NW-Bound
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2008
- Messages
- 35,712
I think you're right under normal, relatively calm market conditions. But not too many months ago when the VIX was hitting all time highs, I was seeing a huge spike in volume on these leveraged ultralong and short ETFs (mostly the short).
There are probably some cancellations there between these ultralong and ultrashorts. I do not own any, and have looked at them briefly out of curiosity. In early 2000, during the tech bubble burst, there was so much volatility that made your head spin; yet there weren't any of these ultra ETFs then. I remembered it as yesterday because yours truly was deep in it. I had 80% of portfolio in semiconductor and telecoms, though not a single dotcom. Got hurt bad and lost 50%, but I survived and recovered.
Recently, have read some postings here where people have lost 50% in this downdraft, yet do not claim to be as heavily weighted in financials as I was in tech in 2000. Whoa! This is truly a biggest recession since the Great One. My lesson in 2000 saves me this time. I've got scars to prove it.