I'm 29 years old and already have a decent ira stacked back for retirement. I started scrapping pennies in college and just never stopped.

Investing in energy seems like a hot topic right now and there is a couple discussions going on in GD but I don't want to wade through all the fighting of cheap gas vs expensive gas. I personally believe cheaper gas is better but I know this trend will end. It's not if but when and I want to be prepared for it even if it comes a couple years from now. So, for yall investment gooroos, what's yalls investment in energy looking like right now?
I don't care if I loose some money right now as the money I'm going to invest is money I take out and live as if I don't have it. I know it's going to turn around and I'll make my money back it's just a matter of when.

My situation is similar to yours, I'm looking at XOM and VGENX. I told myself if oil was still low into the year I would jump in, time to fo I suppose.

Oil is going to tank.....  they have found the stuff everywhere,

I did the same thing. I told myself if oil hadn't blown up I'd invest. Like I said it's a matter of when not if.

When there is blood in the streets buy, even if the blood is your own.

If you are looking to buy and hold for the long-term (10years) then you can selectively pick some oil stocks.  XOM is a decent bet, but don't be fixated on the day to day volatility.

The problem with the energy sector is the declining GDP print of emerging market economies in addition to the inventory surplus.  Demand has slackened and the Saudis are going to stop pumping.

Lots of supply, declining demand, price goes down.  We could be looking at 25/bl before seeing prices rise again.

I believe crude hit $29 yesterday. I'm meeting with my financial guy sometime this week about making some investments in the energy sector.

I never thought I'd see this low of oil/gas prices in my lifetime again.

For a young skipper like you who is long term you could wade in with some well diversified energy names.  Ones that are not little niche markets and ones that have good balance sheets.  Stay away from more specialized and speculative higher debt energy companies for now.  There is likely to be a flurry of bankruptcies as a result of this.  Companies that thought oil would never go this low and borrowed a lot to run their business.  You don't want to buy that shit at any price.  I would wait for more shake out.  or buy in a little at a time as things go down.  Don't try to catch a falling knife.

Very true. I try to stay as diversified as possible through my roths and mutual funds. I was wanting to do a buy now sell later(not long term) for the next boom/bust and the theory of catching a falling knife sounds spot on.

Something to consider.  Toss a little money in penny stocks of long standing companies.  These guys who were $30-60 a share could have a huge payoff if they come out of this and bounce back.  A $20 investment at $.005 can get you 4000 shares of a company like Sandridge or Sabine.  If they go to zero, you're out $20, if they bounce back to $40 over the next 10 years, you have $160k in your account.

Long shot, but the risk is relatively small considering the reward potential.  I'm doing it, but I wouldn't put more than pocket change into it.

i own the following energy names and have been buying some of them a long time, like 35 years.  i have a cross section across the industry from E&P, integrated majors, pipelines, refiners.  I try to accumulate more shares during the busts like this one.   I like energy for the dividends.  

oil will bounce back one day, who knows when but it will.  average in every month or week if you can afford it

XOM, COP, CVX, SE, VLO, MTDR, CLR

Doesn't Shell have a 9% dividend?  Definitely worth owning if so.

I own XOM, RDS.B, and STO. I've been averaging in since last year. I'm negative so far but I have time to wait. I'd be careful investing in any of the smaller companies with high debt and poor cash flow. Some will be bankrupt before this is over.

I'm meeting with my financial guy on Saturday. I'm going to see what my options are. He said he was personally looking at mutual funds that were diversified in the bigger companies.

Post what he recommends.

Will do.

Monaco, Piaget, Ferrari, etc.

oh, wait.  

you meant "to clients".

OP, here is a book you should pick up:
http://www.amazon.com/About-Asset-Allocation-Second-Edition/dp/0071700781

ar-jedi

http://etfdb.com/etfdb-category/energy-equities/#overview

Does it have pictures and pop ups? If no, I'm not interested.

Some of this stuff is way above my pay grade. Never made it that far in college.

it's is EXACTLY what you are looking for; that text provides excellent guidance on the process of "asset allocation" -- which is a fancy term for avoiding over-concentration in a single asset class, and taking some of the emotion out of buying and selling asset classes.  importantly, it helps prevent "performance chasing", which is a destructive emotional tendency to continue to purchase an asset class that has already gone up for a long period of time, and gone up well beyond it's intrinsic value.  the gold bugs in GD can help you out with understanding this concept of "performance chasing"...  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asset_allocation
http://www.forbes.com/sites/mitchelltuchman/2015/03/20/investing-basics-what-is-asset-allocation/#4a66054e394f

and, you can take "asset allocation" to finer granularity than is portrayed above.

for example, a view of your equity (stock) holdings may indicate that you are under-weighted in large caps; hence, this would drive new investment in large cap ETFs and/or mutual funds.  similarly, in 5 years you may see that you are over-weighted in large caps (due to appreciation).  this would signal a move towards mid- or smaller cap holdings.

*very simplistic asset allocation example*:

rule: tulips should not exceed 50% of my portfolio.
rule: gold should be between 30% and 40% of my portfolio.
rule: cash should never be less than 20% of my portfolio.
rule: asset allocation should be done on 6 month intervals.

so you take $100 and invest it.

$40 of tulips
$30 of gold
$30 of cash.
-------
$100

over time, tulips appreciate -- a lot. gold drops a bit. and, you have also save a bit more money.

at the six month check, you find that you have

$80 of tulips
$25 of gold
$45 of cash.
-------
$150

so:
the "tulip rule" is being violated. you sell some tulips to "rebalance".
the "gold rule" is being violated. you buy some gold to "rebalance".

$50 of tulips
$50 of gold
$50 of cash.
-------
$150

you will notice from the above that tulip profits were converted into gold and cash. inherently, the process of following your "rules" forces you to, over time, move out of things that have appreciated a lot and into things that have appreciated less (aka depreciated). this, in turn, defeats the natural human tendency to "chase" high performers. drawing from my example above, that method would involve buying MORE tulips as they get more and more expensive to own -- and we all know that approach does not end well, whether it is tulips or gold. similarly, holding too much cash for too long presents a different kind of risk. asset allocation also gives you an advantage in getting out ahead of asset class rotation; see, for example, the periodic tables of asset class performance published annually by Callan or Prudential etc
e.g.
https://investment.prudential.com/util/common/get?file=1D065355D2CC360385257B7D00536F8A

understanding and applying asset allocation has been shown to be the greatest factor in long term portfolio success.

ar-jedi

Ar-jedi

Thank you very much for the information you provided. I have alot of reading to do regarding this. I read your post above about three times and with each time I read it, it got clearer and clearer.

personal finance and long term investing are important to learn about: no one else is going to do it for you.  moreover, the approaches you take will change with your seasons; for example, as you get older your asset allocation scheme may tend towards "stream of income" rather than "capital appreciation".  same with buying a house, planning for your children's college expenses and so on and so forth.  folks recommending "do X" or "do Y" can't take all these factors into account -- only you can.  this is why -- EVEN if you are assisted by a professional fiduciary (such as a fee-only financial planner) -- you should understand the basics of how and why asset allocation works.  

i'll provide another example...

there are lots of threads where folks opine about the pros and cons of making pre-payments (or even a large "bulk payment") into your mortgage note.  as you can see from item 3 below, this again involves a discussion about asset allocation...

1) any decision to "pay down the house" should weigh against what your tax-adjusted note rate is. for example, if you have a 3.5% APR mortgage, and you are in the 25% tax bracket, your "effective" mortgage rate (given the income tax deduction on your mortgage) is about 2.5% APR. hence, making a one time payment against this mortgage note is similar to buying a long term bond at 2.5% rate of return. in this case, at this mortgage rate, there are likely better approaches -- namely, other financial instruments which return higher rates. so, in some cases, it is financially to your advantage to *not* pay down a mortgage and use your funds for other purposes which have greater financial benefit.

2) paying down your mortgage note with principal payments does not change the "mortgage payment" itself unless you refinance. while paying principal in advance does reduce the term (time to payoff) and decrease the amount of interest you will ultimately pay, it does not change the monthly payment whatsoever. if you are currently paying $1000/month on a 30yr $150K note, and you bulk pay $100K against the principal, you will still owe $1000 next month, and the month after that, and so on.

3) from an asset allocation standpoint, putting a large chunk of money all at once into your mortgage can result in over-allocation to real-estate. this is just as financially hazardous as over-allocation into any other asset class, such as equities, credit instruments, precious metals, or cash.  when folks state that they are "house rich/cash poor", this is the result of allocation imbalance.  

ar-jedi

I'm about 90% through the book. It's not complicated and I thought it was very much worth reading. My 401k only has mutual funds and after reading the book I realized I was not allocating between the funds correctly and I wasn't rebalancing. I wish the 401 had some other options now like mircocap and small cap value but this should help me work with what I have. My IRA is invested in individual stocks that pay dividends which are set to reinvest. I'm going to compare performance between the two accounts over the next couple years. My brokerage now offers no fee Vanguard ETFs with auto rebalancing so if my stocks under perform I may switch both accounts to funds using the method in the book.




 

Well just got done.

We discussed options for ever 2 hours about the best options for me since I'm 30 and already invested into several mutual funds through Roth ira.

He actually recommended continuing the way I am but contributing more towards it so it will snowball.

I'm going to start direct depositing my checks into an Edward Jones money market account and then more direct payments from that just to streamline the process into funding my Roth.

I'm told him I'm considering more investing towards raw land. I have the equipment and manpower at my disposal to turn a several acre trac into pasture if I so choose. I flipped a foreclosed land deal for 2x my initial investment once before and I believe if I look and wait for the right deals and be patient, I'll do good with that. He agreed and said that let be another leg propping up the stool.

We also are starting a college fund for my two boys. I'm on the fence about it as I'm kind of on the side of there's no way I can pay for their college they way the cost of education is trending up at the current rate. We shall see.

I also asked about the penny stocks/high risk investment types. Edward Jones doesn't do that kind of investment so a Scott Trade account might be in my future and he said he was more than willing to help with that.

So any ideas about what oil stocks people are getting into?

Phillips 66

 

I'm looking into VDE. Vanguard energy ETF

Oil will bounce back, and I'm guessing sooner than later. Someone will fold in their overproduction, and/or another major escalation will occur and that will help move the price/bbl upwards. Saudi Arabia wants to send troops into Syria, but only behind a US-led coalition. You have Russia and Iran backing Syria, and there is no way those two powers will relent. Yep, just a matter of time.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned BP. XOM seems to be the safest bet, but they're not discounted enough yet.

http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_10_17/684683_Any_way_to_lock_in_current_gas_prices_.html&page=1#i11712083