Has Anyone here made alot of money through stocks?

I just wanted to hear some success stories. please tell me how u got into stocks. how much u started with and what stocks u invested in. any other information I'd appreciate as well. Thanks

Worked for a big (fortune 100) high tech company back in the Internet hay days!

The company offered employee stock option purchase plan where every quarter you could purchase (at a 20% discount) a certain amount of the company stock based on your salary.

I maxed that out for years... I ended up making more every year on stock options than I did in salary... The company was splitting stock once or twice a year and growing by triple digits...

Plus, I invested some of my own money in this company and I was awarded stock options as a bonus a couple of years because of spectacular performance (not bragging - true).

During this same time period late nineties - 200?, I was also investing in other high techs including Sun, Yahoo, Cisco, EBay and a bunch of others.

Crazy that so many of my coworkers NEVER took advantage of the employee stock option purchase plan.

Here is where the luck came in... I got really burned out on the whole corporate jet set lifestyle... I was missing seeing my son grow up (I was never home)... So, and it seemed like a crazy thing to do at the time...

I cashed out on almost everything, bought a mountain, built a log cabin and now I live in the absolute boonies... I just got lucky and cashed out (mostly) within a year before the high tech bubble burst.... I essentially transfered all that money into real estate... and it has worked out nicely. Not cause I am smart or anything (although I was smart to take advantage of opportunities right in front of me...) just lucky.

Now, my son (14yo) is a "big" stock market investor with the philosophy of start early, buy quality and plan to hold for a long time...

He owns a little of these companies (from his own money and he usually asks for stock for birthday and Christmas - no kidding): Starbucks, Hersheys, Disney (did have Pixar too), MGM, Wrigleys (he gets a box of gum at Christmas), GE and some others that I don't remember. He has some cash saved up and is looking at water stocks (ala Warren Buffet) and carbon nanotube technology startups. He has rejected purchasing McDs and WalMart (maybe he knows something we all don't?)...

He intends to hold these stocks for decades! If he follows through with this, and keeps investing, by the time he is my age he will be financially independent.

Theres a couple of real life true stories for ya!

you bet ye, never worked a day in my live for the other guy.

I have.

The approach/method is summed up here:

http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/TradingZoom/

- along with a list of the best books on stock investing.

The first stock I bot was AXP back in 1989 through payroll deduction. I dabbled in stocks for years until I started trading full time for a living in 2003. I make hundreds of trades every year (my broker must be very happy :)) - but which stocks I buy is not as important as the method I apply. In other words, it's not the stocks that make you money, it's what you do with them.

The method that works for me is buying small cap breakouts. It takes a lot of time and effort to learn how to pick winners but once you have it - it's a very valuable skill because nobody can take it away from you.

In the late 1990's you could invest in practically anything and make money. I did pretty good. Now, I am in the lending and borrowing, a little bit. It seems pretty profitable. Check my profile if you're curious.

I had a large amount of Microsoft and Intel and some S&P 500 index fund that I accumulated over the early 1990's and I sold it all in Sept. 1998. The market was getting a little crazy around that time. I had big profits on paper, so I cashed out.

I sold about 1.5 years too early, but I still made a lot. I've been getting back in stating in about Jan. 2004. Jan. 2004 was not a great time to jump in, but I've been doing OK at this point, though not as well as the late 1990's.

I have not invested into stocks yet, except for mutual funds, because all of my money is tied up in lending out my money. I am going to start next year. My advise is to join an investment club. If you don't know what you are doing then it is just a crap shoot. By joining an investment club you will get the experience of researching a company. Do not expect to hit a jackpot because only a small percentage of stock investors actually hit a big one and I would say they all had bombs before then.
Once you get some experience within the club then go at it on your own. You will be working with experienced investors in the club who are willing to teach you because they are counting on you to do a good job at researching. There are many investment clubs that you can join through the internet.

There is an old joke that the way to wind up with a million dollars in the stock market is to start with two million and trade a lot.

My hubby was discussing a transaction with his broker, and said he wanted to buy so many shares of x stock. The broker said, "Is that buy or sell?" My husband laughed and said, "Buy. I only buy." The brokers said, "Well, yes. I've noticed that."

We started saving to continue investing before the "black Monday" crash of 1987, so when the stocks fell drastically, we were able to pick up several really good undervalued stocks.

We don't pick all winners, but by far and away, we pick solid stocks. Our very first pick was $1000 in an energy stock, and we lost every cent. We were more careful to research them after that.

Pick stocks or mutual funds you understand. If you can't read the quarterly reports or the prospectus and understand it, you probably don't want the stock because you either can't judge the value of the company or because they are being deliberately deceptive.

If the price drops, decide, "If I didn't already own it, and I found it today at this price, would I buy it?" If you would buy it at that price, then don't sell it. If you would not buy it at its current price, then one wonders why you haven't sold it before the drop. Sell if the fundamentals are bad.

Ignore the pundits, but use your own sense.

Don't "bet" what you can't afford to lose. Leverage isn't bad, but it is a gamble, so use it carefully.

Diversify.

Mutual funds are a good place to start if you don't have a lot of business experience or knowledge of the sectors.

Make a policy of buying x dollars worth every week, two weeks, month, or what-ever.

Don't kick yourself if you screw up. Learn from it, and do better. There are only two kinds of stocks--those you bought too much of, and those you didn't buy enough of. If you want to make money, you have to be comfortable with yourself that you will always have this situation, and not panic or beat yourself up over every "too much" or "too little."

We live under our means, and have saved enough to retire early on relatively low-paying jobs while also putting our sons through college, both debt free. The most important thing is not to get drunk on the high that comes with seeing good choices and knowing you just got a huge capital gain. If you give in to the "let's celebrate" mode every time something good happens, you will let much of your good fortune slip through your fingers. It doesn't feel like you've "worked" when the market takes a jump, You might give in to profit taking and easy come, easy go spending habits. If you have no other savings, it will feel like you've been hit by a truck if the market goes down.

One final truism - little bites can eat an elephant. Don't feel as if you have to invest every dime in THIS or THAT stock to make a killing. Just eat the elephant a little at a time.

yes! through clixsense.com/2273470 investments

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