The time is here to lock in gains and hedge your portfolio risks. Even though this rally could still have a few percentage points left to run, we think the time is right to take much of your equity long exposure off of the table and to wait for a meaningful correction in equities. While “timing” the market is difficult, valuing the market based on CAPE or the Shiller PE ratio makes a good deal of sense. Right now, profit margins are higher than they have been in thirty years and profit margins are generally mean reverting. Granted, the rise of the internet has become a source of higher margin revenue for companies but the general theory of mean reversion when it relates to profit margins is pretty sound.
All in all, only the most risk hungry speculator should own stocks here unhedged after a 15% or so rise in the Nasdaq 100 so far this year. We think that the market is poised to repeat last year’s timultuos summer of discontent and are looking to short some things here including but not limited to Salesforce.com (CRM), QQQ, Amazon.com (AMZN), LinkedIn (LNKD), Dunkin (DNKN), IWM, MDY, etc…
On the long ledger, consider holding GOOG calls as a hedge against your other internet stocks as well as Dow calls for a “long hedge” against your net short position or fully hedged position in stocks. While it is okay to own some stocks forever, we think that the stock market is at least 35% overvalued at current prices and that it is certainly time to sell stocks hand over fist.
Buy low and sell high is the fundamental tenet of becoming a good stock market investor. Right now the market is too high for us to be anything besides extremely cautious when it comes to equities. That said, some investors with a long term view should simply add on the way down or remain invested in dividend paying stocks. Warren Buffett now gets his original investment in Coca Cola back every single year thanks to KO dividends.
