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Strategies & Market Trends : Bob Brinker, Moneytalk and Marketimer -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: InvesTing who wrote (1631)	10/16/2007 11:21:38 PM
From: octavian	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 2121

queen said: "Obviously, I personally lost a whole lot more of my portfolio by not hearing and following Brinker's advice." InvesTing responded: <<I do not understand how that could be true unless you stayed "out of state" from January 2000 through Aug. 2000. During that time the market was often quite a bit higher than when people got the January 2000 letter.>> --Right. But not everyone remembers all those details like you, I and other fanatics do. I actually sold my last fund in July or August, when the market was rallying and brinker was telling listeners it was "one last chance to get down to 60-40."

To: InvesTing who wrote (1631)	10/17/2007 6:42:16 AM
From: InvesTing	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 2121

I find the claims of those who promote Brinker's worth as an advisor of great interest. Following what they claim to do rather than what they say about Brinker is very interesting. Sometimes it just plain doesn't add up but that is the way it is with investing. A candid look at your particular claims may help other investors who are reticent to trust Bob Brinker or any other advisor know when to jump on their advice and know when to run away from it. Of course for me that has always been the issue --even Brinker seems to blink and not do what he claimed he would do when situations develop. That's why I think this guru in particular takes absolute faith or absolute idiocy to follow. But let's look at what you said. Someone asked you: "In January 2000 Brinker recommended selling 60% of stock holdings. Did you follow that recommendation? " You replied: "No, I was out of state for a time in December 1999 and January 2000 and didn't even hear about Brinker's very successful call until later, to my dismay. Obviously, I personally lost a whole lot more of my portfolio by not hearing and following Brinker's advice." I was amazed you said that. You seem to be intimating that Brinker's January call was so time sensitive that if you didn't get it in early January (remember then it took from a few days to about two weeks for some to receive their marketimer every month) all was lost and you were powerless to act. I just don't understand that at all, because once you got the newsletter you had to realize that the market was about the same as it was before it was sent OR HIGHER for months!! Curiously last night you said this. "Only partly right, octavian. I remember the general trends, I just don't remember the numbers exactly. But I know darn well I lost more of my portfolio by not following Brinker's January call than I ever lost on the QQQ (I say QQQ because that's what it was at the time). I remember that the market continued up for a couple of months after Brinker's January call to convert to cash. I believe I heard that he actually said something about that earlier in December to his subscribers before he announced it on the air. Could it be that he believes his subscribers deserve that kind of heads up before the general public? Anyway, by the time I heard about it, I thought it was too late and all the brokers and advisors around here and all over were saying "it'll come back, it'll come back". At that point I thought it was too late and I was too inexperienced and yes, too indecisive to do anything...well, decisive. My fault." So now are you saying the bit about being "out of the state" had nothing to do with it? That the inference you seem to have made that Brinker's advice was so timely that you felt helpless to act unless you did so immediately was not the case? Brinker's advice in making investment changes in a portfolio one could argue is never very time sensitive. (I would say any change he calls is also as likely to be wrong as right) . Yet you claim that being late reading that one rag caused you you to lose tons of money more than you lost on his disasterous QQQ call. Oddly here you are then a champion for Bob Brinker on these threads and you didn't take his advice to lighten up in the market although you had almost a year to do so--but you jumped on the QQQs. So you lost all of the money anyone fully invested in the market would lose and additionally lost the money Brinker threw at the QQQs . Quite interesting. Just to carry the example on to show anyone who wants to follow Brinker that his January call was not remotely time sensitive and that in reality any claim that being "out of state" when the mail came to your house had anything to do with your ability to get out of the market at a HIGHER price than Brinker had suggested here are some dates monthly for the rest of the year. On 1/05/00 spy was 140.00 On 1/11/00 Spy was 144.00 On 2/11/00 Spy was 138.00 On 3/11/00 Spy was 140.00 On 4/11/00 spy was 150.86 On 5/11/00 spy was 138.00 On 6/12/00 spy was 144.00 On 7/11/00 spy was 149.00 On 8/14/00 spy was 149.00 On 9/14/00 spy was 148.00 On 10/10/00 spy was 137 On 11/10/00 spy was 136 On 12/10/00 spy was 139 So you see for anyone who wanted to take money out of the market you had the whole year essentially as throwing a dart would have likely put you at a price within 5% up or down of his January call. Yet you seem to suggest that somehow one missed the boat by "being out of state" . Oddly though even though just days or weeks after you could have unloaded the broad market at 5% higher than Brinker's January 2000 call you bought more QQQs in Oct 2000 to add to your stock holdings. You claimed to have sold them when they went down--but didn't sell anything else. . This is a great exercise in what seems to be the waste of money buying Brinker's newsletter. You felt you couldn't act on his advice you thought because it was time sensitive? and you didn't notice that the market was higher? --though as we can see it was not time sensitive. You were paralyzed to act on his rather bizzare overall market timing call even though for a year after you could have done so with no harm and likely a benefit. Yet you ACTED IMMEDIATELY to load up on his terrible advice to buy QQQs around 80$. What do we draw from this? I think "firstly" as Bob would say, buying a newsletter didn't help you a bit and indeed hurt your performance. We learned that some buying a newsletter don't trust Brinker enough to move any money to follow his advice even though they had a year and many opportunities to follow him at better prices. Secondly they are likely to follow his dumb advice more readily than they are to follow the advice that is more prudent. Thirdly, by not subscribing to his newsletter and pocketing the money, they would have known everything you knew and did not act on or did act on; simply by watching Brinker sites on the net or reading hulbert. Brinker was obviously bad for your portfolio. I'm sorry. But I do believe your sharing of your personal unsuccessful approach to marketiming via Bob Brinker. might help others. Thank you.