Results form Market Timing Question on Linkedin

Thank you for answering the question on market timing. I learned some things from the answers and identified a couple of good references. I decided to write a summary and send it to those who answered the question. I also will post it on a blog.

I think the educational material one respondent suggested at Morningstar is very good. http://www.morningstar.com/Cover/classroom.html

The CAPS concept is interesting. http://caps.fool.com/

Analyzing the responses, I concluded 27% of the aswers from fairly pure market timers, 20% from those who consider the time element important, 33% from those who take the oppoortunity to buy more aggresively at a minimum when stocks are undervalued, and 20% who avoid timing completely. In other words, 53% would claim they were not market timers. Of course this in not a scientific survey.

Interestingly, two people suggested Warren Buffet as their guru and reason not to time the market. While Warren's favorite holding period may be forever, he has a record of selling stocks. I would guess, because he thinks those stocks are overvalued and therefore likely to fall or not do as well as the market in general.

I do enjoy this quote from Warren Buffet, "I think we’ve got fabulous capital markets in this country, and they get screwed up often enough to make them even more fabulous. I mean, you don’t want a capital market that functions perfectly if you’re in my business,"

This getting screwed up every so often is what every market timer wants!

When it game to influencers/gurus, Philip Fisher received one mention, while Buffett, Modern Portfolio Theory, Random Walk, Peter Lynch, and trend following all received two mentions.

I seriously doubt anyone will convince anyone to move from one investing style to another.

I do pay considerable attention to one market time, Robert Drach, who has demonstrated he can beat the market, since 1995 in a public forum and since 1995 in a private forum. You can find his public trades I referred to at: http://www.pbs.org/nbr/site/research/investors/drach/drach/

Two people suggested their websites, which were very focused on the concept of market timing.
http://futuristicinvesting.blogspot.com/
http://www.savingsandloans.co.nz/occasional_papers.htm

Again, much thanks.

Best Fortunes in your investing,
Micro