Hi Mad2; My feeling is that the (local) bottom is in increasing order of severity, this past Friday at 4pm, this coming Monday at 10am, or, worst of all, Tuesday at 10:30am.
But I bet that if you put 1/3 of your money into the market at those three points, you will have a very good return within a week or two.
I don't think that the market as a whole really craters until mom and pop lose their jobs (or retire, or die and leave it all to their wastrel kids), and all those stocks get liquidated at the same time. Right now, the Fed is printing money, everybody is fat and happy, and they are putting their excess profits into stocks. They've learned very well to buy the panics, I doubt that we will see a real panic in the first 18 months of the next bear market. (But if the market does bottom on Tuesday, it could be a pretty nasty one day drop, none of this light stuff like yesterday).
A lot of people are still very profitable in the stock market, and are going to be buying up stuff. It worked in the past, and until the herd is forced by circumstances beyond their control (i.e. long bond at 10%, no new housing starts, inflation of 9%, short term rates of 11%, etc.) to sell their stocks or starve, they will continue to hold. (Of course the market will be down before the above happens, rather I mean that is what will have to happen to get stocks down to decent values again, where you look through the S&P100 and see P/Es almost entirely in single digits.)
-- Carl |
