The Rule Breaker Portfolio contained, at its launch date on August
4, 1994, an initial amount of $50,000. Some people invest more and many people
invest less. We chose $50,000 because it represents a middle territory for
our readership. Anyway, it's also a solid amount for keeping commission costs
down, and enables one to diversify enough (holding about 12 stocks--who would
want to diversify further?). Please keep in mind, dear Fools, that commissions
can really hurt equities investors who invest $10,000 or less, sufficiently
diversified. If you have further questions about this, please go directly
to our Fool's School -- and do NOT collect $200 -- and read our
13 Steps to Investing Foolishly. We wrote
those articles to help all people in all situations.
The Portfolio's allocation loosely conforms to the writings in our book,
and our Fool's School. (You can read more in
The Twelfth Step of our Investing Foolishly
series.) Essentially, we plant our foundations with the Dow Dividend Approach,
mix in some medium- and small-cap growth companies, and occasionally sprinkle
on a short sale or two. In the past, some of our best stocks have done
sufficiently well to overweight them in our portfolio -- that's OK, because
that's part of the idea. We ride our winners. The point is to look at the
initial amounts we put in any stock, because that was the "portfolio allocation"
model that we intended -- we never load up disproportionately on any one
stock, and suggest you shouldn't either. It's unFoolish.