Archive for February, 2009

Birthday Plans

// February 25th, 2009 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

What: Mine and Michael Wegerson’s Birthday!

Where: Cactus and Chris’ House

When: Thursday the 26th of February

  • Pregame and Cake @ 8:00pm (Chris’ House)
  • Cactus Awesomeness @ 9:00ish (Cactus Martini Bar)
  • Piano Bar Awesomeness @ 10:30ish (Cactus Piano Bar)

Any and everyone is invited to all of the festivities. If you are in the West Lafayette area then come and join us. If you aren’t then just make a spontaneous spur of the moment trip up to West Lafayette. :) Everyone is guaranteed to have a good time. We are nice folks. Plus, if you have never been to a piano bar and sung along with the pianoman then here is your excuse to have one of the most awesome nights of your life! If you have any questions or don’t know where the Cactus is (in which case you better be from out of town!) then give the cell a call. You can find the number on my facebook page. See you for the festivities!!

P.S. If you need a place to crash then no worries just call the cell.

GE

// February 4th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Uncategorized

A few weeks ago I drained my checking account and contributed the money to my 2008 RothIRA contribution. If you are unfamiliar with what a RothIRA is or just want to brush up on the details then I recommend this explanation. This year for my contribution I did something a little different. In the past I have always bought a mutual fund for my investment, but with the market having been beat up so badly I thought I might be able to find my own stock(s) rather than pay a professional to do it for me (i.e. purchase a mutual fund). Here is what I came up with.

GE – When I purchased the stock it was trading for around $12. I set two criteria that if met I would purchase shares. The criteria were the dividend provide 10% interest on my principal and that the CEO, Jeff Immelt, publicly stand by the dividend. Early in January the first criteria was met. GE shares fell below $12.40 which was the crucial number. Every three months GE pays thirty-one cents to all the shareholders for each share they own. This means that over a one year period GE will pay $1.24 for each share. At $12.40 the dividend is 10% of share value or to put another way if I bought $1,000 of GE then over the course of a year GE would pay me $100 in cash. Then on January 23rd during GE’s quarterly report conference call Jeff Immelt reinforced GE’s commitment to paying a dividend. It was then that I jumped and purchased shares.

My question to the greater community is whether or not you feel this was a good decision and to see if anyone out there had any stock picks of their own? I will say that I’m not 100% convinced GE will retain it’s divdend at the current rate. I think the dividend will stay, but I recognize there is a chance it could drop in value. Thoughts?