it is like 1999 deja vu all over again.

i think once the fed stops pumping money into the bond market, this stock market will drop like a rock.

whatever happens, it will be quite a ride! buckle up!

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Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

I have been wondering much the same thing.

I guess I shouldn't care because I am still cash poor.

really, unless you plan on selling everything right now, it is nothing but a paper profit.

of course your human nature (greed) will prevent you from selling because...what if....it keeps going up?

i can see it now....a few months from now, if this thing comes crashing down. a lot of people would say....had i only sold, i could have a Ferrari now.

history will repeat itself. it doesn't really change. Someone once said...there is no new history, the only 'new' history is what is new to YOU.

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Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

another thought...
whatever happens, the guys at Goldman Sachs are sure to sell off or purchase put options on everything right before the crash.

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Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

Every time the Fed even mentions tapering the 85 billion per month printing, the market panics.

They are too afraid to end QE now, we've got QE to infinity and beyond.

What a way to punish the fiscally responsible. Given the loons in charge, I just cannot see this ending well.

Jim

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14 E250 BlueTEC black. 45k miles
95 E320 Cabriolet Emerald green 66k miles
94 E320 Cabriolet Emerald green 152k miles
85 300TD 4 spd man, euro bumpers and lights, 15" Pentas dark blue 274k miles

"Had I not sold & run to cash in 2008, I'd be way ahead of the game."

Actually, the run-up is almost done, IMHO. We hit 15,725 in mid-September and are less than 300 pts higher on the Dow two months later. NASDAQ down 15 points this afternoon. SPX flat to down, NYSE up marginally.

And before you start yellin' for Yellen, realize that the voting members of the Board of Governors, who ALL have to vote for a decision, are actually getting more conservative next year due to rotation of voting seats.

Plus interest rates are going up again this month, whether the Fed likes it or not, and property prices in many markets have stagnated or fell since the summer.

As far as selling now, I'm not buying the market as a whole; index funds are for muppets. I'm buying stocks that are depressed due to other factors, but which have good fundamentals, technology, and/or names. 787 catches fire in some African rathole? Buy BA. Tesla car catches fire making for good headlines? Buy TSLA then sell when the panic subsides. Merger on hold? But AAMRQ and wait till the specuvestors jump in again, 300% profit, baby. Solar unpopular last year? Buy SPWR or FSLR...

Trust in G-d and stop-loss orders, of course as well.

Blaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrgh, I think you jinxed us, NASDAQ -42(!), DOW -15. Thanks!

One year too late selling might also be a perspective. Do not feel alone. I was thinking about suggesting my wife liquidate her fund last week but will not follow through. Call it greed that I have not. Or if I did and the market still climbs would I ever hear the end of it.

The ideal that Chinas economy will double in the next 7 years announced today seemed to stimulate the markets here initially. Personally I thought it was a downer as north America has no such picture for itself in view. At best I expect no real growth in north America overall in sectors where it really counts.

A lot of Chinese expected growth will come from guess what continent. Do we in north America have any real growth if you discount the retail sector that is so predominate today? If the taxpayer is putting more and more borrowed money into the system or it is being done by central powers in our name? Government at all levels have joined this game to some extent as well. Just to attempt to sustain what is. Where is the reality?

The system in north America can only function well with real growth. We seem totally lacking in how to live in a zero or less growth climate.

Wall street needs some lessons in responsible behaviours.I have this feeling they would even sell out there own mothers for their perceived self interests. As for the political angle. Wall street has already positioned people in strategic government positions including even advisors to the president. This will still grow and is a wonderful scenario in itself.

Interest rates going up substantially would be a miracle in the current environment and do a lot of damage. Still it may be the responsible move. Based on this do not expect signifigant changes in rates..

I have been playing with the ideal of buying some farmland.There is even a fund out there that buys it up and rents it out. It has been taking off reciently. I think the object is more to protect the value of any principal than huge gains on it.

Something like a real gold if you reflect on it. I think farming has started to do much better in the last couple of years. As the old saying goes people will still have to eat. There at the same time are many things they do not really have to do.

This quarters profits by the large grocery chains are down. My wife thinks that many people are switching over to buying more specials or promo items than ever before is causing it. Or they are simply buying less.

You get older like the wife and myself. There is no longer time to make up heavy losses so you become ever more conservative. Sitting on a lot of cash and watching it steadily decline in value is not an answer either.

Why would you want to merely protect the value of principal if you can get an 8-10% return renting real-estate (d/k about land)?

Real estate is okay and we have made money on it in the past is true. Sometimes it was easy money and once in awhile a pain in the posterior.

There are 138 homes in town for sale right now and they are not moving as they always have perhaps other than in the dirty thirties. We are also losing population to the western oil sands patch influence up here in eastern Canada is not a good omen either.

This is something entirely new here and I suspect the resale prices will fall off seriously before those homes will sell. The point today is money invested, earnt or otherwise probably cannot sustain itself for purchasing value in the future.

Anyways the prime difference is that you are actually running a rental business. The less money you have going in the better and it can be a real builder of capital. Your risks are mostly the unknowns down the road.

Our provincial rental boards and the lack of good tenants have made that business a crapshoot locally in the last ten years. Money was never really designed to do the things we expect and do with it today. It was simply originally designed as a convienient medium of exchange.



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