{"id":47973,"date":"2019-10-04T12:04:38","date_gmt":"2019-10-04T16:04:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.technologyinvestor.com\/?p=47973"},"modified":"2019-10-04T12:23:27","modified_gmt":"2019-10-04T16:23:27","slug":"buy-and-hold-heres-why-it-makes-huge-sense-no-todays-employment-news-is-good-news-for-one-good-reason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.technologyinvestor.com\/?p=47973","title":{"rendered":"Buy and Hold. Here’s why it makes huge sense. No! Today’s employment news is good news for one good reason."},"content":{"rendered":"

At 8:30 AM on the first Friday of every month, we get the month’s most important economic news — the jobless report. Today’s was OK.<\/p>\n

Courtesy CNBC:<\/p>\n

+ The jobless rate in September dropped 0.2 percentage points to 3.5%, the lowest since December 1969. (Everyone who wants to work is working.)<\/p>\n

+ Nonfarm payrolls rose by 136,000 in September, below the 145,000 forecast by economists polled by Dow Jones. (Economists are rarely right. That’s why they call economics “the\u00a0 dismal science.”)<\/p>\n

+ However, past numbers were revised higher. August was revised up to 168,000 from an initial estimate of 130,000, while July was increased to 166,000 from 159,000, for a net gain of 45,000.<\/p>\n

+\u00a0Wages rose 2.9% for the year, the lowest increase since July 2018. (It’s bizarre that wages aren’t growing faster when the job market is so tight. But automation, IT — information technology — continue to have a huge impact. That’s why our portfolio has stocks like Docusign, Twilio, Servicenow, Salesforce, etc.)<\/p>\n

Today might be a good day to sell some stocks you don’t feel comfortable owning long term.<\/p>\n

We are definitely headed into a recession.\u00a0 In fact,\u00a0Moody’s Analytics’ Mark Zandi says one-fifth of economy — manufacturing, farming, and shipping — is already in recession.<\/p>\n

The consumer — 70% or so of the economy — is still doing well. But, for how long we don’t know.<\/p>\n

Glorious Fall weather this morning:<\/strong><\/span>
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\nColumbia County, mid New York State. Friday October 4.\u00a0 Photo by Mark Johnson, who’s also a great tennis player and my regular partner.<\/p>\n

Buy and Hold. The perfect investment philosophy(??)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

IBuy and Hold doesn’t work. You have to watch your stocks — or put in automatic stop loss orders. Here are the worst performers this year of the S&P500. It’s a fascinating (and depressing) list:<\/p>\n

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I started drawing some charts of random losers over the past year — not ones I own.<\/p>\n

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In short, either you make a conscious decision to own a stock that’s dropping — e.g. Macys has lots of valuable real estate — or you dump it because it’s reached your stop loss of, say, 15%<\/p>\n

Waiting for Godot\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

In the play he never shows.<\/p>\n

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You must update your Apple Watch OS. <\/strong><\/span>Here’s why.<\/p>\n

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My grandkids get endless pleasure by tapping my watch and listening to Micky and Minnie tell time.<\/p>\n

How life has changed<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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What a weekend<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I’m off to Boston to take granddaughter Sophie to a Saturday matinee:<\/p>\n

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Should I wear my flower?<\/p>\n

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I suspect Sophie will kibosh the flower.<\/p>\n