"Avoiding the Big Loss"
Never mind the FOMO... here's our real MO...
By Bill Bonner
Catania, Sicily - "We just arrived in Sicily. We’re going to a wedding in Taormina, site of the TV show ‘The White Lotus.’ We’ve never seen the show (we don’t have a TV)…but we’ll give you the low-down later. Meanwhile, this is probably a good time to explain why we’re so gloomy and doomy…
Where’s the recession? Where’s the stock market crash? Has the bear market turned into a bull market? Has the coming recession been upstaged by an approaching boom? What’s the problem? Why spoil a good party by mentioning that the curtains are on fire and the police are at the door? If you listen to the popular press, you might think America’s finances are delightfully robust. Here’s Dan: "The NASDAQ just closed out its best first half of a year ever, with $QQQ up nearly 40%."
Bidenomics Inaction: The latest ‘data,’ says the press, is positive. Employment…inflation…sales – it’s ‘all good,’ or so they say. And Joe Biden tells audiences what a great job he’s done; here’s a recent speech: "Bidenomics is working…Today, the U.S. has had the highest economic growth rate, leading the world economies since the pandemic. The highest in the world. (Applause.) We created 13.4 million new jobs. More jobs in two years than any president has ever - (applause) - made in four - in two. And, folks, it’s no accident. That’s Bidenomics in action…"
Really? Is the economy really so good? Are stocks such good investments? Is there no reason for darkness and worry? We’ll look more closely tomorrow. In preview, gloom makes a comeback! By way of further explanation, here at Bonner Private Research, we tend to look on the dark side. Perhaps it is because of those many years we spent in a Baltimore ghetto. We hear corks popping; we duck to avoid the cross-fire. We smell lilies; we look for the open casket.
The “Big Loss”: Or maybe it is just our sorry métier. You work all your life. You save your money. You invest it. After the age of 55, the worst thing you can do is to take the ‘big loss.’ It’s like a bad fall in the bathroom. Because, it’s almost impossible to recover. You can still make profits. But you won’t have time to compound them substantially.
So, for most readers, missing a boom is much less of a problem than not missing a crash. Missing a boom is like taking a vacation; you can get back to work later. But get hit by a crash…wiping out half your money…and you may have to downsize faster and further than you intended.
Our #1 goal, here at Bonner Private Research, is to try to understand what is going on. Washington promises to build a better world for you. Wall Street promises to make you rich. Our job is to make sure you’re not devastated when those promises don’t turn out. We don’t mind being “too early.” And we forgive ourselves for being wrong sometimes. But we damned sure don’t want to be blindsided by a crash we didn’t see coming."
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