Cody on RM: Stay Patient With the Market and Players

Stay Patient With the Market and Players
08/08/2006 11:17 AM

I'm gonna pass me a brand new resolution, I'm gonna fight me a one man revolution, someway,
Gonna start my rebellion today. But here come the people in grey,
To take me away. -- The Kinks

In the last 24 hours, I've received dozens of impassioned pleas in my inbox on top of scores of blog Comments and prior emails, all of which say something like this: "Make some paper trades so you have some trades to write about."

"Just make up a trade, if nothing else."
"I thought you were a money manager, not a poser wannabe."
"If you really think X, then you should be short Y. Players play, man, and writers write."

As James Altucher asked me this morning when I shared some of this with him: Why are people so upset that I went to cash?!

It doesn't make sense -- and is a real disservice to all readers -- for me to just pretend that I'm excited about a trading idea when I'm not, or even worse for me to just make stuff up. The ol' transparent manipulation ploy ("A real trader would do it") doesn't work, either. I think that worked on me when I was five. It doesn't work on me at 33. Seriously.

I think I've made it clear that I'm going to approach this market on my terms and my terms only, and all the chastising, pleading, anger and whatever else you send my way won't change that one iota. So enough already. I'm doing the best I can and writing about what my best is. And sometimes my best will be dead wrong, of course. But my best is all I can really do in the end.

The markets are flatlining slightly in the green as we approach the Fed announcement. Gun to head, I figure we rally more into the announcement and then we'll have to see what's said and done from there. Until then, I'm just going to have to tell you, I'm being patient. And I am.