Go, Economy!

[Thief Silver]

Bad idea. yeah you can think "Well it's not my fault not everyone is an executive at their companies." that doesn't work. The people doing garbage, or dirty underpaying jobs that we need someone to do aren't going to reliably be able to save up enough money to make it to 80 and have cash left over (Though 80 is a stretch anyways since at that point it's hardly living).

[Othello Harrington]

Bad idea. yeah you can think "Well it's not my fault not everyone is an executive at their companies." that doesn't work. The people doing garbage, or dirty underpaying jobs that we need someone to do aren't going to reliably be able to save up enough money to make it to 80 and have cash left over (Though 80 is a stretch anyways since at that point it's hardly living).

Everybody can save money Thief. Why should I to pay for some 75 year old chain smoker who never saved a dime in his life.

[Thief Silver]

Considering you can count on companies to force their older employees to retire at younger ages, no they're not going to have enough money to live for 15+ years on their own.

Also I'd rather the person who's 75 year old chain smoker be the guy who gets welfare because hopefully he'll die off sooner.

[Gooch]

A few things:

I'd watch the S&P closely. It has been trading in a range between approximately 1250 and 1400 and it currently sits at 1409. If it can breakout to the upside convincingly, say 1450 or so, I would interpret it as a bull confirmation. The market is always ahead of the actual economy, both on the upside and downside. Volatility has noticably dropped, but it's hard to say we've bottomed so I'd be careful and look for confirmation signals like this.

Look for new leaders to emerge. I've had rolling long positions in Visa and VMWare for the past month and like these two along with MasterCard and Apple (not a new leader, but not leaving). I'm not saying these will be the guys, but I have some comfort that barring broad market event risk and the occassional analyst downgrade (usually after a nice run up), that these equities will be on an uptrend going into next quarter's earnings. But these have enjoyed nice run ups over the past month so, as in boxing, protect yourself at all times.

The housing market is still shit, but it may have bottomed. That does not mean it is home free. It could remain at the bottom for 6-12 months or longer before it sees any life. And this is only if it has indeed bottomed. Jumbo loans just ain't there unless you want to pay with an organ. No one's buying loans so in turn the lenders still aren't lending. Standards are crazy, lenders want six month comps but no homes are selling to get those comps and even if you can get one, it's at a severely discounted value.

[MarsKitten]

Eh the economy right now only hurts people who're in the middle, the rich are fine so long as they're diversely invested (as they should be) and the poor are in the same failboat as always. Those who're reliant on a single or slim range of income options will hurt the worst. The house flipping thing is over, thus killing people who made a second career of that, people whose jobs are cheaper over seas... well sucks to be you.

If you don't have a science or professional degree you're proper fucked. You're a generalist and are properfucked by anyone who has slightly better credentials than you.

And I hate to be downer but thats the price of globalization, you're competing with every fucker in the world now for a job with these corporations. Half the equation is totally out of your hands (price of labor/education here v. there).

Yet when we're asked to take care of people hit by hard times, we tell em to fuck off, except when those people are corporate entities, then its okay to dump taxpayer money on them. Ugh, i feel ill, time to update the av tagline.

[Saint of Killers]

You can make very short term gains based solely on successful company announcements. I've done it before. Made money over 2 days and then pulled out. It's obviously risky. No guts, no glory.

a bunch of people have won the lottery too. that doesn't mean that lottery tickets are a good investment.

By the way, the days of "buy and hold" investing (i.e. ostrich head in the sand technique) are dead.

bullshit. if you are halfway intelligent about it you will beat almost all active investors in the long run with a passive strategy. very few people can beat the market.

from a warren buffett interview:

What advice would you give to someone who is not a professional investor? Where should they put their money?

Well, if they're not going to be an active investor - and very few should try to do that - then they should just stay with index funds. Any low-cost index fund. And they should buy it over time. They're not going to be able to pick the right price and the right time. What they want to do is avoid the wrong price and wrong stock. You just make sure you own a piece of American business, and you don't buy all at one time.

[Gooch]

Hey, if I could buy up enough of a stake in a company that I could exercise some level of control, then I'd go long indefinitely like Buffett, too. But I can't so I don't.

[Saint of Killers]

he's not saying that's his strategy. he's obviously one of the very few that can be a successful active investor. he's not telling people to follow his model, because he knows very few can. he's saying that pretty much everyone should be investing in index funds long term. he actually tells people that they are better off investing in index funds instead of berkshire. the richest man in the world believes in passive investing for the vast majority of people so much that he's actually telling them not to invest in his company (although he's also smart enough to realize that people will do it anyway).

i'm sure you're a smart guy, but i highly doubt that you can beat the market. if you could show that you could do it consistently, you would be making millions of dollars managing a hedge fund.

[Gooch]

Buffett's strategy is great for the majority of Americans because they don't have the time or energy to focus on asset management, and the ones who do would rather invest that time researching what shoes to buy, what car to buy, what to spend that $600 on, etc, because that's more important to them. And most Americans have this sense of entitlement that you park your money in some fund, some index, and it's supposed to make you rich or provide your retirement with little to no effort or knowledge required on your end. It's a nice thought, isn't it? I'd like that deal, too.

Beating the market is not necessarily my concern. I am not a fund manager who gets paid based on performance fees resulting from generating excess returns for my clients. I'm just looking to make money under reasonable risk levels and with a plan containing both an entry and exit strategy.

I have my ups and downs and I still have some unrealized positions out there, but I'm doing pretty ok in comparison to the market.

[Anthony]

And I hate to be downer but thats the price of globalization, you're competing with every fucker in the world now for a job with these corporations. Half the equation is totally out of your hands (price of labor/education here v. there).

Yet when we're asked to take care of people hit by hard times, we tell em to fuck off, except when those people are corporate entities, then its okay to dump taxpayer money on them. Ugh, i feel ill, time to update the av tagline.

Don't worry about it too much, globalization does little bad in the long term, there are just short term getting used to it issues.