No visible means of support and you have not seen nothin’ yet
Everything’s stuck together
And I don’t know what you expect starring into the TV set
Fighting fire with fire
It is a terribly difficult time to be a thinking person. Almost agonizing.
Hey, hold up there, Tim-bo. I’ve been buying stocks, and I’ve been doing great! I’m a thinking person!
No, you’re not. You’re opportunistic. You’re profitable. But you’re not thinking. You’re just in the right place, at the right time, with the right disposition.
I say again: this is a terrible time to be a thinking person. The more stupid you are, the better you’ll do. The more cloying, the better. A sycophant? You’ll thrive.
We all know Irving Fisher’s famous quote from 1929. Everyone knows it. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you don’t read nearly enough. And that single quote was from 90 years ago.
We are treated to a sentiment exactly as arrogant, cocksure, and wrong-headed as Professor Fisher’s quote every single day now. Like this gem from your VP:
Of course, I couldn’t help myself.
Not to be outdone, your President chimed in this morning, just before the selling began.
Naturally, his sycophantic, toady VP retweeted it at once.
Anyway.
As self-congratulatory as I’m able to be about my own “thinking” nature, it has, of course, done me tremendous disservice over the years. A man who suffered a dreadful head injury in the year 2000 and simply bought AMZN and held it to this day clearly has beat virtually every other person strolling the planet. The same goes for AAPL.
But my problem isn’t the past. It’s the present. And a saturation of cowardice in the soul of your long-suffering, but surprisingly sweet-tempered, host.
I entered the day with only 40 short positions and a commitment of 85%. This was deliberately light. It’s light because, for virtually every day of the past eleven weeks, Fed-bucks have sadistically butt-raped any pitiful ursine creatures that dare wander the Earth. Powell – – a man for whom my hatred has ascended to such demonic heights, that I fear for my very soul – – has taken over the economy and destroyed true capitalism. And the bears.
Adjunct to my watch list of 40 true positions was another list, Bear Pen, with a full 120 prospective shorts. Every one of them is a gorgeous chart. Every blessed one. Because I’ve been doing this a while. And I’m relatively good at it.
And, if my balls were the size of well-watered cantaloupes, I’d have increased my positions form 40 to the full 160. But they’re not, so I didn’t. I’m just too goddamned scared, thanks to that goddamned, son of a bitch, should-be-slowly-tortured-to-death Jerome Powell.
I did, however, with teeth gritted, short 20 out of the 120. Thus, I am short 60 and have left 100 untouched, abandoned, like forlorn but deserving children. They stand aghast, wondering why I have forsaken them. I have done so, my beloved, out of nothing but fear.
The 60 in my flock are, as I type this, all profitable. Even the new 20 ones, which I shorted only minutes ago. And since that fucking bastard Powell is going to speak later today, who knows if they will survive or not.
They are logically chosen and sensibly managed. But our world is insane. And all I value anymore are my own sanity, and the sanctity of this tiny corner of the web. It’s what I have, and something I can call my own. And our premium members have made it all possible. Them and me. The only ones.
So bless them. And may God smile upon the bears yet again, and smite the wrongdoers profiting from these egregious times. You cannot shake hands with the devil and say you’re only kidding.
Thus spake Slope. Amen.
