Apprenticed Investor: Trading Diary, Part II

If you manage your own assets, knowing how well you did -- or didn't do -- is crucial to your success. To do this, you need a reliable method to measure yourself. Some of you may discover that it's cheaper, more tax-efficient, to simply index; you may ultimately generate better returns by avoiding stock selection and market-timing altogether.

But before you can make that decision, you need to know, in the immortal words of former NYC mayor Ed Koch, "How'm I doing?"

Last week we reviewed the importance of memorializing what you were thinking when you bought a stock. This week, let's figure out how well you are doing with what you purchased. ...