This is one of the questions that Im asked the most and its an answer that I like to answer in two ways.
The more technical or objective way to answer it is to compare your performance to something concrete. For example the market average in your own country. For us here in Australia its the All Ordinaries index which has returned well over 40% in the last few years and has averaged over 10 percent per year over the last 25 years. If you havent made a return of at least this rate then you havent performed at a satisfactory level. I know its a fairly cold way of looking at things but thats the facts.
So consider this, it is a well known fact that 70% of fund managers dont actually beat the market average. However, being an individual investor and not faced with the same constraints you should comfortably be beating this average to consider yourself successful.
How do I beat the average you ask well theres a very logical answer to this question. It comes from three very important characteristics of any share.
Firstly, the share should be a leading company within the industry. For example within the top 100 largest companies. Those with a proven...