Stock Market Bubble Illustrated

I don’t often spend time going through stock charts, but I did so last night for a few hours and I spent the night tossing and turning dreaming about bubbles and crashes. When I woke up this morning I realized two things –

1. We are in the lucky minority who were very early in getting in front of this ongoing stock market bubble. One of the curiouser things about traders and investors is that we easily forget who was saying what when. The guys who attack me presently for preaching the concept of taking profits and preparing for the next crash while the markets are at new all-time highs are often the same guys who used to attack me for positioning for the bubble that’s now here. Do you remember these reports from me?

Thinking it through — the case for a bull market Sept. 1, 2009 | By Cody Willard

A couple ideas on how to trade the Money Supply Bubble Nov. 5, 2009 | By Cody Willard

This ain’t Cisco in 2000 and Apple and Google are not in a bubble Oct. 28, 2010 | By Cody Willard

Get ready for the new tech bubble, the biggest bubble of all time  April 7, 2011 | By Cody Willard

The great inflating bubble June 14, 2011 | By Cody Willard

I make a lot of mistakes and I try my best to be objective about my calls, but there’s little question that that our analysis that the Fed and global economic policies were going to inflate a huge stock market bubble, one that is, as you’ll see in the charts below, now here. And while I do think there’s still upside to come in the stock market bubble, I don’t encourage leaving on the table all our chips and hard-earned gains from over the last few years since I returned to trading.

2. The App Bubble has truly blown as big if not even bigger than I expected.

Take a look at these charts and tell me that you think it’s a better time to buy now than it was back in 2009, 2010, or 2011.

CHARTS SINCE IPO FOR:

P

Z

YELP

THREE YEAR CHARTS FOR:

NFLX

GOOG

AMZN

The worst performing stock of the six I chose has still gone up several times over in the last 700 trading days. There will be a time and place with better buying opportunities than loading up on these bubblicious stocks at this point in the cycle. That doesn’t mean I’m jumping ship entirely (yet?) but let’s remember headlines like these from just a couple years ago.

World Stocks Fall on Cisco Guidance, Ireland Worries – 123Jump.com – Nov 11, 2010

Sensex falls 296 points as tech stocks get further pounding – Indian Express – Apr 19, 2011

Growth concerns hit stock markets hard –

US economic concerns dog world markets –

So let’s summarize. I think the next huge bubble is coming, but it will be in gold and silver and probably anything else susceptible to inflationary pressures, so I am actively trimming down our exposure to stocks, even as I expect there is still some upside to the ongoing stock market bubble, and building up our exposure in physical gold and silver. It’s as much a defensive as anything else here as the desperation for yield is likely to break the back of the Fed’s ability to keep rates low, but it also has the kicker of seeing another phase of upside with bubble potential.

It’s this kind of analysis and prodding of conventional wisdom that keeps you ahead of the curve.