We very much appreciate that sentiment. And although it may not influence anybody in terms of how they feel about this feature, I do want to expand on our motivation.
The first time Marco showed me this feature, I hated it, as I do all such popular-stock lists. But on reflection of what this was in terms of our site, I saw it as a good thing. And for that reason, changed my mind and supported it. And later on, I proposed the addition of the link “Why you should care” (which you only see if you are not logged in) and I wrote the text one gets upon clicking. In case you haven’t seen it, here it is:
The typical most-popular lists are potential disasters waiting to happen
We’re not alone in believing this. Consider what Peter Lynch, the legendary former manager of Fidelity Magellan, had to say at the opening of Chapter 9 of One Up on Wall Street:
If I could avoid a single stock, it would be the hottest stock in the hottest industry, the one that gets the most favorable publicity, the one that every investor hears about in the car pool or on the commuter train — and succumbing to the social pressure, often buys.
Do you really think it’s to your benefit to see and click on tickers in a list like that?
Our most-popular list is completely different
Our list consists of stocks that appear most frequently in models created by our users based on screening and ranking. Some are well-known. Others are not. Either way, this is absolutely, positively the best way to find investment ideas based on at least some objective showing of merit and without regard to what news sources you consult, what tips your friends provide, etc.
Having the right stocks come to your attention is critical to investment performance. No matter how great you are at evaluating stock, you have no real chance to succeed if you always wind up applying your skills to stocks that aren’t really worthy of being examined in the first place. Expand your field of view with rule based investing. That’s what Peter Lynch did. That’s what Warren Buffet does. They, and other investment greats, pick stocks based on genuine investment merit.
Join us and do likewise! Invest in models created and maintained by our experienced users. Create your own models. Research the ideas you uncover through your own models or the models you follow.
That explains our motivation. We aren’t trying to front-run anybody (actually, as Marco pointed out, we’re doing the exact opposite; I suppose you could say we’re back trailing). What we’re trying to do is sell the approach to investing followed here. That’s a big job. It may not seem that way to you, because you already get it. Don’t underestimate how many don’t. Heck, there are even guys who got Nobel Prizes for arguing that what you do can’t be done. So we really do need to explain why we’re different from and better than the other guys.
You have a stake in our success here. Obviously, better marketing benefits Portfolio123. (As equity investors, you look for companies that are doing well. We’re a company too. We also want to do well.) Bear in mind, though, that through R2G, you’re not purely P123 customers. You are also actual or potential (if you so choose) partners. The more effectively we can sell the sort of model-based investing we do, the more effectively we can attract subscribers to R2G models create and maintained that way. So actually, if you encounter somebody who says to you: “Why should I come to R2g on Poirtfolio123? There’s Covestor, there’s Motif, etc. What’s so great about you folks?” consider how you’d respond. Our popular-tickers promo is part of an effort to coach the investing public to understand that we and YOU are better.