I'm now 100% long right now too.. I bought EWT (taiwan), RSX (russia ETF), some S&P, and VLO in today's bottom. Have no more ammo left... Damn I need to make some more money so I can buy more at these discount prices. In 2 years, my account should do very well.
Markets don't always maintain the gains from a ST snap back from the low. IMHO the level of dislocation is such that we may see a 2-3 year flat bottom after any ST snapback.
Which of the above were property based collapses? Property based collapses are the ones where you see 2-3 year flatlining. 2000-2002 looked pretty flat to me and that was not even property based.
There's a critical - even most critical - element no one has mentioned. Jobs. How can things improve while we're still shedding jobs? The U.S. needs to create 150k jobs per month to maintain GDP growth. We're losing jobs; not just any jobs, but some of the best paying jobs. Manufacturing got body slammed since 2000, and now, construction, financial and professional services (everything from real estate to brokers to bankers) are taking it from behind. We've lost nearly a million jobs this past year, and 160k this past month (pending revisions). You can't call a bottom with a declining job market, no matter how you enthralled you are with the notion of the markets as a forward discounting mechanism.
Excellent point on the jobs. Let me add, however, a counterpoint. Corporations have a huge cash base and earnings base (from a 14T GDP) versus previous bear markets (11T GDP when we were 800 in 2003). Just remember, when the S&P was 800 (true support?) in 1997, GDP was only 8.1T. Considering S&P is down almost 500 points, maybe it is worth speculating most of the recession's job losses will be priced in. Regardless, may not be an exact universal bottom, but considering the govt measures (unprecedented) being invoked here, I'd have a hard time betting the short side here.
Seems many corporations are already drawing down their credit lines. Not sure how valid historical comparisons may be in terms of valuation. How many consumer and manufacturing business models were based on profits from providing credit? How much of the last decades profitability was from one time gains from relocating manufacturing to China and Services to India while keeping the price point the same or on a slower trajectory to cost reductions?
A great buy with a tight stop, especially for anyone short and well reserved. Here's my overall view but a lot of the content is missing as it's private. However there's enough here to see the opportunity for nimble traders.
Ehh....I have a bad feeling. I don't think things are better than we feel, and I don't think the bottom is close. Cramer almost compels me to reverse that position, as he did scream the markets are dead, but there really is way too much fundamental damage on the supply/demand side. I do understand there's a lot of cash sidelined, too. I just think people aren't going to be in a rush to invest it in anything looking remotely like this moonscape.