# Your biggest loser



## daddybigbucks (Jan 30, 2011)

You are supposed to learn from your mistakes, but it always hurts when you pick a loser.
Just wondering about your biggest loser over the years?

I started investing after the Nortel crash, so my biggest loser to date is CMT.
Compton Petroleum- Its heavily levered into nat.gas and its debt is high.
And for some reason i bought in big as i felt it was undervalued. But it is just a slow sinking ship.
Bought shares at $1.30 and still have them at .32c now
Bought CMT.wt at $.25 and presently at .05c


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## Eder (Feb 16, 2011)

I've owned Bramalea, Hollinger, Nortel & BreX...but thank God I missed Enron.


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## lister (Apr 3, 2009)

A technology company back in 1999/2000. They were making the next ultra high capacity optical media. Great technology. Company went kaputs. I lost about $13K. I didn't do any other trading until late 2008.


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## Betzy (Feb 7, 2011)

PBN Bought March 4th and it has tanked since...


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## webber22 (Mar 6, 2011)

Husky Energy (HSE) - It hasn't recovered from the 2008 levels and is still in the dog house


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## hboy43 (May 10, 2009)

Oh, so many I have held until bankruptcy, let's see if I can remember them all ...

White Rose
Aim Global technologies
Canadian Fracmaster
Nortel
Gandalf (maybe, or did I just miss selling when it was way high)

I know there are 1 or 2 others, can't think of them now.

These have fortunately been offset by other holdings over the years, some of which were quite a ride. Like Nova Chemicals. I lost money on all of the first 8 or so trades in this one over the many years I was a shareholder. Fortunately I made one last trade back in February 2009 paid off and recovered all the losses, plus a bit.

I have also made money in other names that were looking like losers for many, many years, the kinds of companies that many will sell upon seeing a loss of say 20%, instead of buying more: Inco, Dofasco, HBC ...

I wonder if Husky Energy will be a multi year dog that will eventually pay out big? I've got skin in this game.

Now my main goal is to avoid bankruptcies. I don't much care if I see a huge paper loss, I just look for and often see a buying opportunity when this happens.

The occasional loss is the price of admission. The net effect is a nice lifetime capital gain. Don't pay too much attention to individual losing positions (or winning ones for that matter), watch the portfolio in its totality. Buy what is on sale, sell that which is pricy: rebalance.

hboy43


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## mrbizi (Dec 19, 2009)

As a newbie investor, I lost money on actively managed mutual funds:

Trimark Funds
Altamira Funds

It taught me early on the folly of investing in actively managed funds (specifically investing in current "Heavy Hitters" managed by "Superstar" fund managers).


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## al42 (Mar 5, 2011)

Yep..doubled down this morning @17.98.
5.35% yield now. Paid to wait?









Betzy said:


> PBN Bought March 4th and it has tanked since...


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## daddybigbucks (Jan 30, 2011)

hboy43 said:


> Now my main goal is to avoid bankruptcies. I don't much care if I see a huge paper loss, I just look for and often see a buying opportunity when this happens.
> 
> 
> hboy43


I agree 100%, I got over 40 holdings so i have no problem if a stock doesnt move for a long time. 
Bankrupcy is the big thing for me as well.
My hardest thing is to sell when im only getting pennies on the dollar,because i am thinking its going to get bought out (like Nova Chem).

As long as the winners, outnumber the losers.


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## Ihatetaxes (May 5, 2010)

Book For Golf (dummest of them all)
Nortel
Air Canada
Many more


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## canuck1 (Apr 29, 2010)

PMCS (Nasdaq)

Bought 200 shares at 24.
Got out at 9


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## Brian Weatherdon CFP (Jan 18, 2011)

I bought Placer Dome warrants in 1989 before I understood what they were. Lost 100% in a week or so. Like buying a car that goes from 100 to zero in 3 seconds. How fast a learning game can start *!!* 

Then there was Timmins Nickel touted so strongly in Northern Miner, which went for 100% bust due to a spurious (I believe) legal case back about 1992 or so.

Labour Sponsored Funds are therefore not the worst investment ever --- just runner-up to the worst.

Lifelong learning means we're never done learning. That's what 2008 was about for the wider financial world 

Cheers!
BW


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## CanadianCapitalist (Mar 31, 2009)

Nortel: Bought at $24. Sold at $4.
JDS-Uniphase: Bought at $88. Sold at $3.

I've had losses on other stocks but these two were the worst.


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## Financial Cents (Jul 22, 2010)

Well, where to begin...

I held mutual funds for years, some duds and lost thousands to management fees. Never again.

Before dividend investing via TFSAs and unregistered accounts and passive investing via my RRSPs, I bought AHX for a buck or so, a few hundred shares and now it's at $0.04. Ugly.

http://tmx.quotemedia.com/quote.php?qm_symbol=AHX

It's not even worth selling now. Annoying. Also never again, taking a "flyer" on penny stocks.


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## bootsie (Aug 30, 2010)

*techbubble rape*

Itemus - ITM
Unique Broadband systems - USB i think
Pangeo Pharma - PIL -
Nortel - in at 66 out at 44


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## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

I haven't been in the game too long, but my biggest loser was Uranium One (UUU.TO) a few months ago.

I sold and lost 4.3% of my portfolio.

I bought 1000 shares at the peak of the "uranium trend". I thought it would go higher because of all the demand. HA!

And look now... Japans disaster. UUU.TO dropped 27.68% today alone. Glad I sold when I did.

*Toronto.gal*, I know you told me you were holding it. I hope you got out of this stock before it tanked due to Japan.. might be a good play down the road.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

KaeJS said:


> And look now... Japans disaster. UUU.TO dropped 27.68% today alone. Glad I sold when I did.
> 
> *Toronto.gal*, I know you told me you were holding it. I hope you got out of this stock before it tanked due to Japan.. might be a good play down the road.


*Hiya KaeJS:* I see you survived the day; I know you were afraid to look at the market today.

Had UUU shares averaged down to $4.40 & sold a couple of weeks ago for just over $6. The Middle East situation had me uneasy & so I had decided to sell some of my smaller & profitable shares & that's why I got rid of them. However, I wasn't so lucky with UEC, which I bought at $5 & inevitably also tanked today, but I'll just hold on to them, it's not like we won't be needing nuclear power anymore. But now is time to think about what Japan's needs for rebuilding will be & purchase in that direction.

You had sold yours too soon if I remember correctly, but if you hadn't sold them, wouldn't you now be at close to your buying price, even with today's 27% dip? I seem to remember you bought around $4 also.

************

*As for my biggest losses:* - I also have not been doing this for very long & have no realized losses yet, but so far, the ones in which I have a high capital tied-up & doing nothing, are: JNJ & Manulife, but at their low premium, at least the dividends are buying more free shares, so a little consolation at least.


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## Sampson (Apr 3, 2009)

Nortel
JDS Uniphase
and most recently, Oilexco (damn credit crisis)

Never again, with these.


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

I have dropped $50K on the combination of Photon Controls, RDM Corp and Nokia. Luckily it was offset by bigger gains but that is the topic of another thread...


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

ah, pangeo.

Never owned it. I forget what alerted me there was something dead wrong but i recall driving up there to have a look-see whether they even owned the factory they said they did or whether the address was just bare land. Yup, they did. Own the factory. Actually, 2 of em.

not long after that the mounties busted em for manufacturing illegal precursors of street drugs.


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## Brian Weatherdon CFP (Jan 18, 2011)

Call options also have the appeal of not being stuck under water forever. Taking a modest "call" position can be equal to owning a larger position long in the stock. Advantage is....it doesn't stay underwater for an unfuriating period of time. It either rises or expires. Another way to go from 100 KPH to zero. 

_Did I mention how much happier I am with strong management teams in active funds?_


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

dear misterbrianweatherdoncfp, as U know it's the buyers of calls that lose money & it's the sellers of calls that make money.

you got the direction right though. From 100 kph to zero for most folks.

the prob is when japan can rebuild & how long it will take. Nobody has a handle on this. Situation has nothing to do w conditions after ww II imho..

meanwhile each one of them calls has a little timer on it & it is busy ticking away its days to expiration zero.

(signed)
don't put it to me like that


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## Brian Weatherdon CFP (Jan 18, 2011)

Dear Humble, of course: that's the nature of a fixed expiry. 

Someone had to benefit -- I hope it was you.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

there's no "of course" about it at all.

your post seems off the mark to me because 1) call buyers lose, and 2) japanese rebuilding is not quantifiable at this point in time; therefore an option strategy, being in its essence a strategy built upon time, is not appropriate in the least.


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## LOST (Aug 30, 2010)

Another Oilexco tragedy. Bought at $13, went to $18 then rode it back down to .11 .


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## scomac (Aug 22, 2009)

CanadianCapitalist said:


> Nortel: Bought at $24. Sold at $4.
> JDS-Uniphase: Bought at $88. Sold at $3.
> 
> I've had losses on other stocks but these two were the worst.


I thought I took a bath, but I think you've got me beat, CC! 

Nortel: bought @$70, sold @$13
ICGE: bought $30, sold $3


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## tendim (Nov 18, 2010)

Off the top of my head..

First Canadian Petrolium (bought in the high teens, it dropped soon after)
Paincare Holdings (Bought at $5.50, company went down for fraud. It is still on my books as a pink sheet at $0.001)
Air Canada

Biggest miss: Bombardier BBD.B. I had it at $5.12 four months ago, and sold at $5.80, look where it is now. Ugh.


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## oob (Apr 4, 2011)

*Bbd.b*

I did so much worse with that.
Bought @ 5.80 held it at through the 4.33 summer low. Sold under 5 in December to catch the capital loss tax break. Fully intended to re buy it / still believed in fundamentals.

Waited the pre-requisite 30 days. it shot up 20%... kept waiting for a dip to re-enter.

Damn...


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## Berubeland (Sep 6, 2009)

Well with warrants you win some you lose some so I take multiple positions around $1000 each and put them on sale the minute I buy them for double or 100% 

I lost big time on Freddie and Fannie when I thought there was no way they could go any lower... hmmmpth

I think the reason I do well with warrants is because I don't believe in the stock market at all  

People are lying big time so you don't really know what's going on unless you're the comptroller. 

But... you can count on people trading and volume plays and arbitrage that happens all the time with warrants. I have no problem buying some crap warrant for half a cent and waiting 9 months for somebody else to buy it at one cent or 3 cents in the case of CCJ.WT.B


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## Causalien (Apr 4, 2009)

My biggest loss was JDS uniphase. I lost my first $10k that I saved up in my life on that and it was my first total loss to $0 in net worth that I experienced (or close to zero). In fact, I had credit card debt back then from just coming out of university so it was really a bad time for me and the lesson is burned into my brain. When I called RBC direct investing to close out of the position, the agent laughed on the phone about the fall. I promptly closed my account with them for the unprofessional conduct. The proceed of my JDS.U paid for the account closing cost. Which let me to test out all the discount brokerage in Canada with $100 and discovering the few treasures that fit my style. 

The lesson I learned is to never let someone else manage your money. Even if that person is your dad and he claims that he has invested for more than 20 years. 

Up till this day I still had no idea what he did with my portfolio and why there were only one stock in it. No diversification from a 20 year old veteran who preaches Warren Buffet like investment style speaks volume to me. I learned that most people who claims experience are just bullsh**.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

That's a sad story. Sounds like you lost more than just $10k.


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