February 2004 

Fantasy Fest in Key West - Are We Set to Go This Year?

February 3, 2004

The market was up yesterday, until the last hour, and I bought into another version of the system that trades the ALLMX family.  I have left the Scudder funds out.  It is too hard to get information about the ones available at Brown, and some information on the web is not correct.  I also bought 3 other funds that have generally done well.  I am still worried about this market, however.  

Well, compared to the pics above, and at the link, the one below from the Superbowl festivities seems rather tame and inconsequential.  But people need to fuss about something.  It keeps the contributions coming in to their right wing organizations.  According to one news report, this brought about a renewed interest in nipple piercing.  So it works both ways!  Isn't that great?  

February 4, 2004

Definitely bad timing to have gone into the market on Monday.  The Cisco results seem to have disappointed.  Who would have guessed?  I have put on a hedge, using the Profunds Ultra Short funds.  If the market goes up, I will not make much; if it goes down, I will not lose much.  At some point, the direction will be more clear, I hope.

February 6, 2004

Well the hedge was not necessary.  I just took it off.  Too bad I put it on, or at least that I did not put it on a day earlier.  Like all insurance, it was expensive.  I am not pleased with my results so far this year.  I wonder how long this buy signal will last.

Well, Since We Have a Body Painting Theme

A Cameroon supporter dances during the match against Zimbabwe during the group C of Africa Nations Cup Match in Sfax, Tunisia, January 29, 2004. Cameroon won 5-3. REUTERS/Radu Sigheti

Maybe I should throw a body painting party.  Who do you suppose would come?

February 17

I went into the market with the third version of the ALLMX family system.  I also bought a couple of other funds, and retroactively designated EUROX as part of that version of the system, since I already owned it.

February 20

A few terrible days, particularly in gold and precious metals, leave me at a loss for the month.  It remains to be seen if the markets in general, and gold in particular, will recover.  Part of the problem is the rally in the dollar.  That cannot last long.

February 23

Sold a bunch of stuff.  I will consider a hedge tomorrow, if things continue to look bad.  I am revising some of my strategies to allow for easier hedging.  

February 26

FUBARN SIGNAL           (Buy, 03/19/03)
   FUBART SIGNAL        (Buy, 03/19/03)
   FUBARB SIGNAL        (Buy, 03/19/03)
   FUBAR5 SIGNAL        (Sell, 02/19/04)
   NASDAQ HIGH THRUST   (Buy, 04/30/03)
   FUSEMC SIGNAL        (Sell, 02/19/04)
   EMAMACD SIGNAL       (Sell, 01/30/04)
   STOCHSIG SIGNAL      (Sell, 01/29/04)
   BEAR SIGNAL          (Sell, 02/23/04)
   LONG TERM SIGNAL     (Buy, 05/20/03)

The market has not moved decisively one way or another.  The various components of the different signals are mostly in sell mode, as can be seen above.  Only some of the thrust signals remain on a buy.  What's worse, gold looks terrible, going down as the dollar rallies.  This cannot be a permanent condition, but it may last a while.

Greenspan on Social Security

Federal Reserve (news - web sites) Chairman Alan Greenspan (news - web sites) testifies before the House Budget Committee, on Capitol Hill in Washington, February 25, 2004. Greenspan on Wednesday said Congress should consider trimming Social Security (news - web sites) benefits by pushing up the retirement age and offering less generous adjustments to future payments. Greenspan said the nation faces major budget strains beginning as early as 2008 as the huge population of Baby Boomers, born after World War Two, begins to retire. (Larry Downing/Reuters)

Talk about stating the obvious!  Social Security, which I am currently taking, is a Ponzi scheme.  It depends on an ever increasing supply of new people into the workforce in order to pay for those who have retired.  No money has been actually invested for the long term.  So of course Social Security will fail.  All Ponzi schemes fail eventually, since there is not an infinite supply of new suckers to put money in.  Unfortunately for the suckers, they have no choice in this case.  The lack of supply is just demographics, not common sense, catching up to reality.  This was all utterly predictable and obvious, so of course our politicians did nothing about it.

February 27, 2003

This was not a good month.  There was rotation out of technology, and gold and precious metals did not fare well.  The small caps have held up, however, and the large caps in the S&P seem to be moving up.  Nevertheless, none of the large cap funds have caught that wave very well.