"You're Spunky! Quirky... I Hate Spunky Quirky"

I actually don't hate quirky, I think quirky is great but I thought of that scene from what I believe was the first episode of the Mary Tyler Moore Show when Mary meets Mr. Grant as I read this article from George Fisher who writes regularly about quirky investment niches.

Quirky areas that I have written about over the years include farmland stocks, airports, Norwegian fisheries and toll roads. George's article provides an overview of timber exports to China from various places and brief introductions to quite a few of the companies in the space.

Of the names he mentions I have owned Plum Creek Timber (PCL) in the past, mentioned Sino Forest (SNOFF) in other blog posts and researched a couple of other names on the list.

Here is an article about rare earth stocks. I read the article and I still don't know what they are but it is another quirky little space in the stock market that someone might want to learn about and of course there are countless others.

While this sort of study and possible inclusion will not be for everyone I continue to believe this is important for several reasons. In the past I have talked stocks like this possibly offering diversification benefits, unique demand elasticity, and also a broader understanding of markets. For example studying the Norwegian fisheries has taught me a couple of things about the Norwegian economy that I might not have picked up just looking at Statoil (STO) which is a client holding.

The new, for me, part of the equation is that one of these quirky things (talking generally, not these specific niches) will be the next really big thing. It would be difficult to find the next really big thing if you never look for the next really big thing. This is one of the great aspects about this job; there are always new things to learn about.

I really don't know what rare earth stocks are.