The CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge

Tomorrow begins the next CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge, and I'm getting my strategies ready. If you're interested in playing yourselves, follow the link and sign up. It's a fun game, and if you win, 1st prize is $500,000 plus the use of a private jet for one year.

I'm following a very basic strategy for the five portfolios I'm allowed to play for the duration of the 10 week game. My first portfolio will be an investment in the 5 worst performing stocks invested in my real world portfolio. The second is a selection of contrarian stocks I picked using the Yahoo! stock screener. The others are, large cap ($500million or more) momentum stocks, the five lowest priced stocks that have a "buy" rating from the majority of stock investors, and the fifth and final portfolio will be invested in the stocks of regional banks.

I know all of that must sound like so much gobbledygook to most of you, but that's ok. Not everyone is as fascinated by the concept of stock market investing as I am.

I've always been interested in investing. Ever since I was about 16 years old or so and I wanted to invest some of the money I had saved from my paper route in MTV. It was going public, and I thought it was a great opportunity. My mother thought differently though, and since I was under 18, I needed her permission to open a brokerage account. She said no. She told me that MTV was a fad, and if I invested in it, I would lose all my hard earned $500 when it went bankrupt! MTV bankrupt? If she were alive today, I'd ask her if the only reason it didn't go bankrupt was because I didn't invest.

I know the real reason she didn't want me to invest though. If I put my money into the stock market, she would not have ready access to be able to "borrow" it. I often wonder why I just didn't hand her my paper rout money every month, since she was going to end up with it every way. Oh, well.

By the way, I've been following MTV ever since it went public (It's part of VIACOM now). If I had been allowed to invest my $500 back in the early 1980s, what with stock splits, price appreciation, and the huge run up when they got taken over by VIACOM, my $500 would be worth $5,108.98 today. But, am I bitter? ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY!!!!!!!!!!!!!