quite a fight going on today in the market.... buy programs versus shorts.
I just had a long discussion with a broker at a major firm and told him if he wants to retain his sanity (probably a lost cause) he needs to delete his entire watch list on his screen. Get rid of infospace and redback and extreme and exodus and and and. There is a whole world of positive performing stocks out there that we just can't seem to let into our consciousness. It is paralyzing him, costing him money, annoying his clients and making him damn near suicidal.
This thread would probably be well served to ban mention of Oracle, Sun Microsystems, Siebel etc etc. They are broken stocks, with a faint pulse. When the patient sits up and begins taking solid food someone can bring it to our attention.
No one mentions Cardinal Health, Gillette, Coca-Cola, International Paper, McDonalds, Mattel, Johnson Controls, Heinz. In a community of obviously intelligent people what is the attraction of beating a dead horse? These are names just as familiar as the NDX. Are we afraid of being christened dinosaurs or worse? Value investors?
Money managers are scared. Scared they can't trust financial statements, arcane business models, analysts. I sense a real and prolonged bias toward investing in the understandable companies. Give me a balance sheet and P & L statement, not an explanation, not an investment thesis. There is money to be made out there people and it doesn't have to be in guessing the feds next move or the lease rates on gold or the future of society.
Try it. Take your finger, type in IP or CAH and click "buy", then type in ORCL and click "sell". It will feel like coming out of confession with a clean soul.
by the way, I "feel" we'll end up today. Not much to go on.
And as all my curmudgeonly diatribes, this is an investment note, not a trading one.
mt |
