A.I.M. Users Bulletin Board

[ls7550]

Hi Tom RE histograms...what software do you generate those?

Just plain old Excel 2002

I think it was Steve who some years back showed me how to set the + and - indicators by adding another line that was the exact same as the stock price line, set a 'marker' for the line in 'Format Series' option, and set 'No Line' so as to just leave those markers. For the values (markers) you don't want to be seen, set the value to off scale i.e. maybe -999 and make sure the Y axis is set to display only 0 upwards.

The chart type is just a custom columns and line on 2 axis choice. The rest is just shading choices etc.

All very manual stuff.

set my portfolio up with about 75% generating living expense income and about 25% invested for "growth."

A conservative 20-80 stock/bond (cash) blend is generally better than an all bond choice. When AIM'd with the AIM LO settings it rode through some horrible times relatively well. 'Cash' still has to be invested somewhere and the trick IMO is to ensure that's diversified sufficiently such that when called upon to buy stock the cash level is preserved, or better still had risen. If cash is a combination of perhaps some long dated treasury bonds, notes and bills, some treasury inflation bonds and some gold, then when 'cash' is called upon its just a matter of deciding which is the best cash asset to sell to provide AIM with the funds to buy more stock. i.e. if stocks were down due to a domestic currency crisis and AIM was indicating a buy, then potentially gold might have risen the most at that time. Enough invested in each 'cash' choice to cover one or two AIM buys might generally suffice. So with perhaps 5% of Portfolio Control trade amounts, PC of 20% of total amount, it could be just a couple of percent each in gold, LTT, STT, TIPS..etc.

Best regards.

Clive.