There are many opportunities to make money, and fairly consistently, with lower risk then the overall market. Volatility trading, arbitrage, mirco/small cap investing, high-frequency trading, etc. etc.

So keep open to investment ideas, try to differentiate between leveraged beta & alpha. If you can’t do it, find someone who can or diversify across non-correlated assets for long term investing.

I also covered Bogleheads and Market Timing

I study money in my spare time, as a hobby. I’ve read around 20 or 30 personal finance and investing books. I’m not a full time active fund manager, responsible for A LOT of money. It makes sense that these fund managers will spend a lot more time researching than I have. I’ve read 30 books, they’ve probably read 300 or more. Despite all their research, the market average still beats the majority of them.

It’s interesting to me that sites like validea.com claim to have made a 173% return over the past three years with their strategy (on sale for $30/month). If this information is so easily available (for a monthly fee, of course) then why aren’t these fund managers at least staying a few points above the index? Something is fishy there.

So for now, I’ll stick with simple Vanguard index funds. In the future I think I’ll set aside a little money to play with these market timing strategies, just out of curiosity. There do seem to be some that may work a little better, such as staying out of the market during the worst four months of the past 50 years (June-September), but I’m not sure yet.

Thanks.

There is so much to learn about investing in stock by reading this book. You’ve got to read to it! After investing some time Darvas concluded that trading like Wall Street is like gambling. Darvas also wrote another book called “Wall Street: The other Las Vegas”.

Okay, I see what you mean now. Yes, I agree that having some bonds in your overall portfolio is a good idea.