Jason Rines (iThinkBig)

Back at the Bottom

I don't disagree. I'll just state my strategy. Wait until the end of Q1 2009 to see what Washington policy is going to be before buying. Winners and losers are still being chosen. I like the risk of GM despite going to be on Washington lifelines for a year or two. I now like some of the financials like JP Morgan.

I am in the Consumer Healthcare sector and serve big pharma. Looks very ripe for five year buy and hold strategy but will Henry Waxman finally have his vengeance? By the end of Q1 I'll have a good idea of that and buy pharma or leave it alone.

I'll say one thing, there are solutions to make money already. In the marketing sector it's called going back to fundamentals and a cost-per-sale model. We're in a deflation, some sectors deflating faster then others. So, buying the beat up banners and only pay them when conversions happens for clients and facilitating the technology to show all returns transparently. The numbers work for our company, the advertiser and the vendor. This is an illustration that one does not necessarily have to lay down and die because the economy is shedding 20% off and going back to Save and Invest for a good long time. I didn't need liquidity and or investment to do it either. The numbers told me when to shed the pounds and go lean and mean. The numbers tell me what to as a manager to make the business work in this new economic reality. The only advantage I may have had is simply that I do not avoid the reality of the downside and therefore ignored the pundits that were bullish for far too long.


On Nov 13 10:05 AM JasonC wrote:

> Personally I prefer a measured greed.
>
> Buy now. But start by buying bonds (corporates, not treasuries bid
> to infinity) and other income producing asset types already smashed
> to heck, with only 10-20% in equities. Concentrate the equity holding
> in the most smashed sectors - finance, materials, retail. Then collect
> your coupons, and as each one comes in, by a tiny bit more stock.
>
>
> You won't care a lick when it ends, with this strategy. You will
> get a better than average price on all the stock and will build back
> up to a 50-50 position over several years. That is the right time
> scale and risk level. In 5-10 years you will be doing well, when
> others around you will have been first smashed, then turned off investing
> entirely, and then sitting in cash yielding zero as recovery occurs.