Misery Loves Company (Cestrian Stocks Bulletin #142)

And happiness loves a gathering!

In the spirit of celebrating achievements, if we hit some winning streak or other in our business we like to thank those responsible for it. No, not our mothers or our agents, but our readers, followers, and subscribers. So, in our various services you’ll see the occasional attaboy directed at your good self and all those others who are enabling our success.

We posted just such a note yesterday - we had some new joiners to our Growth Investor Pro service and we like to welcome everyone in person. “Welcome!” said we, after having noted the continued growth of the service in the face of stock market doom.

In chimes one of our longstanding members. “Misery loves company”, says he.

Well, a Wave 4 down will do that to the best of us.

We’re in a Wave 4 down in the S&P and the Nasdaq right now. Well, if you squint, stand on one leg, and down a very sugary drink in one shot, you could say we’re maybe in a Wave 5 up. But if you’re sensible you’d stand on both legs, open your eyes, drink maybe a coffee and say, dunno about that move up yet. Let’s call it a 4 till proven otherwise.

Here’s what a Wave 4 looks like.

Now, a Wave 4 doesn’t look like it’s going to be that bad. Not like a Wave 2. Most recent Wave 2 at this scale? End of the world in March 2020, market self-immolates in about four minutes but then reverses back up in a trice, everyone too stunned to notice, nobody freaks out all that much. That’s a Wave 2. Shock & awe but mainly flash-bangs, no real weapons of mass destruction. Wave 2 movies? Any Hollywood disaster movie. Always works out in the end for the good guys.

But a Wave 4? Jeez. Sure, doesn’t look much. But what it feels like is, slooowwwwwlllyyyy grinding you down. Ev-er-y day brings either more pain or false hope followed by more pain until you lose hope in hope itself. You watch All Is Lost, the Robert Redford movie, over and over. Partly because it is the essence of a Wave 4 movie. But mostly because it’s available in the new ‘free’ movies package on TV and you cancelled all your TV subscriptions already, as you recently decided that capitalism is surely crack’d and coming to the end. (The final straw was your last trip to the gas station).

Investing and trading can be a solitary business, which is why FinTwit is a thing. Not a very useful thing but certainly a thing.

Since you already read our musings, we’d like to invite you to take the next step with us if you’ve yet to do so. Don’t worry, it costs zero dollars per month and always will do. Come join our Fin Twit For Grownups, Cestrian Stocks Symposium. It’s a stocks board, but not as you know it. Wonderful content from many contributors. No stock-shaming, memefests or YELLING IN ALL CAPS. The Cestrian Three Rules of Chat apply at all times, being:

1 - Keep It Clean, It’s A Family Show

2 - There Are No Dumb Questions

3 - Leave Your Personal Politics At The Door

You’ll find a generalist stocks main channel and then side channels for single name stocks or specific topics like the Fed, fundamental analysis, charts, whatever.

If you’re new to stocks or this is your eleventh selloff since 1929, you’ll be welcome at Cestrian Stocks Symposium. It’s a great crowd.

It runs on Slack so it works 24/7 on any device. 100pc uptime since inception. Free now and forever. Come join us today - because as much as misery loves company, the misery won’t be forever. Even Robert Redford made it back to land.

DISCLOSURE: Cestrian Capital Research, Inc staff personal accounts hold long positions in $SPY.