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"The world seems more uncertain today than at any other time in my life," writes Oaktree's...
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Sunday, September 16, 2012, 8:28 AM ET"The world seems more uncertain today than at any other time in my life," writes Oaktree's Howard Marks, but it doesn't mean we should settle for assets deemed "safe." Dusting off an old book on corporate bonds, Marks takes comfort knowing the asset class performed well during periods encompassing the Great Depression and world wars. "Corporate investing represents an attractive strategy for uncertain times."
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As a investor one cannot wait for the "perfect time, perfect era". That just a utopia as humans aren't perfect and are bound by errors.
Productivity continues to rise, opportunities to make money abound..
And yes, nothing is "safe".
I think the part about the United States's period from 91-2001 deserves some mention. To quote Francis Fukuyama, this was supposed by many to be the "End of History". Things didn't exactly turn out that way, but it did lead to a nice 10 years of spectacular growth. One is also reminded of the post WWII period where we in effect bombed out all of our competition for a generation...nice period of growth there.
Now that China is experiencing the difficulties of being a developed economy (this is only going to increase IMO) and Europe is hamstrung for the next forseeable 10+ years, might we be on the verge of entering another "white swan" period like the above two I have mentioned? Our main two competitors are pretty much spinning their wheels and will be doing so for the forseeable future and we "accomplished" this by non military means. Combine that with the fact that consumers have been massively deleveraging for the past few years (pain now, but the right thing to do for the long term) and it's not that hard to see what might be around the corner.
Of course, we could all implode on a black swan event that isn't even a focus now, but I see way too many articles on that and not that many on the other side of the coin.
Bernanke is doing a pretty good job keeping inflation in check and providing a boost to confidence in the capital markets.
While the world is never "certain" in any sense of the word, things are far more stable and predictable today than they were in late 2008.
In two years no one will remember any of this has ever happened. Slovakia or someone will announce possible plans to leave the EU, and some dolt will declare it to be the most tumultuous of times in human history.