In my 30 years in the markets I have learned many things, but one of the hardest to accept was that if the mainstream press is talking about it, it already happened – or it never will.
Most mainstream money news sources are worthless.
That’s bad enough, but the effects of this worthless mainstream information have a destructive outcome, and it falls hardest on the retired…
The retired are more vulnerable to the media’s garbage because they do not have the time to recover from the losses created by the panic selling the press has, and will, continue to generate.
Almost all panic selling is driven by the media.
The additional pressure of a limited time horizon not only limits the retiree’s universe of possible investments, but also makes them most vulnerable to bad information.
The retired investor is the most likely to sell in a panic and cut their losses. It is a nightmare scenario but an understandable knee-jerk reaction driven by the fear of not having enough money to live on.
But the fact is the best thing anyone can do is ignore 99% of the media’s noise and not sell. In sell-off after sell-off, the winners stayed the course and the losers sold at a loss.
This is particularly pertinent now when the market has hit new highs. The press is lining up with predictions of sell-offs, tops, corrections, and long-term slow to no growth, and all sorts of bad news articles and video segments.
I know it’s difficult but, as the negative news continues to grow, stop and think about one of my favorite quotes from Morgan Housel of MarketWatch.
It goes like this:
“According to Google, the phrase ‘double-dip recession’ was mentioned 10.8 million times in 2010 and 2011. And, it never happened. There were virtually no mentions of ‘financial collapse’ in 2006 and 2007. And, it did.”
The mainstream media never gets it right. What they report has either already happened or never will.
Train yourself to avoid the herd and ignore almost all of what you hear on TV. It will be the best thing you will ever do for your money.
Further Reading: The Oxford Club’s Chief Investment Strategist Alexander Green recently discussed why all this talk about the Fed’s “taper” is yet another distraction perpetuated by the mainstream media. Find out why you shouldn’t be buying in to all the hype here.
Marc Lichtenfeld also chimed in this week on what rising rates exactly mean for your portfolio. To read his “How Rising Interest Rates Will Affect You,” click here.
And finally, to read what Alex told investors they should be doing in light of a possible conflict with Syria, click here.