Profitable Investing

Average Subscriber Review:

Go anywhere newsletter that generally focuses on “low risk growth” — recommends portfolios for stocks, mutual funds and ETFs, and dividends, among others.

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Posted in ETFs or Mutual Funds, Income Investing, Stocks |

Gumshoe Articles & Teaser Picks Revealed

“Collect a $6,500 Payday Every Three Months”

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a teaser ad that says you can “collect a $X,000 payday” — and it’s obviously appealing, there aren’t many among us who don’t find their eyes drifting toward a headline like “$6,500 payday,” even if, like your friendly neighborhood Gumshoe, you light your cigars with $100 bills. OK, [...]

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“Safest Stock in the World Set for 30% Pop”

“If you buy only one of the three safest stocks in the world, make it this one.” How’s that for an intro? In a tumultuous market, who could possibly turn away without reading the ad? The ad this time is from Richard Band, pitching his Profitable Investing newsletter — he tells us that he’s got [...]

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Richard Band’s “Perfect Storm” income stream stock

I haven’t written much, if at all, about Richard Band over the years, but he’s certainly a been a fixture in the investment newsletter landscape for quite a long time (I think the letters been running for 30 years or so) … so when I saw his latest teaser pitch I thought I oughtta give [...]

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Subscriber Reviews

Posted by Phillip Ngaillah on Nov 4, 2010 @ 5:26 pm

Investing is a major challenge as the investor have to risk when he decide to start or run a business. communication between the investors example sharing the information and experience will be vital.take an example we people from the developing countries where preparation is another challenge because saving of ten years can lead to zero when the investor touch the field. I believe that this system will help show the way forward.

Phillip Ngaillah, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania

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Posted by Jack on Oct 23, 2010 @ 12:59 pm

I’ve been a Profitable Investing subscriber for over eight years, and I have been generally satisfied with Richard Band’s conservative newsletter advice. However, when my present subscription expires, I will not renew it.

I do agree with Chick’s August 29, 2009, review. I also found this site while looking for RICHARD BAND’S HASSLE-FREE ETF PORTFOLIO returns — because his newsletter has never posted cumulative YTD returns for any of his portfolios. It IS outrageous that performance figures are not subscription-inclusive.

Per a response to my email inquiry, service@rband.com on 10/18/10 wrote, “Hulbert in his Financial Digest reports the returns of Richard Hassle-Free ETF Portfolio as being 3.3% overall since Hulbert began tracking them 4/30/04, through 6/30/10. The 5-year return from 4/30/04 for this portfolio through 6/30/10 is 1.3%.”

Methinks that’s WAY too conservative for my retirement funds, even during the present global economic crisis. I’m 62, and I’m getting completely out.

Ciao.

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Posted by Cat on Feb 15, 2010 @ 1:43 pm

Interesting to read and informative. There is usually some bullish and some bearish prediction so that a few issues later he can point back and say “I told you so.”

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Posted by Chick on Aug 29, 2009 @ 2:09 am

I have been subscribing to Profitable Investing (P.I.) for over ten years, and I’d like to know where my profits are. I found this web site looking for P.I. returns for 2008 because Richard Band did not publish the 2008 performance in his newsletter. Richard Band did, however, say it was ‘painful’. I could buy these figures from Hulbert, but isn’t it outrageous that the performance figures are not inclusive in the subscription?

I know you won’t believe this, but I lost money in the stock market in 2008. Before then, I was just about breaking even with P.I. It seems to me P.I. is a great part of my problem. Am I imputing my personal portfolio plunge unjustly to P.I.? Objective portfolio performance figures would help me decide if the fault lies not in my newsletter, but in myself. Alas, I have to go grubbing on the net to find this information.

Here are the good things about P.I. It has a target demographic – 45 years old through retirement. It offers not just stock picks, but target portfolio allocations with a stock component and a fixed income component. Sometimes there are additional components (currently there’s an MLP component added to the mix). You can choose from the model (aka Total Return model) portfolio, the dividend (aka Incredible Dividend Machine) portfolio, a few mutual fund portfolios, and an ETF portfolio (I used that to help manage my 401K). Sometimes the newsletter discusses aspects of personal finance outside of portfolio management that are of interest to its target demographic. The newsletter frequently comes up with ideas I’d never come up with on my own. Each recommendation comes with a ‘buy below’ price. Once in a while, the calls are spectacular! It has a web site which is updated about once a week, sometimes a little more often.

Here are the bad things. I’m no financial planner, but some of the positions seem risky for retirees. The portfolio has too many positions for the home gamer to manage – the model portfolio currently has forty three (that’s right; 43!) positions. If you spent an hour a week doing your due diligence with each position, you’d have a second full time job! Once in awhile, the calls are spectacularly bad. In today’s world, a twice a week website update is lame.

The style of investing is buy-and-hold. The good thing is you avoid a lot of tax paperwork and taxes if you buy and hold. The bad thing is that P.I. seems to have no sell discipline whatever. The bad calls really hurt unless you have a sell discipline of your own to protect your profits, or at least to cut your losses. Sell calls are rare for P.I. When the rare sell call comes, it is usually always late — the position has a crushing loss, or it made a spectacular run up, and P.I. rode it right back down again.

That’s the Achilles heel of P.I. – no sell discipline. I’d be hurting even more than I am now if I had not taken matters into my own hands. (I know; we are big boys and girls and are supposed to take matters into our own hands, but shouldn’t the newsletter that got you in be your beacon out?). It only takes a couple of spectacularly bad calls to put you underwater.

This has to be said. I find it very worrisome. Richard Band has a weird obsession with Jim Cramer. Pre-crash – about the time I was learning great stuff from Jim Cramer’s Mad Money TV show – P.I. would gratuitously berate Jim Cramer in every issue – and I do mean every issue. This was embarrassing to read – Cramer was teaching me to protect my profits from Band’s bad calls. It was annoying — Richard Band frankly needs to put all that energy into making me money. Post crash, certain ‘Cramerican’ expressions have started creeping into each issue, and onto the web site. I thought Richard Band had learned humility. Unfortunately, the last issue said “I don’t mind watching CNBC’s Jim Cramer, but only if he’s priced at his true value—free!” Hmmn. Mighty bold words from a man who began his August issue with the Cramerican expression “Stay in the game!”, are they not?

So here I am, on this web site, mulling over whether I will renew when the subscription rolls over in 2010.

Since this is a beta site, I will say that I’m not sure what ‘consistency’ means; tried to leave that blank but could not. I’d like a way to indicate how practical easy the advice is to implement; as you can see here I find the P.I. portfolio a bit unwieldy.

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Posted by Shoe Guy on Mar 20, 2009 @ 11:47 am

Steady, reasoned, consistent, all the adjectives you would look for in a financial advisor. I have subscribed for a couple of decades, and if I hadn’t gone off with new suitors on occaision such as Navellier, etc., I would have more of my assets intact. Richard has had his toughest year, but has not abandoned the slow and steady value-oriented approach to managing your portfolio.

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