INVESTOR SPOTLIGHT.

Name: Jason Mitchell

Residence: Northridge

Occupation: Supermarket boxboy and full-time student 

Age: 27

How he got started: At 17, he convinced his father to open a joint brokerage account. The first stock they bought was Anheuser Busch, his mother's employer. They purchased 30 shares at $37 each, in February 1987. They sold it for $52 in early 1991.

But Mitchell wished they had acted on a tip that he got from his bowling league friend's father: Buy Berkshire Hathaway. It was trading at $7,000 a share in the late 1980s. It closed at $43,800 on Friday.

Best stock pick: Prima Energy. He bought 400 shares at $12 in late 1990 and sold it for $16 two months later, a 33 percent profit. Shortly after, Iraq invaded Kuwait and Prima Energy's stock price shot up to the mid-30s in a few weeks. Mitchell said he was ``too disgusted'' to follow the company afterwards.

Worst stock pick: He bought 500 shares of Computer Concepts Corp. in mid-1993 for $4 each. The stock tumbed. Mitchell finally gave up on it in January, unloading it for less than a dollar a share.

Investment philosophy: ``I like to find companies that are undervalued in price.'' A stock tumbles when a company misses Wall Street's earnings projections, even by a few cents. Mitchell will buy the stock if the company still is performing above its own projections, belongs to a growing industry and is positioned near the top of the sector.

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Photo

Photo: (Color) Jason Mitchell