things are going GREAT. I just don't choose to invest in any company that is trying to manage DOWN. Why would you do that? What is it that you'd see that would say --- HEY! What a great investment!

Amazon is growing top line and growing it's business..... Sears is trying to manage it's loss of business and scale itself down to the shrinking customer base. Which one going forward is the better bet?

These are hypothetical questions by the way and not meant to be answered --- they're just meant to THINK ABOUT when investing.