Reacher's Story

I used to have set up model portfolios on the Hargreaves Lansdown platform. My share selections would come from various sources: magazines, RNSs and blogs (eg The Naked Trader and Phil Oakley).

Stockopedia has been great. It provides a very useful database pulling historic data from the Income Statement and Balance Sheet. It also shows some very useful metrics provided in a consistent manner. There is a very good screening tool that provides generic portfolios based on factors. These can then be tailored by the investor, or a brand new screen can be set up. I have a few screens which cover growth, value and bargain factors. This is very helpful for idea generation. Finally, but also very important, is the Stockopedia community and discussion boards; this includes the Small Cap Value Report (SCVR), the Investment Club and some individual contributions. Stockopedia is a great starting point for discovering shares for further research.

If anything, I am now more involved in the investing process and probably have less free time! However, I feel empowered and I am able to make and record my decision making. This can help and guide me in the future and refine my process.

If you are serious about investing, spend as much time as you can understanding all the various aspects involved. Do effective research and due diligence, consider the risks, capital allocation, have a long-term time horizon, and record your decisions. Investing is about skill and luck: therefore, consider whether your gains were pure skill (which is unlikely), pure luck (also, unlikely) or somewhere on this spectrum. Ideally you want to get closer to skill than luck and that requires a good process. Finally, this is your hard earned cash that you are investing. Therefore, why wouldn’t you take investing seriously?