First Trades

These actions actually took place back in June.
The first two stocks I decided to buy as my first real experience in trading in the stock market were Potash Corp./Saskatchewan (POT) and BPZ Resources, Inc. (BZP).

Reasons I chose these two companies:
Potash Corp is the largest supplier of fertilizers in the world. Fertilizer prices are at an all time high due to a high demand and not enough supply for farmers around the world.

BPZ Resources is an oil driller in Peru and Ecuador. With oil prices on the rise and this small company upgrading its capacity and drilling capabilities it seemed like a great investment.

Results (so far) and mistakes made:

The price of oil continued to rise after purchasing BPZ and I made some small gains after a couple weeks, but then the huge drop in oil prices began and this stock suffered.

Potash was similar results in that the first couple weeks I had made small gains, but even though Potash reported record earnings that had quadrupled for this quarter, I got first hand experience of what happens when the market decides to switch sectors. Commodities had been on a great run and I thought I would join in on this. A few weeks after I joined in the big hedge fund managers have decided that financials, healthcare and drugs are the new place to be. This has caused a major sell off in commodities and of course the Potash stock has suffered even though the company is doing great.

Another big mistake I made and have now learned from is one that many new investors make. Buying your stock as a money market order and also purchasing all the stock at once rather than over a short time period.

Hopefully I can learn from these mistakes and continue forward.