First a reminder: If you missed Episode Two of the W Network Expert Challenge on Sunday night, it is being re-aired tonight Wednesday, July 1st 2009 at 8:30pm on the W Network.
The Financial Blogger had asked a bunch of other personal finance bloggers if they wanted to participate in a friendly stock picking contest for 2009. The criteria was to pick four securities in equal dollar amounts listed on a Canadian or American exchange (not including derivatives) to just sit on for the duration of 2009 with no changes allowed. We are to provide updates every quarter and the contest ends on the last trading day of 2009. The initial prices will be based on the closing prices of December 31st, 2008 (i.e. yesterday).
Disclaimer
My picks were pure swing for the fence plays – two of them were 300% leveraged ETFs, one was a 200% leveraged ETF and the fourth was a penny stock play. Leveraged ETFs only do well if the underlying investment goes in the intended direction with little to modest retracements (if you are holding them for any extended length of time).
You can read the original rationale for the picks on my original post back on January 1st, 2009.
In case you don’t read the original post, read this: THIS STOCK PICKING CONTEST IS JUST FOR FUN, IT IS NOTHING MORE THAN GAMBLING. DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT BUYING THE STOCKS LISTED HERE OR ON ANY OF THE OTHER BLOGGERS’ SITES WITHOUT FIRST CONSULTING A PROFESSIONAL FINANCIAL ADVISOR. IF YOU BUY THEM ANYWAYS, YOU MUST RAISE YOUR RIGHT HAND BEFORE PLACING THE ORDER AND REPEAT, “I AM A NUTBAR”.
Performance Update
The second quarter was kind to most equity portfolios and having a significant degree of leverage further enhanced that performance. My four picks were up 50.29% for Q2, after having been grossly underwater in Q1 (-21.77%). The cumulative performance for the first six months of 2009 now stands at +28.52%.
A brief recap of the picks:
1. TNA.us: Direxion Small Cap 3x Shares (-18.54% YTD)
2. EDC.us: Direxion Emerging Markets 3x Shares (+54.95% YTD)
3. ENA.v: Enablence Technologies (+96.67% YTD)
4. HOU.to: Horizons BetaPro Nymex Crude Bull Plus ETF (-19.01% YTD)
On a relative basis I went from 7th out of 9 competitors to 4th out of 9. You can click on the other bloggers’ names below to read their performance updates too. (If they have not yet updated their blogs, you will be directed to their homepages.)
| Q1 Performance | Q2 Performance | Cumulative | |
| Four Pillars | -2.67% | 51.50% | 48.83% |
| Intelligent Speculator | 4.33% | 38.99% | 43.32% |
| The Wild Investor | -8.90% | 50.35% | 41.45% |
| Wheredoesallmymoneygo | -21.77% | 50.29% | 28.52% |
| The Financial Blogger | -0.94% | 14.23% | 13.29% |
| Million Dollar Journey |
-2.96% | 7.72% | 4.76% |
| Dividend Growth Investor | -8.27% | 8.97% | 0.70% |
| ZachStocks | -24.19% | 21.15% | -3.04% |
| My Traders Journal | -27.54% | 16.18% | -11.36% |