Chris, thanks for your kind words. It's too bad that Heinz has been so busy trading and involved in his musical projects, that he has not had time to write on SI lately.
But it's great that he's been busy and doing fun things.
I've known so very many people who have lost quite a bit of money the past 2 years.
started reading SI about 2 years ago....in that time, my investing and the market as a whole have changed tremendously.
In March of 2000 I owned 24 stocks....23 of them were tech or biotech.
I lost quite a bit of money.......I have retreated into a capital preservation mode with 60%Vanguard GinneMae Fund and the rest mostly gold and oil.
It was very hard to dissuade folks from playing the momentum stocks when they were going up so much a few years ago, It was ok to trade those stocks so long as one had a Good trading technique or system. You also need to be able to switch over from the bullish market mindset of "Buying on the dips" to the Bear Market Reality of "Selling on the Rallies"
That's one reason that I never stopped talking about value and Income stocks back in 1999 and 2000 on John Mike & Tom's Wild World of Stocks Thread
It was impossible to not talk about tech back then, but I also talked about Value and Income stocks like WMI,CD,FAX, CEI, Y, various reits, Gold stocks etc.
My profitable Trades and positions the past 2 years have been mostly shorting tech, with the occasionally 4 month switch over strategy of lightly buying tech when It looks like it's getting really oversold. (Like when the VIX hit the 57 level back on Sept 21 of 2001. Same level as the Oct 8th 1998 Low).
From the long side, I've had my successes by being in the value and Macro cycle oriented names and themes like I've talked about here.
Obviously Some of the shorts have worked really well, and I've still got some on. I've had a higher percentage of my own money in cash and safe Income funds this year than I've had in the past 10 years.
I think that's telling about this year's market environment.
In a bear market, It pays for many investors to try not to get to tricky. And that includes me !! -g-
NLY had great results. I'll post those in a sec.
John |
