I have a couple of points I’d like to make.
I mean, it seems as if this board is running a parallel/counter newsletter service taking aim at recommendations made in premium services, see westport. And then making its own.
I believe one of the original reasons this board was created was because Saul was posting about PSIX on the WPRT board. He suggested PSIX as an alternative to WPRT while saying WPRT was not a good investment. People got tired of hearing about PSIX, and combined with requests on other boards, this board was created for Saul and others to talk about any investment in one place.
This seems perfectly reasonable, as others have said this is what TMF was originally before paid services.
Saul’s investment style is clearly opposite to what the motley fool is all about. His style is more short time oriented. And that’s fine.
The exact opposite to TMF would be more like day traders, or people selling in and out of stocks with very short holding periods, not caring about management or how the business is doing.
If you think about it more deeply, Saul’s style is very much aligned with TMF. He looks for great growing businesses, great management, and always invests with the original time frame of years.
Why does he sell? In some cases he believes that the business/investing thesis has changed. In other cases he finds a better stock to invest in and is forced to sell his worst ideas. Do either of these reasons run contrary to TMF, specifically SA and RB? No. In fact, they are complimentary. If one deems that the investing thesis is broken then one should absolutely sell. The difference between Saul and TMF is that Saul’s threshold to sell is much lower then TMF, or said another way, TMF’s threshold to sell, or even place a stock on hold, is very high often resulting in just holding most companies through thick and thin. As for investing in better ideas, well that just makes sense mathematically. If you think investment A will earn 30% over the next few years compared to investment B that will only earn 10% over the same time frame what would be the better investment? Of course it would be investment A, but in Saul’s case in order for him to invest in A he has to sell something as he’s fully invested, and in this case since B is is worst idea he sells B. SA and RB are never forced to sell anything due to capital reasons. Therefore even if Saul just sold for capital/allocation reasons, it would look like his investment time frame was much lower then SA and RB.
Now think about this, what are 2 big complaints about TMF paid services?
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They never sell, which in some cases like WPRT result in some huge loses. In some cases, and in hindsight, there were sometimes enough business/thesis changes that could have warranted a hold or sell decision. I am down 88% on my own WPRT position for reference.
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There are so many picks, how do we decide on the best ones? As investors with limited capital, where should I put my money?
I think Saul, this board, and the regular posters are simply trying to address these issues, and I think they’re doing a good job.
Does that make TMF services obsolete? Of course not! Like Saul has said, the vast majority of his portfolio is TMF picks. My own portfolio is 97.4% SA and RB picks. I would never give up SA and RB.
It’s seems as if Saul has become this kind of divine entity that does no wrong
Clearly Saul can do wrong and does make mistakes (SZYM). I expect him to make mistakes in the future, he expects himself to make mistakes in the future. I expect myself to make plenty of mistakes.
But that said, I do agree with you to a certain extent. It’s so important for an investor to be able to critically think about an investment for themselves. The recommendations of SA and RB are just that, recommendations, and I think where you see a lot of backlash is with people who blindly follow the services. I worry that there are people that are blindly following Saul’s picks too.
A good part of the posts come from people who apparently has reached such a level of confidence that entitles them to “recommend” stocks. Some have even started to write pages a la TMF1000.
Granted, some of the posts are interesting and even formative. But maybe, just maybe, we should re-evaluate our limits and level of competence.
I think you are misinterpreting the page posts. Like others have said, these are for scrutinization, not to be taken as a must buy Saul pick. Again critically thinking about investments is so important.
Additionally, how do you think 1000 got his start? Was he always a TMF’er? No. He started on the boards as 1000 and developed his thought process over years with page posts. He was eventually promoted to TMF status, partially due to his fantastic work on the boards as a member! Having others aspire to TMF1000 levels of contribution is a fantastic and worthy goal. I applaud the page posts. Will there be mistakes? Surely. But we are free to disagree with any investment decision, or point out errors we see in various posts (like the page posts).
And lastly
I just wanted to point out that I find it odd that someone would start a board that goes under his/her name.
TMF1000 does not have a dedicated board. David and Tom Gardner don’t have a dedicated board.
Tom and David run premium services, you’re not obliged to subscribe to, not boards within a premium service.
The Everlasting portfolio is crazy expensive, stock advisors or rule breakers are not
If you have something to say about a stock, why don’t you use the pertinent board?
Firstly, you are not obligated to subscribe to any board.
You are technically correct, Tom (TMF1000) doesn’t have a board named after him. But his “home” is the Cloning (D-E, 5-6) board. It is his board for all intents and purposes. In it you can see posts from 1000 that are before he got his TMF moniker. Tom’s board has been running since 2000.
Or perhaps you’ve heard of Pencils2 (David K), who was also recently promoted to TMFPencils. David is another fantastic poster who offers his take on TMF picks, and regularly does huge posts as to the pros and cons of specific investments, both TMF official picks and his own picks. His own personal board is Pencil’s Palace and has been running since 2006. It has over 7k posts.
Finally, I think you will find that most regular posters here post their “big posts” on both boards, both Saul’s and the TMF dedicated paid service boards. UBNT, BOFI, and AMBA are ones that I regularly follow, and all important posts are always posted in both spots. That said I would expect some posters not to have all subscriptions, which would limit their posting abilities. For example AIOCF is a Canadian pick, which I would expect almost none of the posters to have subscribed to.
Final final thoughts: I’m sorry this post has turned out to be so long. There was just so much I disagreed with Franco. You are of course entitled to your opinions, but I think it you thought about it more deeply you wouldn’t have nearly as many objections.
However I think you make an extremely important point as well. It is undeniably important that when making any investment decision the investor doesn’t just blindly pick a company, no matter who suggests it. And I think a board like Saul’s will inevitably attract some people who are like that. So there is some major risk that some investors face here. That risk is mitigated a bit when those types of investors follow a service like SA, RB, Supernova, or One. It’s less risky because you have dedicated teams of analysts, trained by the Fool no less, regularly going over all pick’s data and reports. Then you have David and Tom G, who have incredible track records, overseeing all the picks. There is accountability, track results, and a large group of talented employees helping investors make better decisions. You don’t necessarily get all of that here. In my opinion this board is for the more seasoned investor.
Again, sorry for the length. This post turned into a big wall of text 