@bengraham Karibu.

I don't think it really matters which label one chooses to wear when investing... because one calls himself a long term investor and makes loses, another is called a speculator and makes profit.... its all about being on the money.

@boris. I think its what PR practitioners call "share of voice". The speculators may seem to be more than the rest because it is essential to them that they track every day movements of share prices and maybe post something about them. But for long term investors the daily movements don't mean as much hence they have less to post about.

But for the wazuans thinking in terms of months, years or even decades I have the words of Nobel Laureate Paul Samuelson to share. "Investing should be boring - more like watching paint dry or watching grass grow. If you want excitement, take $800 and go to Las Vegas"

Imagine if you put a bean in the ground and sat there watching it every day to see it grow? You just have to invest and then let time do its thing

Some of you may know Fidelity Investments which is an American multinational financial services corporation. It is one of the largest mutual fund and financial services groups in the world and manages a large family of mutual funds, provides fund distribution and investment advice services, as well as providing discount brokerage services, retirement services, wealth management, securities execution and clearance, life insurance and a number of other services.

Recently, an internal performance review of Fidelity accounts was conducted to determine which type of investors received the best returns between 2003 and 2013. The customer account audit revealed that the best investors were either dead or inactive—the people who switched jobs and “forgot” about an old account leaving the current options in place, or the people who died and the assets were frozen while the estate handled the assets.

Perhaps there lies a lesson here for those who believe in constant boarding and disembarking of buses at every stage. It may be more exciting and may keep you very busy but you could probably do better to just sit on your hands and do nothing. Am not going to go so far as to suggest that you die for the sake of higher returns though.

I couldnt agree more. Investing in shares should be done passively to realize maximum returns...a few right choices and patience to wait for five years will do the trick...a neighbour bought Ksh 4 million worth of safcom shares in 2013 @Ksh 3. He offloaded all of them recently at Ksh 16.5 and went to coast for a week.