Earlie from Earlie:
Long time web pal "Box", caught me with a nice body check last evening. Carrying the puck with one's head down is asking for just such a jolting event so we exchanged some PMs so I could get an understanding of his viewpoint. Box is rarely shy and its valuable to have friends who will level with you, even when the commentary is not what you want to hear.
In essence his perspective is that Earlie shows up from time to time, posts his viewpoints and then disappears for lengthy periods leaving "followers" stranded. Can't argue a darned word about that as it is accurate. He also thinks that if posted ideas "don't pan out", they deserve "postmortems" from the poster. Makes complete sense to me and I intend to do just that in the future.
He also sees Earlie's comments on stocks that Earlie thinks might be winners as inappropriate. Again, his comments hit home with me.
Summing up, he feels that Earlie has let folks down who trust his judgement. Ouch! This one cut, but again, most of us move through life not really knowing what others are thinking of one's activities so having someone provide such info is valuable.
That there are folks who read SI threads and assign value to my personal views is a nifty compliment but also a sobering thought for me. It hasn't been a consideration and will be in the future.
With respect to appearing then disappearing, market-related projects have dictated much of this, but I'm heading for retirement so this ought to improve.
In spite of wrestling with the whole concept for many moons, I have never really got my mind wrapped around the best way to provide positive recommendations. I do see situations that hold high promise and that appear to provide solid risk/reward potential. Unfortunately, the obvious problems are that:
- one comes across as promotional if a recommendation is made
- when the recommendation doesn't work out, folks feel let down.
In retrospect, avoiding recommendations makes the most sense.
During this past two years, my basic premise has been that we were witnessing a bear market rally following the first leg of a secular bear market (in which considerable "excess speculation" was eliminated via the crushing of the NAZ). I expected that follow-on rally but didn't expect it to move as high or last as long. I couldn't and didn't get involved as I am "fundamentals-driven". I thought then, and still do today, that gold stocks represented a rather obvious low risk way to play the long side, accompanied by modest put positions to provide decent insurance in case the rally sputtered. I also took on a couple of "juniors".
I posted that strategy from time to time and it proved to be a winner. While the puts provided losses, the golds galloped and provided excellent gains. The juniors also worked out, so on balance both years were nicely profitable. Unfortunately, "the devil is in the details" and this was missing. We shall see if Earlie can improve on this in the future.
Best, Earlie |
