Investing

Sure, there might be folks who got rich by finding companies like Chipotle Mexican Grill (NYSE: CMG) when they were small caps, then selling when their market caps grew larger than $2 billion.

Where the stock market will be tomorrow, next week, or even next year is anyone's guess. And considering the enormous size of the global financial markets and all of their moving parts -- including the new ones coming out of Washington -- such prognostication is about as futile as trying to boil the ocean.

Do you remember when you tried your first beer because everyone else was doing it? Are you the type who sees all the big movies on opening weekend so you can talk about them at work on Monday morning? Or maybe you bought Citigroup (NYSE: C) or Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) in late 2006 because housing was doing awesome and those companies were rolling in the money?

There are many "teachable moments" during a trading week. This week, the Fool wrote on the chalkboard about what's going on in D.C., a noteworthy market signal, and how to think about choices between domestic and international investments.

Monday
The new trading week kicks off with Tiffany (NYSE: TIF) and Williams-Sonoma (NYSE: WSM) reporting. Both of the luxury retailers -- in jewelry and kitchen wares, respectively -- are expected to post improved profitability over the previous year's holiday quarter.

Last month, I attended an investment conference in New York that brought together some of the luminaries of the value investing world, including Marty Whitman, the founder of Third Avenue Management and one of the deans of the business and William Browne of Tweedy Browne -- the company that used to execute trades for Ben Graham and Warren Buffett. As I listened to the panels of elite stockpickers, I was left with an unsettling question: As companies and governments continue to juggle with the aftermath of the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression, is stock-picking dead?

Facebook has now overtaken Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) to become the country's most visited website, according to Internet traffic analyst Hitwise.

Generalizations will kill your portfolio.

Based on the aggregated intelligence of 160,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS, the Fool's free investing community, French telecommunications giant France Telecom (NYSE: FTE) has earned a coveted five-star ranking.

The following is a direct quote: "if they cant tell you what will go up 100% in a few days then motley fool are worthless and they suck at picking stocks."