Did you see Biden saying, “no one making under $400,000 will see their taxes go up”? A reporter then asked his press secretary if he meant individuals or households. She said “households”. Well, second grade arithmetic says that it is now $200,000 for singles! Just wait until they go down that slippery slope and say no, we meant $200,000 for households ($100,000 for singles) and so on. Better save at least some of the “COVID Relief” check you got (or didn’t get) to pay for higher taxes. The government giveth and the government taketh away!
That’s the end of my political commentary for a while. Thanks for bearing with me as I get that off my chest.
Now, to my main commentary for the week. For the growth and income funds, I would not make any changes. Just wait for the growth fund members that have underperformed to break out again. It may not happen this year but as I said I think that they will in the next 5 years. As for the income fund, it is intended to provide above average income along with some possibility for growth. Stick with it.
“Stick with it”. That makes me think of some of my regrets. As the “Chairman of the Board”, Frank Sinatra sang “Regrets, I had a few, but then too few to mention”. Well, actually I had more than few, Frank, I bet he did as well the rest of you! Here are some of my investing regrets in the hopes that you can avoid making the same mistakes:
- Taking profits too soon (like Microsoft, Apple, O’Reilly Automotive, and many others)
- Holding on to high P/E stocks like Cisco when interest rates were rising
- Not pruning losing stocks when all hope is lost
- Listening to analysts who may have taken the opposite position
- Buying and selling options based on a “hot tip”
So, there you have some of my regrets. Now, to some of things I did “my way” that turned out pretty well for me:
- Buying Exxon shortly after the “Exxon Valdez” disaster. Certainly Exxon has made some mistakes in the period afterward, but its dividends are helping fund my retirement.
- Buying Phillip Morris during the “Tobacco hearings”. Dividends from its successor companies are funding my retirement today.
- Buying value stocks at low P/E’s and selling at my price target (sometimes it works out well, sometimes, not so well, see above!)
- Buying dividend paying stocks like Pfizer and reinvesting the dividends over many years then turning off dividend reinvesting to live on the dividends and avoiding selling the principle.
- Selling covered calls when I was mildly bearish on a stock and collecting the premium. Sometimes I was “called away”, but hey the stock met my target price and I collected the premium on the option too!
Well, there you have it. Please feel free to contact me with comments or questions.