Today's moves

Before I get into today's moves, let me go over a bit of the terminology I'll use. If I make a purchase, it will be either as an investment or as a trade. The difference to me is that trades for me have very specific catalysts and typically very short timeframes. Usually a trade for me lasts anywhere from a day to a month, with most of them lasting a week or two. They're very short term in nature. I have very tight stops and won't allow them to go down much. Investments are typically positions that while I also may have a catalyst for, I have a much longer timeframe (usually 6-18 months) for that thesis to play out, and I build my positions in investments slowly over time and I genearlly trade around them. If they spike up I take some off the table if they drop down I usually add. I try to take advantage of natural volatility in stocks to improve my return.

On the trading side of things I initiated new trades in CAL, LUV, and SLB today. LUV is a very short term trade while the other two may take longer to play out. I did my own homework, but all of the ideas came from a newsletter so I'd rather not say much more. I also closed out two trades. I sold BIIB after 4 days for a small loss (bought at 51.89 and sold at 51.35) and BNI also after 4 days for a nice gain (bought at 74.65 and sold at 78.61).

On the investment front I pared back my position in GFIG because it had gotten too large and the stock has had a pretty nice run. I still hold a position in GFIG but I trimmed back about 40% to lock in some nice gains of about 8% of my cost basis. I added to my positions in MA and DEO as they both pulled back a little today and both are relatively new positions in my portfolio so I haven't fully built my position up yet. Jim Cramer is very big on MasterCard (MA) on his Mad Money show right now, and I agree with him that it's one of the best ways to play the holiday season. It makes most of it's money by taking a little bit from each transaction, and we're all shopping more and more with plastic instead of cash. DEO is an international liquor stock that deals mainly in higher end liquors (also recommended on Mad Money). I like it for it's good dividend (almost 3%) and steady growth. It's had a nice run but still sells relatively cheap in relation to its peers.

DEO is a relatively low risk stock IMO while MA is a much higher risk having just IPO'd this year and having already had a very big run. Both are two of my current favorite stocks in my portfolio and will continue to add to both if I can improve my cost basis.

I also took some gains I had made last week and put them into my money market account. Typically I like to keep 10-20% of my portfolio in cash. This allows me to always have capital to deploy if I see something I like.

-Rizen