Investing General Discussion

Khane said:

I don't equate that to you personally at all. I agree with most of what you say in this thread and typically share your views on strategy and long term goals.

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I just mean because I sell puts which may be bought by gamblers. I equated your previous opinions to include options amongst their BS games, which they can be, but I believe they have a useful function when used appropriately by educated parties. Meaning I don't find them exclusively predatory. Now 3x leveraged ETFs...that's another ball of wax.

My expectation is that a lot of people do get back to work pretty quickly but that many companies will take this opportunity to tighten the belt some and get rid of some less needed people. It's hard to gauge just exactly how many this will be. Unemployment in the 8-12% range after we are full running would not surprise me. At that point I'll be watching those weekly and monthly numbers pretty closely to see what kind of run rate on new job growth we end up with.

If the demand is slow due to changes in behavior new hiring will not be robust. I expect further monetary and fiscal stimulus during this period. Stumbling blocks include capital expenditures by companies being anemic due to cloudy near term outlook. Consumer reluctance to re-establish old behaviors, eat out less often, travel less often etc. (I think this will fade with time if we don't have a significant relapse. ) Many people are fearing a second shut down but based on behavior we are seeing around the country last few days would people even listen to a second shutdown? Very hard to say.

Add on to that we have an election this Fall and partisan fighting will make additional fiscal stimulus harder and harder to come by as we get close to Nov.

It's because of all this that I would say if someone missed this first 30% upside, jumping in with both feet may work if you have a stomach for more downside volatility and a sufficiently long outlook. Otherwise a very slow dollarcost avg of cash into the market is probably prudent. If it dips go a little heavier. Cash and low yielding bonds are going to be trash coming out of this and just need to keep looking forward and positioning for the long term. All this free money might finally be what is needed to get the inflation the Fed has been searching for. If we do get a higher rate of inflation you sure as shit don't want to be in cash or bonds.

Historical recessions, we would get a second low where fear is lower, people are more demoralized by stocks, and that people begin to give up that things will improve. That is the magical moment when our pessimism will have gone to far and the recovery begins in ways we had trouble seeing just prior. However, this event is very atypical, it's self induced complete shutdown of an economy that was at full employment. Literally nobody knows the trajectory of how we come out of this.

If you want to be super negative, if we get inflation while the economy is failing to find it's footing then we are in serious shit. 1970s stagflation all over again and the Fed will be forced to raise rates in the face of slowing demand. This is the worst possible outcome. People should not live in fear of this, pay attention to it, some things are bigger than us and some things you just can't hide from. Holding good solid assets is all you can do during that environment, and given how many here are savers we are better positioned for that worse case scenario than the prolific borrower.

And to reiterate you don't need to position based on guesses, if things are as weak as many of us expect then the market is going to struggle with the 200 day ma which has just started rolling over, we may be acting impatient. The decline was very rapid compared to how the market would slowly give ground into a weakening economy, if we are in a bear market you are going to know because that 200 day is going to start to point down and the market will struggle to get consistent closes above it. If that happens it's okay to be a little greedy with buys and wait for lower prices but it will more likely be stair steps down as earning revisions for 2021 and 2022 are made and this can happen for an extended period of time. There will be green days there will be red days but the trend will wane.

On the flip side if we get on top of the 200 day avg and stay on top of it to the point it begins turning up then it will become more prudent to apply long term money into the market.

The good news is the 100s of percent that will be made in the years following all of this, you don't need to catch the bottom of a bear market to reap the rewards of the subsequent bull. Patience is warranted.