No, this blog post isn’t one of those MarketRiders reviews. Well, I guess it could be because I do plan on writing about how MarketRiders has been working out for me. What I am not planning on doing is giving a rundown on what the system is and how it works. I’ll leave that up to those “technical writer” types.

I basically wanted to talk about an email I received from MarketRiders yesterday called, “A Litmus Test.” MarketRiders emails are the type I don’t usually delete right off the bat. I generally browse through them to see if there is anything relevant to my life. Much of the time the emails simply reaffirm everything they pitch on their website and how what they say really is true. Most of the time, I don’t get into email newsletters, but when it comes to money, I change my tune.

MarketRiders Email Header - Courtesy of MarketRiders

Here’s the deal. MarketRiders is right. They are so right I love it. It’s funny because after I learned about what goes on behind the scenes (by reading a countless number of books and websites), everyone on television, radio and the internet has become amazingly transparent. Television is the worst. Do you want to talk about agenda? Holy cow. I mean, you can’t have one “Financial Expert” say one thing one minute and then another “Financial Expert” say the exact opposite the next minute and expect to have anyone trust a word these people say.

Here, I’ll give you an example of what I am talking about by plucking a few headlines from today’s news:

- Markets Looking Up Due To European Fears Easing
- Stocks Sinking to Crash Low Signals Worse to Come
- Angela Merkel’s Ban On Naked Short-Selling Is Brave, Not Naive (She was described as pretty much having no knowledge of capitalism yesterday. Today she’s Wonder Woman.)
- Euro Gains Most Since September as Traders Exit Bets on Decline

After reading headlines like this for a few months, it gets very easy to figure out which team is pushing out which story. The best ones are the ones released early in the morning that say, “Unemployment Down In 8 States” and then the afternoon headline released from the other side that says, “Unemployment Up In 42 States.” It’s hilarious. But, of course many of us just listen to the quick blurb as we are walking out the door in the morning. I just don’t get how people can base much of their lives on this junk. And trust me, they do. My sister told me a story yesterday where a guy informed her that Obama is trying to turn our country into a Democracy. That’s a poor example of what I am talking about, but it does clue you into how ignorant people can be when playing the “Telephone Game.” Remember that one from grade school? Unfortunately this guy really didn’t know what planet he was on and that just made the whole thing even more sad.

Anyway, enough of me ranting a raving, let’s talk about the current markets. Yes, they are up and they are down. Do you care? Probably. I care, but I don’t go nuts. Why don’t I go nuts? I’ll tell you in one short sentence:

Because I am invested in everything.

Let’s ask another question. Would I be nervous right now if I was invested in nothing but individual stocks (like about half of the amateurs out there)? Answer: Oh heck yes.

What I am talking about is this – When a stock price goes down, you never quite know if it’s ever going to come back up. There are more examples that I even know of where a stock price has gone down and just kept going down…until it disappeared. That’s a shame for the investors, but that’s life.

I don’t really enjoy staring at the ceiling wondering how fast my money is evaporating at the moment, when I should be sleeping, so I don’t invest in individual stocks. I like the relative security of investing in “Markets.” If an entire market is tanking, such as what Europe is going through, I just think there is a guy walking about with one of those price guns putting everything on sale. If an entire market really fails, we have bigger problems than my investments and I know just the hills I am going to run for. But for now, all this turbulence is simply offering some real bargains for those of us who are confident in our balanced portfolio.

Day after day, I think of money. It’s probably more of a hobby than anything else. Ever since I learned about asset allocation and rebalancing, I really have become a sort of spokesperson for the idea. It fits with my personality of getting into something way too deep, losing and then coming back to my senses and acting like an adult. That last part is where MarketRiders helped tremendously. They knocked me over the head and told me to grow up. I thank them for that. Then, they held my hand and said, “Hey man, it’s just not that hard. It’s actually really easy. Three steps and you are done.” Genius. And only ten bucks a month.

I feel bad for the people I preach to. Usually, they have no interest in investing and their eyes glaze over when I start talking about it. Let this be a warning to you…all I need is a hint of an idea that you might be interested in what I have to say and you won’t get away from me for at least an hour. If you’re smart, you’ll smile and nod and try to get the heck out of there.

When I do catch someone, I try to tell them as much as I can about asset allocation and rebalancing. I think the best analogy I use is to describe the whole scene as a seesaw. Sometimes things go up and sometimes things go down. When things go down, it’s not necessarily a bad thing, it just means that you should buy more of it. Then, I get into my, “You know, soooo many people really don’t buy low and sell high” ramble. All I have to do is to mention the droves of people who just sold much of their European stocks because they slid. What do they say, “The only guaranteed way to lose money in the market is to sell…” I think that’s it.

People get nervous. That’s not going to change. People like it when things are “in the green.” That’s when they buy. They want to be on the winning side. Unfortunately, many people who buy when things are in the green lose a lot of money. You have to think like a real investor and realize that if the market is going down, things are just a heck of a lot cheaper than they were yesterday.

If you’re interested, here is a nice demo of the MarketRiders system:

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