Stock markets: What is Mr Ritholtz doing now?

By Prieur du Plessis, on May 14th, 2010 posted in: Investment, Stocks

Barry Ritholtz, writer of The Big Picture blog, made a call to go 100% liquid last Wednesday (see here) – a day before Thursday’s plunge – as he thought the market was overdue for a crash of 10% or more. According to Yahoo Finance – Tech Ticker, Ritholtz said: “We had been lightening up a little bit as stocks got stopped out or hit our upside targets. Obviously the market was … entering a period of more volatility so we moved to 100% cash. The collapse the next day was more luck than anything. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than smart.”

Looking ahead, he said: “The most accurate way to describe our perspective now is to say: the data that typically accompany real tops are just not there yet. We could be moving in that direction but … I’m leaning toward [thinking] this was the correction we were looking for. When things are really uncertain and disheveled you sometimes have to step back and say ‘there’s no clarity here’. Now we’re kind of just watching how this plays out.” In the meantime, Ritholtz’s firm Fusion IQ is making no big bets and is just trading in and out of positions.

That is the word according to Mr Ritholtz.

Source: Yahoo Finance – Tech Ticker, May 12, 2010.

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