Steady: Riding the Market Upheaval

Jpop Group Speed
The picture on the left is that of the jpop group SPEED that was (and is) arguably one of the most popular Japanese female pop groups of all time in terms of record sales. According to Wikipedia, during their time from 5 August 1996 to 31 March 2000, each of their 11 singles sold at least 550,000 copies. That is a massive number by today's standards.

What does Speed has to do with the recent market upheaval?
The reason why I brought SPEED into this blog post is because I was inspired by their single, "Steady" which one of my favourite songs from their album "Moment". Since I cannot read or speak Japanese, it is the title of the single and the word "Steady" that is relevant to you (and I) during these times where the recent market turmoil from the sub-prime contagion on the global financial and equity markets.

The gut-wrenching market moves has reinforced how you should be steady in your investment approach and strategy and your objectives of your investment portfolio. If you are in the Warren Buffet long-term investor mood and go for value-investing in shares of companies that has strong fundamentals, then you would have been relatively steady in pursuing your investment strategy. However, not many of us can remain steady to our original investment objectives when faced with paper losses on our portfolio. I can remember how many times I was so very tempted to liquidate some of my stocks amid the turmoil generated from the fear, uncertainty and doubt and coursed through the investment forums, market chatter and CNBC market reports. It seemed like the end of the word was nigh !

Steady as she goes
After these moves for the last two to three weeks, this week sees the market starting to work out the subprime issues as now analysts have flipped from their positions where they were questioning the depth and breadth of its effect on Singapore equities and flopped to saying that the banks were oversold as the central bank (MAS) was ready to inject liquidity into the market and that all 3 local banks (DBS, UOB and OCBC)'s exposure to asset backed securities affected by the subprime issue was negligible.

We are the market and the market is us
Again we are reminded that the market is a mis-mash of market players consisting the big boys, the retail punters and every Tan, Muthu and Abdullah who wants to buy, sell and hold stocks and shares who are affected by emotions, facts and news that breaks all the time.

Remember to evaluate what is your investment strategy? Investor or trader and act according to how steady you hold your beliefs (or not)!

Be well and prosper.