Money and Finance
Nightmare on Wall Street: This Secular Bear Has Only Just Begun - By Ed Easterling
Secular bull markets are great parties. Investors arrive from secular bears really wanting to take the edge off. As the bull proceeds, above-average returns become intoxicating. By the time it is over, the past decade or two has delivered bountiful returns.
In contrast, secular bears seem like hangovers. They are awakenings that strip away the intoxication, leaving a sobering need for an understanding of what has happened.
Conventional wisdom explains these periods as irrational or coincidental periods. In reality, secular bulls and bears are periods driven by longer-term trends in the inflation rate. A trend away from low inflation, whether to high inflation or deflation, drives the value of the market lower. That leaves investors with below-average returns. The return trip — when the inflation rate trends toward low inflation — drives the value of the market higher. That provides investors with above-average returns.
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Hussman Weekly Market Comment: Closing Arguments: Nothing Further, Your Honor
“For as long as I can remember, veteran businessmen and investors – I among them – have been warning about the dangers of irrational stock speculation and hammering away at the theme that stock certificates are deeds of ownership and not betting...
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Hussman Weekly Market Comment: The Siren's Song Of The Unfinished Half-cycle
Given the extent and maturity of the recent advance, it’s very odd that analysts are now beginning to toss around the idea that stocks have entered a secular bull market. These notions are based not on the level of valuation, nor on the duration of...
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John Mauldin's Outside The Box: Converging On The Horizon - By Ed Easterling
The end is near! Stock market history and earnings cycle history are converging. As a result, the market is likely to be down for the year 2011 or 2012. If not, then it will have been different this time. Crestmont’s research focuses primarily on long-term...
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Don't Confuse The Economy With The Stock Market
Here are a couple of paragraphs from Unexpected Returns that highlight the importance of being careful not to confuse the economy with the stock market.Economic Growth and Stock Market ReturnsThe lack of correlation between economic growth and stock market...
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John Mauldin: The Dark Side Of Deficits
Secular Bull and Bear Markets Market analysts (of which I am a minor variety) talk all the time about secular bull and bear cycles. I argued in this column in 2002 (and later in Bull's Eye Investing) that most market analysts use the wrong metric...
Money and Finance