How To Invest

In addition, Pat thinks then beginner investors should cultivate two important qualities: a healthy sense of skepticism and patience.

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Investors should approach all investments with a healthy sense of skepticism. This can help keep you out of fraudulent stocks that masquerade as high-quality stocks. It will also keep you out of legally operated, but poorly managed, companies that promise more than they can possibly deliver.

If you are a new investor, you should also realize that losing patience can cause you to sell your best choices right before a big rise. All too often, investors buy a promising stock just as it enters a period of price stagnation. Even the best-performing stocks run into these unpredictable phases from time to time. They move mainly sideways in a wide range for months or years before their next big rise begins. (Stock brokers often refer to these stocks as “dead money.”)

If you lack patience, you run a big risk of selling your best choices in the midst of one of these phases, prior to the next big move upward. If you lose patience and sell, you are particularly likely to do so in the low end of the trading range, when stock prices have weakened and confidence in the stock has waned.

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How To Invest Library Archives
A: Yalla Group Ltd., $23.87, symbol YALA on New York (ADRs outstanding: 119.2 million; Market cap: $3.7 billion; www.yallatech.ae), is a social media platform that provides voice chat rooms and online entertainment featuring popular board games....
A: Medtronic plc, $130.12, symbol MDT on New York (Shares outstanding: 1.3 billion; Market cap: $175.4 billion; www.medtronic.com), develops, makes and distributes a wide range of healthcare-related devices and equipment....
A: Illinois Tool Works, $229.00, symbol ITW on NYSE (Shares outstanding: 316.5 million; Market cap: $72.1 billion; www.itw.com), is a multi-industry manufacturing company operating in 53 countries. Known as ITW, it has roughly 43,000 employees.


The company’s diversified range of industrial products includes aerospace technology, bridges, wind turbines, restaurant appliances, packaging solutions, electronics, deep-sea welding products, and a range of automotive components such as fasteners, door handles, powertrain, and refuelling systems....

The breakup of multinational chemical maker DowDuPont into three separate firms—Dupont de Nemours, Dow, and Corteva—is a great example of how spinoffs can unlock hidden value for investors.


Looking at the two new firms, Dow has gained roughly 30% while Corteva has jumped 60%....
A: Three main factors continue to drive demand for healthcare products and services: the rapid aging of the population in developed countries; the expansion of medical services in developing countries; and significant new developments in the field of medical technology and innovation.


The iShares Global Healthcare ETF, $80.06, symbol IXJ on New York (Units outstanding: 35.3 million; Market cap: $2.8 billion; www.ishares.com/us), invests globally in healthcare companies.

The fund tracks the S&P Global Healthcare Index....
A: Vital Farms Inc., $24.60, symbol VITL on Nasdaq (Shares outstanding: 39.6 million; Market cap: $969.5 million; www.vitalfarms.com), offers a range of ethically produced pasture-raised foods. Started on a single farm in Austin, Texas, in 2007, Vital Farms is now a U.S.-wide consumer brand that works with over 200 small family farms.


The company is the industry leader in pasture-raised eggs, holding more than 80% of the U.S....
A: PagerDuty Inc., $39.27, symbol PD on New York (Shares outstanding: 79.5 million; Market cap: $3.6 billion; www.pagerduty.com), operates a platform that collects real-time data from software systems and devices and then notifies its IT customers of incidents that might adversely affect their operations.

As it receives data, the company uses analytics and artificial intelligence to “learn on the go,” so the same adverse events don’t hit clients again....
A: Kimberley-Clark Corp., $142.29, symbol KMB on New York (Shares outstanding: 338.0 million; Market cap: $47.0 billion; www.kimberley-clark.com), is a leading maker of personal-care and tissue products. Its brands include Huggies, Kleenex, Scott, Kotex, Cottonelle, Poise, Depend, Andrex, Pull-Ups, GoodNites, Intimus, Neve, Plenitud, Viva and WypAll.


The consumer goods giant has been in business for 149 years and its wide range of family, baby, and feminine care brands are sold in over 175 countries....
We think the first three stocks we analyze this week—Kimberley-Clark, PagerDuty and Vital Farms—provide some educational investor reading.

Kimberley-Clark is a world leader in personal care and tissue products, including toilet paper and disposable diapers....
A: Preferred shares behave more like long-term fixed-income instruments rather than short-term instruments. So, while short-term interest rates are still relatively low, the outlook for long-term interest rates is less certain.

The underlying credit quality of preferred share issuers can be a negative factor in some cases; for example, when the issuer’s share price is falling.

So unlike GICs, which don’t fall in value, the prices of preferreds can decline along with stock markets.

If you want to own a preferred share as part of the fixed-income segment of your portfolio, and you can accept some risk, then preferreds are okay to hold....