<p>Are you anticipating a layoff? I hope you are wrong!!!</p>
<p>One of my sisters lost her job in the meltdown - but she’s independently wealthy - her husband lost his job twenty years ago.</p>
<p>One of my brother-in-laws will probably either lose his job or move to another company. His company is in a death spiral. He’s staying with his current company to cover a health insurance issue with his daughter for a short period of time. He should be highly marketable with his skills.</p>
<p>I know far, far more people that have found jobs since the financial meltdown though than have lost jobs. That includes my son, a niece, several children of co-workers, children of cousins and other relatives and a lot of people that have been hired in the last four years. There’s also this little mall nearby that’s hired 1,000 people in the last two months.</p>
<p>The local Trader Joes moved over the border from MA to NH three weeks ago. They doubled their floor space and it feels like they more than tripled their business. They are hiring people like crazy. The move was less than a mile but it put them within easy walking distance to a bunch of apartment complexes and vastly increased the amount of space available for parking.</p>
<p>Things are definitely uneven around the country.</p>
<p>The central bankers look like they are going to try to crank something up but they are fighting a lot of structural and political problems. That’s a tall order - they can only do their best.</p>
<p>For those watching for deadlines - there’s a Federal budget thing coming up in a month I think.</p>
<p>In my case, I should know by the end of next week what is going to happen; although, who knows? Things have a tendency to get delayed.</p>
<p>[Germany</a> EFSF Won’t Buy Spanish Debt - Business Insider](<a href=“http://www.businessinsider.com/germany-efsf-wont-buy-spanish-debt-2012-7]Germany”>Germany EFSF Won't Buy Spanish Debt)</p>
<p>Steady profits on the backs of employess not seeing meaninful salary increases,increasing costs for those employees healthcare,and more production from these employees…many homeowners have lost a good chunk of their equity ,while they can afford their mortgage payments,the loss of the equity will prevent them from moving up…</p>
<p>those are all true, but dstark was asking when the stock market would take a hit.
most people in the US are no longer invested in the stock market, so their financial situations will not directly affect stock prices, imho. Most trades these days are done by professional investors. And they, and their clients, are not in the same dire economic situations as those mentioned above.
The US has the strongest, most financially stable economy in the world today. It may not have the largest economy for much longer, but foreign investors are still parking their $$ here, for good reasons.</p>
<p>Speaking of professional investors, what my new investment manager proposes make absolutely no sense to me. I suggested to him to find taxable bonds for my Roth account. He said I was dead wrong not to buy stocks for it instead of bonds since stock returns are historically higher. He knows my tax bracket is considerably higher than LT CG rate. Do I trust him to pick any investment for me?</p>
<p>[Say</a> What? In 30-Year Race, Bonds Beat Stocks - Bloomberg](<a href=“Bloomberg - Are you a robot?”>Bloomberg - Are you a robot?)</p>
<p>Do I trust him to pick any investment for me? </p>
<p>who knows?? you’ll have to get advise on that question from other clients who are happy with his guidance.
But i agree with the premise- for a Roth, I would invest in strong, financially healthy, multinational US based companies that pay dividends, have little debt and great possibilities for future growth- here and especially overseas.</p>
<p>From the Bloomberg article-
"The biggest bond gains in almost a decade "</p>
<p>the last 10 years, in which the DJIA and NASDAQ have essentially gone sideways, is the reason bonds have beaten stocks over the last 30 years.
That is not the case for many individual growth stocks, especially in technology.</p>
<p>Yes this is true particularly for the big ones from 10 years ago: msft, intc, csco</p>
<p>Stockpicking takes effort and time.</p>
<p>^I believe you. I don’t think I can trust my investment advisor. He was just giving me a conventional talk on higher returns on stocks. He should have compared savings on 15% tax on LTCG with 35% tax on interest. If he skipped that, I doubt he is inclined to put in efforts to pick stocks.</p>
<p>Bonds beat stocks because 30 years ago interest rates were double digits.</p>
<p>Right now, It has to be tough to be an investment manager. Interest rates are very low. Bonds are not going to have the same performance over the next 30 years that were acheived over the last 30 years. No chance. Zero chance. The world has too much debt which leads to subpar growth. Subpar growth over time should lead to subpar stock
market performance.</p>
<p>Stocks are not as overpriced as they were 30 years ago. One reason the stock market hasn’t gone anywhere over the last 12 years is because stocks were incredibly overpriced 12 years ago. </p>
<p>In the US, now the issues are subpar growth, and too much debt in society. The baby boomers are sellers of stocks, not buyers so the demographics aren’t as strong. The wealth and income inequality in this country are at extreme levels which leads to a poorer economy, which can lead to poorer stock market performance over time.</p>
<p>If I was young, I would be invested in stocks over bonds. I would only own mildly distressed bonds like financial company bonds.</p>
<p>I am not young though, and I think the investment climate is awful, so, I don’t know. I think intellectually stocks are probably the better </p>
<p>investment, but I hate the downdrafts.
If you are going to be a buyer for 20 years, stocks probably are better than bonds. </p>
<p>Earlier, I posted that IBM 10 year notes were sold at a yield below 2 percent. You don’t get much interest anymore in the corporate bond.</p>
<p>The bottom line…</p>
<p>Igloo, you are going to have to take risk to get any kind of return.</p>
<p>No, too old to take any risk. 3-4% yield 5 year term, rated A or better. I haven’t gotten 6-8% yield on stocks for last 10-20 years. When it gets better, I could shuffle around.</p>
<p>Ok…</p>
<p>I understand…outside of cash, munis are my top investment…</p>
<p>I haven’t really seen this…which corporations pay 3 to 4 percent for 5 years?</p>
<p>If this is your risk tolerance, you probably need a different investment manager. Somebody more in sync with what you want. Doesn’t mean there is anything wrong with the investment manager you have. Just means you aren’t a fit, simliar to students fitting into schools.</p>
<p>Interesting con call from EQR this past week. Their stock did not do much so not bad but not great either. They expect to continue raising rents as the market will bear. </p>
<p>There is a lot of turnover but new tenants don’t have trouble higher rents. Their average rent to income is only 17% which is kind of amazing. </p>
<p>In some markets like Denver, they are doing a lot of rentals to people clearly looking to buy and them they leave when they find something.</p>
<p>They have been avoiding certain markets for a while like Vegas and Chicago.</p>
<p>Reading con call transcripts can be interesting.</p>
<p>Stockpicking takes effort and time.</p>
<p>yup. and a little luck doesn’t hurt either!</p>
<p>Stocks are following housing, into the abyss…no players/buyers…population trends dictate this…</p>
<p>^^ there are more buyers for homes these days than a few years ago…now that includes groups of investors [REIT’s]who are buying up foreclosed / distressed homes en mass and turning them into rental properties. Pretty soon [ in the next few years] all of that excess housing inventory will either be sopped up, or bulldozed, new homes will start to be built in more economically viable areas where businesses is growing, and prices will start to rise at a historically normal rate of increase[ not at the unsustainable “bubble” rate experienced in the middle of the last decade ]</p>
<p>Frederick C. Tuomi – President, Property Management: That’s exactly the point we’re making, whereas looking at the kind of metrics caused our portfolio, Denver just kind of popped up. On one hand, it was worrisome and that the – it had high turnover, it was growing, and it was due to rent increases and it was due to home purchasing, but then on the revenue side it’s one of the top performers there as well, so we have great rent growth, but then also very strong leasing velocity through this leasing season, high occupancy, low left to lease and it just continues to grow. So, looks like even though that market has recovered, the single family is healthy, people are buying homes, there is plenty of demand for our product from our profile and they are ready willing and able to lease apartments at the current rents that continue to grow and refill those vacancies.</p>
<p>Eric Wolfe – Citi: But I guess also as part of that we should probably expect to see turnover keep rising in your markets. I mean is that an expectation that we should have or is that just sort of you’re saying we might see this in isolated cases and certain markets like Denver.</p>
<p>Frederick C. Tuomi – President, Property Management: Well, I think clearly this year you’re going to see turnover increase over last year, and last couple of years has been kind of low. It will normalize probably – I would say, probably after next year, but yes, turnover will continue to grow from increased rents and from home buying, and Denver just happened to be example where we’re seeing both at the same time. Other markets with big increases and turnover like San Francisco and Boston were not seeing home purchasing. They’re too expensive or they are hard to get, and other markets where home buying is picking up, they went through a low and we’re not having the increased pressure.</p>
<p>[Equity</a> Residential Earnings Call NUGGETS: Denver - The Model Market, Views on Chicago and Vegas | Wall St. Cheat Sheet](<a href=“http://wallstcheatsheet.com/stocks/equity-residential-earnings-call-nuggets-denver-the-model-market-views-on-chicago-and-vegas.html/]Equity”>http://wallstcheatsheet.com/stocks/equity-residential-earnings-call-nuggets-denver-the-model-market-views-on-chicago-and-vegas.html/)</p>
<p>Comparing buyers today to those of 2008± is not a fair comparison…housing will not see the highs of recent boom for decades, and rightfully so…the buyers today are more investors, then true homeowners…demographics are going against both stocks and housing</p>