When it comes to our investing toolkit, all we really need at our disposal are the hammer and the nail.
In other words, you don't need fancy bells and whistles to find undervalued companies ripe for market-crushing profits.
You don't need a broker who's probably ripping you off, and you especially don't need a Bloomberg terminal that costs $24,000 a year and takes up half your office.
All you need are the basics, most of which are free, publicly available, and right at your fingertips.
That's right: Independent research does it every time.
I've mentioned here before that publicly available 13F filings are one of the best tools retail investors can use to find unreasonably lucrative investment opportunities and gain and hold a profitable, sustainable edge.
I like to dig through these documents filed by money management firms every quarter to see exactly what the Wall Street bigwigs are buying and selling, as well as measure how well they're performing compared to the previous quarter.
By doing that, you get an exact picture of what the best and, let's be honest, worst investors are doing with their clients' funds.
And over my more than 27 years in the markets, I've dug through enough financial filings with my shovel and hard hat in tow to understand the most important lesson in investing…
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