Higgenbotham's Dark Age Hovel

[Higgenbotham]

Every five percent down one percent sell...

That's about right. Yesterday I sold 4 percent and bought back 3 percent this morning. I intend to sit until the next big shift. Although maybe with another 5 percent down I may target a sell of a net 2 percent. And a little more at the next 5 percent level below that.

Also, as noted here, when actively trading I used to follow certain people, 6 or 8 of them, who I thought had a decent handle on the market. I will no longer be following any market commentary. The reason is, as the new dark age goes into its acceleration phase, those who did well during the maintenance phase of a declining civilization from 1971 to 2011 or the easy counterfeiting phase since 2011 will not be able to make the adjustment to the new dark age acceleration phase. At least not right away. There will be a new set of winners who can be identified later. Kind of like how Joe Granville was the man in the 1970s.

So for instance we may see bears saying thus and so will happen because it happened during the bursting of the first tech bubble back in the year 2000. Maybe so, but I wouldn't count on it. The year 2000 was still in the maintenance phase of a declining civilization and by my reckoning anyway, it is now the acceleration phase of the new dark age.

[Higgenbotham]

There will be a new set of winners who can be identified later. Kind of like how Joe Granville was the man in the 1970s.

I don't think the world any longer correctly understands Joe Granville. This article perhaps comes the closest but it's still off the mark.

What Happened: On this day in 1981, Joe Granville warned his newsletter readers to "Sell everything!"

Where The Market Was: The Dow closed at 1,004.69 and the S&P 500 traded at 138.12.

Granville's Bold Prediction: On Jan. 6, 1981, in his weekly newsletter, Granville warned investors that a stock market crash was on the horizon and they should dump all their stocks. The following day, the Dow tanked 4.2% on record trading volume of 92.9 million shares, making Granville look like a genius.

A year after Granville's call, the Dow was still down 14%, and Granville had become famous for calling the drop. At the time, Granville has 11,000 newsletter subscribers paying $250 per year for his insight. Others paid $500 for urgent phone alerts.

Granville's followers praised him for his 1981 call, his prediction of the bear market in the late 1970s and his bearish call ahead of the bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2000. Critics point out that he completely missed the bull market that started in 1982.

While Granville gained notoriety for his 1981 call, his overall performance was far from impressive. From 1980 through January 2005, Granville's stock picks for investors lost 0.5% on an annualized basis compared to an 11.9% average yearly gain from the market as a whole.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/day-mark ... 00153.html

As other articles incorrectly state, Joe Granville was not primarily a showman. Granville had a good understanding of markets. He was primarily a bearish stock market prognosticator who made a number of correct stock market calls as the bear market wound its way down to the 1982 low. As posted awhile back, the Buffett Indicator made its low of 0.32 in 1982. That's how he got his following of tens of thousands of subscribers, not because of his showmanship.

For the purposes of what is being discussed here, it doesn't matter that Joe Granville missed the bull market post 1982 and lost his subscribers money after 1982. As long as there is no bull market coming for the next 20 years.

Whoever that person is (or persons are, hopefully) who is now bearish and can reasonably find the twists and turns to the bottom of the coming bear market is yet to be identified. Granville had a great run in the 70s, calling a number of turns. That seems to have been completely forgotten. That's why he was seemingly able to move markets.

If a bear market is starting someone with a similar talent will probably come to the fore. I will be on the lookout for such a person and will take their opinion into account. But as of yet there is no such identifiable person.