Podcast Episode - When You Should Sell A Stock

Are you making mistakes when you buy a stock?  On this Suze School, Suze explains why a stock's price isn't the only indicator of its value and why investing in a company you don't understand could keep you up at night. Plus, see how the future is already here, in terms of AI and so much more.

Listen to Podcast Episode:

Podcast Transcript:

Suze: August 24, 2025. Welcome everybody to the Women and Money podcast, and I want all of you men out there to hear the next line. Women and Money podcast and Everybody Smart Enough to listen.

You're starting to piss me off, those of you who post on YouTube and everything. I'm a man. Can I listen to this podcast? Can I watch this YouTube? Give me a break. Women and Money and Everybody smart enough to listen. Suze O here, what a way to start, right? I'm feisty today, everybody.

And today is Suze school.

Now, what a week this was. It was a really serious learning week in the stock market, a learning week about what kind of investor are you?

Are you an investor that really belongs in the stock market, or are you somebody who calls yourself an investor, but you, you're not an investor, you're just somebody who wanted to get in on something you bought something and when it starts to go down, you freak out and you sell.

So why am I talking about this? Because it was this last week when all of the AI darlings, all of them went down significantly, but the one that went down the most was my favorite, and you all know what my favorite is, and that was Palantir. It literally went from almost $190 a share all the way up there.

All the way down in like 2 or 3 days to almost 141.

Until it came all the way back and finished on Friday at about 158.

But during that drop, so many of you and all these writers and these interviewers that were calling me saying what do you think about Palantir now, Suze? It's done. It's over. It's are you kidding me?

Are you just kidding me, everybody? Because here's the thing the other day, I was talking to this investment person, a very major person, not Keith, by the way. Keith is too smart to be this dumb, but that's besides the point, and he was telling me about this stock portfolio that they've put together with all these great stocks and everything like that.

And that he literally took all of those stocks and he pass dated them for years to see how would they have done five years ago, four years ago, and so on and so forth.

And I said, and the point is, he said, so it's a really good portfolio, Suze, and what I said to this person was, what the stock has done in the past, does not make it a good stock.

A good stock is a good stock regardless of price.

The price of a stock does not determine if it's good or not. Is Palantir good when it's at 190? Is it bad when it's at 158?

So you have to stop looking at the price of a stock to determine if you are going to buy it or not or if you are going to sell it or not. Do you know that Palantir, the stock that all of us really like, in May of 2022 it was at $7 a share.

And it sat at about $7 a share all the way for one full year till May of 2023. Now can you imagine you buy this stock? You really like what this stock is about. Forget your political opinions for a second, but you like the concept of this stock.

And you're sitting on it for one year and it's not moving.

And you're saying to yourself, it's still at 7.

And you go, I can't take it anymore. I'm going to sell this stock.

And then all of a sudden this stock starts to take off and in the next few months actually it's at 16 and then it continues up and then the rest is history. It really is. So right now with Palantir at 158.

Does that mean when it was at 190, that you shouldn't have bought it?

And the answer to that question is no, of course, you should have bought it, which is why you're going to dollar cost average into this stock.

Now I know you think that every stock has an upward limit cause you all ask me, Suze, when should we sell? When do you get out?

I have to tell you I've owned some stocks now for almost 20 years.

I don't know if I'm ever going to get out.

Truthfully, because, number one, if I get out the capital gains tax will be so exorbitant.

But the truth of the matter is there's no reason for me to get out just because it's gone up in price.

Because that stock is still that stock, and it has just gotten better and better and better. Am I making sense to you?

So stop thinking, when is it time to sell? It's time to sell not because the price of the stock went up. It's time to sell when the company itself, the people who are running the company, it's no longer in favor. It's been taken off of an exchange because nobody cares about it anymore. Well then you might want to sell.

But you don't want to sell stocks that are part of the future. You do not. You want to be in those stocks when they go from 158 back to 190, maybe to 200, maybe to 300, and so on and so forth.

So you have to know why did you buy that stock to begin with. So the Suze school today isn't about Palantir cause you know I love Palantir. All right. In fact, just let's put a pin in that for a second. The other day on the Women and Money Community app—and for those of you who aren't part of it, you go and you download it for free on Google Play or Apple Apps—I was playing a little game with everybody, although they didn't quite appreciate it so much and that I said, All right, everybody, I am off of Palantir now. I don't want to talk about Palantir. You know how much I love Palantir. I'm now switching my attention to another stock.

And they were like, what stock is that? Suze, what stock are you now interested in besides that? And I said, Well, what do you think? And a lot of people guessed X, Y, Z, A, B, C, all these stocks, and only three people could guess the stock that I'm really starting to be interested in again. And so if you want to know about that, you better go on to the Women and Money community app and find out what it was.

OK, besides that, however, very seriously. So the Suze school today really is about did I make a mistake buying this stock? How do you know when you have made a mistake when you have purchased a stock, OK?

Number one, here are some signs that will show you if you've made a mistake. You bought it on emotion, everybody. You bought it because your friend told you so or you read a headline or you didn't want to miss out. All of those are wrong reasons. If you cannot explain in one or two sentences what the company does and why you believe in its future, I am telling you then that is a mistake.

You have to know what you are investing in. You have to know why you're investing in it, and you have to know why you want to keep it. Second, you're just simply relying on hope. If the only reason that you are holding on is because you hope it comes back, how many times have I said that hope is not a financial plan?

And hope is definitely not investing. Hope, believe it or not, is gambling. You hope that the right cards are dealt to you or the dice are going to come up with whatever they're supposed to come up with. Hope is not investing.

And the fundamentals have changed, so the company's earnings, they're shrinking. The debt is piling up, the competition, everybody, it's wiping them out. The story is no longer the same, and I just said this a little bit ago, but I'm going to repeat it. That is not a stock that you want to hold on to.

Next, and I told many of you this this last week. The stock is costing you peace of mind. What have I told you the goal of money is? The goal of money is for you to be secure.

And if you have used your money to buy a stock and now you feel insecure, you need to sell that stock. Now how do you know you're freaking out about the stock because you are checking the stock 10 times a day.

And if it's keeping you up at night. I'm telling you you don't own that stock. That stock now owns you, so you have to sell it.

You also need to sell honestly if it's too big a piece of your portfolio. If one single stock makes up more seriously, everybody, than 5% of everything you have and you're nervous, you've put yourself in danger. On the community app what I did say to everybody is the reason that I'm done now with Palantir is because at this point in time, it really makes up the perfect percentage of my portfolio.

And even if it goes down and down and down again, I'm just going to sit there because I own enough shares of that stock now. I had a goal in mind of how many shares I wanted to own. I now own that amount of shares, and that's it, really. That's it.

And now like I said, I've moved on to another stock which you're just going to have to figure out what that was. I told you where to go to do so anyway.

How do you know that you didn't make a mistake? Because you got to look at the other side because sometimes that drop in price doesn't mean you were wrong. Like the drop in price of Palantir doesn't mean you were wrong. It just means the market is throwing a tantrum, a hissy fit, so to speak.

So how do you know when you did not make a mistake?

Number one, you bought it for the right reasons. You did your homework. You believe in the company and you understand the business. Do you hear me?

Number two, the fundamentals of that company are strong. Their earnings are growing. The business is solid. Nothing has changed everybody except the stock price.

Next, you have time. You are not investing for next month. You are investing for five, 10, or 20 years from now. So short term drops, they don't matter to you. When you tell me that you need to make money, you only have a short period of time. What can you invest in? I always tell you the money market accounts. That's it. Your money does not belong in the stock market.

And one of the key things, honest to God, that's an indicator you did not make a mistake, is you can sleep at night. So if you know what you own and you're calm. Even when it dips, then it's not a mistake, and it's really not a mistake when you are happy when it goes down. Now this is a big one.

If the price drops and you think, great, I can buy more at a discount, then you didn't make a mistake. That's called conviction. That's courage. So when that stock dropped the other day down into 140 area, that's when I struck big time. I was so happy to see that again.

'Cause I still wanted to buy more shares when it was at 190, and then I thought, all right, I'll buy it 190. I'll buy at 200. I'll buy when it's going up again. But just in case, I'll wait and I'll see what happens here. So when it came down to where it came down to, and hey, it can go back there again, that's when I've finished with my purchase.

All right, and last but not least. You didn't make a mistake if you're diversified. Because as I said to you last week, you're not betting the farm on one stock, so you have the freedom to ride out the storm and even add more shares if you want.

So where do you fall on that scale? Did you make a mistake or didn't you? And if you have made a mistake, you need to have the courage to simply sell. Cause you do not want to be invested in something that you do not understand, cause if you are invested in something that you do not understand, then you live in a constant state of fear.

And what have I told you? Fear is one of the main internal obstacles to wealth, and why is that? When you have fear, shame and anger, by the way, as well. You feel powerless, and when you are powerless, the number one law of money comes into effect, which is power attracts money and powerlessness repels it. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, you haven't been listening to me for all these years because that is the number one law of money, and you should find the podcast where I talk about it.

I just want to say one other thing here. And it's, I realized when I said you want to invest in the future. You want to invest in the future, and AI is the future.

But guess what? AI is no longer the future. The future is here. It has already arrived, and it will be here for a little while longer, and there will be some companies that absolutely make it, and there will be many companies that absolutely do not. So again, when I'm asked, is this like the dot-com bubble which I talked about last week. It is on some level. But not yet. Not yet.

There are still really, really great stocks that are going to be here. They already are leading the way. They will continue to lead the way, and that is where you want to be invested, and I have talked about all of those stocks to you already. The future is here.

So do you have time to wait to get aboard this AI train? You do not. Because it has left the station. And you want to be on it for the ride of your life.

Now with that said. I still seriously believe that come October. I think you might see the lows of this market. But after that, I think you will see the market absolutely continue up, and I've said it. I said it in Market Watch, which I had an article in. I've said it in all the interviews that I've had lately in that I think it is not impossible that in 2026, starting at the end of this year, you could see the market, the S&P 500 index, 7,000 or 7,400, but right around there.

But as I've said recently as well, I expected August to be a rough month. Last week it was a rough month. Now on Friday, the markets skyrocketed because Jay Powell said, oh, he might lower interest rates.

I really hate that. I have to tell you. Because I don't want things to go up and down based on what the Fed is doing. I want it to go up based on the earnings and everything of the company itself. But with that said, right now that kind of information is sparking the market. But if it turns out that he doesn't lower interest rates and he leaves them where they are, all right, you're going to see the markets go right back down, which is why I thought August and September, cause I knew he would be doing something then, possibly could be rough months.

But again, I think we will see the low sometime in October. I don't know if that's going to happen or not. But I can tell you I am using that as a guideline as to how I myself am dollar cost averaging in to the other positions that I have where I want to build up the amount of stock that I have of each one to a specific number.

So there you go. Few things I just want to tell you now. Number one, Colo comes back today—very happy to have him home.

Next, a lot of you have been asking me, Suze, I read in Kiplinger's magazine, where I did an interview, that we could get the Ultimate Retirement Guide for 50+, the updated version, for $10 including shipping. Why can't you just give us that offer as well on the Women and Money podcast, and Everybody Smart Enough to Listen?

Well, listen to me now. That offer has been there for a long time. If you just go to SuzeOrman.com/Offers—that is where you will find the must-have documents for $99. That is where you will find the ultimate protection for $18 for your kids that all of you need for $36. And that is where you will also find the Ultimate Retirement Guide for 50+ for $10 including shipping.

So you should absolutely write that down because that's where I put all the offers for you to have so you don't need all these crazy URLs to find what you want.

Also, I like to say to everybody, make sure that you go to youtube.com/SuzeOrman, my official YouTube channel, and that's where you will find "How am I Doings," "Can I Afford It?," old Suze Orman shows. Go there, subscribe. Because you never know when I might do a live webinar right there and you want to be a subscriber so that you will be notified when that happens.

All right, everybody, so until what? Until Thursday when Miss KT joins us again for Ask KT and Suze Anything. There's only one thing that I want you to remember when it comes to your money, and it is this:

This is the year to make your money, make more money. Do you hear me? The future is now, the present. Give yourself a true gift and get involved with it.

All right, stay safe, stay strong, stay secure. See you soon. Bye bye.