Every year, Mass Mutual comes to our company and gives the lecture about 401k investing(company’s 401k is through MM). Inevitably, the guy tells us to get into the various funds, but specially the one they have the big interest in. When he came last year, I had just moved to 85% money market and 15% bonds. The Dow was at 12k and Bear Stearns had just fallen apart.
I argued with the guy that people should just move to safe positions until all the bank stuff gets settled. He used the old refrain “the market always goes back up, don’t be a chump and sell low and buy high!, you’ve got years to retire”
It never went up the rest of the year. I moved some of it back recently, but I’m still 65% money market. I figure if the whole thing unravels and the dollar collapses, none of it is going to matter anyway, but if the market does go up, I’ll capture some of the gains.
We seem to be going down the same path that has led to nearly two decades of economic stagnation and declining stock prices in Japan. Now Japan seems to be headed over another cliff , too.
The long term bottom may be long time from now.
Short term trading bottoms will happen every few months.
See post 74 for some eye opening stats.
Sounds like you made an excellent move. We should all be so wise... :-)