The Realities Of Market Timing Without timing, the movements of the market may seem possible to understand. Every day, innumerable explanations of every blip are published and broadcast on television, radio, in magazines and newspapers and on the Internet. Economic and market trends often persist, and thus they seem at least slightly rational. But all that changes when you begin timing your investments. Unless you developed your timing models yourself and you understand them intimately, or unless you are the one crunching the numbers every day, you won't know how those systems actually work. [More] The Realities Of Market Timing Now imagine that you write each return on a card, put all the cards in a hat and start drawing the cards at random. And imagine that you start with a pile of poker chips. Whenever you draw a positive return, you receive more chips. But when your return is negative, you have to give up some of your chips to *the bank* in this game. If the first half-dozen cards you draw are all positive, you'll feel pretty confident. And you'll expect the good times to continue. [More] When to invest in the Stock Market Is really not as important as to how you invest in the stock market. And how you invest in the stock market should take into consideration what goals you are setting for that stock market investment. For example, are you investing for capital appreciation or for income through dividend paying stocks? Or is the investment in the stock market for the combination of both capital appreciation and dividend income? Are you investing through a Mutual fund(s) or selecting your own individual stocks? [More] Diversification For Children After reading a comment by Single Ma not long ago, I realized that it would be a great idea to distill some of the more basic ideas about investing down to a simple level so that even a small child could understand them and not become bored at the idea of investing in the stock [...]. "You will be astounded by what your children are being taught in school!" You will be astounded by what your children are being taught in school! TIBB - TIB Financial Corp. Announces Stock Split Yesterday (09/27/06) TIBB - TIB Financial Corp. announced a 2 for 1 stock split payable October 24, 2006. Its shares closed today at $31.90, down $0.10 (-0.31%). This stock is not optionable and has an average daily trading volume of about 2,412 shares..