[quote=sdrealtor]So Im curious if the recent events change anything about the position of the OP or Rich on a sell now call? Or does it still stand?[/quote]
My position hasn’t changed. The fundamentals remain awful. I talk to bankers on a regular basis and their balance sheets are filled with land mines that don’t have to be revealed until well into 2021. These folks live in the real economy, and they know they’re getting propped up big time.
Since Covid cropped up I’ve always thought that the real market disaster was going to occur after the vaccine was widely available because until then, market participants can fantasize about how great things will be afterward (the tech bubble version of “sure, they lose money now, but who knows how much they’ll earn one day!!??”). Once the vaccine is available and reality sets in – that things are in Turdville and that although there will be some improvement at the margins, they’re not going to improve sufficiently quickly to justify current valuations… then it’s look out below. Having said that, if this doesn’t happen before the end of next year, then it likely won’t happen… and we’re looking at a decade of sideways-ish low single-digit returns for stocks just based on valuations. Either way – epic crash or crap returns for a decade – it’s not good from current levels. In this elegant chaos, I choose not to participate in this particular brand of silliness. Although, full disclosure, in a bout of pure underserved serendipity, I’m actually participating in my most successful investment ever, as the craziness has allowed one of my VC investments to go public (STTK) and I’m up 32x over ~2.5 years. Problem is… it could all go in the toilet as I’m locked up for another two months… so, I’m not counting any coin from that one (yet). So, how much can I really complain about this insanity.
Anyhow, I think the thing to always keep in mind is that the prices we see each day in the public markets are set by the marginal buyers and sellers. And this group isn’t “investing” as we think of it; they are trading, guessing what the other guessers are going to guess a couple of weeks (or hours or minutes) into the future. High or low or in-between, don’t trust that price – it’s probably lying to you.
