Is it time to get out of equities?

[R13...]

Advice:
Buy yourself "The Behavior Gap" by Carl Richards. Will help you better understand your motivation and reasons for wanting to change your strategy and so ultimately make better decisions.

My opinion is that trying to time the market is pretty much gambling. Rather set a financial and life goal and pick investments that will get you to that goal. Then your only reason to change investments is to realign with your goal.

Will def buy the book in the evening on kindle, the illustration on the cover makes me laugh...
1. Buy/Greed
2. Sell/Fear
3. Repeat until broke

 

[Cius]

In terms of the market cycle the world economy seems to be bottoming out right now. Spain recently actually got GDP growth (even if it was only 0.1%) and there are some signs of improvement. The big banks in the US and companies that where bailed out have largely been repaying the fed meaning inflation may well remain lower than expected and things are stable. Personally I think we may see slow growth for the next little while followed by another bull market kicking off in the next 2-3 years. On the other hand we could see another bubble pop with the US debt/dollar thing and a double dip recession and possibly even a depression. Really hard to predict right now. Either way I am just leaving my money in the markets and on aggressive. I am young enough that I can leave it long enough to recover and timing the market is a dangerous game.

 

[saturnz]

we are not bottoming out, the eventual pain is simply being kept on hold by central banks trying to delay the fallout through printing money, once that stops the real fallout will begin. We have not actually felt the effects of the financial crisis.

Europe is still in problems, read the article in the Economist dated 26th-1st November which shows Europe's hidden debt crisis. Also read the Standard Bank's latest quarterly which suggests there are no real pressures on commodities, they are all in surplus and expected to remain that way for sometime.

 

[systemofpurplelimpminion]

I have been advised to get out of my high equity holdings (Satrix and Coronation) and move into less aggressive funds because markets are at a high and overdue for a correction. Anyone else think the same? Prices are really high in most equities except maybe resources (gold is especially low from its high of near $2000).

My coronation top 20 for example is 41% up since I got in last year. Satrix DIVI about 12% up so not so good. I have since got into the INDI at both satrix and coronation. My own head says I should move into property as that has been lowering at lows for a while now so looks slightly cheap but could stay low or even drop lower.

I would rather suggest defining what your purpose is with this investment as also what type of investor you are (low/medium/high risk) as there are no one size fits all solution and when you attempt to time the market, your are essentially gambling.

I found a number of books that helped met with these concepts, the most important of which is aptly named the investment bible by many and is the book by Benjamin Graham, Intelligent Investor.

Does this ring any bells? If not, he is the guy that taught Warren Buffet the basics about investment... ie your investing in the value of the company not the market or share

 

[kamikazi]

Look at your equity portfolio in terms of contraction and expansion in stead of gains and losses. By switching your strategy now, you are trying to time the market. Might be useful with individual stocks, but risky with a whole portfolio. I always see downturns in the stock market as an opportunity as your money is buying more units at a better price, which means accelerated expansion when the next upturn comes around. And what other asset class is going to pay you additional dividends on your investments?