Jessie's Review

Throughout the Stock Market Game, I contributed to my group by distributing out who was blogging about what topic. Also, I thought of some of the stocks we ended up buying. Once we decided as a group in what we wanted to buy and short sell, I made the transactions. I also did research on companies so we could compare and choose the best one to buy. I did the math to decide how much of a stock we should buy and what we should limit the price on.

I have learned so much about the stock market over the 10 weeks we play this game. I had no clue how the stock market functioned, but now I know the general vocabulary of the stock market. Also, I learned what to look for in a stock that makes it a good or a bad one. At first I thought our group should only invest in one stock, but I learned it is good to have a diverse portfolio.

What I wished I had a better understanding about was how the website of the game actually functioned. Some of the keys on the top of the page were confusing because they all seemed the same. Also, I had no idea about short selling until the end when I finally asked a question on how to make the transaction. Also, I wish I would have had more information on mutual funds because as a group we were going choose to invest in one but we did not feel comfortable investing in one.

The game was a really fun experience because of what I learned from it. I enjoyed looking at what ranking my group was in and how much our stocks gained and fell. Within one night my group's ranking went up 109 spots and the next night it fell about the same amount. The user name and password was complicated but by the end I knew it by heart. It was fun to spend a lot of money, make investments, and take risks.

The Hershey Company Decks the Holidays with Festive New and Classic Treats

As many people are beginning to celebrate the holidays, Hershey is celebrating with new delicious treats and gifts. The Hershey's Cookies & Cream Nutcracker-shaped bar, and the York Peppermint Pattie snowflake gift boxes. Hershey's holiday products make great gifts, snacks, and stocking stuffers. Hershey's holiday candies also look like things during the holiday and taste like festive holiday flavors.
Hershey introduced a new holiday packaging for the popular holiday candy Hershey Kisses. The kisses are wrapped in red, green, and silver foil and come in a bag with mistletoe and snowflakes.
About 40% of candy purchased during the holiday season is for baking or dishes, and crafting. On HersheyHolidays.com, Hershey's has many recipes for baking cookies to decorating them. On the Hershey Kisses bags, there are also recipes on the back.

Kim's Review

What I learn from the stock market game that it can be a challenge. You can't tell if the product that you brought is going to do well. If this was a long term then you could tell if the product is going to do good. We invested in Microsoft and Apple because everyone wants a electronics. We decided that everyone in the group would be doing 2 for a week and switch to a different person for the week. It was Jessie ideas to short sell on Hersey's. I would change that we could of brought a another company not just Microsoft and Apple. Try to expande our buying and selling.

Our Portfolio for week 10

Our Portfolio

We have $99,256.62 for week 10.
We have decided to sort sell on Hersey's for 100 shares.
We place in the stock market game 371 out of 973.
Microsoft is doing well for this week, but Apple is not for this week.

Heather's Review

Over the past 10 weeks I contributed to the group by giving my group input as to what companies we should invest in. We only had invested in Apple and Microsoft for most of the Stock Market Game, but towards the end I helped her decide whether or not we should invest in Revlon and Hershey. I also helped to organize who would do what blog posts each week.

I have gained a greater sense of knowledge about the stock market and how to invest over the course of 10 weeks. I have learned the importance of investing in stocks for long and short periods of time and how to predict each one's success. I have also learned that it is important to keep a diverse portfolio when striving for low-risk investments.

I feel that throughout the Stock Market Game I have learned so much. If I were to have this experience again I would like to have a better understanding of how short selling works. There was just a little confusion as to how to go about short selling a stock at the end of the 10 weeks.

I think the game was organized very well. There is really nothing I can complain about because I have learned so much. I enjoyed being able to blog about each article and the reviews of the portfolio. I was able to learn how to use blogger.com and on wikispaces, insert graphs and other tools to use as references.

GM picks outgoing Microsoft CFO to run finances

An article found at usatoday.com states that GM is bringing in the chief financial officer of Microsoft, Chris Liddell, as part of the company. General Motors is now relying on him to run its troubled finance operations. The company believes that 51 year-old Liddell brings depth and experience to the job leading GM's global financial and accounting operations. Since it left bankruptcy protection in July, this move is GM's first permanent top management hire from outside the company. GM's current CEO, Ed Whitacre, stated, "We're also looking to his experience and insights in corporate strategy as a member of the senior leadership team in helping out restructuring efforts."

The Stock Market for week 10

The Stock Market


Dow Jones: The Dow Jones started with 10,403.41 and ended with 10,325.89. In the week, they increase,but decrease on Friday. Their big sale was Wednesday. They opened 10,449.89 and close with 10,452.00. It seems that they started high but go down on Fridays for some reason.

NASDAQ: The NASDAQ are doing not too good. They opened 2,202.31 and end with 2,211.45. It is like the Dow Jones. It started high in the begining of the week but it decrease at the end of the week. They didn't have a big sale for this week.

S&P500: S&P500 open on Monday with 1,107.98 and ended on Friday with 1,102.47. They are like the other stocks. It started out high but at the end of the week was low. They didn't have a big sale for this. Hopfully next week will be better for them.

Review of the Stock Market (Dec 7-11)

DJIA-On Monday December 7, the DJIA opened at 10,386.86 and had a high of 10,478.23. At the end of the week on Friday December 11, it closed at 10,471.50, and had a high that day of 10,516.47. The high of the week was on Friday at 10,516.47 and the low of the week was on Wednesday at 10,207.29.

S&P 500- On Monday December 7, the S&P 500 opened at 1,105.52 and had a high of 1,110.72. At the end of the week on Friday December 11, it closed at 1,106.41 and had a high at 1,108.50. The high of the week was on Monday at 1,110.72, and the low of the week was on Wednesday at 1.085.89.

NASDAQ- On Monday December 7, the NASDAQ opened at 2,191.35 and had a high of 2,201.42. At the end of the week on Friday December 11, it closed at 2,190.31 and had a high of 2,202.40. The high of the week was on Thursday at 2,202.84 and had a low of the week on Wednesday at 2,155.96.

**Wednesday was not a good day for these stocks because their lowest prices of the week came that day.

Revlon: A 'Beautiful' Buy

An article found at Bloggingstocks.com stated that Revlon promises a better look for consumers and investors. According to Steven Halpern, Revlon has been able to refinance and sell debt in an economy where credit has been tight, especially for notes that Moody's rates B3, or 'junk', is a testament to the company's strength. He also states that he believes that even in an environment of high unemployment, people want to take care of themselves. He suggests taking care of your investment portfolio with health and beauty stocks like Revlon.

USA Today Report Week 9

USA Today Report



Shoppers turn out,but hold for deals




The new york-shopper were making a list and checking them twice, looking for good deals for this week. This week, there are having discounts and deals. The shoppers to spend marginally mor than last year. The retailers have cut down on inventory all year and planned holiday sales will on advance this year. With the weak economy and high unemployment,comsumers have been spending for this year. But there are signs that it is improving. The Commerce Department reported Friday sales rose 1.3% last month,after a 1.1% October gain, the healthiest advance since August and mor than double the increase economists had expected.
People are trying to find a way to save there money. There are looking for discounts or coupons to use to buy.

Review of Our Portfolio: December 7-11

For the week of December 7-11 Revlon and Apple went down and Microsoft went up. Microsoft is continuing to thrive, whereas Revlon and Apple are not as successful. As of December 14, 2009, our total equity is $99,463.32 and ranked 377 out of 969.

27-inch Core i5 iMac (with Core i7 option)

Apple introduced the first ever iMac to offer a quad-core processor. The new 27 inch iMacs are the first to use Intel's Core i5 and Core i7 quadcore processors. Although they were not available at the time of the announcement they are finally out and definitely worth the wait.
There are four standard iMac configurations, three of which have 3.06GHz Core 2 Duo proccessors. The forth standard configuration is a $1999 model that has the same 27 inch screen, 1 TB hard drive, and 4GB RAM as the $1699 27 inch 3.06Hz Core 2 Duo iMac but has a more powerful ATI Radeon HD 4850 graphics card with 512MB of GDDR3 memory and Intel's core i5 quadcore processor running at 2.66Hz. The Core i5 has 8MB of L3 cache which is shared among the processing cores.

The Core i5 has a featured technology called Turbo Boost. If an application is not using a lot of the core, the cores that are not being used will shut off, and the active ones will speed up. This allows the processor to run up to 20% faster under heavy work loads.

With the Core i5 iMac and the 2.8GHz Core i7 iMac, Apple has not just blurred the line between consumer and professional systems, but almost totally erased it. The 2.66Hz Core i5 iMac offers faster performance at most tasks than the 2.66GHz Quad-Core Mac Pro. The Core i5 iMac also has more memory and more storage while being $500 less than the 2.66GHz Quad-Core Mac Pro plus with the Core i5 iMac you get a 27 inch screen.

Review of Our Portfolio: Nov 30- Dec 4

As of right now, we are ranked 362 out of 965. We have a total equity of $99,511.28. We bought a new stock, Revlon. We bought 780 shares of this stock.Apple went down last week, and Revlon and Microsoft did pretty well, but not enough to make us go up. We are still thinking of a company that we want to short sell.

Sen. Nelson unveils anti-abortion amendment

An article found on Yahoo!Finance explores the issue of abortion. Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska has recently released an amendment to the Senate's health care bill that puts stringent restrictions on abortion coverage. Liberals say they will not support it because it goes beyond current laws. This issue could threaten the passage of the overall health care bill because Nelson says he won't vote for the bill without the abortion language. The amendment made public Monday bars any private insurance company that gets federal money from covering abortions. That would apply to most insurers under the new bill, since they will benefit from new government health subsidies for low-income people.

The Stock Market Nov. 30- Dec.4

The Stock Market for this Week



S&P500: The S&P500 started with 1,091.07 on Monday. It close on Friday with 1,105.98. It seem that Thursday was there big sale. It open with 1,110.59 ,but closes 1096.92. The S&P500 is like a roller coaster ride. It goes up an down with the stocks.

NASDAQ: The NASDAQ started low but jump right back up for the end of the week. In the beginning of the week started with 2,135.93 and close with 2,194.35. Friday was there great day to sell. It open 2,203.75 and close with 2,194.35. Between the three stock markets, the NASDAQ are doing well for this week.

Dow Jones: The Dow Jones open with 10,309.77 and close with 10,388.90 in the end of the week. In the beginning of the week it started small but it increase by the end of the week. Wends day was their big day for selling. It open with 10,470.44 and ended with 10,452.68.