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Toofuzzy

03/18/15 3:36 PM

#39172 RE: AImanager #39171

Hi Almanager

One risk with AIM is an individual stock going to zero.

You can avoid that by using Exchange Trade Funds. But they will have less volatility which Aim likes.

Decide what you want to own (for the rest of your life) diversifying either by style or industry.

You don't have to invest in everything at once. You can add investments one at a time as you have more funds. The minimum amount you should start an individual AIM account with is $20,000 (10,000 stock , $10,000 cash maybe a higher percentage of cash at the present time using the V wave ) That is because you really don't want the transactions to be below $500.

You can check your calculations with the QUICK AIM CALCULATOR. There is a link in the bookmarked post of Toms historic page.

AIM is not a get rich quick scheme. It takes a full market cycle to really have any effect in capturing volatility.

TD Ameritrade has 100 ETFs you can trade for free, you can trade Vanguard ETFs for free at Vanguard, and other big brokers have some ETFs you can trade for free.

Toofuzzy

Toofuzzy

03/18/15 3:39 PM

#39173 RE: AImanager #39171

Here is a link to the QUICK AIM CALCULATOR

http://web.archive.org/web/20120609073103id_/http://www.aim-users.com/calculator.htm




http://web.archive.org/web/20120609073103id_/http://www.aim-users.com/calculator.htm

Toofuzzy

OldAIMGuy

03/18/15 5:31 PM

#39174 RE: AImanager #39171

Welcome Sven, Re: Spreadsheet check.....

There's an ancient Excel spreadsheet that should work well enough to check your overall efforts. It resides at the old AIM-Users pages that have now been archived:

http://web.archive.org/web/20120623150522id_/http://www.aim-users.com/aimware.htm

Hope this helps,

SFSecurity

03/18/15 8:09 PM

#39175 RE: AImanager #39171

Welcome Sven, Drop me an e-mail at 60e20f21@opayq.com and I'll send you a version of the one Tom referred you to. I've added a couple of calcs for return on investment, and a version that lets you back test with delayed buy/sell to see if that works for you.

Learning the spreadsheet is very important but even more important is selecting the right position to AIM and the right time to enter a position. There has been a number of posts about this here so it is worth looking at prior posts by OldAIMGuy, Toofuzzy, Alton, karw and others. You might look at some of mine as well as I have often asked questions that get replies with some answers that might help.

You will have to make up your own rule set for the AIM parameters to use, what you will be looking to invest in, and when to invest. Expect to change them as you learn more.

Best,

Allen

ls7550

03/19/15 8:54 AM

#39176 RE: AImanager #39171

Hi Sven

AIM-HI was Robert Lichello's last incarnation, which starts with 20% cash reserve

With AIM-HI you :

Start with a 80-20 split of stock value and cash
Initially set Portfolio Control (PC) = stock value (SV)
Each month (or quarter) you check AIM's current SV (share price x number of shares)
If your PC is larger than SV, then AIM is considering buying T = PC - SV - 0.1 x SV
If your SV is larger than PC, then AIM is considering selling T = SV - PC - 0.1 x SV
Only actually trade that T amount if T exceeds 10% of SV
Each time you BUY additional shares, increase PC by 0.5 x T
(PC remains the same after each sell).
Don't trade too often, review or trade at most once each month or even quarterly

Boundary Price of Next Sell = PC / ( Number of Shares x 0.8 )
Boundary Price of Next Buy = PC / ( Number of Shares x 1.2 )

A significant factor of investment reward can be attributed to the price paid for stock. Lump in at a relative high and likely longer term rewards will be relatively low.

AIM provides a means to cost-average down the average cost of stock over time (market cycles). In effect buying during dips, replenishing cash reserves during peaks. Replacing older higher cost stock with better valued stock.

If as a simple example you hold three main assets with no/low correlations then at different times likely one will be up, another down ... and other times that might be completely reversed. 20% cash, 80% split equally three ways (26.6% each), might at one time see one having dropped a third $26.66 dropping to $17.56 value. If at that time all of cash reserves are added to that stock then you have enough to double up on the stock (i.e. deploy $20 cash reserve into that stock). Later when a recovery occurs you can in effect sell the original shares to replenish cash reserves leaving just the shares bought at a relative discount ... and you've cost-averaged down the average cost of that stock. AIM steers you automatically towards such trading over time. It won't hit the exact tops and bottoms, but it does tend to average in (out) relatively close to the peak/trough levels. More often you can look back at AIM's trading history and see that it did a reasonable job - all by itself.

Cost averaging down the cost of stock combined with price appreciation (broader general rise in share prices), and reinvestment of dividends will likely provide acceptable overall rewards over the mid to longer term.

Ideally you want to be holding assets that aren't perfectly correlated (the ideal is where as one declines another rises), that individually provide similar overall positive rewards, and that are likely to recover rather than fade away totally. Funds are more likely to survive longer term than are individual stocks.

Some trade AIM frequently - small amounts relatively often, but you can achieve similar rewards by trading AIM less frequently, capturing larger moves/amounts. Monthly or quarterly reviews is a reasonable choice. Yearly revies is too long for the way that AIM works. With more frequent than monthly you're not providing sufficient breathing space for AIM to work well at cost-averaging.

Over time I've come to reduce my number of AIM's down to managing three main assets. Land (properties), domestic small cap, foreign large cap ... holding index type versions of the small and large cap stocks. Foreign provides FX (currency) change (gain/losses) on top of stock gains/losses, which helps reduce stock correlations. Others invest smaller amounts in a more diverse range of individual assets/funds - each to their own.

Welcome aboard.

Clive.