specmav

I will have to look into real estate in Japan. I do know they are coming out of some bad times over there. Which is usually the best time to invest. Do you know of any ETF's or ADR's that deal with Japanese real estate?

Yes you can! It is called short selling. You borrow stock (mainly from your broker) and sell it back into the market in hopes that it drops in price so you can repurchase it. An example: I borrow 100 shares of XYZ at $1 a share I sell it collecting the 100 bucks If it goes down to .75 a share, I made 25%. This happens because I buyback the shares at $75 and return them to the broker. So I get to keep the $25. Transaction costs are not included in this example and you will have to take them into account like any other business cost.

I am not exactly sure what you mean from "runs". You profit in the markets just as you do in business "buy and sell for higher". You would purchase stocks that you researched (technically and fundamentally) then you would hope they increase in value.

I personally would run far far away from penny stocks. One reason why stocks move is due to mutual fund managers buying shares of stock. When you have billions of dollars to invest, you don't buy a penny stock company. I would stay with stocks above $10 a share.

I am pretty sure I have toppled the 100 book mark. I don't really bother counting on the slim chance someone might ask me. I would have to agree with soultrader on this. I would even say close to 90% of trading books are useless. One of my requirements was that the author actually be a trader.

Some people view trading as a way to get rich quick. They view it as a lottery. What they don't understand is that you can make money by controlling risk and your own psyche.

I have just recently started trading, I wouldn't call myself an expert, I would put myself in the intermediate category. Not a master of trading but not a newbie either. I currently run a political forum at www.thespeculatingmaverick.com. Stop by after you discuss enter and exit setups for some politcal debating.

While not a substitute for experience, I would read as many books on trading as possible. This way you get a wide variety of ideas about trading. Some are good ideas and some are bad. You just have to learn how to tell them apart. I would pick up Winning on Wall Street as a primer on the subject.

Many people have said that big oil is responsible for stripping them of their hard-earned money at the pumps. Where were these people when those same oil companies were almost bankrupt? We had Exxon and Mobil, now we have ExxonMobil. People forget that during the 90's oil was between $13-$20. Oil Companies were merging just to stay alive. A prime example of people not caring about increased prices is Cisco (CSCO). This router company went up in price over 14000% (after multiple stock splits) was that stocks have no real bearing on your wallet. An investment of $10K in 1996 would have turned into a little over 180K at Cisco's peak. If a stock climbed from $20 to $70 in a couple of years, does that mean your cost of living went up? Oil did just that! People are only mad because they have to spend more money at the pump, which is understandable. This brings me to a question. If oil companies were in such dire circumstances, why didn't they jack up prices when the ecomomy was booming back in the 90's when more people were flush with cash and could shake of the prices easier? Because 'Big Oil' have little or no control over what the market deems an appropriate price. Hedgers and speculators control the cost of oil. Since oil is a commodity and not like other products, it is connected to the market due to its finite supply. There are many rational explainations as to why oil is so expensive: The instability in the Middle East (Afganistan, Iraq and Iran) The damaged oil rigs after Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico The violence in Nigeria Bolivia nationalized their oil and gas reserves The fact that an oil refinery hasn't been built in the U.S for over 20 years These are just a few reasons that oil is at the price it is. George Bush can be blamed for the first example, since it was his administration that went to war with Iraq and destabilized the country. Sooner or later oil prices will come down. The more important question is when. I believe when you start seeing companies not directly connected with the oil business start drilling or exploring, that is when the oil market will take a nose dive. This means the market is over saturated with companies trying to profit from the high cost of oil. What would Yahoo! know about drilling oil? They don't have a clue. These companies would see the proverbial pot of gold. We should all know that this is the sign of a topping market.