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One of the more amusing theories of the modern age is that one must own stocks because there are no suitable alternatives. Take Jim Cramer's Winners of the New World. You will note that he did not mention bonds. It was heavily implied, as is the case now, that bonds could not be relative winners of the 21st century.
February 29, 2000
Winners of the New World
So, if you can't own the retailers, and you can't own transports, and you can't own banks and brokers and financials and you can't own commodity makers and you can't own the newspapers, and you can't own the machinery stocks, what can you own?
A-ha, that just leaves us with tech. That's why we keep coming back to it. That's why, despite the 80% increase in the Nasdaq last year, we are looking at another record year now. It is by that process of elimination that I have picked my top 10.
I would like to now extrapolate this "no suitable alternatives" theory to the transportation industry.
We can't own cars. So many people die in cars each year that it has become a travesty. Death traps each and every one of them, and don't even get me started on the financial costs of owning and operating motor vehicles.
We can't own bicycles. We're now forced to wear helmets, and it isn't because bicycles are inherently safe, let me tell you.
We can't own helicopters and airplanes. There just aren't enough places to land them and parking at our local strip malls is just right out.
A-ha, that just leaves us with pogo sticks. What better vehicle could there possibly be to navigate this brave new economy's cyclical ups and downs while simultaneously getting virtually nowhere over the long-term? It is by process of elimination that I have determined the only suitable method of transportation of the new world. The rest? You can have them.
Stocks and pogo sticks for the win at any price! You heard it here first, lol. Sigh.
This is not investment advice.
Monday: New Home Sales
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11 comments:
30 years were paying 5-6% right through 2007:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=Y1i
sigh. I'll try to remember that for my next life. If I get to start in the 60s again my three must-dos are inventing Tetris for the C64 and Apple II, MTG sometime after that, and buying gold and bonds when they were out of favor.
(funny how you actually had a hand in one of those! I was in Japan in the early 1990s so I missed the initial rollout, but I had college buds who somehow got involved early, one becoming a US champ and a designer/developer at Wizards. Anyhoo, this was pre-internet too so I only had the vaguest idea what MTG, but with the first revised boxes I started opening, I was completely blown away by the utter cleverness of the invention . . . no accident that both Tetris and MTG were created by mathematicians I guess)
Then again had I bought $5000 worth of AAPL when I wanted to in 1997 it'd be paying ~$2000/mo in dividends now . . .
I almost bought $4000 to $5000 in Apple back in 1988, but my credit history wasn't well enough established to qualify for the loan to buy the top of the line computer. Hahaha!
In hindsight, it was a good thing that I was denied. I was laid off from my first career computer job after just 18 months when the small consulting company folded.
I was also laid off from its replacement job after 18 months as well. Who knew a US computing office of a Japanese landscspe architectural company wouldn't be all that stable once Japsn's resl estate boom turned to bust?
Ah, the joys of being naive and in my 20s! Filled with American optimism and the idea that the world was my oyster!
And then there was that 3rd job, It lasted much longer. Too long. Much pent up demand for layoffs and corporate fraud seemed to hit all at once. Hellish experience. Go figure.
If it makes you feel any better. would have been difficult to know that you could have invested in MTG. It was a private company which means you pretty much had to get lucky and know somebody who worked there. i played Pinochle on a regular basis witj someone who did. After seeing the product, I asked if they were still looking for investors. They were! That will go down as the best question of my life.
Curiosity is not the "killed the cat" negative that it is portrayed to be. This economy has definitely got my attention. I'm curious to know how pension funds are going to achieve 7% returns or more in a 2.5% long-term treasury world. Very curious indeed, lol. Sugh.
I ponied up $6000 for a 5MB Mac IIcx in 5/89.
That was at the height of the DRAM shortage so the 4MB expansion alone cost $800.
$6000 then would have purchased 133 shares then. Yeah, I get more utility from being a lifelong Mac pro now than that $600/mo dividend flow would buy at least.
how pension funds are going to achieve 7% returns
yeah that's still a mystery but I had a shower-thought recently that (what I have been expecting to be) the coming baby boom equity selloff maybe isn't going to be an event since the boomer echo is bigger than they are:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?id=LFWA24TTUSQ647N,
plus with all the printing going on global wealth will be a big buyer, too.
The real impetus of space colonization should be finding somewhere else for all this money to go . . .
Troy,
The real impetus of space colonization should be finding somewhere else for all this money to go . . .
Interplanetary bank deposits destined to *not* drive up interest rates, but instead lower then to 0.00001%, much to the surprise of the "rising interest rate" theory faithful, lol.
heh sitting here vegetating, the thought occurred to me how "First Bank of Mars" sounds funny.
I've long held design ideas about the colonization of Mars (if you can tell I derive immense pleasure thinking about my design ideas and negative pleasure actually developing them towards a sellable state) but then the killer thought hit me: what if Pioneer, Viking, and the rovers were the real NASA fraud-jobs and the US has steadily been colonizing an actually perfectly habitable Mars since the 1970s?
By now we could have a rogue colony like from The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress with nobody even knowing about it : )
ah, beaten to it:
http://kissanime.com/Anime/Aldnoah-Zero
sorta. I'm not the biggest fan of anime (Sturgeon's Law applies) but that looks interesting.
...fraud-jobs...rogue colony...Harsh Mistress
Heard a rumor that Palin can see Russia from Mars.
Fritz_O & Troy,
Heard a rumor that Palin can see Russia from Mars.
Hahaha!!!!! :)
http://i.imgur.com/abQQ8K2.jpg
I've inhaled the first season of that anime. It's not 100% awesome, but it's watchable at least.
Troy,
Our Stsr Blazers!
Um, 100% awesome, thsnk you very much.
Might be a tad biased as my dad served on a battledhip in WW2. ;)
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