As with all of our work, we did it in an attempt to amuse and to educate. We also wanted to draw a few lessons that individual investors might find useful in the years ahead. We think you should research and invest in the companies whose products and services you use and can understand. The mistakes we've made in our Motley Fool real-money portfolios generally centered on investing in that which we didn't understand and couldn't easily follow in the years ahead. The investor who researches into and understands the businesses she owns dramatically increases her chances of building wealth with common stocks over the long haul.
Some people think that the IPO market can provide quick and easy money.
We'd suggest they think again. Today, investment firms and the financial media continue to quote opening prices for popular IPOs that do not reflect the prices available to public -market investors. Individual investors need to be very careful of IPOs. Conversely, the initial public offering is the first public trade. These are often quite different prices.