Mr.Positive said:
I was buying silver when it was around $10 an ounce, now it's over $46 an ounce...over 4 times what I bought. Are you saying that's a bad investment?
Make that $36 and dropping. I'll refrain from telling you "I told you so" because I think it'd come across as caddy. I mainly just hope the younger investors looking for solid advice are ignoring you because I don't personally think that every lesson has to be learned the hard way.
I saw where you're admitting $25 could be the floor. It boggles the mind that you think an investment that "should" drop that much further is actually a good one. In saying that, by logic you're admitting it's bad. If you're really just encouraging "short-term market timing" on top of the precious metals suggestion, you're making the worst investment mistakes at the same time!
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Want some real investment advice, fellows? Cash is king right now. Stocks are overpriced by multiple market valuation tools. Bonds, especially those with longer maturities, are also poised to be poor investments given that interest rates have only one direction to go (that'd be up). However, a particular type of bond, know as TIPS for short, could potentially be a great place to be with the inflation protection to offset interest rate rise. Precious metals are overpriced to all but the most naive. Real estate is also not looking that great either (including REITs).
So I'd recommend cash equilivents, TIPS, and corporate short term for 60%+ of your portfolio, and sprinkle in a dash of equities just for the purposes of hedging your bets.
To be clear, the primary purpose of cash and short term bonds is capital preservation, not return. So anyone who says not to invest in these solely because of their poor return isn't seeing the bigger picture. Personally, I'm more interested in a return OF my money than a return ON my money.
When to go back heavy in equities? Wait for the blood in the streets, and most everyone you meet to be completely dismayed by stocks. Then you know the time will be to buy with your cash. Most everyone else won't have any because they followed the herd and invested in things like silver.