Are you considered clairvoyant? Do you win an office football pool every year? Or are you the sort of person who, while possessing no psychic abilities, does not mind spending hours crunching numbers and analyzing obscure data in hopes of discerning future trends?
If you failed to answer yes to any of these questions, then market timing may not be for you. However, many armchair investors persist in the belief that, by carefully following business news and trusting their “gut” instincts, they will be able to beat the market. Some study the stock tips in personal finance magazines, others hope to glean additional insight from analysts’ reports and specialized investment newsletters, and still others attempt to mine all the available data, crafting complex simulations of how the market is likely to behave in the future.
But if financial professionals struggle to keep ahead of trends, private investors are even less likely to outfox the indexes. As soon as a piece of business or economic news hits the airwaves and the Internet, analysts and brokers react immediately to the information. Because these financial professionals act so rapidly, the stock market almost always reflects all the known information at any given moment in time. And even if an individual investor were able to develop an analytic model with some real predictive value, unexpected events—such as a terrorist attack or a natural disaster, or even a political scandal—could lead to sudden and dramatic market fluctuations that no model based on historical data could have anticipated.
It is only natural that investors would want to find some way to sit out bear markets and get back just in time for the next bull run. It is useful to keep in mind, however, that even the slowest equity markets have some bright spots. A professionally managed diversified portfolio will help you protect against loss and capture whatever gains might occur in a market downturn.
Trying to pinpoint the right time to invest in the stock market is an exercise in futility. If you have a longer period to save, owning equities provides the most effective hedge against inflation and taxation available. Since it is impossible to know where the market might go from here, it makes sense to start investing now and continue investing on a regular basis, regardless of market conditions. Remember: long-term investment success is achieved not by timing the market, but by time in the market.
"Dangers of Market Timing." FMeX. 2016.
