[scottwww]

Unless you have a lot of time to invest as well as money, I would leave most of the decisions up to a professional. That could be a mutual fund manager, hedge fund manager, financial advisor... The trouble is picking a good advisor. You will be paying them substantially for their expertise.

The money you put into individual stocks should just be speculation money that you are not counting on being available if you need it some day. When individual stocks are used as a primary investment, you should have diversity in them. Probably at the very least 20 differnet well-chosen stocks. And don't buy domestic investments only.

You need to know how much risk you are ready to accept, what your time-frame is for cashing in the chips, and what are your reasonable expectations for rate of return.

The experts disagree to a high degree about how to invest your money. As an individual investor it is hard to know any better than them.

Don't put it all in one place. Don't let it sit idle. If you can't baby sit it, then get the help of someone who will do it. The stock market is a great place to invest, but it certainly is not the only place.