Are You Selling Right Now?

Video Length: 00:07:58

Jen Rogers, my favorite person to interview me, asked questions for Yahoo Finance's The Final Round. Miles and Brian got in there too. I loved the interview. I got across exactly how I feel about markets.

The first question Jen asked, “Was what are you selling right now?” I explained clearly, "Why would I be selling because that would be a form of capitulation? I want other people to capitulate so I can buy their shares." That's exactly how we run portfolios, and that's why we have both bonds and stocks. What's most interesting about the last month is that the market has gone no place. After four, five, six weeks of volatility people wonder, ‘Should I be doing something?’, ‘Should I be changing things around since all we hear is bad news?’.

My answer is straightforward: News, while it can move markets, is not as important at the particular levels that you want to buy or take profits on.

To use a real-life example, I have a trigger to strongly think about purchasing stock if the S&P 500 gets near 2500. Now will the news make it go there, I don't know, and I don't care. Could a strange announcement from the Trump administration or the Federal Reserve or Apple Computer cause the market to get down to that level? It could, but again, I don't care. What I do care about is what the price of the market is since all we can buy is price. I look at a few other things like how volatile the market is when it gets to that price, what the trading volume is, and honestly you do have to take the pulse of the planet and figure out where the crowd is heading.

That's different than trading on the news itself, as in the content of the news, because you can't buy a trade war. You can't buy a financial blog. The only thing you can buy is price, so while the news is interesting, sometimes entertaining, and sometimes depressing, the reason I keep abreast of it is because it lets me know what the mood and what the sentiment is for investors and speculators when the markets get to that magic moment where I have to make a hard decision on behalf of all my clients.

Now for the fun stuff: I got to say New Mexico, I got to mention the type of clients I have, and I got to tell people that they should be skiing right now instead of watching the news. Lastly, I’m at the point in my career where I’m able to wear a cool sweater by Ted Baker instead of a white shirt and tie. Thus, it was a success.

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Duanne Johnson 5 years ago Member's comment

Love this guy's stuff!

Karen Klein 5 years ago Member's comment

Yes, this guy clearly knows how to do an interview.

Christine Tan 5 years ago Member's comment

Yes, but will it go up 10% or down 10%!