Nicholas' Story

I tended to look for a good dividend yield and buy companies with a reasonable price to earnings ratio. I read the financial press and financial websites but avoided chat rooms for the most part. I also occasionally bought special situations such as takeover bids and where shares seem to be significantly underrated.

I try to buy companies with a stock rank of 90 or greater with a good yield. I also buy into segments that are currently performing well and/or appear to be underrated.

It is difficult to be certain as we are in a bull market and a significant proportion of my holdings were purchased before I started using stockopedia. However, I think that most of my recent purchases and sales have been much better informed and most have performed well.

I think it is important that they decide their investment strategy. Investing for income and therefore looking for dividends of around 5% with no or modest capital gains is different from trading in growth shares and setting stop losses. I think the latter approach is more difficult and requires more time and effort and skill. My suggestion would be to start with the first approach and gradually introduce a proportion of the total investment into trading growth shares after reading extensively.