Finally Sold My Position in Dell

I used to be a big fan of Dell (DELL) which was a horrible mistake on my part. Nevertheless, any investor will have good ideas and dumb ideas. This was a dumb one.

I initially bought Dell in late 2005 around $30.50 a share and rode it all the way down to $8 earlier this year. When you’re down that much, the temptation is to say “Screw this” and sell out at any price. Fortunately, I fought that and held on for a bit more.

I decided to come up with a fair price and wait until Dell came within range. The fair price I chose was $15 a share. The stock recently hit it though I held out for a little more and sold today at $17.

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It’s easy to talk about your winners but I wanted to share some of my big losers as well. Still, the lesson is the same and that’s not to let your emotions get the best of you.

Comments

[Graham and ...:]

OK, I bought it at 10 and sold it at 13. I was a "winner," but sold too soon.

This highlights the strengths and weaknesses of the Graham and Dodd methodology: Buy "right," but sell "too soon."

Sep 17 11:12 AM

[rkiss:]

I have shares of Dell with a cost basis of $32.23 and will patiently hold on to them in hopes of breaking even. I've always been am optimist!

Sep 17 04:59 PM

[Wisdom vs. ...:]

DELL is getting stronger in enterprise by focusing on cloud related goodies, i am not ready to change my sell thoughts, but keeping an eye on it, def would not short it

Sep 18 12:01 PM

[Hayweed:]

Dell is in slow growth mode and the deal to buy Perot today signals that. Question is how much longer will Dell make the hardware as they try to transition to a services company like IBM. Problem I see is that this appears to be a catch up play. HP gets EDS so Dell buys Perot. HP got a market leader and Dell got an also ran.

Sep 21 11:00 AM