Looks Like A Stock Market Correction:
 

A correction would be a decline of 10%, or less, in a relatively short period of time. I say bring it on; let's get it over and done. Corrections are normal and needed from time to time.

:)

We prefer to call it a "consolidation".

Just tell me the day before it happens.

Some have been calling correction for the last year. Nobody knows!

Read an article yesterday that had some analyst predicting a 15% correction on the horizon. He also pointed out that the last two changes to the Fed chair brought corrections to the market soon after the change. Bernanke leaves office in January 2014.
Being very cautious with investments right now.

I see some good valuation metrics out there. We're real close to stepping off the curb for some good buys.

I hope you're right. It seems to me however, that the stock market gains of the past few years are largely correlated with the increase in the Fed's balance sheet ...ie printing money (metaphorically speaking) by the various QE programs.

Corrections, when they come, seem to be largely a matter of panic at the prospect of the Fed stopping with the free money from what I can see.

Who cares if there is a correction. Unless you need the money in the next six months (and if you do, it probably shouldn't be in the market), then the market will correct and recover and at the end of the year you will probably be up about 8%.

Timing the market
 

It is a fools game.

You mean like how up to last year, 2012...buying/selling the DOW...if you'd bought at the peak in 1999 (11722), you could have been forced to sell below what you paid? That's 13 years to recover. Yes it was up higher during that time, but it's also been down...a lot...do you remember 6547 in 2009? It LOST half in 10 years. Are you willing to guarantee that it'll be up in a year?

And sadly...that recovery period includes changing the index to get rid of losers. Using the original companies, would it be up? I don't know if it would.

The banks make money...and the lucky. If the Fed stops spending $90 billion a month to keep things going...to keep interest rates down...it's gonna get ugly. The fed is the guy giving a dying patient CPR...we can't pay the bills. The bills have gotten too large.

A fools game is the interest rates anyplace other than the market. I will take the ups and downs and collect my 8-10% each year.

btk

It's true that in 2009 I lived through the worst financial crisis I am probably going to see in my lifetime. I left my money in the market and recovered it all and more in a relatively short time. Also, during that time none of the companies that I invest in for dividends cut their dividends, so my income didn't change, and in fact it went up.

The Fed pumped around $3 trillion into the economy since 2009. THAT is why things are as they are. The market is up because of Fed money. It's another bubble being blown. Like the housing bubble, education costs bubble, previous "bull markets", all went up from Fed money. You're gambling with people who cheat. I'm NOT saying you can't make money. The premise was "don't worry about any correction, it'll be back up in a year". And I disagreed.

Opportunity
 

:agree:

Well said. I see a correction in the market as an opportunity to buy lower than I had been previously buying at. Then ultimately when the market goes up, I made even more than I would have before the "correction".

Correction
 

Since the great depression the stock market has averaged 1.5 corrections a year. (down 10%). It has always recovered and the average over those roughly 90 years is over 8%. You just have to roll with the punches.:bigbow: