It’s easy to be gloomy. See all the stuff below. But this stuff will turn around on a dime and the market will come roaring back. Late last week the mortgage REITs — including NLY, ARR, AGNC and TWO — came roaring back. The world had written them and their high yields off. My friends love TWO. I dipped my toe back into these things. But these and the market could swing again, on another dime.
The good news is that recently I’ve been flooded with interesting real estate opportunities — largely in commercial. Residential has tightened, with prices approaching nosebleed territory.
The basic problem with today’s world of investing is there’s simply too much money around scrounging among too few opportunities.
Yes, even after the meltdown in 2008, there’s still too much money and too few good opportunities.
The best way to approach this week’s Thanksgiving Day holidays is to be largely out.
Investors rush to beat the threat of higher taxes. From Sunday’s New York Times. Click here.
These charts from the weekend’s New York Times depress me:
Six reasons the rally has been running out of steam, according to Nouriel Roubini (“Dr. Gloom”)
- Growth is weak.
- The Eurozone crisis is backsliding again. Greece is coming to a head (once again).
- Political concerns (fiscal cliff, etc.).
- Valuations have gotten way stretched, and are difficult to justify given low inflation and more developed market deleveraging.
- QE is running out of its impact, and unlike past QEs (QE1 and QE2), QE3 was launched near a market peak, and if anything revenue and earnings misses are expected to accelerate.
- Geopolitical risk is back (Israel, Gaza, Syria, etc.).
Roubini’s points were excerpted by Business Insider from a recent note to clients of his economic consulting firm.
I thought of running a serious picture of Roubini like this one:
But the man does give the best parties in Manhattan.
My hat’s off to Samsung. My old Samsung DLP TV’s mirrors got stuck. Samsung sent a repair man. He fixed the problem. He said the repair “was on Samsung.” The TV was way out of warranty. No wonder they’re killing all the Japanese makers — Sony, Panasonic and Sharp.
Governor Chris Christie on Saturday Night Live. He’s funny.
Click here.
Harry Newton who had a lovely Sunday afternoon taking Susan and Rosie to Art Omi Arts Center in Ghent, NY (130 miles north of New York City). Great exhibit of iconic American art relating to freedom and the vote from the collection of Lawrence Benenson:
In addition to its new exhibit building, Art Omi also has an extensive sculpture garden featuring really beautiful art.
It’s a wonderful place to visit. For more, click here.
Azithromycin remains my drug of choice. It works. I’m well.
I once was out jogging deep in the woods when a giant brown bear came after me. I ran like mad and outran him. OK, that’s not true, but it does make the point that fear is a great motivator. For running from danger. But unfortunately not for investors. Fear with cause today surrounds us: terrible economic policies here and abroad, deadlocked Congress, leading from behind (no world leaders left), terrorists active, Iran almost with the bomb. So tons of cash sit safely locked away not being invested. I like wild optimism better.