Help with investing

Alright I know there have been investment threads before, but bare with me.

Alright so I have alittle over a thousand dollars sitting in my savings account (just a "Keep the change" account from bank of america)

After researching alittle bit it looks like either an ing savings account or six month cd's are probably my best opition given my lack of experience with the stock market and that I don't know when I will need this money. I keep enough in my checking account to pay my bills and leave me some entertainment money, but things come up and cars break down so long term investments probably arin't for me right now.

Dose anyone have any advice as to which rout I should go (ing or cd's or both) or anyother ideas? I hate to have the money just sitting there doing nothing.

Thanks in advance for your opinions and suggestions.

maybe look into buying some etf's?

[quote51f466b169="FreeEnterprize Joe"]Buy Gold & Short the Market. Dollar is inflating, so precious metals are rising. Only 4 companies keeping the market up these days are Google, Apple, Amazon & [b51f466b169]some other one[/b51f466b169]... recession is in the making. Just wait until the federal reserve cuts interest rates again... watch gold fly up..[/quote51f466b169]

Berkshire Hathaway? Microsoft?

[quote7642bdf8e3="JordanE"]After researching alittle bit it looks like either an ing savings account or six month cd's are probably my best opition given my lack of experience with the stock market and that I don't know when I will need this money. I keep enough in my checking account to pay my bills and leave me some entertainment money, but things come up and cars break down so long term investments probably arin't for me right now.[/quote7642bdf8e3]
That's the smart way to go. Unless you find ways to minimize transaction costs (to free), trading stocks/commodities with a grand is not very practical.

Here's a thread from slickdeals where they discuss various high yield savings accounts like ING
http//forums2.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=24167&t=582973[]http//forums2.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=24167&t=582973

It should point you in the direction you want to go.

I know this is going to bring controversy but Chinese stocks are something to look at. Something that will not do very well here will do well there. They are very volatile but the more the better ). Here are a couple of thoughts

In order to drink the tap water in China, you have to boil it because it is so gross. With the Chinese middle class growing at an astronomical rate (66M a few years ago is expected to be ~350M in 2010), people will be able to buy more bottled water. A purified water company is something to look into.

Another thing is meat processing, pork especially. Pork is the meat of choice by a long shot in China. 80% of the meat in China is sold in a wet market (street vendors, meat hooks, etc) and 20% is processed in a modern facility and sold in supermarkets (like we have here). Like I said earlier, the middle class is growing fast so people will be able to spend a little bit more on meat that will not make them sick. The government is pushing this initiative and trying to swap the percentages around. Zhongpin, Inc is a meat processing company to look into (http//caps.fool.com/Ticker/ZHNP.OB.aspx).

Those are just two examples. It really all depends on how much risk you like.

[quoteeb0b25e716="FreeEnterprize Joe"]Buy Gold & Short the Market. Dollar is inflating, so precious metals are rising. ... watch gold fly up..[/quoteeb0b25e716]

Should have read "d00d you should speculate in gold. It has been going up, so obviously it will keep going up! Following this wise advice worked great in 1980, so why wouldn't it work today?! Plus, short the market. Obviously it is going down, and no sophisticated investors short the market, so you can do this before the fears of a recession are even priced into the market!! Then, since the dollar has been falling, it will obviously keep falling, since these trends tend to last forever. Soon this the U.S. dollar will be worth as much as a confederate dollar during the civil war, and gold will keep shooting up, and you will soon have 1,000,000,000,000 dollars worth zero $0 in todays dollars. GO GO GO! HURRY! INVEST IN GOLD NOW!!!!!"

[quote4c336d9bde="tracemhunter"]I know this is going to bring controversy but Chinese stocks are something to look at. Something that will not do very well here will do well there. They are very volatile but the more the better ). Here are a couple of thoughts

In order to drink the tap water in China, you have to boil it because it is so gross. With the Chinese middle class growing at an astronomical rate (66M a few years ago is expected to be ~350M in 2010), people will be able to buy more bottled water. A purified water company is something to look into.

Another thing is meat processing, pork especially. Pork is the meat of choice by a long shot in China. 80% of the meat in China is sold in a wet market (street vendors, meat hooks, etc) and 20% is processed in a modern facility and sold in supermarkets (like we have here). Like I said earlier, the middle class is growing fast so people will be able to spend a little bit more on meat that will not make them sick. The government is pushing this initiative and trying to swap the percentages around. Zhongpin, Inc is a meat processing company to look into (http//caps.fool.com/Ticker/ZHNP.OB.aspx).

Those are just two examples. It really all depends on how much risk you like.[/quote4c336d9bde]

It also depends on if this information is "undiscovered" and "not-public" and if you believe in an efficient market, in the sense that it is not possible to consistently earn above-average returns in a predictable manner time-after-time. Buying pork because demand in China will increase the demand for pork and profits of the companies is like buying health care companies because obviously the baby boomers are getting older and they will need health related products. This may have been helpful years ago before everyone had "discovered" the tend, but I don't think it is helpful now.

[quote9684b1b2cd="hehehhehe"][quote9684b1b2cd="JordanE"]After researching alittle bit it looks like either an ing savings account or six month cd's are probably my best opition given my lack of experience with the stock market and that I don't know when I will need this money. I keep enough in my checking account to pay my bills and leave me some entertainment money, but things come up and cars break down so long term investments probably arin't for me right now.[/quote9684b1b2cd]
That's the smart way to go. Unless you find ways to minimize transaction costs (to free), trading stocks/commodities with a grand is not very practical.

Here's a thread from slickdeals where they discuss various high yield savings accounts like ING
http//forums2.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=24167&t=582973[]http//forums2.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=24167&t=582973

It should point you in the direction you want to go.[/quote9684b1b2cd]

I agree with this post.

One, you don't have a lot to invest. And two, you are not looking for a long-term investment because you want liquidity. Obviously you can sell your stock anytime, that isn't the problem. The problem is having to sell because you need money this week and the CEO has just quit and the stock is down 20% but you KNOW it will be back up eventually. You don't wanna be forced into selling at any time based on exogenous information. For this reason, I recommend a high-yield savings account. I use citibank for mine, but there are higher rates elsewhere. Don't waste your time cashing rates though, this is only helpful if you have a large some of cash.

Gigante pretty much nailed it on the head in my opinion. I've been reading books on the stock market for the past month or two. A great one to start out with is the official dummies guide by Paul Mladjenovic in my opinion. It gives you a strong foundation on a lot of the terms and etc. It won't teach you any secrets but it will make you realize what's right for you. (It talks about bonds, commodities, and stocks).

Book link

http//www.amazon.com/Investing-Dummies-Business-Personal-Finance/dp/0764599038/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-1643029-9760165?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1194229462&sr=8-1

A lot of financial magazines have investment guides to help you get started. In the form of a questionaire it will eveluateyour investment timeline, tolerance to risk and so on.

Most repuatable financial website will have these guides too.