[patriciaruth]

I think the market will stay sick until we take out Saddam.

[backhoe]

My fast- and irreverant- take on this?

We're paying the price for tolerating "the decade of frauds" that preceeded this era. It will eventually shake out.

[philman_36]

Playing the stock market.
Playing the ponies at the track.
Not much difference IMO.

[The Duke]

So, have P/E ratios now become reasonable, or is there a need for additional slippage?

The reality is that the stock market became one big game of musical chairs, and now that the music has stopped and the scramble for chairs is over, everybody left standing has a big frown on their face (and probably wants Uncle Same to somehow start the music back up).

[waterstraat]

The government is doing nothing to stop immigration into this country. Therefore, who knows how many new terrorists are coming in each week. It is only a matter of time before another bombing or something else expodes in this country. Worse yet, it is possible that an immigrant might set off a nuclear explosion. If a nuclear exposion goes off, or if Hoover dam is destroyed, then todays stock prices will collapse, stock prices will drop at least 90% from current levels. You have no idea how low stock prices could go if something like that happens. To buy now, or even to own any stocks, while we are letting in thousands of new terrorists accross our borders, is crazy.

Worrying about future terrorist activity is not off the wall anymore, it has already happened, and we are faciliting more such incidents. It is a very real, and very likely threat.

Why buy now, when you could buy stocks at half the current prices when the next building gets blown up?

If stock prices did recover, it would only be a matter of time before the next terrorst activity sends them crashing again.

No rational reason to buy stocks until we close our borders.

[PGalt]

The stock market is an entity unto itself, musical chairs with money.

[patriot_wes]

Since December I've had a three-fold increase in the number of people who want to know about investing in real estate, which in many areas is appreciating at 10-30% a year. Everyone figures the stock market is in idle for a long time to come.

[unbiasedtruth]

Something else to add to this: watch for the democrats to start screaming this fall leading up to the November election, "this is the worst economy in 30 years."

[bimbo]

Investors are voting their disapproval of Wall Street Analysist con games, Corporate Accounting frauds, etc., etc. When these messes are cleaned up, the investors will slowly return to the Market.

[gwynapnudd]

Stocks are heading for the traditional valuation of 10-12 PE ratios.
These will be refered to as the good old days.

[hinckley buzzard]

A stunning display of ignorance and/or duplicity by these so-called experts.

Two overwhelmingly false premises:

1This is a terrible bear market. Bullcrap. In historical terms this is just the start. Want a BEAR market? Wait till P/E ratios hit about 10 instead of 40.

2 : The economy is "recovering" so the market should be Bullish.

Duh, sorry, but there is no compelling reason to link the two.

Example: In the 16 years from October 1965 to June 1982, the economy grew tremendously. The Dow went from 960 to 811. (Buy and hold, you bet!)

Nothing has changed with the stock-hawkers. They are still trying to sell, no matter how crappy their product. (Henry Blodgett and Mary Meeker, where are you now?

[Gritty]

All this talk on stocks and losers.

It seems like the good times are over for much of the equities markets,... unless one is investing in gold/silver mining stocks or certain other isolated areas.

The next boom is in commodities. They have been in a bear market for years. Now it is time for wise investors to move there and stop trying to recreate the .com Boom that ended in March, 2002. They will come back, eventually, but will probably take years to do so. In the meantime, put your money where it will do some good.