Stocks I am playing with

If you are not paying yourself before you pay your bills and blow money at the bars, you are doing yourself a disservice. If you are living paycheck to paycheck, you either need to lower your costs, get a better paying job / second job, or both.

The stock markets have been volatile lately because of the subprime market affecting lending. When this happens, people get scared and sell. However, the herd mentality often means that good companies are sold along with the bad.

Two stocks I have been watching and jumped on a couple of weeks ago are Countrywide (CFC) and Holly Corporation (HOC).

Countrywide is the nations biggest home loan lender. Although the industry isn't doing well, it is a stable company with a lot of assets and a history of taking advantage of downturns to better place themselves strategically.

Holly Corp is a midsized crude oil refiner that is demonstrating tremendous growth. As the U.S. isn't investing in more refining capacity as a whole, they will only continue to mint money.

I purchased both 2 weeks ago after the market did its big 300+ point drop.

My CFC stock is up 18.31% even after correcting a little bit on Friday.

HOC is up 22.52%.

Not a bad return in anybody's book!