Is it a common mistake to hold a stock for too long?

When should you sell a stock if you want high returns and are willing to take risks? Is it when a company is to big to grow much more?

I read comments sometimes like, "I've held X stock for 20 years" and it looks like this stock may have done really well at first but it hasn't been doing anything for the past decade and you should have tried something else.

A company is never to big not to keep growing in the market/

Once upon a time. the basic investing philosophy was to buy and hold. But today with all the changes in communications, products and availability of data, the buy & hold theory is not that popular

Yes you can buy & hold a stock for 20 years, but the modern day investor will after the stock rises to a given point they will sell it, and when it drops to point , they buy it back.. So one investor will buy & hold for 20 years, Another will buy and sell the same stock several times in 20 yrs. The one that goes in and out will make the most money

You never buy an investment, without knowing when and where you're you going to get out of it

If a stock drops 8%-10% you should get out of it, if a stock doubles in price sell half of it.
You always use stop orders, as the stock rises you move the stop order up to lock in a profit

People who get burned are usually the ones who try to time the market and sell too soon or panic and sell for a loss when the price drops. It's far, far smarter to buy stocks that look like quality, long run performers and hold on to them. I recall reading an MSN Money article a while ago that said over the last X number of years, buy and hold investors averaged twice the return that short term investors did.

It is my belief that there are about five stocks you should always have in your portfolio. And, there are others you can buy and sell as their valuation changes.

As a technical trader, I would say you are holding a stock too long if it is no longer making you money. So as long as its' value is going up, hold the stock. Now comes the hard part. Can you sell a stock that has decreased in value? Many people just can not. There are two basic scenarios, 1) you have made gains and the stock price has started a down trend. 2) you have already lost money and the stock is in a down trend. The problem now is determining how long will it continue in the down trend, what is the next support level, and are you willing to take additional losses? Some traders sell when the closing price has been 1 or 2 days below the stock's 50 day moving average. Other things that effect this decision are how well is this stock doing compared to its' other sector members, what is the general market doing, has this down trend pattern been usually shallow or deep? It is a matter of statistics and learning when to buy and sell to optimize the probability of having more gains than losses. Read some books on technical analysis. Sorry, I can not be of more help here. Check out the Yahoo group ComputerProgramPicks. Good Luck to you. Having luck is executing with a prepared mind.

Not always. In the failing U.S Economy i would buy stocks now and hold on to them until the U.S peaks again and sell it before a crash but, wait until mid year to buy U.S stocks for that is when it is projected to hit rock bottom then sell it before another crash like this. So i would sell it in a time like before the whole markets collapsed in on themselves.

Yes.

Yes, many become married to a stock, particularly someone who works for the company. (not an insider) My dad is an prefect example.

Dad worked of IBM. He bought IBM stock at a cut rate from IBM. (there was a restriction of holding for one year, but once it was held a year he could sell)

When he passed away he had X00,000 dollars in stock.

I did a historical price survey of IBM. I did not chose either the highest price for sell or the lowest for buying. If he had bought and sold he would have had about 3.5 million. Providing he reinvested all of his profit in the stock and he got all of the stock splits. I did not take out of taxes, I wasn't that interested.. chuckle...

it is a bad idea to hold a stock for too long,when a stock is high in the market sell and use it to purchase a more leser stock in the mtk,u may not sell all the stock but sell part of it to purchase another.it good to buy when people are not buying and sell when people are looking for it.