Best Q1 in 13 Years

I apologize for the lack of posting this week, but honestly, not much has been going on. The market finished its last day of the quarter today and Wall Street had its best first quarter since 1998.

For the first three months of 2011, the S&P 500 gained 5.42% (not including dividends) and our Buy List gained 7.62%. Including dividends, our Buy List gained 8.06% compared with 5.92% for the S&P 500. And if this means anything to you, our beta so far is 1.035.

For the five-and-a-quarter years of the Buy List, we’re up 44.83% compared with 18.62% for the S&P 500. Our long-term beta is 0.943.

Historically, when the market gains between 5% and 7% in the first quarter of the year, it averages another 7.1% gain for the rest of the year.

I’ll note that Oracle ($ORCL) gapped up a week ago after its earnings announcement. The stock, however, drifted lower on Friday and this past Monday. Since then, in almost a delayed reaction to its earnings news, the shares have slowly rallied.

Joe Banks ($JOSB) looked like it was behaving the same way as Oracle—jumping on earnings then drifting back. However, JOSB seems to have found some support around $51 per share.

I should add that being diversified has helped us out a lot this year. Of our 20 stocks on the Buy List, 14 are up and six are down for the year. Please take note. It doesn’t take much to make sure your portfolio is well-diversified.

And by the way, being diversified doesn’t mean owning Apple ($AAPL) and Google ($GOOG). You need to own different industries as well (says the guy who stupidly left energy off his Buy List).

Posted by on March 31st, 2011 at 4:59 pm


The information in this blog post represents my own opinions and does not contain a recommendation for any particular security or investment. I or my affiliates may hold positions or other interests in securities mentioned in the Blog, please see my Disclaimer page for my full disclaimer.