Down goes the Dow

Say wha? wrote:

So-called?

seriously. Maserati seems to want it both ways - to say that yes, there is a conspiracy but no, there is no actual fudging of numbers.

Or maybe it's the other way around - that there actually is a conspiracy, but no actual fudging of numbers.

Come on, M - just go whole hog on it and declare your views.

o crap I mixed that up, but you might know what i mean.

agip wrote:

Say wha? wrote:

So-called?

seriously. Maserati seems to want it both ways - to say that yes, there is a conspiracy but no, there is no actual fudging of numbers.

Or maybe it's the other way around - that there actually is a conspiracy, but no actual fudging of numbers.

Come on, M - just go whole hog on it and declare your views.

Surely you remember Maserati's response when challenged on his notion that CPI was miscalculated and that he had a better way of doing it.

///////////

M: CPI is BS.

Doubting Thomas (T): I suppose you have a better way, otherwise it is just so much hot air.

M: You're right, I will back up my words.

T: Great. Can't wait.

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T: Waiting

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.

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T: Still waiting

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.

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T: Ahem...

M: You know, it's getting easier and easier to ignore you.

LOL

Good luck!

Friday Fiddle, coming up.

Markets will get a bit of a bump.

Same old, unless the US markets regain a leadership role.

Buffet had a busy week buying on the dip. Wish I'd done the same as we'll be climbing back to 17K following the jobs report.

Well, what do you know? Headline from M*:

"U.S. Stock Futures Point Higher Following Employment Report"

I don't wish I did anything that Buffet does, I'm not in his position, although I'm considering buying BRK.

Up 78 in early trading.

I want Buffet to do it, and I'll be content with the scraps.

He seems to enjoy it, whereas I don't.

Well up on the day.

Gee, who would have guessed?

Stay tuned for more exciting action on the Q4 ride.

So how low does gold have to go to make it attractive?

Up 209 to 17,010

This was painfully obvious, but a good gain nonetheless.

Gold? I think gold is a very personal thing, I don't necessarily think that many people consider it rationally. It's attractiveness therefore depends on all sorts of things like your state of mind, which will be different for everybody.

I love gold. Not enough to own any of it, but I love it anyway. I love all pure elements, I find them amusing. It dropped to 1192 today, on all the great news. Wasn't Sprott saying definitively that it would go to 2000+ sometime in 2014? Well, the year's not yet out.

On the flip side, I have heard people saying it should go much, much lower.

Whatever. If you like it, buy some of it! You can sit there and fetishize it, which I must admit has some emotional value. I do have a few random proof gold and silver coins around, and I haven't looked at them in years...but I could see how someone would think they were cool.

If the price of jewelry had anything to do with the spot price, you could buy your girl some nice gold jewelry, that would be a good way to hold it, and to greatly magnify its value. If she's not into gold, go silver or platinum, or maybe white gold.

Actually, that sounds like a good idea, I might do it myself!

I've been tempted to have a few bars around for fun. To rub'em around in my hands and get a woody. Too paranoid about having that much laying around the house though.

agip, there is no "conspiracy", in the nefarious way in which it is normally understood. That would require too much coordination, and C&C.

There is certainly, however, a loosely-coordinated and sometimes-agreed-upon effort to shape the markets, through ongoing management. Market performance is now a primary driver of policy, which is a "relatively" recent development, which is why the management seems nefarious.

To be sure, there is some abuse, but that is true of all managed systems.

All the numbers are fudged, all the time, from data collection practices to sorting to analysis. Some of the fudging is disclosed, some is not. It doesn't matter. The general ethos of the fudge is fairly well agreed-upon, and as such is predictable.

This is one reason why, although I think it should happen, an all-out "crash" will not in fact happen. A new normal will inexorably take hold, and the shift in normative values will be insidious. This is already happening, the point is how to use it to one's advantage, to the extent possible.

The market is just one cog in this large machine, but it is a very significant one, and one that is worth paying attention to--but not for the purposes of "making a buck". That's what real work is for. The market is helpful for knowing where you are in the grand scheme of things, and for paying attention to strategic social stratifications, which will in no small measure describe the future course of your options and your life.

Markets will continue to fluctuate for at least the next week, with no readily discernible trend, IMO, unless some insane political or epidemiological news is released.

Dude, make up your mind. You sound like one of those prognosticators that covers every possible scenario so that he can say he was right. Man up and make a specific call, bro.

Call me Deacon Blues wrote:

Dude, make up your mind. You sound like one of those prognosticators that covers every possible scenario so that he can say he was right. Man up and make a specific call, bro.

Yup

//////////////////////////////

Surely you remember Maserati's response when challenged on his notion that CPI was miscalculated and that he had a better way of doing it.

- - - - - - - - - - -

M: CPI is BS.

Doubting Thomas (T): I suppose you have a better way, otherwise it is just so much hot air.

M: You're right, I will back up my words.

T: Great. Can't wait.

.

.

.

T: Waiting

.

.

.

T: Still waiting

.

.

.

T: Ahem...

M: You know, it's getting easier and easier to ignore you.

LOL

Good luck!

I have made several very "specific calls" on this board, from the very specific like Friday's news and bump, to the less specific like Q2/Q3 performance, to the even less specific like total 2014 returns, to the least specific of a significant drop in Q4 2014 or Q1 2015. They have so far ALL come true, even the last one, if you want to consider the 10% correction as a significant drop.

That record of not only success, but of actually making specific predictions, is probably unmatched by anybody else on this board. It is certainly not all the predictions I make, for I don't post everything on this (I apologize), unimportant (to me) but sometimes interesting board.

Because I freely share many of my thoughts, I will re-iterate the point I made about a flight to quality. First it manifested on the largest scale, in ROW losing and USA gaining. Then it manifested on a smaller scale, with USA small- and mid-caps losing and USA large caps gaining (relatively, of course, since it is a smaller scale that is governed by the larger-scale dynamic). Now it will manifest in bonds, and money will flow from the lowest-rated to the highest-rated, as the ethos of yield search gives way to that of wealth preservation.

It's the same dynamic we have seen in other markets, e.g. real estate, consumer goods, art. There emerges a broadened and newly-differentiated "luxury class", and exclusivity rises with increasing prices and barriers to entry. This will not only be the case with things like hedge funds, but will become the case with individual stocks as well, in my opinion.

The important things will be to think about 1) how high prices can in fact go--in other markets, they have achieved levels that are absurdly high in comparison to the equity and bond markets (those high prices come at the direct expense of yield and liquidity--however, there are lots of people with lots of money, so liquidity might not be too much of a problem), and 2) what exactly constitutes quality, and what embodies that quality, in spades.

Funds, and even individual stocks, will become increasingly more branded, with the secondary effects of brand identification, like status. Wealth preservation is a big deal, and so far stocks and funds have had almost zero cache, which is why you see the uber-rich buying a painting for $100M rather than buying $100M of stock with that same money, or the well-off buying a $2M house instead of buying $2M of stock with that same money. They have no cache because they are not sexy, they are not tangible, they are abstract and offer nothing concrete. Somehow that will have to change.

Consider BRK-A, which I am considering. No splits, no dividends, highest-priced on NYSE, relatively illiquid. Great stuff. The only problem at this point is that Buffett's old. They have succession plans, not yet released to the public, but that's not comforting. Too bad, I may have missed the BRK-A ride--but there are other, unlisted investment vehicles that are very expensive, but that are similar, in private equity situations.

And that's where good, big money will go, and has already started to go.

If you think I'm blowing hot air, fine, that is up to you to decide.

But don't ever say that I don't contribute anything of specific substance to this thread.

I make this post for the benefit of earnest posters like agip, flagpole, and others, because I value their commentary and opinion, especially because it often conflicts with my own.

As for you trolls, well...it really doesn't matter, none of you consider the markets in any meaningful way, anyway.

BTW I'm setting up a new office in preparation for getting back into the game for a while. It was nice to take a break and do other things, but I think that opportunity will once again present itself in the near future.

Maserati wrote:

BTW I'm setting up a new office in preparation for getting back into the game for a while. It was nice to take a break and do other things, but I think that opportunity will once again present itself in the near future.

Does that mean that you will be leaving this site for good? No more hot air?

Calling Friday's news and bump is nothing to brag about. The timing of that report had been known for some time and the actual news was no surprise after the ADP report a few days ago. Given such positive news, my dog would have predicted a bump.

Can't deal with facts, huh?

Looks like I may have been trolled out of this thread, we will see.

You really are tiresome. It is a shame because there are some interesting people on here otherwise.

What facts? That you "predicted" the obvious?