Sense on Cents

2:30pm, Friday afternoon August 7th, Midtown Manhattan.

Stocks are up close to 2%. Wall Street is back. Meet me on the bar car. Which way’s the beach?

I can picture those lucky enough to get off the trading desks early, sprinting to the train to head to ‘the shore’ (don’t say ‘the beach’ in Jersey) or ‘the Hamptons.’

Living for the moment when appropriate is not necessarily a bad thing as long as one never loses sight of the scope and length of the overall landscape. In so many words, I guess I am saying enjoy the view when you have it but never forget that life is a journey, not a destination.

Imputing this thought process into an investing style, one needs to be nimble enough to detect short term trends while never losing sight of the long term fundamentals. I understand the long term is nothing but a series of consecutive short terms; however, so much of our country seems to have a tough time looking beyond the very short term. I believe that mentality is the foundation of our economic problems. Where am I going with this?

Enjoy the up market while it lasts, but be mindful that our economy has massive debt burdens and structural issues that will require real attention to truly regain its footing.

These debt burdens and structural issues are embodied in a report put out yesterday by Comstock Partners entitled Deleveraging the U.S. Economy.

I STRONGLY recommend this report to those looking for a macro-perspective on our economic landscape. It encompasses a wide array of economic data and perspectives. Throw it in your ‘Save’ file. Suffice it to say . . . the road is long!!

For now, though, the train is leaving the station. Which way’s the beach?

LD

This entry was posted on Friday, August 7th, 2009 at 2:38 PM and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.