Right now I am cold as ice - really since last fall I've been on a big winning streak (about 6 months), able to sidestep this market and still find ways to make profit while the market went through 2 enormous bear markets interspersed with a bull run late in 2008. The past 4... err, 5 weeks on the other hand - have been a disaster. Not a -20% type of disaster or anything but for me, lagging this many weeks in a row is a disaster. I'm still up for the year to date and all that but I feel like a .180 hitter in MLB right now. Until I get my bearings back I need to play it safer or else I am going to be headed for a negative return year to date. I "get" what is going on in this market - momentum trading is the rage again and valuation means nothing. I'm the one who says every few weeks "It's all about sentiment" so of course ... it's about sentiment. By being conservative and looking at things like PE multiples I'm being shown to be a fool. I get it. Worse - everything you learn for many a year is basically moot right now so as I said last week, I am walking around blind - charts don't matter, fundamentals don't matter; just buy - anything, at any price... except Sequenom. Frankly I want to be all cash right now until I figure this "new and improved" market out, but I'm trying to keep to my script and 100% cash is not really part of the gig.
So for now I'm going to take my profits when they arise i.e. Mastercard - and try to figure out how to recapture the magic. The long winning streak spoiled me, because it usually is not possible to "beat the market" for that long of a period on a consistent basis, and now she is getting her revenge. The Sequenom thing, while not a major part of the portfolio or massive destroyer of value - is so out of left field, and really kicks you in the rear end. Then I see an old holding in A-Power Energy (APWR) rocket up week after week when it did nothing for months on end (but go down) when we owned it. Up til yesterday we were having a solid week, if not spectacular. At this point, solid would of been fine. Instead we continue to go backwards and I have another losing week on my hands - I want to kick the proverbial dog. Instead I kicked some Mastercard out.
Great video here from about 3 weeks ago - I think Mr. Najarian was talking about me in reference to the walking befuddled camp! :)
Long Mastercard, Sequenom in fund; no personal positions
4 comments:
No kidding. It's kind a random market right now as the speculating crowd lurches from one sector/company to another in random ways. You can try to guess what's next and catch the pop but you could also get run over in the process.
Better to play roulette.
I'm with ya
I didn’t notice you sold out APWR. You were a strong believer and I bought it because of you (check is in the mail). Now that everyone is playing roulette, what about revisiting your old LDK (it has been behaving like APWR since the QCells jv)...
Mark, You are a rational investor in an irrational investment world. It’s tough for a buy and hold ’em. The sidelines doesn’t sound like a bad place to me.
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