The Bottom Line: Rules for Stock Market Success

Investor's Business Daily founder William O'Neil offers "20 Rules for Stock Market Success," touted to "materially improve" investment results for self-directed stock investors.

            "It's all about that entrepreneurial spirit," says Investor's Business Daily Vice President Kathleen Sherman. "You can make money if you work hard."

            The rules include:

            · Buy stocks selling at $15 a share or higher;

            · Learn how to read the charts in the daily;

            · Consider stocks only when earnings have grown 25 percent or more in the recent quarter;

            · Buy when market indexes are moving up and selling for cash when market indexes have gone down for five or more days;

            · Buy mostly in the daily's top six tracked industry sectors, which in October were 1) photography equipment and related leisure industries, 2) airline transportation, 3) clothing manufacturing, 4) magazine media, 5) computer networking and 6) supermarkets and mini-market chains;

            · Cut losses when a stock drops 8 percent below your purchase price. This would be your stop-loss point. 

            You'll find all the rules at Investor's Business Daily's website , investors.com, now offering a two-week free trial to new investors.

            "It's really a shame that if you don't prepare yourself for what the market does, you have a lot of potential to loose your money," Sherman says. "On the other hand, it's so helpful to people when they realize there really are some rules and if a stock goes down more than 7 points, they know what to do."