Mechanical Investing for August 2007

Posted by Michael on August 6th, 2007 filed in Finances, Personal Stuff

I was traveling this week on business, so I didn’t get a chance to trade until today. Ouch, it bit me, too. I would have been better off investing in chocolate this month, at least I’d retain some of the capital.

Interestingly, some of the gurus over at the Mechanical Investing board have started working on models that predict volatility, and this month’s volatility was predicted a few weeks ago. I’ll have to pay more attention to that.

Last 4 weeks: -1.6%
Last 3 months: -0.3%
Last 12 months: +4.8%
Year to date: +5.0% (Dow is +6.5 ytd from 12,463)

Holding for another month:

Ticker	Bought	Now	Months	Return
MCY	$53.85	$52.76	9	-2.06%	Mercury General Corp. From the LPE_YLD screen.
MDR	$79.63	$80.62	2	+1.18%	McDermott International. From the Screamers screen, but now it’s on the RSPeg2 screen.
PKOH	$20.80	$26.21	3	+26.21%	Park-Ohio Holdings Corp. Originally from the H52EgPS screen, but now on RSPeg2.
PFE	$26.10	$23.87	6	-8.61%	Pfizer Inc. From the LPE_YLD screen. Looks like a loss, but with dividends, it’s actually up a little.

Selling these:

Ticker	Bought	Sold	Months	Return
CAE	$82.51	$65.14	1	-21.71%	Cascade Corp. From the Screamers screen. Ouch. Screamers do that.
CMCO	$34.14	$23.60	1	-31.04%	Columbus-McKinnon. From the RSPeg2 screen. Ouch.
MCK	$59.51	$59.74	1	+0.33%	McKesson Corp. From the H52EgPS screen.
PENX	$30.45	$32.86	1	+7.72%	Penford Corp. From the Screamers screen.
PFGC	$32.98	$28.30	1	-14.09%	Performance Food. From the H52EgPS screen. Ouch.
RNR	$58.99	$55.78	2	-5.34%	RenaissanceRe Holdings. From the Peg_Minimalist screen. A casualty (heh) of the marker volatility.
RS	$46.37	$49.39	4	+6.4%	Reliance Steel and Aluminum Co. From the TREPPE screen.
XL	$84.73	$74.01	1	-13.27%	XL Capital Ltd. From the Peg_Minimalist screen.

New stocks for this month:

Ticker	Bought	Sold	Return
CFI	$11.85	$N/A	N/A%	Culp Inc. From the Peg_Minimalist screen.
CLB	$101.74	$N/A	N/A%	Core Laboratories NV. From the Peg_Minimalist screen.
DO	$92.90	$N/A	N/A%	Diamond Offshore Drilling Inc. From the TREPPE screen.
FDP	$27.61	$N/A	N/A%	Fresh Del Monte Produce Inc. From the H52EgPS screen.
ISRG	$206.66	$N/A	N/A%	Intuitive Surgical Inc. Maybe they perform operations by really good guessing. From the Screamers screen.
MLI	$37.30	$N/A	N/A%	Mueller Industries Inc. From the H52EgPS screen.
NVT	$64.37	$N/A	N/A%	NAVTEQ Corp. From the Screamers screen.
PCU	$96.95	$N/A	N/A%	Southern Copper Corp. From the TREPPE screen.