I remember EMMD, the promotor got it up to 3.60 before it crashed (HUM?) It was the QRC Investment group, I remember jumping in at .64 cents. You just never know with the penny stocks, it is very very very risky.
as a novice trader I have learned too. you must learn how to read the charts. I taught myself with some very good tutorials on youtube. the 5 year chart appears to give a very good overview of the stocks performance; any stock graph that looks flat then like someone climbing a mountain in a short time frame (1-2 months) followed by a sharp drop (straight line) is your typical pump and dump profile. You can make better choices when you see this.