I talk to hundreds of companies a year and spend hour after hour in heady pow-wows with CEOs, financial analysts and my colleagues in the mutual-fund business, but I stumble onto the big winners in extracurricular situations, the same way you do.

If you have the stomach for stocks, but neither the time nor the inclination to do the homework, invest in equity mutual funds.

When even the analysts are bored, it's time to start buying.

The biggest winners are surprises to me, and takeovers are even more surprising. It takes years, not months, to produce big results.

When management owns stock, then rewarding the shareholders becomes a first priority, whereas when management simply collects a paycheck, then increasing salaries becomes a first priority.

There are substantial rewards for adopting a regular routine of investing and following it no matter what, and additional rewards for buying more shares when most investors are scared into selling.

Average investors can become experts in their own field and can pick winning stocks as effectively as Wall Street professionals by doing just a little research.