Books about investing during bear markets/crashes...

[buffett]

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"market timers" like Warren Buffett

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wow.

[laserboy]

No offense to you or your value investing friend, but I will take my cue from the greatest value investor of all time, Warren Buffett.

He had the foresight to liquidate his funds and return all the money to his investors in the late 60's, avoiding the bear market of the early 70's. He had the foresight to warn us from investing in speculative technology stocks in the late 90's while hotshot analysts were calling him a washed up has-been. And right now he is sitting on $43B in cash, $20B in foreign currency, and investing in undervalued Korean stocks.

"We can't find any attractive securities right now."
Warren E. Buffett, 2005

[DesertCat]

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He had the foresight to liquidate his funds and return all the money to his investors in the late 60's, avoiding the bear market of the early 70's.


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He "retired". He didn't know when the market would return to sanity, he just knew he couldn't find anything attractive to buy. And he was yearning for a personal change. Here is a quote from his actual partner letter announcing it.

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May 29th, 1969

To My Partners:


About eighteen months ago I wrote to you regarding changed environmentall and personal factors causing me to modify our future performance objectives.


The investing environment I discussed at that time (and on which I have commented in various other letters) has generally become more negative and frustrating as time has passed.


Maybe I am merely suffering from a lack of mental flexibility. (One observer commenting on security analysts over forty stated: "They know too many things that are no longer true. ").


However, it seems to me that: (1) opportunities for investment that are open to the analyst who stresses quantitative factors have virtually disappeared, after rather steadily drying up over the past twenty years; (2) our $100 million of assets further eliminates a large portion of this seemingly barren investment world, since commitments of less than about $3 million cannot have a real impact on our overall performance, and this virtually rules out companies with less than about $100 million of common stock at market value; and (3) a swelling interest in investment performance has created an increasingly short-term oriented and (in my opinion) more speculative market.


The October 9th, 1967 letter stated that personal considerations were the most important factor among those causing me to modify our objectives. I expressed a desire to be relieved of the (self-imposed) necessity of focusing 100% on BPL. I have flunked this test completely during the last eighteen months. The letter said: "I hope limited objectives will make for more limited effort." It hasn't worked out that way. As long as I am "on stage", publishing a regular record and assuming responsibility for management of what amounts to virtually 100% of the net worth of many partners, I will never be able to put sustained effort into any non-BPL activity. If I am going to participate publicly, I can't help being competitive. I know I don't want to be totally occupied with out-pacing an investment rabbit all my life. The only way to slow down is to stop.


Therefore, before yearend, I intend to give all limited partners the required formal notice of my intention to retire.

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"We can't find any attractive securities right now."
Warren E. Buffett, 2005

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He also said this in 2004. And in 2003. And in 2002. And in 2001. And in 2000. In fact, I challenge you to find one of his few annual reports where he doesn't tell his shareholders that stocks are too expensive and he's unlikely to repeat past performance in the future.

Value investing allows you to pick attractive investments and shun unattractive investments. It tells you nothing about when prices will change, either for individual securities or for entire markets.

[SuitedPair]

Jim Rogers has not been managing the fund for about a year now. He continued to determine the composition of the commodities index, which the fund tracked, but the management of the fund was given to Beeland following a transaction late last year.