Vacations

Sorry for not posting in a while but I took a few days with the family. Too bad I cannot leave the laptop home but the newsletter calls.

It was a unique (for me) opportunity to get delayed market information and "big picture only" information rather than the tick by tick changes I am used to getting here. What did I learn? Up one day and down the next and all of it matters less than barrel full of analysts.

It's summertime and late August, specifically. That's all we have to know so that we don't read too much into anything that happens. And as much as I despise not giving my subscribers pages of analysis and trading ideas each morning it is better to look lazy than lose money for them.

It is far more noble to advise trading restraint than to take excessive risk to try to make a few dollars. As I always say, sometimes the best trade is the one you don't make but that, of course won't get you rated in Hulbert's Digest. Can you imagine going to an investor conference and advertising that you did nothing and wanted to collect a management fee? Better than losing money but you can't tell anyone about what you did not do. The fish that got away, so to speak.

They don't tell you that in "market analysis" school, do they? They certainly do not tell you it's OK to SAVE the client money instead of LOSING it while you actively "manage" things. Those of you managing client money now know that sometimes you have to talk the client OUT of a bonehead investment, right?

Anyway, that's where we are today. The market is nuts this week not in a good way - even if you are a bear.

How about taking a vacation with your family and doing something valuable like getting to know your teenagers? That's what I did last week. And if you are looking for a good family place, Smuggler's Notch, VT was pretty darn good. You can pass on the Alpine slide a few miles away at Stowe. You thought gasoline was expensive!