I dabble in stocks....but banks, some communication and CAT.....beyond that I stay with funds cause I just dont have the time of day to track it all.....I did find the following article that may be helpful for those aspiring stock tycoons...............
If you had purchased $1,000 worth of Nortel stock one year ago, itwould now be valued at $49.00.
With Enron, you would have $16.50 remaining of the original $1000.00.
With World Com, you would have less than $5.00 left.
Had you purchased $1,000 worth of Delta Air Lines stock you would have
a net balance of $49.00.
If you had purchased $1,000 worth of beer one year ago, drank all the
beer then returned the cans for the refund, you would have $214.00.
Therefore, the best current investment advice is to drink heavily and
recycle.
(this of course is based on Canadian empty bottle return rates but Im sure it can be recalculated for regional indexes)