In Search of the Perfect Investment

I sold my Qualcomm. My heart was heavy. But the stock is performing terribly. I’ll come back in if it drops significantly. I do like the stock. I like what it’s doing. I like its future. But all that is emotion. And every time I let emotion get involved, I lose big money. Meantime, I remain optimistic for a recovering economy and an improving market. What’s bizarre (at least to me) is how weird price moves can be. My BRKA is up 7.6%. But my VZ (a boring utility) is up 18.4%. RWT is up 47.5%. Go figure.

The first thing to know about selling is that it’s their money. They can spend it any which way they want, including ways you think are stupid. That leads to the second point, namely they will probably buy for different reasons than you are pushing. Which leads to the biggest mistake in selling — namely the seller talks too much.

Your buyer will have objections, some of which will appear trivial or irrelevant to you. But you need to address them seriously. What you’ll probably do is skim over the objections and focus on what you like. Then you’ll talk too much and lose the sale.

Your buyer may not be good at telling you his concerns. You have to dig a little. I use a technique called “active listening.” It was invented in the 1970s for parents having trouble talking with their kids. Active listening said repeat the last thing your kid said, but make it a question. “I don’t want to go to school today.” “You don’t want to go to school today?” Keep repeating. Keep probing. You’ll eventually find the reason the kid doesn’t want to go to school today (everyone has Nike sneakers and he doesn’t) or the reason your prospect doesn’t want to buy (he doesn’t trust your technology).

Once you know the real reason for not going to school today, you can address it with what’s known as a trial close. “If I picked you up during my lunch hour, and we went shopping for Nike sneakers, would you go to school today?”

I bet the kid will be out of the door faster than you can say Nike.

But…you’d better turn up at lunch time and buy the sneakers. Having an urgent meeting in the office is not an excuse to stiff your kid. You’ve already done that three times. And that’s the real reason he didn’t want to go to school today — though he talked “headaches,” “abusive kids,” “stupid teachers”, etc. etc.

Often you’ll never know the real reason — until you probe, and show real interest in them.

My friend is trying to sell his bank on extending a loan. He’s fed them information they didn’t ask for — but which he thought was important. And he did it all via email — the absolute worst sales tool.

Shut up and listen. A good rule.

My Outlook has been running slow. Solutions:

+ Delete old emails. Millions of them.

+ Archive conversations I may need tomorrow, but not today.

+ Run Scanpst (the Inbox Repair Tool) on Outlook.pst (which is where Outlook stores its emails, contacts, calendar, and tasks).

 Completely dead iPad? Mine died because I didn’t use it for a while.

Solution: Plug in its charger. Go away for about five hours. It will start on your return. God willing.

Afghan Leader’s Office Gets Bags Full of Cash From C.I.A. From today’s New York Times

KABUL, Afghanistan — For more than a decade, wads of American dollars packed into suitcases, backpacks and, on occasion, plastic shopping bags have been dropped off every month or so at the offices of Afghanistan’s president — courtesy of the Central Intelligence Agency.

All told, tens of millions of dollars have flowed from the C.I.A. to the office of President Hamid Karzai, according to current and former advisers to the Afghan leader.

“We called it ‘ghost money,’ ” said Khalil Roman, who served as Mr. Karzai’s deputy chief of staff from 2002 until 2005. “It came in secret, and it left in secret.”

The C.I.A., which declined to comment for this article, has long been known to support some relatives and close aides of Mr. Karzai. But the new accounts of off-the-books cash delivered directly to his office show payments on a vaster scale, and with a far greater impact on everyday governing.

Moreover, there is little evidence that the payments bought the influence the C.I.A. sought. Instead, some American officials said, the cash has fueled corruption and empowered warlords, undermining Washington’s exit strategy from Afghanistan.

“The biggest source of corruption in Afghanistan,” one American official said, “was the United States.”

To read the whole depressing article, click here.

The absolute best comment ever left on my site:

Larry (Guest):

The market is FIXED. THe little guy has NO CHANCE. Why do sites like this (i.e. mine) exist?! You will lose all your money investing in the market! I sold all my stocks in 2009 (yes, at the bottom) and I have been happier since. Now I invest in gold bars, old coins and guns. When Obummer bans guns they will be worth a fortune!

Of course, Obama won’t ban guns. Whatever makes you happy is critical. I personally don’t find investing in the stockmarket — or for that matter investing in anything else — makes me happy. Unless it goes up and that makes me happy. But it doesn’t always go up. And that makes me feel very stupid and depressed.

Favorite this week’s New Yorker cartoons:

Harry Newton who eyes the gold market. It looks like it’s coming back with a vengeance. My ETF of preference is SGOL.

Nice part-time job? BudgetBlinds is a franchise. Michael and Anne bought blinds from them. I bought some on the weekend. Blinds are not cheap. Looks like a profitable franchise and a painless way to buy blinds — all sorts of them. Before you get the man in, check out their comprehensive web site BudgetBlinds.com.

My bank manager can’t make a decision on refunding me $300 in excess charges. He has to escalate that to his boss, who’s not in. I love banks. Remember last week’s search for the perfect bank. Still looking.