Black Monday?

[wabmester]

Ouch. Don't look at the NIKKEI if you want to sleep well tonight. Dropping over 550 points as I write this.

Should be an interesting week....

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Looks like the markets worldwide took a 3-5% bath in the last trading session.

Sweet. I'm getting ready to buy some stuff...this is just the correction I've been waiting for.

 

[wabmester]

Hmm, it turned out to be just another dark gray Monday.

I *almost* like stocks at this level. *If* earnings were to continue to grow at this rate and interest rates and inflation stayed at this level, stocks would be a bargain.

I bought a little more international today.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

I still want another 1000 points off the dow, at least 300 off the nasdaq and 100 or so off the S&P before I feel like I'm buying at a good price.

I guess the good news, a la Buffett, is that I'm not selling anything, so dropping prices are irrelevant...

 

[eytonxav]

Despite all the lectures on market timing, I dumped my mutual funds several weeks ago and continue to do my rain dance to keep the skys gray/black. Actually the summer months look to me like a time where there is apt to be no significant market upside (overvalued IHO), but a good possiblity for further erosion, given the overall current mess (Iraq, interest rates worries, deficit, inflation, Osama, Bush/Kerry, etc).

I may DCA back in over the next 6-9 months; however, in the event of a dramatic downturn, I will dump it all back in.

Doug

 

[unclemick]

Once again, I plan to charge forward and do nothing, except watch how well my balanced index funds rebalance. The chewy part comes when bond and stock prices go south together - whether 'true grit' can watch a -22% 1973-4 type dip with aplomb.

 

[John Galt]

Had lunch with my folks today and mentioned to my Dad
that I have no stocks. He is almost in the same position.
He is 86 years old but we came to this point by different roads, i.e. he is
quite financially unsophisticated. Any way, like unclemick
I will not be changing anything. I have envisioned the
worst case and decided I would survive, financially
if not literally.

John Galt

 

[Lancelot]

Once again, I plan to charge forward and do nothing, except watch how well my balanced index funds rebalance.

Sounds good to me! Didn't John Bogle once say "Just stand there, do nothing!!!"

Personally speaking, I know alot of folks make money when the market moves, but for me, the more I trade, the poorer I become.

I did but a little of Vanguard's Total Bond Index-at $9.99 a share, it looked (relatively) attractive. Time will tell...................

Lance

 

[John Galt]

"Trading" (selling at the wrong time) has cost me a lot of
money over the years. Now, I literally just sit on what I have and cash the interest checks. Once in a while I
do a real estate deal. If my "portfolio" excluding real
estate is never "called" by the borrowing companies then the money would remain right where it is after
I am long gone. That's why it is called "forever"
money. Boring I know, but that's the way I like it.

John Galt

 

[Paul]

It seems to be a good time to buy QQQ and sell it in a few days when it goes up again.

 

[Lancelot]

I own no real estate right now, but one nice thing about (real estate) is, if one is fortunate enough to enjoy some capital gains, there is no annual tax bill, like the taxable mutual fund "capital gains" payouts. And real estate has that sweet 250/500k capital gain exclusion for certain real estate sales.

Not bad, not bad at all........

 

[John Galt]

Greetings Lancelot! I am quite comfortable with real estate and have been for a long time. I understand it and it's been good to me. You have to get by the
illiquidity issue though. The little manufacturing
company I ran until 1993 has morphed into a (tiny)
real estate investment corp., mostly. I had no plan for this
(actually I didn't have much of a plan at all) in 1993,
but it worked out fine and looking back is not too
surprising given my natural inclination toward real
estate as an investment.

John Galt

 

[Lancelot]

Hi John,

Glad that real estate has been good to you. When something works, why not stick with a wining strategy!

Unrelated to real estate, Scott Burns just wrote a great colum about rising interests rates. You may enjoy perusing it (or maybe you already have!)

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcon...umns/2004/stories/051104dnbusburns.95e6e.html

All the best,

Lance