u/DizzyCalligrapher189

Started buying the Alpha Picks names in February, equal weights, about $1,500 each. As of this week that sleeve is down around 14% while my plain index money is up double digits. I know 8 months is nothing and the service says to hold for the long run. I'm not panicking, just reassessing what I pay for.

Premium on its own I actually use. The quant ratings and the dividend grades are a decent first filter, and some of the author articles are really good.

Picks is the part I'm questioning, because what I'm really doing is buying stocks I don't understand on someone else's say so, which is exactly the habit I wanted to break.

For people who have had both for a while, did Picks come good for you over a longer window? Did anyone drop Picks, keep Premium, and choose from the ratings themselves? Or did you move to something else entirely for the research side?

Long term holder, early 30s, not looking for trading tools.

Hi all. I am in my early fifties, and I am slowly moving about 30% of my portfolio into dividend stuff before I go part time in a few years, felt real responsible with a spreadsheet and all. Then I found a 9% yielderr, told myself the market was just sleeping on it and put $18k in.

Two months later they cut the dividend and the price dropped right with it... you can probably guess it was a mortgage REIT..

So my safe income pick lost me the income and a chunk of the principal at the same time, so I can clearly not just sort by yield and buy what looks juicy.

What I'm asking is, what is your "check" that catches things like this before you buy?

I keep reading that I should journal every investment decision. Write down why I bought, what I expected, what would prove me wrong. It sounds smart and I have never once done it consistently (consistently is the key part, I have done it a few times with investments).

Part of me suspects it is one of those things that sounds disciplined but does not actually move the needle, like color-coding a budget. The other part of me suspects I avoid it because reading my own past reasoning would be embarrassing.

For people who genuinely keep a decision log, has it changed how you invest, or is it just a record you feel good about having? And if it has helped, what does yours actually look like? I do not want a complicated system I will abandon in a month.