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Non-Tech : Kirk's Market Thoughts -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Chip McVickar who wrote (4601)	1/1/2017 12:40:38 AM
From: Kirk ©	4 Recommendations Recommended By Investor Clouseau rdkflorida2 Robert O toccodolce Respond to of 26768

Thanks!

To: Chip McVickar who wrote (4601)	1/4/2017 1:40:53 PM
From: Kirk ©	3 Recommendations Recommended By berniel Investor Clouseau kinkblot Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 26768

I capitulated. After having a bearish friend since I first started managing message boards at Suite101 in the 1990s and a bear with the moniker "Perma Bear" took residence on my boards, I tried to be open minded, allow him his own forum on my sites. I continued to participate when I left Suite101 and it went under and he found his way to Facebook. After a few years of posting with the fake name, Facebook told him he had to post with his real name but could make a permabear forum, which he did and I followed and tried to politely engage with the permabears and occasional bull who posted there. At the end of the year I asked if he felt any guilt keeping so many out of the market and roughly tripling their portfolios or more if they followed me rather than his bearish ways. I got the old crap about how he'll eventually be right. I pointed out that a nuke could take ALL my stocks to zero tomorrow and I'll have more cash in my mostly equity portfolio to buy what is left when the dust settles than I had as a total portfolio when I first met him.... That is what happens when your Explore Portfolio gains over 700% and you take profits to generate a cash position much like Buffett does with his portfolio. No guilt - It doesn't matter to them! AMAZING Anyway... I was fine with that but the minions of bears who are clueless and seem to share a similar wrong idea of how the World works... They say just raise taxes on the productive and redistribute it to them in their government jobs and all will be right in the world... When I point out Obama cut taxes on EVERYONE by 2% when he wanted the economy to recover and it did... They blame Bush for cutting taxes rather than Obama making the cuts permanent BUT increasing our taxes a HUGE amount with ACA and that is fine as we have people with insurance, but they won't admit it hurts growth... Some other clueless ideologue gave me a stack of credentials he has studying Econ under some guru's with PhDs and a Nobel Prize... started in how Trickle Down doesn't work and he has proof... yet he left his high paying job and lives overseas, probably because it is cheaper and he was tired of giving over half to the government, but won't admit it to himself! Then today some "mentally challenged" person tried to tell me Apple stock price would crash if they used repatriated cash to pay dividends and buy back shares since that is what happened when MSFT started to pay a dividend. When I pointed out Apple has a PE a fraction of what Microsoft's was when it changed from growth to value and this is ALREADY priced into Apple's stock, he started to make stuff up. Conclusion... some people are so wrong for so long that it is more like mental illness than a learning opportunity and when you discuss facts with them, from a distance nobody can distinguish the crazy from the sane. Anyway, I capitulated and "unfollowed" his forum and will do my best to not participate on any regular basis.

To: Chip McVickar who wrote (4601)	6/8/2017 4:31:29 PM
From: Kirk ©	Respond to of 26768

So far, a GREAT year! SPY up 9.5% YTD! Here is the latest sentiment update: Dear Kirk Lindstrom, Thank you for your submission. Your article has been selected for exclusive publication on Seeking Alpha as part of our Premium Partnership Program. You can see it live here: SPY And Markets At Record Highs While Investor Sentiment Churns A link to your article will be sent to 22,714 investors as a real-time email alert. My 60:40 "Explore Portfolio" is up about 8% YTD so the individual stocks are doing much better than the markets as the cash hurts returns.... but as I'm now 60, that weighting feels about right for neutral. I was over weight stocks earlier but now I'm happy to take profits as it works higher and spend the money if the markets never go down again..

To: Chip McVickar who wrote (4601)	8/5/2017 2:34:05 PM
From: Kirk ©	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 26768

So far, a great year! Wonderful and Very Happy New Year to You Kirk I have my health and wealth from the continuing run in the stock market. I hope you are just as happy and healthy! Question/Thoughts for general comments from all: So many times in semiconductor land we mark tops when too many say "it is different this time." Well, here are some differences since 2000 that piss me off as a consumer but I love as an owner of semiconductor and capital equipment maker stocks. Software - aka BLOATWARE updates that make perfectly good devices nearly nonfunctional after a few years as their makers want to add more ways for you to "buy things" be it my DVR (wants it easier to watch extra paid for content) and my tablets and smart phones. This means we have to buy new things and spend too much time learning what changed, just to get back the functionality we were happy with before the Farking upgrade! The move from desktop to laptops meant people dropped and broke their PCs more often. These days, many/most use their smart phone "phablets" to communicate with family, friends and customers AND they often drop them in the toilet or on the floor requiring more frequent replacement. Making a phone call is "virtually free" (with unlimited talk, text and data plans) on an incremental basis but I just upgraded a 2.5yr, $600 Galaxy S5 phone with a $600 Galaxy S8 phone. Very similar prices after the discounts and 2.5 yrs of time. The S5's battery swelled and did some cosmetic damage so a new battery should allow me to use the phone in the house as a remove or WiFi phone while I'll have more confidence the new one won't leak.... New phones have the batteries glued in and you can't replace them so this would just be land fill.... and With traffic and congestion so bad, I don't want to be without Waze and the phone to make hands free calls while driving so I can use the time otherwise wasted. and The younger generation seems afraid to talk to people so they want to order their food with an ap.... So... We'll still have ups and downs in the cycles as you might buy a cheap phone if yours breaks when you are between jobs, but I don't think most, especially those younger than me, can go a day without being connected.... so they'll just buy a cheap phone on installments if forced. Anything else to add to my list? Everyone else, please feel free to add to my list.

To: Chip McVickar who wrote (4601)	1/27/2018 7:49:02 PM
From: Kirk ©	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 26768

Happy New Year Chip. I haven't heard from you in awhile. I hope all is well and happy for you and yours.

To: Chip McVickar who wrote (4601)	10/5/2018 2:15:34 PM
From: Kirk ©	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 26768

Hi Chip, I hope you are happy and well! Boy, Hussman continues to amaze at finding ways to remain bearish. The Music Fades Out John P. Hussman, Ph.D. President, Hussman Investment Trust October 2018 Chuck Prince famously said we have to dance until the music stops. Actually the music had stopped already when he said that. – George Soros Soros.... smh! hussmanfunds.com Though my sense is that the market is currently registering a major bull market peak, suppose that the market is actually poised to double from its current level without any material weakness at all. Frankly, that would be fine, because it’s very unlikely for the market to experience a sustained advance without also recruiting favorable market internals, which would encourage us to shift our stance to a much more constructive outlook (though undoubtedly with a safety net given current valuation extremes). It was our pre-emptive bearish response to “overvalued, overbought, overbullish” features of market action – without deterioration in market internals – that created difficulty for us in recent years. The chart below shows a tally of an even broader set of technical, monetary, sentiment, and economic features frequently observed at bull market peaks, where the bars are restricted to periods with both overvaluation and unfavorable market internals on our measures. The only time we’ve ever seen a confluence of risk factors anywhere close to those of today was the week of March 24, 2000, which marked the peak of the technology bubble. In my view, this sort of analysis is useful because it doesn’t rely on any single risk factor, and emphasizes that while these risk factors can emerge individually without consequence, a large and critical mass of them probably shouldn’t be dismissed. My impression is that this is as close as one gets to ringing a bell at the top. Doesn't anyone check his record?