EU Spin Me Right Round, Baby

Yeah I, I got to know your name
Well and I, could trace your private number baby
All I know is that to me
You look like you’re lots of fun
Open up your lovin’ arms
I want some

You spin me right round, baby
Right round like a record, baby — Dead or Alive

It didn’t use to be like this. Your P&L, your performance, didn’t depend on how well you were gaming the cycle of “Same Crisis as Yesterday, so Panic” to “Oh, The World Won’t Collapse Tomorrow, so Buy” over and over and over. And over.

It is time to panic about Greece and the Eurocrisis – The Cody Word …

Jan 27, 2012 – Seriously, if you were worried about Greece’s debt crisis and the …Cody Willard writes Revolution Investing for MarketWatch and posts the …

Now’s the time to panic about the EU crisis – The Cody Word …

Nov 30, 2011 – Cody Willard writes Revolution Investing for MarketWatch and posts the … /01/business/central-banks-move-together-to-ease-debt-crisis.html?

Remember the great Greek crisis — of May 2010? – The Cody Word … Jul 11, 2011 – the same thing during last month’s Greece crisis. …. Cody Willardwrites Revolution Investing for Marketwatch and posts the trades from his …

Alas, such is the stock market we live in today. And the markets here this morning, it’s a broken record yet again:

Spain Bedevils Markets Again

Spain continued to cast a long shadow over financial markets as a fresh selloff in Spanish bonds underscored concerns that the country may need a formal bailout.

And it’ll be an ugly open. As usual, I don’t think we should panic and indeed should try to buy the EU-crises panics like this, as we have been doing so successfully for the last, now year and a half. To be sure, I thought we’d have more space between this panicked sell-off and the last one, but it is what it is. Just Friday morning, I’d written, “I do think it’s getting closer to being more of a time to start trimming and building up our short hedges than to be so heavily long as we have been while prices were lower.” And I followed through with some selling as noted.

I still don’t think we should actually panic any more over Greece/Spain and the EU as a macro-economic issue or a major threat to either our own economy or the stock markets. The markets are all down since the advent of the EU after having been in growth mode for decades before that…but that doesn’t mean we won’t have a week or two of markets that slide lower.

And I’m not sure I’d call this pullback so far anything but a pullback. Remember my  Top 3 signs that the market’s in a panicky sell off:

1. The headlines are all dominated with gloom and doom and explanations and reasons that you should be panicking
2. The bears I talk to are gloating and the bulls I talk to aren’t just selling, but selling their key holdings into the downturn and are sick to their stomachs.
3. The sell-off, even at just 5%, is so straight down and so clearly full of panicky selling, that you can’t miss it.

That said, I’ll go back to what often drives the markets for the short-term — and that is fear. Who’s more scared, the bulls or the bears? The bulls are scared, the bears are thinking they’ve finally got their big crack. Again. Again. Again. Like they did every other time the markets have sold off over EU-debt crisis fears.

I’m not going to try to change my stance over any of this.

Dead or Alive – You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)