After 22 trading days so far this year the S&P 500 is up 6.94%. Anyone may have a bullish outlook or bearish one but right here right now the market is rallying and seems like it has a good head of steam behind it.
About two months ago I posted about my belief that we could be in for a range busting rally. At 1344 the SPX is not there yet but is getting closer--to be clear I am thinking big rally that goes quite a bit higher but does not last. For now this theory is not yet wrong, it is too soon to say correct.
There are two points to this post. One is to clients that if big rally that then fails turns out to be correct then people will start to feel better and better about the market and their portfolios which might make it emotionally difficult if we do some selling at SPX 1500.
The other point is for readers who actively manage their portfolios. Chances are most active managers (including do it yourselfers) always have an opinion on the current state of the market and what might be coming next. The front end analysis in this equation is only part of the work. The back end execution, when you're right, and the ability recognize and adapt when you are wrong is probably more important.
Anyone who is even mediocre, which can absolutely be enough to get the job done successfully, will get some big calls correct.
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10 comments:
I'm not sure whether it's harder for people to sell when the market is up big or buy when it's down hard. For me, it's the former.
Thanks for your insights today, Roger.
Ditto here.
I am an extraordinary stock picker and am 100% invested.
However, I do not know a thing about selling.
Roger, if you want to do your readers a service, please render a piece on when to sell. I not only don't get it, I have never "gotten it".
Wow I am in teh same fix.
Are the comments about not being sure about when to sell serious or sarcastic?
If there is interest here I can address how we do this later in the week.
Can't speak to the seriousness of other comments but, judging from the amount of time it took me to develop an adequate sell discipline, I'd be willing to bet you have readers who would be interested.
OT: Pats are getting their mojo back; that first quarter was fugly.
thanks RW
me on twitter;
Has there ever been a stranger half to a Super Bowl? Giants dominate, Patriots up by 1
08:36 is serious for sure.
For what it's worth, this has been a challenge for me as well. And I've been buying and selling for over ten years on my own. It took along time to get comfortable with a sell strategy on a stock that was rising.
Sam
I would be very interested on RR's ideas on when to sell. The only time I ever did any serious selling was during the crash of 08-09 when I sold a few ETFs to book the losses and immediately bought similar ETFs so I would not be out of the market and miss the sure-to-come bounce back. The strategy more or less worked and now have sufficient carry-forward losses to hopefully never pay another capital gains tax.
Any input on how hedge funds are performing during the recent rally? Seems that most funds have been getting crushed the last 6-8 months but I've heard funds have been grossing up net long over the last 2 months.
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