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Strategies & Market Trends : Waiting for the big Kahuna
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To: Bonnie Bear who wrote (14987)3/14/1998 9:15:00 AM
From: Tommaso  Read Replies (2) of 94695
 
Some very limited and anecdotal evidence:

I just got back from our local farmers' market. At one point I stopped in front of some turnips to evesdrop on a conversation. Two guys that looked about 50-55 years old. Talking earnestly about IRAs. They were putting everything they could, for themselves and for their old parents, into mutual funds.

Hence the continuing positive inflow in AMG data. Hence the stock market staying up like a giant inflated quonset greenhouse or swimming pool cover.

I think that the best analogy might be with nineteenth-century banks. During good times people poured their money into them, confident of becoming rich or at least providing for the future. A whiff of bad times and banks closed by the dozens or hundreds, leaving depositors with nothing. Smarter people had gold coins in jars behind a brick in the basement. Enterprising people were building up businesses.

Today, the brick in the basement is the FDIC insured savings account. A lot of people who understand nothing about stocks or mutual funds are at much greater risk than they realize. This stock market is driven not so much by wild speculation as in the 1920s--but rather by misplaced perceptions of thrift and safety.

I find I am unable to guess how soon and by what stages the disillusionment with mutual funds will occur. But to judge by the bank panics of the last century, just as soon as about thirty million people realize that their "savings" are not really secure, they could try to withdraw them. Because you don't get totally wiped out --don't lose all your money-- I guess it could be slower than a bank panic. In other words, a typical bear market of about 24 months.
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