Reflections on Ferg's Reflections

Just noticed Ferg's posting after plugging in Pmac's. No Ferg, you have lots of company! I like to tell the story of attending at the last Dofasco quarter century club dinner where almost everyone in the room was down a hundred grand or more. It could have been a morose evening but the mood was buffered by the fact that no one was crowing about doing better than the other guy. Unlike the tech wreck and other bubbles of the past, this thing, as you pointed out, has hurt the conservative investor as severely as the speculators. In a recent article in the Economist magazine the point was made that everyone is being bailed out except the prudent individuals who did everything according to the accepted wisdom. A balanced portfolio, diversification, intelligent asset management - yes, we did all that but to what avail when every sector is in the tank and even if you have cash to squirrel away, interest rates on safe havens are negligible. My brother-in-law has graduated from not opening financial statements to swearing off all forms of news entirely. He got to where you're going early - forget about it and hit the links. We'll have to explore this further on April 6th. AH