Workshop Portfolio

<FOOLISH WORKSHOP>

Most Appearances

by David Forrest (workshop@fool.com)

Fargo, ND (Feb. 19, 1999) -- Hey, Fools! Happy weekend to you all. As promised last week, I went on the experimentation trail this week and tried to put together a mock portfolio that would isolate those stocks that appeared the most times in the weekly rankings. The underlying logic here is that stocks that appear on a lot of different radar screens might be decent performers, as Dell Computer (Nasdaq: DELL) was for 1998.

Here's exactly what I did. I used a pseudo Dozens model, adding stocks just once a month. Each month (the first ranking of the month), I allocated $1000 fake bucks and bought as much as I could of the appropriate company at the day's closing price.

There were two caveats. First, a stock had to appear in at least half of the screens to be considered (4 of 8 last year). Second, I didn't buy something I already owned. These two conditions gave us two months without stocks to buy, which is just fine. Also, if there was a tie, I split the $1000 up and bought proper amounts of each stocks. (There was actually one month where 4 stocks were bought!) Okay, here is what was bought, and when, in this model portfolio:

1998
January 9 - Dell Computer (Nasdaq:DELL)

February 6 - ICN Pharm (NYSE: ICN), Alaska Air (NYSE: ALK)

March 6 - Best Buy (NYSE: BBY), Whole Foods (Nasdaq: WFMI)

April 3 - HBO & Co. (Nasdaq: HBOC) [now McKesson (NYSE: MCK)], PeopleSoft (Nasdaq: PSFT)

May 1 - No addition

June 5 - Lowes (NYSE: LOW), Gap Stores (NYSE: GPS)

July 3 - No addition

August 7 - Lexmark Intl. (NYSE: LXK), Recoton (Nasdaq: RCOT), Staples (Nasdaq: SPLS)

September 4 - Symbol Tech (NYSE: SBL), Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT)

October 2 - EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC)

November 6 - Aegon (NYSE: AEG), Biogen (Nasdaq: BGEN), Paychex (Nasdaq: PAYX), Quicksilver (NYSE: ZQK)

December 4 - Solectron (NYSE: SLR)

The results are pretty impressive. To date, the "Most Appearances" portfolio is up 58.50% versus the Standard & Poor's 500 Index, which is up 18.19% in the same period. That said, I have not added in the new stocks for January and February yet. I'll do that soon and get back to you all in next week's report. In the meantime, I'd be interested in anyone's thoughts on this out on the message boards [web link].

Take care,

Bogey

Check out the latest file updates for the Workshop:
New Rankings | Workshop Returns


Workshop Portfolio


9/28/01 as of ~5:30:00 PM EDT

Ticker Company Price
Change		 Daily Price
% Change		 Price
AETAETNA INC NEW0.943.36%28.94
BABOEING CO(1.04)(3.02%)33.36
CATCATERPILLAR INC1.112.53%44.91
COGCABOT OIL & GAS 'A'0.693.59%19.90
DDDU PONT (EI) DE NEMOURS0.992.74%37.14
DGXQUEST DIAGNOSTICS(0.45)(0.73%)61.42
EKEASTMAN KODAK0.421.31%32.49
GMGENERAL MOTORS1.393.38%42.55
LHLABORATORY CORP AMER HLDG(NEW)1.141.42%81.21
MOPHILIP MORRIS COS(0.76)(1.55%)48.24
NEWPNEWPORT CORP0.261.90%13.97
NVRNVR INC(0.54)(0.38%)140.41
PKXPOHANG IRON & STEEL ADS1.097.51%15.61
PVNPROVIDIAN FINANCIAL1.075.64%20.04
QCOMQUALCOMM INC(0.40)(0.84%)47.16
RJRRJ REYNOLDS TOBACCO HLDGS(0.69)(1.19%)57.31
SLESARA LEE CORPUnchg.Unchg.21.09
UNFIUNITED NATURAL FOODS0.563.18%18.15
WMIWASTE MANAGEMENT(0.01)(0.04%)26.74

Overall Return -- total % Gained (Lost)
  Day Week Month Year
To Date		 Since
Inception
(12/24/1998)
Workshop1.30%7.32%(12.02%)(20.66%)(18.91%)
Comparable S&P 500n/an/an/an/a(19.07%)
S&P 500 (DA)1.95%7.48%(8.33%)(21.22%)(14.88%)
NASDAQ2.02%4.71%(17.46%)(39.68%)(31.41%)
DJIA (DA)1.68%7.07%(11.07%)(17.86%)(2.22%)

Internal Rate of Return -- Annualized Rate of % Gained (Lost)
  Since Inception (12/24/1998)
Workshop(17.62%)
vs. S&P 500(17.63%)

Trade Date # Shares Ticker Cost/Share Price Total % Ret
1/8/0126MO40.9448.2417.82%
1/8/0122RJR50.1057.3114.39%
1/8/0167UNFI16.4518.1510.34%
12/24/9824CAT43.0844.914.24%
1/8/018NVR136.63140.412.77%
1/8/0140WMI27.4426.74(2.54%)
1/8/0150SLE22.5421.09(6.42%)
1/8/0161PKX17.8315.61(12.46%)
1/8/0115DD48.8337.14(23.95%)
1/8/0129AET38.1728.94(24.19%)
1/8/0139COG28.7519.90(30.79%)
1/8/0114QCOM75.5447.16(37.57%)
1/8/018LH134.6981.21(39.70%)
12/27/9918GM73.2642.55(41.92%)
1/8/0118BA59.5333.36(43.96%)
1/8/019DGX114.4961.42(46.35%)
12/27/9920EK65.0932.49(50.08%)
1/8/0120PVN55.5020.04(63.89%)
1/8/0115NEWP74.9613.97(81.36%)

Trade Date # Shares Ticker Total Cost Current Value Total Gain
1/8/0126MO$1,064.50$1,254.24$189.74
1/8/0122RJR$1,102.25$1,260.82$158.57
1/8/0167UNFI$1,102.12$1,216.05$113.93
12/24/9824CAT$1,034.00$1,077.84$43.84
1/8/018NVR$1,093.00$1,123.28$30.28
1/8/0140WMI$1,097.50$1,069.60($27.90)
1/8/0150SLE$1,126.88$1,054.50($72.38)
1/8/0161PKX$1,087.75$952.21($135.54)
1/8/0115DD$732.50$557.10($175.40)
1/8/0129AET$1,107.00$839.26($267.74)
1/8/0139COG$1,121.37$776.10($345.28)
1/8/0114QCOM$1,057.62$660.24($397.39)
1/8/018LH$1,077.50$649.68($427.82)
1/8/0118BA$1,071.50$600.48($471.02)
1/8/019DGX$1,030.44$552.78($477.66)
12/27/9918GM$1,318.62$765.90($552.73)
12/27/9920EK$1,301.75$649.80($651.95)
1/8/0120PVN$1,110.00$400.80($709.20)
1/8/0115NEWP$1,124.37$209.55($914.83)
 
Cash: 
Total: 		$10.80
$15,681.03
 

Key
• S&P 500 (DA) = dividend adjusted. Dividends have been added to the total return of the index.
• DJIA (DA) = dividend adjusted. Dividends have been added to the total return of the DJIA.

Note
Note: The Workshop Portfolio was launched on December 24, 1998, with $4,000 which was invested in the Foolish Four strategy. Approximately $15,000 was added on January 8, 2001, to support five additional mechanical strategies. At that time approximately $1000 was transfered out of the Foolish Four strategy to bring the Foolish Four into balance with the other strategies. (That's why the Foolish Four's overall return is not consistent with stock values.) Such rebalancing will take place each year among the strategies so that each will start out with approximately the same value at the begining of the year. No more cash additions are planned. The first four tables above show the overall performance of the portfolio. Below that we also track the performance of each component strategy. All transactions are announced publicly before being made, and returns are compared daily to the S&P 500 and the Dow. (Dividends are included in the yearly, historic and annualized returns.) Stocks are chosen using strategies developed by the Workshop community.