Jason Hall

Often I force myself to really reevaluate my thought process because history tells us the worst time to selling a struggling stock is when macro or cycle factors are causing it to struggle.

You're probably selling the bottom.

If it's valuation, I force myself to evaluate the business from a longer term perspective.

Because using valuation for a very mature company like a Walmart or a Target is very different than a growth-oriented one, like the Rule Breakers that we've talked about, particularly for investors with very long time horizons.

My biggest sell mistakes were for valuation on businesses that can easily grow their revenues by 5X or 10X their current levels over the next 10 or 20 years.

it's almost always best to hold on in those cases if the business is historically done pretty well.

Valuation might make sense if it's a mature company that doesn't have those kind of growth things.

Now, I do two more things too, Emily.

I ask myself,

This question, if the stock doubles in five years or it goes up 5X over the next decade, will I regret selling it?

And then I force myself to wait two market days once I've made a decision before acting on that sell decision.

Cooling off period and regret minimization, those two things go a long way towards avoiding making those selling mistakes.

Happy Thanksgiving, Emily.

Emily, I am never short on opinions.

We know that.

But

Motley Fool Money is a good idea to align those opinions with expertise.

This morning, we have earnings from four of the largest Chinese companies.

I know that you lived in China for four years.

You have plenty of bullish thoughts that can be backed up with actual knowledge and expertise.