"Here is the recap of the 2014 Freewilly Blog Picks. I had 7 Up, 6 Down and 1 Even. 3 sectors underperformed - 3D Printing, Oil/Energy, and Heavy Equipment-Rental "

Dow Jones Industrial Average 18,053.71 (Up) Week Ending 12-26-2014

Well I would have done a lot better if I had sold my 3D Printer stocks, DDD and SSYS, back in August at the peak, when they were on the plus side. That is called hindsight and is not allowed in Annual stock picking. Semiconductors, Oil, and Heavy Equipment Rental were not my friend. So my overall total return for my 14 for 2014 stock picks was (-1.164), a small loss for the year.

Here are the winners:
Hain Celestial (HAIN)      UP 31.84%
Arris (ARRS)                     UP 29.23%
Direct TV  (DTV)              UP  29.17%
Berkshire Hathaway "B"  (BRK.B)   UP 28.27%
Yahoo  (YHOO)                  UP 25.12%
 Nike  (NKE)                        UP 23.64% 

If I had just stuck with this group above I would have been in really good shape!

Maybe the more you are diversified, the lesser is your chance of success? That is what Warren Buffett and George Soros think. Maybe something to look at is "Over-Diversification" as an issue in your investing style.

That brings us to the three stocks in the middle. All monster gain stocks in 2013.


Polaris Industries (PII) Up 5.05%
Google (GOOG)  EVEN  0
Golar Nat Gas Transport (GLNG) (-0.25%)

Apple (AAPL) would have been a much better anchor stock for you in 2014 then Google. That may flip flop around in 2015.

 So much for the GOOD and the BAD, I guess I need to tell you about the UGLY and here they are. ALL would have done much better as 6 month picks rather than 1 Year picks.

So here they are:

3D Systems (DDD)  DOWN (-64.20%)
Cree (CREE)  DOWN  (-48.16%)
Stratasys (SSYS)  Down (-35.64%)
Manitex International (MNTX) Down (-21.02%)
Holly Frontier (HFC) Down (19.35%)

It  is amazing that five little stocks could do so much damage to your annual results. 3D Systems and Stratasys and also Google were pouring money back into their business development, instead of worrying about their short term results. Wall Street had no patience for that. Maybe a little too much hyped expectations . CREE did great growing in their LED lighting business but fell short in their semiconductor business. Manitex fell in sympathy with its sector with Hertz Global and United Rentals going down. They are starting to recover now.
 

 
So what can we glean from the results?

1. Don't own too many stocks. It makes it difficult to be successful.
2. When the hype gets ahead of the results in stocks in new technologies like 3D, head for the sidelines. Don't take excessive risk in your investing.
3. Stocks who are tied to commodities like "Oil" can come down no matter how well the company is doing individually.
 
So next week, I will give you my "15 for 2015" Freewilly's Stockpicker Blog picks.

Happy New Year!        


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