The truth is they were worth a miniscule fraction of the price that they are currently valued at, but that doesn't mean they were penny stocks. Stocks do something called a stock split, the stock price is cut in half, and the amount of shares available double. In addition the people who own shares are given the chance to own twice as much. What appears to have once been a stock worth pennies may not have been. The best stocks to buy now, aren't necessarily worth pennies, but they will have that appearance once they have gone up significantly. You have to really understand statistics if you want to invest in penny stocks and you have to apply it. If a stock either doubles or goes to zero, and you get it to double 10% of the time, that's not math that's in your favor. However, if the stock went up 10 times the amount and went from 10 cents to $1 or more, then you have the system working. 9 times you will lose 10 cents, but on the 10th time you gain 90 cents or more. So that is the break-even point at a minimum. Unfortunately, this can still be a losing proposition if you can't handle money management. In order to maintain your ability to buy stock, you will need to be able to continue to invest. If you buy 10 stocks and you lose, you will be unable to buy any more if you invest 10% of your bankroll. You will be putting the odds against you. Now that's why you need to never invest more than 2% of the your money available for trading. That's enough to handle going quite a few times without a win and still having enough invested to dig yourself out. Buying penny stocks more so than any other is about money management. There are no sure things. The fact is most cheap stock investors are hoping to get rich off a lotto ticket. It's not really smart to buy stocks just based on their share price. It can be a reasonable strategy if you really know what you're doing. However, there's so many stocks available, it's better to focus on buying stocks. You should be looking for the best stocks to buy now, not the best penny stocks to buy now. If the stocks happen to be penny stocks, then you can still buy them, but understand that over 90% of traders go broke at least once and over 95% of these buyers lose it all. So the best penny stocks to buy now, are those that also happen to be the best stocks to buy now. If it's not the best stock, it has minimal chance to go up. That's why there's no room for me to give actual penny stock recommendations because most stocks for cents on the dollar don't pan out. I'd be fighting the odds, and you have to understand that first before you think you know the best penny stocks to buy now. It's possible to know the best penny stocks to buy now and still lose it all. The reason is, everything has a chance to go to zero, just as everything has some chance to go from its current price to double or triple. Stocks under a dollar have the highest probability of going to zero. Stocks never debut for under a dollar on the Nasdaq or New York Stock Exchange. The best penny stocks to buy now aren't sure things, they're just "less uncertain" then all of the others. Maybe the best penny stocks only go to zero 70% of the time. Sure if you lose your investment 7 out of 10 times and make 10 times your money, it's a good investment, but only if you have correct money management. Most people have $1000 to invest, and they invest $300, and lose it all, and then they only have $600, they invest $200 and lose it, they have $400, they invest $100 and they lose it and now $300, they invest $50 and then they lose and with $250 they invest $20 and the stock goes from $.10 to $1 ad they sell but now they only have $450 which is less than what they started with. So you can see how it's possible to have what looks like a winning trade on paper, There's a reason why you never hear stories of Warren Buffett or Monish Pabrai investing in 99-cent stocks or cheaper. First the market cap is so small they would probably buy half the company with the change in their pockets compared to the average Joe. Second, they never got rich off buying penny stocks because most of them don't work.