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Anyone else think today was fishy?

Last week I was emailing one of my old high school buddies and I was lamenting the timing of my retirement (Oct 1) . He told me he never trusted the market and had his money elsewhere. I didn't give it much thought until the market closed today . Today was as fixed as the election of the last president . As of today I don't trust the market either.

Comments

  • Well, ya. I'm sort of investing now for my wife and me, and I'm post-retirement. But sort of investing for heirs, too. In The Philippines, if you're not among the tiny minority born into wealth, then you are born shit-poor, and you will stay that way, without any outside help. I'm down from my all-time high, but not doing badly. Not trying to time the market, but the Thursday sell-off spooked me, so I did then what I ought to have done in late September, but 6% poorer. ...And I was waiting for end-of-year pay-outs, too.
  • Howdy folks,

    It's amazing how little it takes to make everyone go nuts. They say Powell is safe and Donald can't tweet for hours due to air flight blackout and security (yeah, spotted over London and tracked for the rest of the trip on twitter) . . . and geez, that's about all it takes for a bit of a Relief rally. BTW, futures are -300 as I type.

    I still do not like anything about this market and fear we have substantial downside in front of us. Sorry.

    and so it goes,

    peace,

    rono
  • larryB said:

    Last week I was emailing one of my old high school buddies and I was lamenting the timing of my retirement (Oct 1) . He told me he never trusted the market and had his money elsewhere. I didn't give it much thought until the market closed today . Today was as fixed as the election of the last president . As of today I don't trust the market either.

    Reading this just makes me chuckle.
  • edited December 2018
    JoJo26 said:

    Reading this just makes me chuckle.

    Me too. What better reason to read the board? Can’t stay drunk all the time.
  • edited December 2018
    Trump leaves the country, markets up +5%.

    But then Trump comes back......unfortunately....
  • Trump leaves the country, markets up +5%.

    But then Trump comes back......unfortunately....
    We need to build a wall to keep him out!!!!:)
  • larryB said:

    Last week I was emailing one of my old high school buddies and I was lamenting the timing of my retirement (Oct 1) . He told me he never trusted the market and had his money elsewhere. I didn't give it much thought until the market closed today . Today was as fixed as the election of the last president . As of today I don't trust the market either.


    - where does he put his moneys?
    - how is a large market drop 'fixed'? you mean automatic trades, or something else?
    - election definitively swayed by efforts of foreign power, sure
  • @DavidMoran. Hi David. I was not thinking about the market drop as fishy. I was speaking of the absurd one day rally. And I meant "something else." And no I am not some conspiracy nut. Yesterday just was too off to be just another day
  • larryB said:

    @DavidMoran. Hi David. I was not thinking about the market drop as fishy. I was speaking of the absurd one day rally. And I meant "something else." And no I am not some conspiracy nut. Yesterday just was too off to be just another day

    Precisely what a conspiracy nut would say.
  • It's hard not to accept the explanation for this volatility (and I mean in both directions) on algo-trading. That or the 400-pound hacker made infamous by Individual #1.
  • Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!
  • edited December 2018
    BenWP said:

    It's hard not to accept the explanation for this volatility (and I mean in both directions) on algo-trading.

    Yep - algo-trading is a big part. Smarter and smarter computers doing the buying and selling in place of human hands. But increased volatility, I think, is here to stay for several reasons.

    Other causes:

    - The 24 hour business news cycle keeps everyone tuned-in to every, often minute scratch & squiggle affecting every market from here to the moon. And the subsequent knee-jerk reactions follow.

    - Fast easy internet access to stock / fund charts of every conceivable shade and color

    - Dissappearance of most defined benefit plans - making every Tom, Dick and Harry a direct market participant. Amateurs have a whole different (not necessarily informed or healthy) view of investing. I suspect this leads to more of a herd (“Student Body Left”) approach. Tom’s got 100K in the markets. Harry’s got 200K. These are relatively small amounts. But there’s an awfully large number of Tom and Harry’s out there. Enough to ring the phones “off-the-hook” at T Rowe Price - and every other distributor.

    Peace
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