Luck is gambling.

For someone trading long term, that is good advice.

@Archeus_Lore I was in the market until it reached 17,500 and sold it all and bought rentals, silver and gold. The metal was just for emergency but I cashed in all the silver because I couldn't turn down the price. Precious metals move on politics as much as the market but doesn't have the bottom, ie. I bought gold at $1230 and it hasn't dropped much lower since. Right now the price is going up on the instability of the president. It only going to get better. I think. The market is at least 15% over value, more to some, they aren't making things anymore just making money off their money, that's unsustainable.

As I understand it, Russia and China are buying gold too, more so than normal.

been doing well with gold bullion & precious metals mutual funds this yr. who knows how long this will last. i had a PM fund about 20 yrs ago that increased 153% in one year. unlikely to happen again, but who knows?

@callmedubious you were probably smart enough to diversify, good call. I only have a few ounces of gold left, my safety net. Every part of my body screams "buy silver", but it's high now. It is my belief that the economy is teetering on the brink, while I said a 15% adjustment is probable, with Trump I would guess 30% is not a stretch. Step lightly.

@clarkatticus ,
i have about 50% cash & 20% in PMs. i have never felt more confident about the PMs increasing in value but i'm now too old to make big bets.

@callmedubious I hear ya, scares the hell out of me too. My old girlfriend is heavily into Tesla, bought in at around $140 so she's still good, but wow, I'd be shakin' like a dog crapping chicken bones.

I can give you some very good suggestions . . . the platform I use now is ThinkorSwim. You can download it, then it allows you to "Paper trade" . . . which is simulated trading, not using your money and risking it, but learning how to use the platform.
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For trading, I consider my main influencers to be Thomas Bulkowski [thepatternsite.com] because he uses STATISTICS . . . if you trade using statistics, you may occasionally make mistakes, but you will make money.
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Secondly, I consider Gerald Loeb to have been a pretty big influence, with his way-out-of-date book "The Battle For Investment Survival", it is a small, but gawdawful book to read, but what I took away from it was that for one, investing long term is for people who follow the crowd, and if you follow the crowd, there is a pretty good chance you will lose money. Additionally to that, Loeb also says that you should not limit your expectations on how much you can make . . . go for maximum return. Because he was around during the Great Depression, he understood how people who invest long term can get screwed in a very bad way. The book is horrible to have to read, because it is so out-of-date, but it has some gems in it. That does not mean you need to read it, my synopsis of it may be sufficient.
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With the ThinkorSwim platform, the best way to learn is use their tutorials and youtube . . . if you have a particular thing in mind that you want to learn, you can get on youtube, plug in the keywords, and usually you will find a tutorial for it.
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I use statistics and the Williams%R indicator (created by Larry Williams) a lot.
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If you want to learn to trade well, you study the masters.

@Archeus_Lore sounds like I've got a lot of reading to do.

@Archeus_Lore ,
as W. Churchill said: " there are lies, damned lies & statistics."

Churchill was no trader. Flip a coin 10,000 times and the statistics will tell you the probability of each outcome. Math does not lie, humans lie. Believe what you want to believe, let some random outcome decide for you. I'll use the statistics.

buy a precious metals ETF or mutual fund. sprott fund a canadian fund listed in the US holds gold & silver bullion. if you have the nerve make an initial investment & then buy the dips. govts/central banks are in the process of trying to trash their currencies on a race to the bottom which puts real interest rates into negative return territory which has to benefit gold since it is an asset that has only increased in value over the millenia. there will be a time to sell. that's the tricky part.

If you feel you really want to jump in, learn the lingo, diversity, mutuals, index funds (my favorite) and indicators like debt ratio, margin and revenue stream. Check each potential buy with their Morningstar rating then their 10 year history. It is important to understand WHAT you are buying. Never guess because even with the best of knowledge it's still a bit of a crap shoot. I went all in after Obama was elected, the market was at 6500, any lower and money would mean nothing anyway so it only had up to go. I bet heavily on Fortune 500 Index funds and several small caps, bought into BofA when it was under $10. That set of indicators will never happen again. If you can wait till there is a market correction, go in just after and pick up the low-hanging fruit, all stocks will tank but some for no good reason, building materials companies, hiring companies and large contractors will be first to come back, the Democrats will pass an infrastructure bill shortly after the next election. Stay away from auto companies if you want to sleep.

@clarkatticus question: ten year history of what?

@callmedubious silver is interesting!

@Donna_I stock price, and earnings