In January 2007, I bought five shares of Circuit City (ticker CC) at $208 each without doing a single minute of research. I didn’t check the balance sheet. I didn’t look for red flags. I bought it because I had walked into that store a hundred times, and it always felt busy and safe. Less than two years later, Circuit City was delisted from the stock exchange entirely.
This post is not really about Circuit City. It’s about how most of us actually pick stocks, and it’s my honest Simply Wall St review, the tool I now use to make sure I never buy another Circuit City by accident.
What Went Wrong With Circuit City (And Why It Matters For Any Stock You’re Watching)
Circuit City didn’t look like a company in trouble when I bought in. The trouble started two months later. On March 28, 2007, the company announced a “wage management initiative,” corporate language for firing 3,400 of its most experienced, highest-paid sales associates to cut payroll costs. The stock actually closed up that day. Wall Street applauded the short-term cost savings.
That holiday season, same-store sales fell almost 12%. By the end of 2007, less than a year after my purchase, the stock had dropped to around $42 a share, an 80% loss. By December 2008, Circuit City was delisted.
| The uncomfortable part: Circuit City isn’t an obscure cautionary tale. Sears was once in the S&P 500’s top 10. General Electric and ExxonMobil were both once among the five largest companies in the index. All are now a fraction of what they were. Familiar and safe are not the same thing as financially healthy. |
This link opens my Webull portfolio and unlocks a discount for Simply Wall St. Sign up for a new account if you haven’t yet ► https://goto.simplywall.st/oNoZ7m
Why We Pick Stocks This Way (And Why It’s Not Just You)
According to a Harris poll of more than 2,000 US adults, 82% of individual investors say they’d be more likely to buy a stock if it’s a brand they love, and 73% say they’re more likely to buy a company whose products they personally use. That’s not fringe behavior. That’s most people, including me in 2007.
My Honest Simply Wall St Review
I use Simply Wall St because it pulls every portfolio I hold, individual stocks and funds alike, into a single view. If a tool like this had existed in 2007 and I had opened it before buying Circuit City, the financial health score alone likely would have made me pause.
Is Simply Wall St Worth It? What I Actually Check
About 99% of my own portfolio is index funds and ETFs, my financial independence engine. But I still invest a small amount in individual stocks, and I run every one of them through the same checklist inside Simply Wall St before buying:
- Valuation — current price vs. estimated fair value from a discounted cash flow model
- Financial health — total assets vs. total liabilities, debt-to-equity ratio
- Past performance — revenue, cost of sales, and earnings trend over time, shown visually
- Future outlook — earnings growth forecast and analyst estimates
- Risk flags — things like insider selling, that the tool surfaces automatically
The Stock That Proves This Actually Works: My Microsoft Example
The most recent individual stock I bought was Microsoft (MSFT). It was trading at $371.27 when I first bought in on June 30, 2026, a $2,000 initial position, after it looked beaten down relative to the quality of the company. I ran it through Simply Wall St first.
| Simply Wall St Check | What It Showed for MSFT |
| Financial health | Total assets over $550 billion vs. $147 billion in liabilities. Two green checks on financial position. |
| Past performance | Earnings grew 31%; revenue and earnings trend shown as a clear visual, not just a spreadsheet of numbers |
| Future outlook | Earnings forecast to grow 14.11% per year; price-to-earnings ratio below the software industry average |
| Risk flag | Significant insider selling over the last three months, worth digging into before adding more |
Since July 27, I’ve also been investing $1 a day into that same MSFT position. As of recording, my Webull portfolio (where I hold this position) is up 30.1% in total return over the trailing year, compared to 18.8% for the S&P 500 over the same period.
How to Use Simply Wall St on Your Own Portfolio
- Link your brokerage accounts (most major brokers are supported) or add positions manually
- Check the “green flags” and “risk” tabs on your top holdings first
- Look at valuation before adding to any position, not just whether you like the company
- Search any ticker a friend, family member, or YouTube video recommends before buying, even if it’s a brand you know and trust
Is Simply Wall St Worth It? My Bottom Line
| Familiar and safe are not the same thing as financially healthy. |
Circuit City wasn’t a bad company for most of its life. That’s exactly what makes it worth talking about. The same applies to Sears, untouchable in the 1980s, gone today. You don’t need to become a financial analyst to catch the next one. You need a tool that puts the answer in front of you instead of burying it in a filing nobody has time to read. That’s my honest Simply Wall St review: it’s the single step I skipped in 2007, and the one I don’t skip anymore.
| Check Your Own Portfolio Before Your Next Buy Try Simply Wall St for yourself using the link below, link up your portfolio, and run the same financial health, valuation, and risk checks I use before every individual stock purchase. |
This link opens my Webull portfolio and unlocks a discount for Simply Wall St. Sign up for a new account if you haven’t yet ► https://goto.simplywall.st/oNoZ7m