We stackers haven't exactly been the Fortunate Son for the last 30 years have we? But maybe there's hope in failure. The post that follows this will be a quote from Bill Bonner's book Hormegeddon. Hopefully I can peck it all out in one post.
"'...Having it good' is, in fact, a leading cause of hormegeddon. Starting out in life, the worst kind of luck you can have is good luck. Imagine that you get As in your classes without working. Imagine that all the pretty girls you meet like you. Imagine that your first investments are great successes. If you have that kind of success your doomed. You learn nothing from success. Like so many other things, good luck reaches the point of marginal declining utility quickly-just ask any child movie star. Starting with bad luck is much, much better. Because it's failure that teaches the important lessons." Bill Bonner
I disagree! I started out as a great pool player with lots of natural talent in my pre-teens, and I only got better over the next 50 years. It all depends on how dedicated you are to make a good thing better. Chris
Someone with makes a stack out of there gold and silver, some will even make castles and fortresses ect. out of their metal.
Well hello folks, long time. This post just had to bring me out of hiding. It seems you are equating your poor performance in metal investing with bad luck. This is not only wrong, it is an extremely poor way to look at things as you will be doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over again. Now, what bad luck did you have with metals????? NONE whatsoever!!!!. The commodity performed exactly as espected. Over the longer term, Ag has followed inflation. NO bad luck there. That is what you would expect. The cost of Ag now is now approximately the cost of production, which is where it should be, so no bad luck there either. The problem you had was not bad luck, it was BAD decisions. This is what ever stacker needs to man up to. Most stackers will not do that, they would rather blame it on the boogeyman or write it off as bad luck, rather than admit they were wrong. This is a very dangerous attitude to have as it does not allow for corrective action. It will just lead to repeating the same mistakes over and over again. Now longline, you really should read the quote again. The whole point of it is the ability to learn from failures. It seems to be the only thing you have "learned" is to keep on stackin' Sooo...... If you would like to keep having the same results, just keep on doing what you are doing, but under no circumstances should you call it bad luck.
But luck does play a role in investing Mike. Or do you think you guys are all investing geniuses when the fed's been goosing wallstreet for the last 8 years? That's right keep on stackin'. Speaking for myself only, the mistake was believing that an economic collapse would occur 30 years ago. Well it never happened. But your simply rearranging the rather trite quote: If you always do what you always done you'll always get what you've always got. That's only true if everything remains static. Keep on stackin' is static; the environment is always changing. IMO, it's changing against wallstreet and the USD. So why should I get out of the boat now? This economic abomination may chew carpet next year or ten years from now. But it hardly matters to me because I don't see any opportunity cost for staying in the boat. Thanks to fed liquidity even dung piles in third world countries are over priced. In fact stackers should stop whining about silver being manipulated down and be grateful they can still buy it cheap, for whatever the reason is. And maybe you should stop worrying about stackers and start worrying about wallstreet's unicorns & butterflies complaceny, faith in the fed, and BLS numbers that can use a bit of hallucination management. Hopefully this concludes our quality time together Mike. If it doesn't, at least try to get the name right next time. It's longnine not longlines.
Well, our quality time can end anytime you want, just ignore my posts so that is up to you, but your VERY weak response deserves a rebuttal as it actually supports my argument. First up, I never said luck plays no part at all, but I do believe that over the longterm, the role of luck is minimized. I did however say that you and the other stackers were not a victim of Bad Luck as you have indicated. If you actually believe your poor investment performance was indeed bad luck, please explain how a commodity that acted exactly as expected makes you a victim. Now you second point is you actually admitted you did make a mistake, which I totally agree with. So from what I see is 30 years ago you made a 'bet' that the strongest economy in the World would collapse. That is certainly not a decision I would have made. That is like picking the strongest building in NYC and betting your life savings that it would collapse in 30 years. While both are possible, it was not likely and you actually seem surprised it didn't happen. In addition, not only is the building still standing, but the economy is still the strongest in the World. Now this third point is comical. You yourself take the time to start an entire post on this quote and then you call the quote trite. Why is that, did you not understand the quote and thought it meant just hang in there..... You also falsely accused me of rearranging the quote. I did no such the thing. The quote is all about learning from failures and making corrections, that is it. Now moving forward, you claim you don't need to make any adjustments because things have changed. Well, maybe a little, but guess what, you are still making the same bet that the strongest economy will collapse in the NEXT 30 years. You were wrong 30 years ago, and the most likely scenario is you will be wrong again. Only this time you will no longer have any time to recover. The only logical course of action is really to follow the advice of the very quote you thought was important enough start a thread about, and make corrections. A balanced, diversified plan that covers all bases is they way to go, as your own words have stated, you HAVE made a mistake in the past, so the very strong possibility exists you will make a mistake in the future. Heck, we all do that. I understand the fact that I Will be wrong on some things in the future so I make my decisions accordingly and diversify to protect myself from my own mistakes. To really think you have THE correct answer is arrogant and that will just get you broke in the investing world. Now you point about the Fed goosing wallstreet in the same line as luck being involved makes little sense. How is that Lucky? First off the Fed does nothing to Goose wallstreet. That is a side effect. What the Fed does do is whatever it can to keep the economy humming, which in turn can be very beneficial to wall street. This is no surprise, it is something that MUST be taking into consideration with investment decisions. It is also not only the Fed. There are other folks who are doing the best they can to keep things rolling. They will also continue to do so in the future, which will make your huge bet on the strongest economy in the World collapsing less likely. But hey, if you are happy with you investment results, keep on the same path as you will get similar results. The POS will generally follow inflation and the cost of production, no surprise there. Of course if you want different results you will need to make adjustment. Remember what Einstein said about insanity. It is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
There is no luck in investing. You either get it or you don't. If I wanted to stake my future on luck, I'd take my money to Vegas. And if thats your strategy, you'll unfortunately be left with the same odds as Vegas, and they aren't in your favor. I find it insulting that my good investment strategies are construed as simply "luck" when I spend hours on research and planning.
I agree in not having all your eggs in any one basket... so, what percentage of a portfolio would you allocate to physical PM?
At this price point, I would have to say, zero if you do not own any, but if you are already holding, probably about 10%. The vig on PM is a killer, so to actually buy, I would hold off to see if Ag and Au go below production costs.
I absolutely agree. Success through failure. It is for some hard to grasp, but the quicker you fall, the quicker you learn to stand. Period.
I would take that further and say in that 10% there should be mix of PMs with rare coins but that's my strategy with the understanding that its mostly a hedge against inflation, a kind of forced savings account if you will. Heck, it beats a U.S. savings account.
Of course there is luck, some of the best investors have screwed up and lost big money on investments. That's not too say its ALL luck, but there is certainly a degree of luck in investing.
