The Long Term Investor

Perhaps my point on politics was insufficiently blunt. I shall remedy that, now.

This is more than a pattern. It's a process.

Before the Iran action - Trump talks about various things in Iran and threatens military action - market ignores

First day of action - All major news outlets, except Fox, declare the war an abject failure - market slightly down

First week of action - Iranian and terror leaders killed. Media framing conflict as a loss. - market moves down

Second week of action - Iran's leadership structure is so decimated, we aren't sure who is in charge. Media reports frenetically on oil price and the occasional drone attack. - market moves down.

Week two to six of action - Media reports on Trump's unwillingness to negotiate, despite negotiations and occasional cease fires. Media speculates oil prices will never return. Media declares war a failure since Iran continues to get in the occasional terrorist style drone attack. - market continues to move down.

About the sixth week - With the exception of Fox who adore the Iran war, media continues to report only things which make the war and the administration look bad. - market finally realizes a couple of months of high fuel prices are no big deal and the S&P 500 rises SHARPLY to approximately pre-war levels.

It couldn't matter less if you like trump or hate him. This is an opportunity.

In the last two weeks, I've seen multiple reports on the F-35 being the worst fighter aircraft the US has ever produced. Unreal. I'll tell you what. If you think the F-35 is junk, select 10 non F-35 aircraft of your choice, any model any nation, and combat me with my 10 F-35. That won't change your opinion but you won't be around to spew your nonsense. Lack of readiness, you say? Sure, there is a service bottleneck which is pretty much solved, at this point. How many years of misinformation will go by before people realize the F-35 is more mission ready and vastly more superior to the most successful fighter aircraft in history, the F-16, was at this point in it's service life? The F-16 had a slight edge. The F-35 has a massive digital advantage. The media is trying to seed doubt about the war.

Media disinformation is the biggest opportunity in investing. If you bet contrary to what the media is reporting, for 100% of news events, you will do tremendously well. The public knows the media is lying and they still can't help but react.

There are legions of babies with candy. If you feel like some candy, help yourself. I did.

 

I totally agree with the media. It's all garbage designed to steer opinion one way or another. I did nothing with my positions. I wish I had some free money, but no such luck this time.

Regarding Iran, I don't believe a thing our government says. I know that the Iranian government is terrible, but we are conditioned to think of all of them as some sort of barbaric terrorist nation.

That's not true at all.

Iran is the only major obstacle to Western/Israeli domination in the Middle East. It has been an Israeli dream for decades to go to war with Iran to clear them out of the way. Trump is a useful idiot who has no idea what he is doing. His foreign policy is led by neocons/zionists. This is nothing new; it's been that way for decades. With that in mind, all of this recent drama makes sense.

Only this time, the targeted country is fighting back with vigor and has the geographic advantage. All of his top brass warned him of this. Iran has been preparing for decades - literally. There will be no strategic victory in this. We are fighting to get back to the status quo.

The initial market panic always happens. The return to market normalcy is the reckoning with the fact that we will have achieved nothing, and status quo is the most likely outcome... at an enormous economic, political, and social cost. Like it or not, Iran is not going anywhere, and they will remain a regional power, especially with Russia/China backing them covertly. Their new supreme leader had most of his family killed by the Israelis/Americans. He's going to make his father look tame. Count on it.

Iran was well on its way toward a civil revolution. The overwhelming majority of the civilians hate their government. Israel stuck their nose in it, probably to keep Netanyahu's war machine going to keep him out of prison. We have only ourselves to blame for kicking this hornet's nest.

If you are interested, the youtube channel RealLifeLore predicted this four years ago. Here is his "I told you so" video:



Okay, now I have said my political piece. My stance is way out there in the open. No need to elaborate.

Now imagine we put all that war money toward a few chip fabs. I might be able to replace my current machine in a few years

 

A blast from the past. I included this little excerpt in a post back in 2023. These are some simple 8 points to think about if you are a long-term investor. One of my favorite lists.

1) The most important discipline for investment success is to maintain a long-term perspective. Most investors do just the opposite. Led astray by the daily financial news, the investment industry, and social media, they focus on what is happening now.

2) Keep investment costs low.

3) Ignore all market and economic forecasts. There are no reliable forecasters. Forecasts can tempt you to stray from your financial plan, especially when the forecasts confirm your own views. This is known as “confirmation bias”.

4) Investing requires rational decision making in an environment of uncertainty. The best way to do this is to operate, as nearly as possible, without a market or economic viewpoint (other than long-term optimism). Relying on your intuition or the recommendations of clickbait, catastrophic financial journalism is a recipe for disaster. You need a game plan.

5) Half of investing is mathematics, charts and graphs, and the other half is emotions. We humans understand the world primarily through narratives, not data and history. In investing, emotions are more important than data and history. When stocks fall, we feel as if they will fall even further and are tempted to shift assets from stocks to cash or bonds. When stocks rise, we feel as if they are going to rise even more and wish we had a higher allocation to stocks. A financial plan helps keep your emotions in check and keeps you on course. Easier said than done.

6) There is no investment that offers investors what they desire -- high returns and low risk. Nevertheless, Wall Street will always offer investors what they crave. Alternative strategies and investments that have failed in the past are often repackaged, renamed, and offered anew to investors. Some will work for a while but when they blow up, investors who never understood them in the first place will suffer the consequences. “We light the fuse, you hear the kaboom” describes how Wall Street continues to do business with its gullible clients.

7) Simplify. Many people think that complexity in finance is a sign of superiority. The more complicated an idea, the better. Not true. I would argue that simplicity is a better proxy for superiority. Simpler usually means cheaper, and cheaper leads to better performance. Yet, investing simplification comes with significant challenges. You need to be still and do less in a system that incentivizes and encourages activity. But it is difficult to be still when all the voices you hear, including the ones inside your head, are saying, “Do something!”

8) There is no such thing as risk-free investing, and you must choose the type of risk you want to take.

#16963Smokie, Sep 6, 2023

 

Well, as for COST, I will celebrate a little victory I am not necessarily going to make a regular practice. WXYZ is absolutely correct and it is getting laughable. This stock climbs no higher than the 115-150 range before suffering 50-100 point loss. Well, this time I sold half my position at 125 and just bought back in today. It's in my Roth so hopefully it pays off a little over the longer run. I actually was thinking to myself that this will be the time they split and I miss out