What is your profession/career?

[born2invest]

Are you working in the finance and investments field or is it on the side to your full time job/business in another industry?

I work in freight forwarding import/export.

[Snow Leopard]

I am a Software Engineer who 'retired' 20 months ago.

Best Wishes
Paper Tiger

[lou]

Accountant

[Jay]

In the finance industry, but nothing to do with Investing/Shares etc

[CJ]

I work in the Finance team at a large company but nothing to do with Investing/Shares.

[Kaspar]

Are you working in the finance and investments field or is it on the side to your full time job/business in another industry?

I work in freight forwarding import/export.

Digital media sales. I have been contemplating a change for a while now, what's freight forwarding like? what sort of qualifications are needed or what skill sets are ideal?

[POSSUM THE CAT]

Having a great time in retirement

[Minerbarejet]

Tired Construction Camp Supervisor, Meat Grader and Wood Turner:)
not all at once

[CJ]

Tired Construction Camp Supervisor, Meat Grader and Wood Turner:)
not all at onceRetired or just tired?

[Minerbarejet]

Retired or just tired?
Both, -now employed as dishwasher, lawnmower and woodchopper, unpaid.:(

[Baaarney]

Civil/transport engineer for a small consultancy. So almost no relationship to finance and investments

[born2invest]

what's freight forwarding like? what sort of qualifications are needed or what skill sets are ideal?

I enjoy it. It keeps me very busy and is non stop.

High school qualification will do. You need to be able to work under pressure, think quickly, be good with people. It's not rocket science.

[born2invest]

Interesting, so everyone here has a profession outside of investments.

[Mista_Trix]

I'm an E-learning Instructional Designer

[JBmurc]

Fisherman / Share Trader (more fishing in summer more trading in winter)

[percy]

I sell books to school and small public libraries.Mainly end of lines.Iam self employed and work from home,.I cover most of the South Island from Dunedin upwards.I sell ex van.Started out part-time but got out of control,so do it full time.I source my books from Auckland publishers/book suppliers.I have been doing it for about 25 years and still love it.Best job in NZ.
The sharemarket is my hobby.

[Lizard]

Once worked as a Food Technologist in QA, R&D, Project Management. Began investing as an at-home mother of 3 in 1996. These days I'm doing all sorts of bits and pieces in a small branch of a commercial flooring business.

I tried for a while to stay home and trade/invest "full-time" while the kids were at school, but found there was too much expectation from children/husband/mother/school that I was available to do anything and everything that nobody else wanted to do... so I have taken refuge in part time work and squeeze investing in around the edges. I would possibly make more money if I spent more time at home investing, but seem to remember it as pretty lonely and lacking in fulfilment. Then again, maybe that was because it was 2007-2008 when investing wasn't much fun anyway!:) Though I did manage to learn the violin to grade 3, tried jazz dance and even went to the gym regularly, so it wasn't all dull.

[peat]

A few years ago I stopped being a sysadmin in the IT industry to study towards being a financial advisor. after I completed my diploma I have been loss adjusting Chch EQ business interruption insurance claims.
I finished that a few weeks ago

[RRR]

I am a GP.

[Grimy]

Motorcycle Mechanic. Spent a few years overseas as a tutor in India. Now in the technical department for a NZ distributor.

[Stranger_Danger]

I own, run and invest in private businesses in a range of sectors, as well as invest more passively, such as in listed businesses.

[Vaygor1]

Engineering Manager looking after 200 multi-disciplined engineers & designers...mainly building offshore oil rigs.
Currently living in South East Asia.

[Lizard]

Do some consulting in Flori-culture (Phalaenopsis) and other varieties within the green house sector as well as in field crop management.

That should be going well - I can't believe how many Phalaenopsis I have managed to kill! Going to have to go back to the African violets and Christmas Cactus - the two things I actually managed to inherit in my life :).

[D B Cooper]

I am a Chartered Accountant who works in Private Equity

[Fred114]

I am a stay at home dad, casualised school teacher, attempting academia, musician, and much else besides....very lucky......

[JPW]

Financial Services

[RazorX]

Accounting technician in a small public accounting firm.

[bmrm]

Financial Analyst.

[bmrm]

Given the flack FAs get in this site - I must say I'm really looking forward to your posts. :)

Haha thanks, I'm not really the traditional sort, I work in intel/forensics.

[ScrappyO]

Self Employed Electrician.

[born2invest]

Do you think your profession therefore creates your investment "circle of competence" ?

From my work in logisitcs and transport I'm therefore more informed on the likes of Port of Tauranga, Mainfreight, CTI Logistics, Royal Wolf Holdings, etc than the average person.

I'm finding it quite difficult to increase my circle of competence outside of really basic and easy to understand businesses.

For example, I've itentified NIB Holdings (health insurance) and Mermaid Marine Australia (oil & gas marine services) on the ASX as companies that have good financials. However, I really do not have a thorough understanding of the insurance or oil and gas industries to know if NIB or Mermaid Marine will be a good company in 5 or 10 years or that "edge" that I get from an industry that I understand.

Should I therefore work to increase my circle of competence and train up myself to better understand the ins and outs of the insurance and oil & gas industies or just sit in my comfort zone within transport, logistics, retail, etc.

I read trade journals, reports from oil & gas independent research, university study papers, annual reports of competitors, government research reports, etc on both of these industries but I still can't get my head around and have the confidence to invest in a company in an industry that I don't feel I can predict into the future.

My current holdings are Supply Network Limited (aftermarket truck and bus parts) which I have bought periodically over the past few years and Credit Corp Group (debt collector) which I have held for about 1.5 years. I feel I have a good understanding of the trucking/transport industry hence my investment. I have also had a bit of background in the debt collection industry from working at a retail bank and from observing people spending on credit and being unable to pay it back and from observing my old university friends unable to pay the bills and them teaching me the process they went through.

[buns]

I don't want to drag this away from the topic but this is a good question.

My short answer is, you can look outside your circle of competence.

I believe you only need to grasp the overall, high level, indicators of competitive advantage in that industry and where that is heading over whatever span you are investing. Where you go to the nth degree, you are going to go around in circles, i.e where assumptions are too detailed and could net out with other parts of your valuation/assessment.

General market nous, which you would have gained in any role where there's competition and forces of capitalism will give you the basis to understand what drives most companies. However, certain industry's which are heavily exposed to technology see their competitive advantages whirl wind for all sorts of reasons and those opportunities are best left to ones with detailed knowledge or speculators.

Think about corporate level management, you see CEO's, CFO's and GM's switch between sectors all of the time as general principles apply to most businesses.

You do need to be careful with this. It's easy to read 3-4 articles which all confirm your original belief and convince yourself you understand the company/industry.

[jimmyco]

Mechanical Engineer working in Power Industry. First post - have only recently started investing

[kiora]

Agricultural Services now enjoying extended gap year sic /s > investments include private equity ,farm equity partnerships,listed equities, PIE Fund (thanks to Liz,one of my better investments)

[Dej]

Chemical Engineer for a biofuels company - but a change to be occurring soon!

[iceman]

Interesting reading on this thread ! I am a Commercial deep sea fisherman working overseas.

[lissica]

Emergency doctor in Australia, coming back to NZ end of year.

Would much rather be a molecular biologist, but doesn't pay the bills.

[Huskeez]

Mines in Queensland! Hollllla

[blobbles]

I am a database IT guy and dabble in development in various languages... I see us IT people are well represented!

[tosspot]

Student 2nd year business

[Schrodinger]

Do you think your profession therefore creates your investment "circle of competence" ?

From my work in logisitcs and transport I'm therefore more informed on the likes of Port of Tauranga, Mainfreight, CTI Logistics, Royal Wolf Holdings, etc than the average person.

I'm finding it quite difficult to increase my circle of competence outside of really basic and easy to understand businesses.

For example, I've itentified NIB Holdings (health insurance) and Mermaid Marine Australia (oil & gas marine services) on the ASX as companies that have good financials. However, I really do not have a thorough understanding of the insurance or oil and gas industries to know if NIB or Mermaid Marine will be a good company in 5 or 10 years or that "edge" that I get from an industry that I understand.

Should I therefore work to increase my circle of competence and train up myself to better understand the ins and outs of the insurance and oil & gas industies or just sit in my comfort zone within transport, logistics, retail, etc.

I read trade journals, reports from oil & gas independent research, university study papers, annual reports of competitors, government research reports, etc on both of these industries but I still can't get my head around and have the confidence to invest in a company in an industry that I don't feel I can predict into the future.

My current holdings are Supply Network Limited (aftermarket truck and bus parts) which I have bought periodically over the past few years and Credit Corp Group (debt collector) which I have held for about 1.5 years. I feel I have a good understanding of the trucking/transport industry hence my investment. I have also had a bit of background in the debt collection industry from working at a retail bank and from observing people spending on credit and being unable to pay it back and from observing my old university friends unable to pay the bills and them teaching me the process they went through.

Best advice I can give, is to read everything you can get your hands on relating to business and company news (AFR/Herald/NBR/Sharechat/Economist/ASB Securities etc).

Also building up your personal contacts and talking about the economy within these circle in general will get your knowledge up and therefore you will spot opportunities.

In the end successful investing is about spotting trends and patterns before other people.

[fungus pudding]

Burnt out old residential landlord, who had the good sense to switch to commercial investor - which is a polite way of saying 'don't really do anything'.

[haile]

I'm a GP probably on the verge of burning out. Hopefully will build a big enough portfolio that would allow me to retire early.

[born2invest]

I'm a GP probably on the verge of burning out. Hopefully will build a big enough portfolio that would allow me to retire early.

Why not switch to a career you enjoy more?

What will you do with your time when you "retire"? Don't say sit on the beach and do nothing because you are obviously highly intellectual being a doctor so you will get terribly bored.

[lissica]

I'm a GP probably on the verge of burning out. Hopefully will build a big enough portfolio that would allow me to retire early.

And I'm waiting to get on the GPEP programme because I thought it would make a nice lifestyle change.

[percy]

Been a Glazier for 26 years. Self employed for 12 years. Wife carries out administration side of business. I deal direct with clients, do some adrenalin pumping stuff like debt collecting, yep, chucked in debt collection services 6 years back as I did a better job. Have thought about starting a Debt Collection thread for those who maybe new to business requiring tips or simply for some interesting reading.
Have discussed with other glass business owners (and my own experience) with going into business is you start out busting butt to make cash. Flippin awesome thou, strut around thinking how amazing and hot you are. Constant couple grand cash in wallet. On top of the world.
Time passes and you realise dissatisfaction with making good coin. Working but no joy. Started working on less work and more play time about 7 years back. Is happening and still working on less work more play. Considered going back on wages but that sends a cold shiver down my spine.
The folk I know believe in bricks and mortar.
Have had chat with mate about ShareTrading. Even had discussion with older brother on Gold Coast recently about investing. I wished to get on this discussion as he is filthy rich and I figure he rubs shoulders with those in the know. I told him how I have managed to predict share price movements, he says it cant be done. He believes in fundamentals.
Plenty more cash brings more options:t_up:, plenty play money:t_up:,more stress:t_down: and I place emphasis on more stress:(.

Stress will kill you.
Doing successful investing ON YOUR OWN should go a long way to take stress out of your life.

[slimwin]

Aircraft engineer.A dying industry in NZ i think.

[percy]

I got around that by buying my wife shares in her own name.
You want the cash,sell your shares,but you will not get any more dividends if you have sold them.
Makes out she is not interested in shares,but watches TV news at lunch time,and always says," I see such and such is paying an 8cent divie,I"ave got those havn't I." " Yes dear." !!!!
Happiness without stress.!!
Start her on Meridian.May pay to put them in your name dear?!!

[janner]

I got around that by buying my wife shares in her own name.
You want the cash,sell your shares,but you will not get any more dividends if you have sold them.
Makes out she is not interested in shares,but watches TV news at lunch time,and always says," I see such and such is paying an 8cent divie,I"ave got those havn't I." " Yes dear." !!!!
Happiness without stress.!!
Start her on Meridian.May pay to put them in your name dear?!!

Yes percy.. Good advice.. ( DYOR ). I think Meridian will put many a smile on faces.. For quite some time..

[percy]

[QUOTE=percy;428924]I got around that by buying my wife shares in her own name [QUOTE]

Interesting Percy. Ive been married for who knows how long. My wife is exactly like her mother:( I just adjust to the painful elder life I look forward too:( It will be OK:( I keep repeating this to myself as I know it will be so:( It will be, I just know it will be, I just know in 20 years I will be filthy rich and happy beyond my wildest dreams, I just know it will be, I keep telling myself it will get better, my dream continues:)



Late last year (or earlier this year) my wife and I organised share trading account in her name and sought $120 000 loan from bank to purchase PEN shares at below 2 cents mid year this year based solely on my chart. Timing was perfect but low was just above 2 cents. Decided to chicken out as high risk. My Fib fan chart did not quite play out to perfection. Flippin heck:t_down:. Maybe I yapped on to many forums, with predicting previous mid 5 cent high then hence folk listen to myself and then predicting low mid year folk have taken note resulting in purchases upholding the shareprice above 2 cents. Top 20 holders have massively increased. I did buy late in June based on my timing.

Flip knows...Flip flippin knows.....Should commodities progress in coming months as I expect then------- kaching:t_up: Karlos is rockin and rolling:t_up:

Build your wealth slowing and surely,and you will get to keep it.! Use savings rather than burrowings.
Stress free.!

[amalgam]

Just found this thread
Ive played around on the sharemarket for over 30 years-lots of ups & downs
I retired 12 years ago & now live off investing

[peat]

Just found this thread
Ive played around on the sharemarket for over 30 years-lots of ups & downs
I retired 12 years ago & now live off investing

presumably you used to be a dentist? :confused:

[Dej]

Engineering Manager looking after 200 multi-disciplined engineers & designers...mainly building offshore oil rigs.
Currently living in South East Asia.

Out of interest, which company? I am looking into working in oil and gas currently (im a chemical engineer from auckland university)