IMHO, (and the learned opinion of many others far smarter than me) market timing is a losers game. [FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Let's hear what experts say about stock market forcasts and market timing:
"I never have the faintest idea what the stock market is going to do in the next six months, or the next year, or the next two." Warren Buffet
"Forget about timing the market, it doesn't work. You'll lose money. Invest for the long haul and then sit back and wait--the market always goes up in the long-run." Paul Farrell, CBS Marketwatch
"Market-timing is bunk." Pat Dorsey, Director of M* Fund Analysis.
"There will always be someone predicting disaster and someone predicting great fortune. At one time or another, each will be closer to correct than the other. But it won't matter to you if you understand this and have invested responsibly. You have a long-term plan; stick with it." Peter Lynch
"Everyone wants protection from the bear. But it's best to get it through diversification, not by trying to outsmart the market in a game in which the deck is stacked against the investor." C.V.Sanders, Morningstar
"Transaction costs and taxes kill most active traders. That's why no market-timing letter beats buying an index fund and standing pat." Mark Hulbert
"The market timer's Hall of Fame is an empty room." Jane Bryant Quinn, Author, Columnist
"Market timing is an ineffective strategy for mutual Fund Investors." CDA/Wiesenberger
"Nobody but nobody, has consistently guessed the direction of the bond or stock market over any meaningf
[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]There will always be someone predicting disaster and someone predicting great fortune. At one time or another, each will be closer to correct than the other. But it won't matter to you if you understand this and have invested responsibly. You have a long-term plan; stick with it." Peter Lynch
"Everyone wants protection from the bear. But it's best to get it through diversification, not by trying to outsmart the market in a game in which the deck is stacked against the investor." C.V.Sanders, Morningstar
"Transaction costs and taxes kill most active traders. That's why no market-timing letter beats buying an index fund and standing pat." Mark Hulbert
"The market timer's Hall of Fame is an empty room." Jane Bryant Quinn, Author, Columnist
"Market timing is an ineffective strategy for mutual Fund Investors." CDA/Wiesenberger
"Nobody but nobody, has consistently guessed the direction of the bond or stock market over any meaningful length of time." John Markese, President, AAII Journal
"Among the 160 or so newsletters the HFD monitors, the market timing recommendations of only 10 have beaten the stock market over the last decade on a risk-adjusted basis." Mark Hulbert 1-18-01
"Over a 12.5 year period, 224 of 237 market timing newsletters went out of business." indexfundsadvisors.com
"I'm a strong advocate of buying and holding." Charles Schwab
"Buy and hold is a very dull strategy. It lacks pizzazz and doesn't inspire much admiration at cocktail parties. It has only one little advantage: It works, very profitably and very consistently." Frank Armstrong, Author
"For most investors the odds favor a buy-and-hold strategy." Carol Gould, New York Times
"Some people in the popular press talk about 'getting into' a bull market and 'getting out of' a bear market, but it is all marketing hype." Rick Ferri, Author
"Only liars manage to always be 'out' during bad times and 'in' during good times." Bernard Baruch
"It must be apparent to intelligent investors who if anyone possessed the ability to do so (market-time) he would become a billionaire so quickly he would not find it necessary to sell his stock market guesses to the general public." David L. Babson, famed investor
"If you buy--and then hold--a total-stock-market index fund, it is mathematically certain that you will outperform the vast majority of all other investors in the long run." Jason Zweig, Money magazine
"The facts suggest that successful market timing is extroardinarily difficult to achieve." Burton Malkiel, author of Random Walk
"If we haven't said it enough, we'll say it again: Market timing is dangerous." Barron's Guide to Making Investment Decisions
"Don't trade in and out of funds. Stay invested.-- Not only does buy-and-hold investing offer better returns, but it's also less work." Eric Tyson, author Mutual Funds for Dummies
"If I have noticed anything over these 60 years on Wall Street, is is that people do not succeed in forecasting that's going to happen to the stock market." Benjamin Graham"
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