I’d like to share some thoughts regarding this chart:
This chart, available only to me, graphs the number of paying subscribers (God bless ’em) to the Slope of Hope. Even though 2022 has been absolutely sensational so far, the number of subscribers is nowhere near the peak of early April 2020.
I think there’s a very understandable reason for this, and I’ve mentioned it before: people simply don’t believe an honest-to-God bear market can ever happen again. The “angle of assault“, if you will, speaks volumes.
- In the case of March 2020, Slope absolutely exploded in its subscriber base literally in a matter of days. After a dozen years of a bullshit bull market, people declared “THIS IS IT!!!!!!!” and piled in. As you can see, over the grueling period from April 2020 until December 2021, the lion’s share of those gains vanished in the agonizing ascent of the stock market, fueled by that son of a bitch prick named Jerome Powell.
- In the case of February-April 2022, however, the ascent has been slow, halting, and timorous. People are tip-toeing in little by little. Many people who got “burned” by the 2020/2021 mega-rally have declared, “Never Again!” as they watch helplessly their all-long portfolios get torched. But they don’t want to come back. They don’t trust short-selling anymore. Burned once, twice shy.
Ya know, folks, there’s a reason bear markets are called “a slope of hope“. It’s because dim-witted bulls keep believing that The Bad Stuff Is Finally Over, and their bull market will come back. So they keep hoping. And hoping. And hoping some more, all while the market slopes its way lower.
Unfortunately, I’m kind of the innocent victim here, because I’m not the one who caused the ridiculous bull market of 2020/2021 to happen, yet I’m the one who has to get on bended knee and plead with people to join the site for their own good. But as the graph quite plainly shows, it’s not that they don’t’ trust ME. They just don’t trust the market. And understandably so.
I thus feel an especially deep gratitude to the blessed souls who DO find it within themselves to actually, ya know, pay the absurdly low monthly fees that are charged here and actually be financially-participating in this site. For this reason, I’ve decided to basically keep almost all the content this weekend behind a pay wall, just as an extra thank-you to paying members (to be clear, ALL paying members, even Bronze).
Of course, you can always change that for yourself and join the club. I hope you do.
