Down goes the Dow

Ghost of Igloi wrote:

j-wo wrote:

Maybe s/he is not a day trader like you?

OK, or a short term investment that within hours turned into long term investment, kind of locked into now. ?

Anybody who knows anything about investing knows that is the way to go. History FTW.

j-wo wrote:

Ghost of Igloi wrote:

OK, or a short term investment that within hours turned into long term investment, kind of locked into now. ?

Anybody who knows anything about investing knows that is the way to go. History FTW.

Pfizer is a real company, with real profits. Pfizer had great news today, yet the stock closed today over 15% below the high it reach in 1999, over 21 years ago. So don’t give me that baloney.

History For The Loss.

agip wrote:

Other guy wrote:

Your reply had nothing to do with the comment that next year the economy will be even worse due to looming lockdowns.

Things will be much better in six months?

At the tail end of 4 month lockdown that destroys so many businesses and puts so many folks out of work?

Or do you think there will be no lockdown?

If there is a lockdown then there will be another bailout of several trillion dollars.

If there is no lockdown, profits will continue to climb.

This.

But really, the first scenario isn't going to happen. There won't be another lockdown - people just don't care anymore. I do agree with Mas that inflation might start to take off but it's been sh!t for so long that a lot of people think inflation is just what we need. Besides, that's like 60% of the nation's strategy to get out of the massive deficit we have lol. Just inflate out of it I guess.

Gold is always in the spotlight because people love to doomsday predict and gold bugs love to sh!tpost on Twitter but my guess is that, over the next 2 years, it's going to be incredibly "meh" as an investment.

Honestly, I feel kind of the same going forward about gold—but I will be satisfied if that will be the case, as long as it offsets USD losses if there are any. I see it as a pure asset, not a commodity. Unfortunately/fortunately miners are businesses, so there are business dynamics, hopefully smoothed by the funds.

If Biden wins, I see China taking off ?. No, seriously, I do. Over the next cycle. I will buy the moment his crusty butt is in the chair.

“I do agree with Mas that inflation might start to take off but it's been sh!t for so long that a lot of people think inflation is just what we need. Besides, that's like 60% of the nation's strategy to get out of the massive deficit we have lol. Just inflate out of it I guess.”

So, house prices advance to the point where people only look at the monthly payment (low mortgage). Home buyers thinking this is a once in a generation deal. Once the demand is moved forward, and eventually met, prices fall in line with demand. At that point the low monthly payment does not look attractive relative to the value of the property (substantially below purchase price). There is no scenario, where there are not consequences to madness.

For years of meh, how about uranium over the past decade. It’s being pumped again. Not biting, again.

Listened to a Canadian money manager over a decade ago promoting uranium. His belief was uranium for nuclear, with falling reserves of fossil fuel for air, car, and trucks. Shortly thereafter another PM promoting shale with reserves that would last centuries. Now we are sold that clean energy is the answer. I tend to believe we need all of the above, currently, with clean energy by far the most expensive in-crowd idea.

Juice Springsteen wrote:

Sold me delta and United stocks today

Cha Ching

I sold United back when it was at 44 dollars/share. Missed the peak date by one day, but oh well. Been kicking myself for not selling some of my other holdings back in June when everything was up crazy, but timing is of course difficult. I DID, however, sell many of my positions today. More than doubled my money with my investment in Discover Financial Services and also did well with some others (40% to 60+%). Now I need somewhere else to stick the money... Will max out my Roth for 2020 sometime in the next several months, and I have a couple pretty big expenses coming up, so I'll spend some money on those...

Still amazed the S and P 500 is up more than 10% YTD at present. Pretty strange given the events of the year, but I'll take it.

seattle prattle wrote:I am the first to admit that we don't know what we don't know, but i cannot fathom that we are in for more restrictive lockdowns. ...

The US is an interesting case study. I've been following the data very closely from the beginning.

One thing I marvel at is that while we all have access to exactly the same data and information, a wide range of interpretations results, and, particularly in the US, they can divide at polar opposite points of view, largely along political lines. You see this to some degree in other countries, but not nearly as pronounced (so far as I've observed anyway).

The US is at the early stages of out of control growth in new cases, and fatalities are starting to follow. Daily fatalities in the US are currently sitting at about 1000. I expect this will exceed 3000 per day before the end of 2020.

I won't argue for a strict "lockdown" in the US, per se. I've been watching Belgium very closely (among other countries). They had gradually eased restrictions over the summer, and saw cases start to rise early September, then skyrocket late September. They clamped down gradually (and thoughtfully, so far as I can tell), eventually going back into a hard lockdown on 2 November, but cases peaked 30-31 October, then started to plummet (currently at less than half the peak after ~ 10 days). This reversal came as a result of earlier measures, before the complete lockdown, since it started before the final lockdown.

There is a lot the US (and others) can learn from how other countries have managed (both good and bad experiences). I think it's unlikely the US will look outward for good examples though, so I predict you are all in for a very hard winter.

What this all means for the markets? Who the hell knows...

This doesn't seem too complicated to me.

The states institute the lock downs, not the federal govt. The way different states took this on has varied wildly. There are a few states that have exhibited the kind of rigor and discipline one might expect would be necessary to reinstitute a lockdown.

But most did too little, too late, and had shoddy compliance when they did. The best those states are going to do is to slow down their re-openings. They simply will not be more that they did already, and if they did, no one would listen. So all they can hope to do is to open up more slowly.

In all likelihood, the treatments will improve and vaccine(s) will start emerging and we will learn how to treat the infected for better outcomes. This will help justify opening up even if we haven't fully got it under control.

Of course, this is just my best take. But I mean, come on! We aren't some obedient culture like Taiwan, we don't have central control over this issue, and we can barely get the public to maintain the low level of compliance currently without entertaining the idea that we could go backwards.

Just won't happen(except in a very few states that actually have their sh!t together).

seattle prattle wrote:This doesn't seem too complicated to me.

The states institute the lock downs, not the federal govt.

...

But I mean, come on! We aren't some obedient culture like Taiwan,...

I appreciate that states (and in many cases municipalities) decide what measures to impose, not the feds. That's the same in most other countries. Look to your north; same thing. Belgium that I mentioned earlier; same thing.

The state of the pandemic is entirely dependent on human behavior (for now anyway, until a vaccine exists), which, in my view, varies as a function of legal and political factors, as well as individual and group values and beliefs. My hypothesis about what makes the US stand out is the high value you place on individual liberty, in favor of group or societal benefit. In many / most other countries, the balance between the good of the many versus the good of the few, or the one, tips in a different direction, and it's not so hard to get people to recognize both directions of transmission and their potential role in it (i.e. giving and receiving), and take less-selfish measures to protect others instead of only thinking about themselves. Of course I generalize, and also tis is only a hypothesis. Probably all wrong...

Finally, I think assigning "obedient" to Taiwan diminishes the importance of what they (and others) have done by presuming to know a cause. Are New Zealand and Australia similarly "obedient?" None of the kiwis and ozzies I know...

After the repeated displays of hypocrisy from the Fake News media - riots okay, cheering Dementia Joe okay, small businesses bad, Trump bad - many of us on the right will tell Dementia Joe to shove his mask mandate up his fascist butt.

[quote]seattle prattle wrote:

This doesn't seem too complicated to me.

The states institute the lock downs, not the federal govt.

Why?

You want to bet that this "responsibility" does not shift to the federal government early in 2021?

Phase two of the life destroying lockdowns are coming...not that Phase one ever completely was lifted.

This will be the worst winter/spring of most people's lives

Many nations have already been locked down.

All on a national level, not region by region.

It's coming and fast.

Resist

We are one of the largest, and most diverse nations on Earth in terms of people, culture, climate, and geography. It's a little more challenging to govern here than a small homogeneous country like Belgium. But that doesn't stop the "golly gee those Americans are so selfish and stupid" narratives from flaring up - as if like 90% of Europe isn't literally in the exact same boat.

Maserati wrote:

If Biden wins, I see China taking off ?. No, seriously, I do. Over the next cycle. I will buy the moment his crusty butt is in the chair.

Biden's China plan is the basically the same as Trump's at this point. Why do you think he'll go easier on them? Also (and this is the ace up my sleeve against agip) the better they do the more likely they will rise up and overthrow their communist government. Milton Friedman said so

Racket wrote:It's a little more challenging to govern here than a small homogeneous country like Belgium.

You imagine that Belgium is homogeneous, which betrays a general ignorance of geography, which I have found common among many people I've met from your country (at the risk of generalizing).

I attended a ~ 2 month training course with the USAF way back when I was a young buck (around 30 years back). There were ~ 65 or 70 other students on the course, all homegrown except me and one compatriot. Over the course of the training I got to chat with most of them, and not one - university educated all of them - could name the capital of my home country. On my way home, the cab driver, a older (less educated) lady was able to name it, having visited once.

I make this observation not intending to insult, just to relate an observation. Americans, in my observation, tend to be oblivious to the world around them. Not all Americans, obviously, but typical ones, including many well-educated. Lots of other great qualities; awareness of the world outside their borders not among them.

As yes, "Americans big dumb, not know anything about world."

As for Belgium being homogeneous, Wikipedia has it listed at 75% "ethnically Belgium." The NYC metro area is larger and more diverse. The point is that solutions for nation states in the EU aren't always transferable to the US because we are a decidedly different country