ISIS Media Teases “Big Announcement” As Pentagon Warns Revenge Attack Imminent
As US officials say they are bracing for some of kind of ISIS revenge attacks after the successful American special forces raid which killed Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and as speculation abounds over just who will be named as successor to head the terror group, a prominent ISIS media channel is promoting that a “big announcement” is imminent.
Islamic State’s Al-Furqan Foundation, which has according to terrorism analysts released statements over the years only related to major developments, on midday Wednesday issued an Arabic statement which reads, “Coming Soon … By the Willingness of Allah the Almighty,” but did not reveal any further details.
BREAKING – #ISIS‘s high-level media channel, al-Furqan, says an announcement is forthcoming.
According to VOA News, the message has been shared widely on jihadist social media platforms, and is considered authentic:
The SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors jihadist communications, said supporters quickly began distributing the poster on social media platforms, with some expressing hope that Baghdadi was still alive while others were preparing to celebrate his martyrdom.
A number of Middle East analysts said they believed the announcement relates to naming a successor to the ‘caliphate’ and that a statement on the terror group’s future is likely to be included.
ISIS spokesman Abu Hassan al-Muhajir was also identified as having been killed in a follow-up operation near Syria’s border with Turkey. Muhajir was believed one of a likely list of candidates to replace Baghdadi.
U.S. Central Command’s General Kenneth McKenzie, who oversaw the Saturday operation to kill Baghdadi, told reporters this week that he’s under no illusion that this marks the final demise of the terror group. “ISIS is first and last an ideology, so we’re under no illusions that it’s going to go away because we killed Baghdadi,” the top general said. “It will remain.”
Nearly 24 hours later, still waiting for the announcement teased by #ISIS‘ al Furqan media wing… https://t.co/yRDQPPuDF3
Crucially McKenzie echoed the Pentagon belief that a revenge attack is coming, though without saying they had any concrete intelligence over anything in the making.
“We suspect they will try some form of retribution attack, and we are postured and prepared for that,” he told reporters at a Pentagon briefing.
The House of Representatives voted Thursday to formally advance impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump amid allegations that he improperly leveraged his position to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden, one of the Democratic frontrunners in the 2020 election.
The vote passed 232-196, with the tally mostly falling on party lines. Also voting in favor of the resolution was ex-Republican Rep. Justin Amash (I–Mich.), the first and only congressperson affiliated with the GOP to publicly endorse impeachment. The libertarian-leaning lawmaker left the Republican Party shortly afterward. Only two Democrats—Reps. Jeff Van Drew (D–N.J.) and Collin Peterson (D–Minn.)—defected.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D–Calif.) spearheaded the vote after months of insisting that impeachment would be a strategically inept choice for Democrats. She made an about-face following revelations that Trump threatened to withhold congressionally authorized aid from Ukraine if President Volodymyr Zelensky failed to investigate Biden and his family.
The House vote is politically significant, as it sets the stage for public hearings, but it does not actually impeach Trump. That will likely come later.
“This resolution establishes the procedure for hearings that are open to the American people, authorizes the disclosure of deposition transcripts, outlines procedures to transfer evidence to the Judiciary Committee as it considers potential articles of impeachment, and sets forth due process rights for the President and his Counsel,” wrote Pelosi in a letter on Monday.
Fifteen witnesses this week have testified behind closed doors, much to the ire of conservative lawmakers. Their frustration culminated in a petulant display last Wednesday, when some of them stormed an impeachment inquiry testimony and delayed it for five hours.
“One of the cornerstones of American jurisprudence is due process—the right to confront your accuser, call witnesses on your behalf, and challenge the accusations against you,” tweeted Sen. Lindsey Graham (R–S.C.). “None of this is occurring in the House.” Republican congresspeople echoed those grievances during the floor debate on Thursday morning, criticizing Democrats for what they say is an overtly opaque process.
House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R–Calif.) made it a free speech issue. “What do you think the definition of due process is? What do you think the First Amendment is?” he asked. “Do you have the right to have a voice, or only the words that you agree with?”
Although that position is politically expedient, it’s also intellectually dishonest. Graham, for one, supported articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton based on closed-door interviews conducted by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr. And the remaining complainants would do well to remember that it was their own party who created the impeachment rules that sanction these initial closed-door hearings. In 2015, Republicans led by then-Speaker John Boehner (R–Ohio) fashioned that guidance for the fact-gathering process, knowing full well that any impeached president would have his or her public day on trial.
“Senator Graham continues to mislead,” tweeted Amash. “The Constitution divides impeachment and trial between the House and Senate. The House impeachment is an indictment. The process he’s demanding happens in the Senate trial. No defendant participates in an indictment in the way he’s suggesting.”
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The House of Representatives voted Thursday to formally advance impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump amid allegations that he improperly leveraged his position to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden, one of the Democratic frontrunners in the 2020 election.
The vote passed 232-196, with the tally mostly falling on party lines. Also voting in favor of the resolution was ex-Republican Rep. Justin Amash (I–Mich.), the first and only congressperson affiliated with the GOP to publicly endorse impeachment. The libertarian-leaning lawmaker left the Republican Party shortly afterward. Only two Democrats—Reps. Jeff Van Drew (D–N.J.) and Collin Peterson (D–Minn.)—defected.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D–Calif.) spearheaded the vote after months of insisting that impeachment would be a strategically inept choice for Democrats. She made an about-face following revelations that Trump threatened to withhold congressionally authorized aid from Ukraine if President Volodymyr Zelensky failed to investigate Biden and his family.
The House vote is politically significant, as it sets the stage for public hearings, but it does not actually impeach Trump. That will likely come later.
“This resolution establishes the procedure for hearings that are open to the American people, authorizes the disclosure of deposition transcripts, outlines procedures to transfer evidence to the Judiciary Committee as it considers potential articles of impeachment, and sets forth due process rights for the President and his Counsel,” wrote Pelosi in a letter on Monday.
Fifteen witnesses this week have testified behind closed doors, much to the ire of conservative lawmakers. Their frustration culminated in a petulant display last Wednesday, when some of them stormed an impeachment inquiry testimony and delayed it for five hours.
“One of the cornerstones of American jurisprudence is due process—the right to confront your accuser, call witnesses on your behalf, and challenge the accusations against you,” tweeted Sen. Lindsey Graham (R–S.C.). “None of this is occurring in the House.” Republican congresspeople echoed those grievances during the floor debate on Thursday morning, criticizing Democrats for what they say is an overtly opaque process.
House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R–Calif.) made it a free speech issue. “What do you think the definition of due process is? What do you think the First Amendment is?” he asked. “Do you have the right to have a voice, or only the words that you agree with?”
Although that position is politically expedient, it’s also intellectually dishonest. Graham, for one, supported articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton based on closed-door interviews conducted by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr. And the remaining complainants would do well to remember that it was their own party who created the impeachment rules that sanction these initial closed-door hearings. In 2015, Republicans led by then-Speaker John Boehner (R–Ohio) fashioned that guidance for the fact-gathering process, knowing full well that any impeached president would have his or her public day on trial.
“Senator Graham continues to mislead,” tweeted Amash. “The Constitution divides impeachment and trial between the House and Senate. The House impeachment is an indictment. The process he’s demanding happens in the Senate trial. No defendant participates in an indictment in the way he’s suggesting.”
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Financial markets can be a scary place for investors. The US economy is now in its longest expansion on record, the world is seeing record level of total debt and now even some corporate bonds have negative yields.
If you’ve carved a pumpkin, got your Halloween costume and been to see the latest scary movie, there’s only one thing left to do: take a look at the Bond Vigilantes team’s 2019 Scary Charts.
If you’re searching for some decent yield right now, high yield must be a good place to start, right? Year-to-date, investors have seen double-digit returns in high yield: around 12% and 9% in the US and EU index respectively. In our yield-deprived time, many who would normally be holding investment grade bonds have been willing to sacrifice credit quality and take a trip into high yield.
But watch out: when there has been the slightest sign of trouble in some large household names this year, these high yield tourists have wanted out at any price. Some high yield bonds have taken a plunge this year, even where the bonds have not defaulted.
So if you’re dipping your toes into high yield, make sure it’s based on a deep understanding of issuers and that there’s nothing lurking in the depths…
If you thought that bonds were the safe and boring part of your portfolio, think again. Take a look at these two bonds, the Argentina 8.75% 2024 and Austria 2.1% 2117.
After Argentina’s relatively market-friendly President Macri was trounced in the primary elections by populist Fernandez, Argentinian bonds were decapitated, with more than half their value chopped off. They now trade at around $40 per $100 par value.
Meanwhile, investors in Austria’s AA-rated 2117 bond this year will be patting themselves on the back for the trade of a lifetime. With a duration of over 50 years, downward pressure on bond yields this year saw the bond almost double in value.
Looking at European and US IG credit, trade wars clearly scared markets earlier this year. But the sell offs are getting smaller. It looks like the market may be suffering from trade war fatigue after so many headlines and tweets over the past few months. But might trade wars come back to spook the markets even further?
According to political hearsay, Democrat front-runner Elizabeth Warren is even more ferocious on trade than Donald Trump. She has also been called “the monopolist’s worst nightmare” due to her criticism of big tech companies, a large constituent of the US IG index. Although the 2020 elections seem a long way off, success for the Democrats may cause some ripples for markets.
While current IMF figures estimate that the US-China trade war has shaved 0.8% from global growth, with 0.5% added back by global monetary easing, could even more protectionism and larger potential tariffs in the future leave investors wishing for the days of Trump?
Equities are for growth and bonds for income, right? Not in Germany, France, Japan and the UK, where real yields are negative even up to 30 years. In Italy you need to invest for seven years to get a positive real yield.
No wonder investors are looking to emerging market debt in search of yield. Brazil and Mexico provide positive real yields, as does Turkey – but beware an upside surprise to inflation.
This is a scary measure of how far investors are being pushed just to get a positive yield.
If you’ve seen enough negative-yielding government debt by now not to be spooked by it, take a look at this next chart.
Even many corporate bonds are now negative yielding. This chart shows the face value of negative-yielding debt in the ICE BofAML Euro Corporate index: now as high as €1 trillion!
Most of this negative-yielding corporate debt is actually in the lower end of investment grade, namely A and BBB.
Here’s a scary statistic: total (public + private) debt in the world has never been higher. And looking at public debt alone, while its peak could be seen during and after the Second World War, government borrowing is at its highest peacetime level.
Taking UK debt as an example, a spike in borrowings can be seen since the 1700s whenever financing was required for a war or conflict. So what is going on now to explain the spike in government borrowing?
One answer may be the greater power of democracy in the world. In order to pay down its debt, a country must maintain a primary surplus. Put simply, it must raise more revenues through taxation than it spends on citizens. While governments in the past had the power to do this, who would vote to be subject to such an environment for long? We have seen the rise of populism in countries like Italy which have tried to move from deficit to surplus.
Governments and central banks have a scary problem in trying to keep public debt under control in this new world.
Bolton Will Not Appear Voluntarily To Testify In Impeachment Inquiry
Former national security adviser John Bolton will not appear voluntarily in front of Democratic-led House impeachment inquiries into President Trump’s interactions with Ukraine, according to The Hill.
Bolton attorney Chuck Cooper said in a Wednesday evening email that a subpoena would be required if he is to testify, after House invited him to appear earlier in the day.
A former US Ambassador to the United Nations during the Bush administration, Bolton was fired by President Trump in September after “disagreeing strongly” with many of his suggestions.
Word of Bolton’s decision not to appear voluntarily comes after he was placed on schedule to give a closed-door deposition next week – news which came after CNN reported last week that Bolton was in discussions with House committees about the possibility of testimony.
Three big new deposition notices just went out, per a person familiar.
John Eisenberg for 11/4
Michael Ellis also for 11/4
John Bolton for 11/7
As the Hill notes, “It is not clear whether a subpoena will be enough to compel his appearance.”
On Friday, former deputy national security adviser Charles Kupperman filed a lawsuit, asking a federal judge to weight in on whether he should abide by an order from the White House not to testify, or adhere to a House subpoena compelling him to appear – describing himself as caught between two competing branches of government. Kupperman did not appear for scheduled testimony on Monday, while a court hearing has been scheduled on Thursday to address the matter.
Bolton and Kupperman notably have the same attorneys.
Democrats are investigating whether the Trump administration pressured Ukraine to investigate, among other things, claims that former Vice President abused his office to force Ukraine into firing a prosecutor who was investigating a Ukrainian gas company who was paying Biden’s son Hunter to sit on its board.
A parade of witnesses have testified behind closed doors in connection with the inquiry; according to portions of their testimony leaked out into the press, several witnesses expressed concerns over an unconventional channel of policymaking on Ukraine involving Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani.
Bolton’s name has come up during the depositions. He is said to have been alarmed by a July 10 meeting during which U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland linked “investigations” to a White House meeting between Trump and Zelensky, and reportedly later referred to it as a “drug deal.” –The Hill
Why is Bolton scheduled to testify when he has refused to do so willingly?
People are VERY disappointed in Jay Powell and the Federal Reserve. The Fed has called it wrong from the beginning, too fast, too slow. They even tightened in the beginning. Others are running circles around them and laughing all the way to the bank. Dollar & Rates are hurting our manufacturers.
We should have lower interest rates than Germany, Japan and all others. We are now, by far, the biggest and strongest Country, but the Fed puts us at a competitive disadvantage. China is not our problem, the Federal Reserve is! We will win anyway.
The Dow is down over 350 points from post-Powell highs…
Has Trump realized that the only way to maintain this farce is to talk down trade and force The Fed to keep cutting til Nov 20202?
Juul Valuation Up In Smoke: Altria Writes Down Stake By 33%, Fidelity Slashes By 48%
Altria wrote down about 33% of its investment in e-cigarette maker Juul today in a $4.5 billion pre-tax charge against the company’s Q3 earnings. The writedown was widely expected after an ugly year for Juul, with the Trump administration planning to remove flavored e-cigarettes from the market and a vaping death toll in the U.S. and U.K. that has now risen to over 20 people.
Juul is also facing a slew of lawsuits claiming that the company got minors hooked on nicotine and started an “epidemic” of teen vaping. The company is also under Federal scrutiny for its marketing practices.
The company said the writedown wasn’t due to “one single event”, according to CNBC.
Altria had invested $12.8 billion for a 35% stake in the company last year, which valued Juul at about $38 billion. Regulators have still not approved Altria’s stake in the company and Altria said it expects an answer in the first quarter of 2020.
The news comes one day Fidelity reportedly slashed the value of its Juul shares on its books by almost 50%. The Fidelity Blue Chip Growth Fund held almost 66% of Fidelity’s 4.1 million shares, according to Bloomberg.
Robby Greengold, a Morningstar Inc. analyst who tracks Fidelity funds said: “Valuing privately held firms is arguably much trickier than more liquid stocks that are held by the public. Juul has been a big driver of returns for several Fidelity growth strategies.”
The Fidelity Blue Chip fund’s stake in Juul is made up of 2.67 million common and preferred shares and fell to $386 million from $738 million during September. In Q3, the fund fell 2.49%, blaming the largest drag on returns on Juul.
Fidelity Blue Chip said in its quarterly fund review: “One stock decision in particular hurt by far more than any other: electronic cigarette maker Juul Labs. The valuation of Juul, which is not publicly traded, fell this period as the company faced myriad regulatory challenges.”
And things don’t look at though they will be getting any rosier for Juul anytime soon. A former employee of the company, in a lawsuit filed last week, accused Juul of selling over 1 million contaminated e-cigarette pods earlier this year without issuing a recall or notifying customers.
Siddharth Breja, former senior vice president of global finance for the company, claims that he was retaliated against for raising concerns about the contaminated shipment. He also claimed that the company sought to resell pods that were nearly a year old at one point. He allegedly pushed for an expiration or “Best By” date on the company’s product.
“Half our customers are drunk and vaping like mo-fos, who the fuck is going to notice the quality of our pods,” Breja claims that CEO Kevin Burns said to him, in response.
Burns, who was replaced as CEO in September, denied making the statement, saying: “I never said this, or anything remotely close to this, period. As CEO, I had the company make huge investments in product quality and the facts will show this claim is absolutely false and pure fiction.”
Breja’s lawyer said: “Mr. Breja became aware of very concerning actions at the company, and he performed his duty to shareholders and to the board by reporting these issues internally. In exchange for doing that, he was inappropriately terminated. This is very concerning, particularly since some of the issues he raised concerned matters of public safety.”
Breja says that on March 12, he learned that some batches of mint e-liquid had been found to be contaminated. Approximately 250,000 of the kits, equating to 1 million pods, were shipped to retailers and sold. He says he was asked to charge the supplier of the liquid $7 million for the contaminated batches and, on the same day, “protested Juul’s refusal to issue a product recall for the contaminated pods, or at a minimum issue a public health and safety notice to consumers.”
“The allegations concerning safety issues with Juul products are equally meritless, and we already investigated the underlying manufacturing issue and determined the product met all applicable specifications,” Juul said about the contamination allegation.
Watch House Democrats Hold Debate Before Vote On Formal Impeachment Procedures
House Democrats on Thursday will debate and then hold a vote on a formal roadmap for President Donald Trump’s impeachment, as several key witnesses have provided testimony this week supporting claims that the Trump administration withheld nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine unless they investigated allegations of corruption against former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.
One day after a decorated army officer told Congressional investigators he witnessed Trump and a senior diplomat pressure Ukraine, three other State Department officials on Wednesday offered more evidence in testimony that supported the allegations against the US leader.
And the inquiry testimony set dates for three more witnesses, including Trump’s estranged former National Security Advisor John Bolton, who would have had first-hand knowledge of the president’s alleged effort to leverage military aid to Ukraine in exchange for President Volodymyr Zelensky investigating his Democratic rival Joe Biden. –AFP via Yahoo
President Trump has blasted the investigation as a “witch hunt,” and has insisted that there was no “quid pro quo” proposed during his communications with Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky.
“Speaking from his annual investment conference in New York, Baron predicted the Dow Jones Industrial Average, based on historical moves over decades, will reach 650,000 in 50 years, with an over $500 trillion U.S. economy.”
Doing some quick math, that assumption is for a 6.6% annualized return on both the Dow and the U.S. economy, as noted by Ben Carlson.
This is roughly a 6.6% annual return to get to Dow 650k
Both are innocuous tweets, meant with the best of intentions to leave you with a sense of optimism about your financial future.
I get it. Really.
As Bob Farrell once quipped:
“Bull markets are more fun than bear markets.”
Here is the problem.
It’s complete bulls*** on both counts.
Mr. Baron, as noted, was speaking at his “buy and hold” conference, and the tweet was meant to both grab attention and headlines.
It worked.
The problem with being “bullish all the time” is that it is also very dangerous.
This is particularly the case in late-stage “bull markets,” where poor investment decisions, and excessive portfolio “risk,” are masked by seemingly ever-rising prices. Previously bad investment ideas, products, and strategies tend to resurface in a different form or package. Investment strategies like “buy and hold” and “dollar cost averaging” become popular even though they are absolutely guaranteed to leave you well short of your financial objectives in the future.
So, what does this have to do with CNBC’s article?
It has everything to do with one of my “pet peeves,” and the biggest fallacy pushed by Wall Street today – “compound returns.”
Markets/Economies Don’t Compound
Let’s start with the economy.
The economy hasn’t seen an annualized growth rate of 6% since the 1950’s when the U.S. was the manufacturing hub of the entire world. Following WWII, the majority of Europe, and Japan following two nuclear bombs, were devastated. Today, the U.S. is no longer a manufacturing hub, but a services provider for ever-lower costs. Services, as compared to manufacturing, has a very low economic multiplier effect. Given $22 Trillion in debt and climbing, the attainment of a 6% growth rate is not a possibility.
The chart below pretty much details the problem.
It is often stated the U.S. economy has grown by more than 6% on average over the long-term. (This is a true statement) However, it is also a very misleading statement. Average and actual growth are two very different things.
If we go back to 1901 and assume the economy grew at 6.6% annualized, as Mr. Baron suggests will happen in the future, the economy would currently be roughly $852 trillion in value, rather than just a paltry $19 trillion.
What happened?
A lot of years of very low, or negative, economic growth.
The same thing holds true with the Dow.
As noted, Mr. Baron suggests the Dow will be valued at 650,000 in the next 50-years. So clearly, as a young investor you should just sock all your hard-earned savings into an “index fund” and hang on.
“The stock market is literally the same thing as a high-yield savings account.” – Jim J. (names have been changed to protect the stupid.)
Here’s the thing.
It has often been stated the markets have had an average annual return of 8-10% depending on who you ask. If we just assume the Dow had compounded at just 5% since 1901, we would already be at 650,000.
But it’s not.
We are just stuck here at a “crappy ole’ 27,000.”
There is a huge difference between compound returns and average returns. The historical performance of the markets since 1900, including dividends, has averaged a much higher rate of return than just 5% annually. Therefore, the Dow should actually be much closer to 1,000,000 than 650,000.
Again, it’s not.
Nope…we are just hanging out way down here at 27,000.
Why? Because crashes matter. This is particularly the case when it comes to your financial goals and investing time horizons.
Think about it this way.
If “buy and hold” investing worked the way that it is preached, then why are the financial statistics of 80% of Americans so poor?
The three biggest factors are:
Destruction of capital;
Lack of savings, and;
Time.
While lost capital gain be regained, the time lost “getting back to even,” cannot be. Unfortunately, we don’t live forever, and time is our ultimate enemy. This is also, after two major bear markets, the majority of “boomers” are simply unprepared financially for retirement.
It is also the reason why we are facing a massive “pension crisis”in the not so distant future as capital destruction, low contribution rates, and over-estimation of returns has led to massive shortfalls to meet required distributions in the future.
Who wouldn’t love a world where everyone just invests some money, the markets rise 6% annually, and everyone one’s a winner?
Unfortunately, there is a vast difference between an “index” which benefits from share buybacks, substitutions, and market capitalization weighting versus a portfolio invested in actual dollars. Yes, a “buy and hold” portfolio will grow in the financial markets over time, but it DOES NOT compound.
Read this carefully: “Compound returns assume no principal loss, ever.”
To visualize the importance of this statement, the chart below shows $100,000, adjusted for inflation, invested in 1990 versus a 6% annual compound rate of return. The shaded areas show whether the portfolio value exceeds the required rate of return to reach retirement goals. As noted, due to the impact of two bear markets, portfolios are well short of the targeted 6% annualized rate of return investors were told they would receive.
If your financial plan required 6% “compounded” annually to meet your retirement goals; you didn’t make it.
See the problem? People 30-years ago who were hoping to retire, simply can’t. It will likely be the case for individuals today looking to retire 30-years from now.
With markets now back to the second highest level of valuations on record, forward returns over the next 10-years are going to be substantially lower than they have been over the past 10-years.
That isn’t being bearish. That is just math.
Dr. John Hussman previously wrote the most salient point on this topic.
“Put simply, most apparent ‘opportunities’ to obtain investment returns above zero in conventional assets over the coming decade are based on a misunderstanding of valuations, total returns, and historical yield relationships. At current valuations, virtually everything is priced for a decade of zero.”
Throughout history, bull market cycles are only one-half of the“full market”cycle. This is because during every “bull market” cycle the markets, and economy, build up excesses which are “reverted” during the following “bear market.”
As Sir Issac Newton once stated:
“What goes up, must come down.”
Looking beyond the very short-term overly optimistic view of “this time is different,” the coming unwinding of current speculative extremes will occur with the completion of the current market cycle.
When we look at 20-year trailing returns, there is sufficient historical evidence to suggest total, real returns, will decline towards zero over the next 3-years from 7% annualized currently. (These are trailing 20-year total real returns, not forward)
Re-read that last sentence again and look closely at the chart above. From current valuation levels, the annualized return on stocks by the end of the current 20-year cycle will be close to 0%. A decline in the next 3-years of only 30%, the average drawdown during a recession, will achieve that goal.
The second-half of this current cycle will begin likely sooner, rather than later. As stated, it is a function of time (length of market cycles), math (valuations) and physics (price deviations for long-term means.)
I am not bullish or bearish.
My job as a portfolio manager is simple; invest money in a manner that creates returns on a short-term basis while reducing the possibility of catastrophic losses over the long-term.
While “bulls have more fun” while markets are rising, both “bulls” and “bears” are owned by the “broken clock” syndrome during the completion of the full-market cycle.
The biggest secret in achieving long-term investment success is not necessarily being “right” during the first half of the cycle, but by not being “wrong” during the second half.
This is a lesson that CNBC should have learned by now.
