All you need is survival

the fairy tale has once again come close to reality. "what else is better than making a living doing daytrading with the stock market?", that's what i overheard the other day at lunch from 2 young ladies sharing my table. i don't have a clue on how they've found out this easiest way of getting rich in this world, but judging from their age and dress appearance, i'd bet it's their dad who's making the killing. and even more confusing is that one of them confessed to the other that she had barely any saving in her bank when she was asked why she didn't invest herself if money was that easy afterall. funny? not much until you know that the girl with zero saving was in her late 20s and the girl asking was obviously 14 or 15 only. where the heck did they get this impression of all these easy money from the stock market?

stock market in hk has finally retreated from its month-long rally of over 1500 points, yup, healthy correction as many would say. can a "healthy" correction look as bumpy as a 5-dollar trading range with hutchison during the day?! we are talking about a multi-billion-dollar-international-conglomerate here and this kind of volatility is probably something more than USUAL. result announcement is due next week for hutchy and you can expect the picture for 3G to get less frustrating (but still a drag on overall performance at the moment) especially when the management shares their plans to get some of their 3G operations listed in the uk or italy.

the calculation part shouldn't be difficult for the harvard-educated analysts at investment banks and i'm sure i can't do anything better than these guys in predicting the earning numbers. i'm clinging onto the belief that there's no easy money in the marketplace - trading volume in warrants is just making up new highs day after day. what's worrying me is the basic mentality of small investors - when would the little guys go into warrants so aggressively and why? a recent article/interview with a hk local small investor might tell us something, "this latest rally didn't benefit any of my holdings, as they are all 2nd or 3rd liners which didn't join the ride, i'm planning to chase-it-back from blue-chip's warrants hopefully." desperate but aggressive. this might be an individual case only but the general atmostphere surrounding the marketplace is so bullish and you gotta be wary of this --- much of the profit improvements of blue-chips this year came from revaluation of properties being counted as profits. it's all paper.

hutchy is a good company, doubtless. and mr. li's biz acumen is second to none among chinese globally, especially in trading assets. but it's not always the case that a good company = a good stock to own. with so many individual investors joining in the warrant market, hoping to make a big killing over the short run (as short as the next minute he/she's in), i won't take the risk of staying near the market top and sitting in a bumpy train isn't enjoyable afterall.

getting off bumpy trains when it's still going full speed has saved me from bloody losses time and again. check your seatbelt if you'd like to ride the upcoming roller-coaster trip and make sure you know where is the emergency exit.