Have We Reached an Historic Buying Opportunity?

By Jim Wiandt

With growth stocks creaming value, one might ask the question.

I find myself agreeing with Matt Hougan on at least one thing two days in a row, which is truly astonishing. And the point of agreement? It's that nearly everyone's instinct is wrong on value in crisis. Your intuition may say to go to the "safer" value company in crisis. But the truth of the matter is that there's a reason that these companies are "value" and that is that they're subject, like small-cap, to more credit, economy, etc., risk in times of crisis. And you see it now.

So for those of you who thought all of these value-focused tilts were ripe after a long rough patch, you will need some patience.

I do absolutely think the time will come (it always does) when value will have its run as the market and then the economy start to turn around. But your guess is as good as mine as to when that will be. I honestly have no strong feeling at all for that, and those who do are either soothsayers or self-deluded.

The main thing I can say about the current environment, Matt, is though I can't tell you what is running when or if we're stuck in a 1-year rut or a 5-year rut, what I do know is that the general area we're in is a historical buying opportunity: a once-in-your-lifetime chance to get your asset allocation plans squared away and really make sure you're saving what you need to be.

Because we may go down more... we may not even have hit a bottom (though I, like Matt, do think we have), but anyone coming in anywhere down here is not going to be hurting at the current cost basis, if you've got a 10- or 20-year horizon, and I don't care if you've got a value tilt, a growth tilt or are 50/50 on your U.S./international weighting.

Just don't put it all in alternative energy and China, no matter what your gambler's instincts tell you.

Comments

[Chris B:]

Remember to use "an" before a vowel and "a" before a consonant (see title).

a cat
an ugly cat
an elephant
a great elephant

Good luck investing anyway.

Feb 03 03:45 PM

[Hayweed:]

Chris you beat me to it. More examples

A crappy written headline.

Only thing worse is when people say he is a looser.

Feb 03 03:49 PM

[baz:]

actually "an" is used before an "h" as well as the vowels

Feb 03 03:55 PM

[the winter ...:]

No comments on grammar, but the saying goes, "It's always darkest before,... it's totally black. Have you ever considered that currently and even for twenty year time frames that it isn't "growth" and it isn't "value" because it's neither?

Feb 03 04:38 PM

[Jase:]

Hayweed,

While we're at it, let's have a chat about 'looser' vs. 'loser':

looser: not firm, taut, or rigid
loser: you

Feb 03 04:39 PM

[redemption997:]

Only suitable if it is a silent h. An honor; for example.

Feb 03 04:45 PM

[Matt5582:]

The Rule

The rule states that “a” should be used before words that begin with consonants (e.g., b, c ,d) while “an” should be used before words that begin with vowels (e.g., a,e,i). Notice, however, that the usage is determined by the pronunciation and not by the spelling, as many people wrongly assume.

You should say, therefore, “an hour” (because hour begins with a vowel sound) and “a history” (because history begins with a consonant sound).

Similarly you should say “a union” even if union begins with a “u.” That is because the pronunciation begins with “yu”, which is a consonant sound.

Feb 03 04:48 PM

[berated:]

I was mildly annoyed, until I realized I was on "seekinggrammar.com"

:-)

Feb 03 05:43 PM

[Roger Knights:]

stocks "creaming value" should be "screaming value"--right?

Feb 03 05:52 PM

[Chris B:]

As redemption and Matt point out, the "h" has to be silent in order to have "an" used before it, as in "honorable," "hour" or "honest" but that is not the case with "historic" unless you pronounce it "istoric" (perhaps the Brits or Aussies do that?).

owl.english.purdue.edu...

I'm sure the author hates us for not discussing the article's content, but there's not much to discuss.


On Feb 03 03:55 PM baz wrote:

> actually "an" is used before an "h" as well as the vowels

Feb 03 05:58 PM

[Steemo:]

I'm a newbie here, but already I can appreciate the intelligent discussion.
I get so disgusted at most website comments, such as on most Youtube posts, that you wonder if those folks could even recite the alphabet.

Feb 03 09:34 PM

[Hayweed:]

Jase guess my joke was over your head. Keep trying you may get out of community college some day


On Feb 03 04:39 PM Jase wrote:

> Hayweed,
>
> While we're at it, let's have a chat about 'looser' vs. 'loser':
>
>
> looser: not firm, taut, or rigid
> loser: you
>
>

Feb 03 09:36 PM

[chippo:]

Hmm..I never new this one..my wife is learning english. shes right there are a lot of complications.

But 20 year time horizons? Hopefully we are not talking that long to get back our loses, because that would just show that the market is a loosers game. Which in fact it probably is. If it crashes ever 10 years the amount of energy that could have been saved by buying t-bills and sleeping better would be worth it.

Feb 04 12:09 AM

[reader:]

"an" is used before a vowel in the following word, a before a vowel. I cannot think of a time when "an" is okay with "h" words.

Ex: an happy man. (Don't think so)

Feb 04 12:56 PM

[PencilNeck:]

Everybody is correct. This is one of those wonderful times when you can't be a looser, I mean loser, I mean...whatever.

www.betterwritingskill...

Feb 05 02:08 PM

[Kunst:]

No, you were just wrong and now you're trying to dance out of the way. And I'm sure you meant to say, "A crappily written headline." While you're at it, put a colon after "More examples" and a comma after "Chris" and "Jase", and a period at the end of your sentence.

People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.


On Feb 03 09:36 PM Hayweed wrote:

> Jase guess my joke was over your head. Keep trying you may get out of community college some day

Jase wrote:

Hayweed,

While we're at it, let's have a chat about 'looser' vs. 'loser':

looser: not firm, taut, or rigid
loser: you

Hayweed wrote:

Chris you beat me to it. More examples

A crappy written headline.

Only thing worse is when people say he is a looser.

Feb 07 10:44 PM