"My three rules of investment writing:
Clarity. Brevity. Profit."

Hi, I'm Judy Alster and I'm the Senior Analyst for 21st Century Investor. To tell you the truth, I'm a little on the shy side. Right now, instead of doing this, I'd rather be finding a dozen stocks on their way up and telling our subscribers about them.

But James DiGeorgia, publisher of 21st Century Investor, asked me to tell you a little about myself and my investing philosophy. Also about how I got to this point, what I do for our subscribers, and how I've been succeeding at it. So here goes:

What I do is analyze and recommend stocks - stocks that are headed up for at least a few months and sometimes longer. Every month I recommend buying about eight or 10 of them in the 21st Century Investor newsletter. When I think they've maximized their profit potential I recommend selling them. My profit record is good; in fact it's quite good. I'll get to that in a moment.

Mainly, I'm a "fundamentalist." I look at the company itself. I find companies in growing sectors of the economy, or sectors that look like they're about to grow, with the chance of dominating that sector for a while. The companies I like are usually making a profit on increasing revenue - or what's sometimes even better as far as the stock market is concerned, they're just beginning to make a profit after several quarters of losses. I prefer earnings that are solid operating profit, not tax benefits or proceeds from asset sales.

The companies I recommend generally have cash flow from operations. And after every single expense is paid they still have cash - this "free cash flow" can work wonders for the stock price. The companies I like best have management that's sharp and fearless. I find that when management makes tough or even painful decisions, like selling non-performing divisions, or restructuring, or even taking on some debt to make an important acquisition, it often has a positive effect on the stock price. Short selling is something I recommend rarely, if ever.

Now, it's great to find a hot or soon-to-be-hot company that Wall Street is just beginning to pay attention to. And one of the biggest thrills is when the stock is undervalued and really starts taking off, soaring 30%, 40% or even 50% in a couple of months.

But I don't mind a company who's under Wall Street's radar entirely. A good company will eventually get noticed.

Here are the profits subscribers have taken on some of my recommendations just since October 2003:

• 68% on IDX Systems
• 101% on Central European Distribution
• 53% on Vimpel Communications
• 34% on Arthrocare Corp.
• 77% on China Yuchai
• 20% on Closure Medical
• 69% on Cyberonics
• 31% on Diodes, Inc.
• 28% on PetroKazakhstan
• 58% on F5 Networks

My dividend plays are a little different. With dividend yielding stocks I don't always insist on capital appreciation, and I'll generally hold the stock as long as the dividend is good. But I still look for extraordinarily sharp management and a promising sector. I firmly believe that every portfolio should always have at least one good dividend-yielding stock. Currently my Portfolio holds four excellent ones. Three have had surprisingly good run-ups in price. All have terrific dividends.

My training and background are in journalism and marketing. I've been researching and investing in stocks for my own portfolio for 20 years. Three years ago James DiGeorgia hired me as a researcher and copywriter. My job was to analyze stocks that other stock pickers picked, and write about them for our publications. After a while I wrote about a few stocks I had researched on my own, and they did pretty well. So I wrote about a few more of my own stocks, and most of them did well too. Time passed in that fashion, more and more of my stocks doing well . . . and eventually they made me Senior Editor and put my picture on the cover of 21st Century Investor newsletter. (I admit, it was gratifying.)

I surely don't expect every subscriber to invest in every stock I recommend. That would be over 100 stocks a year; the commissions alone would put you in the poorhouse. What I do every month is present stocks in a number of sectors and in several price ranges. The emphasis is on value, although I do give space to growth stocks. My intention is to let readers choose according to their own investment goals and preferences, their patience, and their tolerance for risk.

Furthermore, I never just recommend stocks and then leave subscribers to sink or swim. This is real money people are putting on the line. I believe in some post-recommendation guidance and even a little hand-holding. So for every stock I recommend, I give you a stop-loss price; that is, a price 12% or 15% under the stock's purchase price. If the stock drops to that price, you know you should sell. And sometimes it happens: I have my clunkers, just like everybody else. But except in the case of two current very low-priced Special Situations, you will never lose more than 12% on a stock I recommend, and never more than 15% on a low-priced stock, if you stick to those stop prices.

There's more. My responsibilities don't stop with the monthly newsletter, which appears on our Web site as well as in paper format. I also maintain an online Portfolio. This is a performance monitor that gives you the profit/loss percentage for sold positions, and the profit or loss on open positions, for every single 21st Century Investor recommendation from October 2002 to today.

The Portfolio is updated at the end of every trading day and is valuable as more than just a tracking device. When a stock has made a respectable profit, I will tell you how to protect it with a moved-up stop price: Check the Portfolio and you'll find out if the stock has a new profit-protecting stop price, and what that new price is. The Portfolio will also tell you when I've sold a stock that looks like it's running out of steam.

So not only will you never lose more than12% or 15% - you'll never hold onto a profitable stock too long and watch your profit evaporate.

The Portfolio is an incredibly valuable feature. We haven't seen anything like it in any other stock-recommending service.