Kass: On Cassandras and Pollyannas

Extreme views can be appropriate at rare points in time, but they are generally bad bets. In reality, few (if any) can pick the tops and bottoms with any certainty. Importantly, it is a rarity when one's top or bottom calling is a profitable endeavor. Rather, stick with some basic tenets for investment success. They always (regardless of bull or bear) remain the same. But a warning: They are simple to articulate and write down but often hard to execute:

• Stay permanently flexible.
• Stop your losses.
• Let your profits run.

Of course, there are other foundations to successful portfolio management, but that's for another time.

Doug Kass writes daily for RealMoney Silver, a premium bundle service from TheStreet.com. For a free trial to RealMoney Silver and exclusive access to Mr. Kass's daily trading diary, please click here.

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Know What You Own: Goldman Sachs operates in the diversified investments industry, and some of the other stocks in its field include Morgan Stanley (MS), CME Group (CME) and NYSE Euronext (NYX). General Electric operates as a conglomerate, and some other conglomerates include United Technologies (UTX) and 3M (MMM). For more on the value of knowing what you own, visit TheStreet.com's Investing A-to-Z section.

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