Portfolio Black Day

[Vanraw]

My Sell sell sell was tongue in cheek for sure. My 401 k, is close to returning to levels prior to 9/2008 as well. For the most part I never touch the 401k. Its distributed well, and if I change it, it is just moving the balance around. Over all my 401k has made money over the years, but my aggravation is that wall street greed continues to screw the small guy. For instance my son had a insurance settlement from a accident that was 100% invested in low risk index funds in 1999 around the peak. 10 years later his original investment is still in the red. Untouched. Buy and hold long...... 10 years..

So when people say buy and hold, I now say, "The big investors thank you for the donation". Yes I'm bitter. My take is that money at the macro level is like energy. It doesn't go away, it just moves around dissipates, moves around etc. When everyone is losing, someone is always winning. We are not the players, and thus the best we can do is to try and jump on the tail of the players low, and jump off before they move the market. Yes yes this is very conspiracy theory based, but Ive seen enough to feel its all a play at the highest levels. Old money is still in control.

So, Dustie making 40% = beating the players. GREAT job, GREAT trade, stop looking at the stock and doing the "if I woulda" and you will happy and fulfilled. Beating the players is the ultimate PVP.

Here's a situation I imagine. Towards the end of the year maybe, or perhaps a tad earlier we start getting good unemployment numbers and the markets go ballistic, moving upwards quickly. Then, at some point later down the line all the government debt obligations start coming home to roost and foreign countries finally give up on buying U.S. Treasuries, which cause a panic in the markets and the whole thing crashes again, leading to massive inflation and the death of the dollar as the reserve currency. Fun times ahead!

On the long side I sorta agree with Breand's position on a strong 2010 due to unemployment numbers. I think we will see some sort of new housing construction bump too. Not great, but enough to get the masses running the market up. I say this because I dont think it will take alot to improve unemployment a couple of percentage points, and I think that is all it will take. So if unemployment drops to say 8%, it will push a strong market bump.

On the other side, I'm not afraid of debt from a perspective of other countries stopping the purchase of bonds. In fact I think bond investment from foreign countries may go up, because inflation is going to force interest rates up. I think It will be inflation that will correct the market.

Here is the thing we need to be afraid of as it relates to the deficit. If the government measures the deficit as ratio to GNP, then inflation can be their friend. Meaning higher cost of goods = higher GNP and thus lower deficit to GNP ratio. This is sort of the President Carter theory of economics. Be afraid.