Market and Economic Meltdown? Keep things in perspective.....

I am not excited about what is happening in the economy right now.....but if you read my BLOG for a while, you know I have been jittery about it for a while.

But not everything is doom and gloom.....we have to appreciate the gains we still have from our past positions. I have an example below of some stock I bought after my Vonage Meltdown.

I bought $3000 in Vonage stock thinking it was the next best thing since sliced bread....and Vonage just kept messing up the parade......the result....it's value fell to $2000 where I got out.

I bought the stocks below...and even after a 10% fall yesterday alone, I still have a hansome profit. (if i sell that is)

Check it out: (I wish the rest of my 401K did this well though)

Unrealized Positions for *******

As of: 01/21/2008

Created: 1/22/2008 8:12:39 PM

LONG INVESTMENTS		SHARES	COST/ SHARE	TOTAL COST	CLOSING PRICE	CLOSING MKT. VALUE	SHORT TERM GAIN/LOSS	LONG TERM GAIN/LOSS	% CHANGE
CHINA UNICOM (CHU)		99	10.8707	1,076.20	22.49	2,226.51		1,150.31	106.89
ISHARES FTSE/XINHUA CHINA (FXI)		11	95.3864	1,049.25	156.94	1,726.34		677.09	64.53
			Total	2,125.45		3,952.85		1,827.40	85.98

Decisions, Decisions.....leave my reliable Vonage to save money with Skype?

What to do...what to do?

I am a very happy Vonage customer of about 9 months or so, and the cost of Vonage actually lowered our phone bill in half or MORE. (and gave us a much better calling area all at the same time)

You see we have cell phones, so we took our long distance phone service off our phone. With long distance, our phone was running about $100 per month. When we took the long distance company off...it went down to about $50 per month.

When we went to Vonage, I believe the fee went to $24.95 per month and this included unlimited local and long distance calling! (after all the government taxes and fees, I think we are looking at about $29 per month)

So my first thought is to drop down to the 500 minute a month plan which drops the cost to $14.95 per month.....but then this Skype plan shows up which blows that right out of the water.

Yes, the $14.95 per YEAR Skype plan is only a first year offer.....and only good until January 31st...but then it only goes up to $29.95 per year....still a huge savings!

I have used Skype from my computer and spoken to people all around the world...and there have been times when it was a bit choppy, but I would say that it has been perfect about 90% of the time. (Vonage has been perfect just about every time.....no issues)

Yes, it means investing in new hardware to route the Skype packets. (I don't think the Vonage router is going to be configurable....I am not sure) The cost benefit analysis should be quite simple. I will be paying about $1.25 per month for Skype vs say $14.95 per month if I cut back to the 500 minute Vonage plan. If the hardware required for the Skype upgrade costs $250, the $13.70 per month saving will pay for the hardware in 18 months. (about 9 months if I compare Skype to my current $24.95 per month plan)

I guess it is not rocket science. I actually think I might just go for the less expensive Vonage plan..unless I can score the Skype router hardware for less. (which I think is possible) At that point, Skype sounds like the way to go!

Anyone out there have Skype experience...more than me? What do you think?

Half of my VG turns into CHU!

<<================>>



Well, about two months ago I decided I wanted to think about getting rid of my Vonage stock. I started by setting up a Scottrade Account ($7 internet trades) and having my Vonage stock transfered there. Then I sat and waited for the stock to rise a bit.

I had bought the stock at something like $9.00 a share when I thought it was an absolutely great buy. I do honestly believe that VoiP is the wave of the future, and I thought that Vonage was going to cash in on it by being there FIRST and biggest in the market. (They may still do that, but given their current state of disfavor, I don't think the stock is going up very soon.)

But at about the time I invested, the IPO buyers were all bent out of shape because they felt that had been taken. Then there were bits of bad news about companies takign Vonage to court for patent infringment, and several other negative news things came up...the stock quickly tanked to below $7.00 a share.

I still think Vonage is an OK company, but people think of it as a damaged stock....so I wanted out. But what to buy?

I started looking around, and I was always taught to invest in things you understand and believe in. In my travels, I have heard the stories of how the cell phone will be the dominent "appliance" in the world...NOT the computer. I thought of growing areas....and India and China came to mind. So I searched for mobile phone telecommunications companies there...and found good things being said about China Unicom LTD (CHU) and China Mobile Limited (CHL).

CHL is a big player, and CHU the smaller....and people were saying good things about both. I decided to sell half my VG and buy CHU, and I never looked back. (I liked the numbers behind CHU a bit more, but both seem like interesting companies.)

I sold the VG at about $7.20/share and bought the CHU for about $10.25/share. The VG has since sunk to about $6.56/share, and CHU is up to $11.49/share. I missed the latest high with VG, and should have just sold it all rather than being greedy. Next time is goes up, I'm out of VG for good!