stock market doomers wanted for investing advice

greenspun.com : LUSENET : TimeBomb 2000 (Y2000) : One Thread

hey y'all- Got a wad of cash out pre Y2K. Don't want to put it in stocks; don't want to put it back in my small bank. Heard various opinions re bonds, boullion, rare coins. Only have 2 months of food for family in #10 cans, the rest needs to be used by summer. Considering getting more food that will last 10+ years as best investment ( good deals now at survival companies.) If so, how much food ( months?) at this point. Even thought of euros. [Thought of giving it all to poor orphan charities and living on a park bench, but too cold now and too many bugs in summer. Not good for family either.] What do y'all think? Please give some sound reasons with your advice. If you say to diversify, what percentages? Think the danger of bank runs is over at least for now? How much fed notes are you hanging onto? Thanks! just wondering......

-- wondering (gotta@makealiving.org), January 17, 2000

Answers

Buy more food as well as durable goods and supplies. Tools, blankets, medicines, and heavy clothing for winter climates will all have good barter value. Those are your safest investments.

-- (kevinD@prethel.net), January 17, 2000.

It is very dangerous to ask for investing advise on a board like this. You cannot verify anyone's credentials, and I have seen enough questionable advice here in the last two weeks to make me take notice. As always, investing has to do with the level of risk you can endure. If you feel more preps are needed, power to you-Even in so- called normal times there is an element of risk with banks, just as there is with crossing the street. I suggest if you really want advise, find someone that you can look in the eye and has certifiable credentials. good luck.

-- Furtureshock (gray@matter.com), January 17, 2000.

Futurestock is corect. The advice on this board is questionable at all times. He/she is also correct about your level of risk. You should do a gut check to find out what that level is. If you can't sleep at night or are concerned about where your money is(money/cash/gold/ect) then it is time to move it to a more conservative investment. Cash is good but having it storred in your house is not the best thing either.

You also don't want to show an increase in percieved wealth either. This is not the time to buy all new appliances or toys(4 wheelers, new cars, ect...). Getting more food for 10 years and having the place to store that stuff might also be looked upon as an increase in wealth as well. You should consider living at(or slightly below) the look of your neighbors. If people are looking for an easy target, they will not pick a house that looks just average or slightly below.

As for the future, you are probably listening to Allen Greenspan who often suggests that the current valuation of technology is out of hand. I completely agree. As for gold, The european union countries are going to continue to dump millions of ounces on the open market. You should not expect that to go up any time in the near future. Gold will probably go down with less demand. If you know that doomers are also going to sell gold after y2k then that will place even more unwanted gold on the market which will depress the price.

If I were you here is what I would do. Have enough food to feel comfortable(10 years is too much). You have a few months now, keep that quantity and rotate the older supplies with new supplies. Make your own house budget and find out how much you spend on the house and living every month. Buy the book(and read it), More Wealth Without Risk, Charles Givens, keep the receipt and deduct it from your taxes next year. The book will help you set up a budget and find out where money is going as well as reduce the amount that you spend for every day items. Keep atleast 6 months(possibly 12 months) of cash in your local bank. Example, for me one years cash would be about $20,000 US. Take the rest and invest it. US treasurys are very safe and a good bond mutual fund will be the way to go if you want this type of security. A bond mutual fund instead of individual bonds would contain different maturity dates giving you a better return over the years. Interest rates are also going up over the next several months which will increase the value of the bond mutual fund.

If you feel comfortable, move some into value mutual funds which stay at a safe distance from Technology stocks. Remember there could possibly be a technology bubble building so you want to avoid this types of funds. Value orientated funds invest in companies which people need every day, Example: soap companies, food, clothes ect. These are things that people need(and buy)in good times and bad. The return will not be great but it will be steady.

good luck

-- ned (ned@nednet.com), January 17, 2000.


I think a lot of us are still sitting on the fence. I still have cash on hand and plenty of food & don't plan on doing anything for a while. My grocery bill has dropped from $150 a week for a family of 4 to $75 just buying meat, bread, fruit, veggies etc., and starting to use what I have stored. The diff. I'm saving is still being pocketed. If I learned anything in preping for Y2K I learned how to save $$ big time. If I were to invest, I w/put my $$ in a C-D where I c/still get my $$ out but loose the interest therein, Hell I'm not making any interest on my $$ as it sits at home so go figure. I have this sickening feeling that the other shoe is about to drop on America and I'm in no hurry to jump into any financial market.

-- Judy (Dodgeball@aol.com), January 17, 2000.

IF you go back into the archives and find postings BEFORE October or September of 1999, you will find that a goodly number of the contributors to the board had NOT been co-opted by Kosky and Co. into the belief that it was The ROLLOVER, Stupid! that was important.

MANY of the contributors forsaw a slow slide into discomfort. MANY of the contributors have NOT seen anything to cause them to disregard what they expected pre-co-optation.

Flesh out your preps with an eye towards depression/recession if you are going to keep prepping, otherwise rotating/sitting on them would be good. OR you can decide that this was all a bunch of pesimistic- panic-mongered hooey. YOUR choice. YOUR responsibility. Take it. Make it. Accept it.

Ya pays yo money an ya chooses yo choice.

Night train

-- jes a tired ol footballer (nighttr@in.lane), January 17, 2000.



Decide how liquid you need to be. Famine and pestilence are not around the corner, and food is a bad "investment". For increased liquidity, just use bond funds, CD's, TBills and the like. Longer term, though, stocks will outperform them.

There are plenty of conservative stock investments at ordinary PE's. Most of the market indices you see skyrocketing do not reflect the breadth of available stocks.

Have a horizon of better than five years if you put money into stocks now and are worried the market will tank soon. If you are betting your money it will tank for sure, stay out of stocks until the "crash" and then buy like crazy if your horizon at that point is still five years out.

Avoid bullion and coins. They are very illiquid and you take a retail/wholesale/assaying/appraising/storing hit that you will not like; their values rise and fall with at least the uncertainty of stocks. If you ARE a true doomer, then you understand that if a true doomsday scenario hits, the currency will be food and not gold, which will be worthless, just as it was during the gold rush when the real "gold" was the egg.

Remember: it's only money. For practical purposes, there is no danger of bank runs, and betting on the Feds to fold up shop is a very low percentage bet--much riskier than any other bet, and if you take advice from the permanently bunkered, you don't care about mine, anyway.

-- Imso (happy@prepped.com), January 17, 2000.


Put your money into Motorola MOT. It topped out Friday at 151. Lehman Brothers has predicted a top of 200 for MOT. I got Call Options riding on it and have tripled my money since 3 Jan. 2000. First I doubled my money with Put options when MOT nosedived right after 3 Jan and then a few days later I entered all my profits into MOT Call Options and my profits have skyrocketed!

-- freddie (freddie@thefreeloader.com), January 17, 2000.

It's hard for me to be serious about anything, but may I suggest, in all seriousness, "The Bear Book" by John Rothchild (John Wiley&Sons), before you put dollar one in ANY stock?

-- Imso (happy@prepped.com), January 17, 2000.

I would never put money in a bond fund. Bonds-definitely, a bond fund- no way. Have you ever looked at a long term NAV record of a bond fund? Most just erode away through both bad and GOOD bond markets! Expenses of bond funds eat up a larger % of return tham they do in stock funds. I also believe that there is a pressure on bond fund managers to manage for yield rather than total return, which can be negative in the long run.

-- J (Y2J@home.com), January 17, 2000.

Here's something on a different tack. Consider investing in developing your skills, such as first aid, making meals from edible wild plants, wilderness survival, alternative ways to earn money. Knowledge is an asset whose value is not contingent on economic conditions.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), January 17, 2000.


Check out www.treasurydirect.gov (for Treasury Bills) and http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/sav/sbiinvst.htm (for I savings bonds). I bonds are currently paying 6.98%; interest rate changes every 6 months, and you can cash them in anytime after first 6 months. 3 months T Bills are a short term "safe" investment.

-- conservative investor (will@marketcrash.com), January 17, 2000.

David's advice is good. Stored food is really more insurance than investment. If you want to invest in food, try food Production. Prepare and plant a garden, raise chickens and other small livestock.

-- Possible Impact (posim@hotmail.com), January 17, 2000.

Ned gave you good advice. Almost all of the people on this forum are well intentioned, but tend to give advice based upon their own issues. You must make your decisions based upon your view of what the future holds as well as your tolerance for risk

There are a number of books on this subject you can purchase or check out from your local library. One I read in the last year that is particularly good and easy to follow is "The Nine Steps to Financial Freedom" by Suze Orman (I used quotes rather than underline even though I know better because of aol formatting limitations). Another middle of the road advice giver is "Bob Brinker's Money Talk" (a talk radio program that airs on ABC affiliates on the weekend).

Biggest issues are taking care of yourself and your family, looking at your debt picture and cleaning that up, paying into a 401K type retirement fund if its available, etc.

-- Nancy (wellsnl@hotmail.com), January 17, 2000.


If there is a chunk of change consider spreading the risk across asset classes. I.e split into 1/3's or 1/4's. One chunk can go into something like money market, one chunk into short term gov bonds, and one chunk into market placed over time. The market one depends on your view of market (bull or bear) and your risk tolerance. My personal advice is to shun what has already made extreme moves like the hot internet market. I also recommend listening to the Bob Brinker radio show (can be heard on the net, weekends).

Good Luck, remember don't get to carried away with diversification the smaller the groups the easier it is to keep track of movements.

-- Squid (ItsDark@down.here), January 18, 2000.


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