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Pastimes : The Justa and Lars Honors Bob Brinker Investment Club Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: marc ultra who wrote (796)	3/18/2001 7:40:43 AM
From: Boca_PETE	Respond to of 10065

Yesterday, Bob confirmed on the radio that indicators that have succeeded on a historical basis in calling market turning points (presumably including the ones Bob used for CTR1 and CTR2) have not worked recently - that they may have been overwhelmed by secular bear forces (sounds very ominous - I sure sure wouldn't want a bear to force me to do anything). I've been thinking the same thing since NASDAQ 2800. Stats on NASDAQ internals I've been keeping since last summer (based on reconstruction of the CTR1 call last spring) have shown numerous successful "text book tests of NAZDAQ lows". Lately, they show water torture marginal new lows on lower volume than the last benchmark low, but adding up to a significant new low over time. This experience corresponds exactly to what Bob said - historical turning point indicators are not working in this environment. This experience brings the old Wall Street bromide to mind: "Every time someone thinks they've found a key to the market, some S.O.B changes the lock". In trying to understand why this is happening, I am again reminded that Bob said "a Bear Market should be the mirror image of a Bull Market". If this is so, it would follow that the difficulty of identifying market tops in a bull market would translate into difficulty in identifying lows in a bear market. Thus, it might be that use of market internals to identify lows in a Bull Market might be most useful to identify counter-trend rally tops in a bear market. Testing this possibility would be interesting research for someone with a lot of time on their hands (any volunteers?) since I still work full time. But even if this idea were found to be true, it wouldn't surprise me that at some point it too would fail to work as "a key to the market". I still think THE MAIN FLAW in Bob's strategy this past years was "GOING AGAINST THE OVERALL LONG-TERM MARKET DOWNTREND". Selling short at tops of CT rallies seems less risky than going long at turning points in the start of CT rallies. REMEMBER, "The trend is your friend, until it gets you in the end". FWIW - Just thinking out loud :-) P

To: marc ultra who wrote (796)	3/18/2001 9:30:56 AM
From: Lone Ranger	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 10065

marc, i'm thankful rp refreshed my mind about this thread. your posts and most others are very thoughtful and academic in nature which lends the mind to exploring the probabilities of market direction. i will state a couple of my opinions. if the naz goes down to 1400 then it will have made sense to sell some of your holdings at this level. the key is then to not be afraid to buy back in for fear of losing some of the eventual upside. but i believe just as it would have been wise to either sell early as the ctr failed to develop or to at least dollar cost average out of the failed rally, then it is very prudent here to buy back slowly in a dca manner. when your luck has been broken, it is then the time to decrease the size and value of your trades until your confidence and capital is restored. i fear for myself and others if we try to get "whole" in one fell swoop just as we over confidently accepted the fact that da brink could do no wrong, and therefore we over allocated to this trade. Personally, i'm looking for a way to buy back in as i have decreased my holdings in the cube related funds. I hope this post furthers the discussion and your analyses are appreciated as are the others on this thread.

To: marc ultra who wrote (796)	3/18/2001 6:40:34 PM
From: Investor2	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 10065

Re: "Now I'm in till the bitter end or a CTR." I've seen several posts where people indicate they are hoping for a CTR to sell their QQQ's. That line of reasoning assumes that the rally will be a CTR and not the first leg of the new bull market. 1. How does one tell the difference between a CTR and the first leg up of the next bull market? 2. How would it feel to sell one's QQQ's in the low 50's, only to see the share price keep going up through a full bull market, maybe never returning to the current prices? Best wishes, I2