Today, stock investors have an abnormal situation. But everyone gets excited over the start to the year in equities. Fund managers and retail investors are busy in formatting their targets for the year.
In the end what directions and multiples they are betting on I cannot visualize. It has become a routine job. Indeed a directionless call. My sense is that they are simply punting on lady luck.
Today definitely not punting investors took a pause in believing in neither the P nor the E indicators. Whereas the self scored stock market analysts are busy in search of new indicators to define the market conditions. It is not going to be as easy as the ‘ kolaveri song’.
I am keeping my mind and thoughts open. It never hurts me to keep an open mind. I can tip my hat to any side of the argument either to the laments of a Bear or to the roars of the Bull.
Bull’s mantra today is tactically, it is probably not a bad thing to have some toes in the risk pool. Bears are comforting themselves that they could dive further because they see more depth in the pool.
Today the chorus is stock market is cheap by historical standards.
But with limping economic indicators I am presently uncomfortable in rolling my investment dice.
I am equally not otherwise enthusiastic about coupling and decoupling aspects of the economy and stock markets across the globe. It will remain only a theoretical debate. Macro global economic picture is very much blurred today.
My broker friend’s loud shout is that it is hard to put lipstick on the current economic pig.
The irony is that across the globe governments are trying to protect both “bad debt and bad investments” by printing currencies. How long?
I see only a chaos trade. One day the market is up for reasons unknown to any one and another day it goes down. It is a hard market to make net money in. Keep one’s expectations very low. Don’t fall a prey to a nervous market trying to force a fake direction.
I need results and convictions before signing my cheques. I don’t mind optimum market volatility or price momentum. Definitely not to the extremes. No more I can tolerate huge gap up and gap down openings.
Don’t forget to remember that Stock market “rallies are to be rented, not owned”.
2012- Stock equity investors face an abnormal situation
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