A.I.M. Users Bulletin Board

[SFSecurity]

Thanks Tom. I especially like "a) Broad trends persist. Discover them. They will survive boom and bust." Paying attention to inflation is one of the keys. Just look at the long term DOW and S&P 500 and see how much it has swung into a major upward trend over the last ~35 years regardless of crashes. I'm guessing that at some point this will prove to be a "bubble" and the curve will flatten out. Maybe my daughter will see it happen, in any case most likely long after I will cease to care, but that does not mean we can neglect the possibility as we plan what we are up to today.

In the shorter term it seems wise to pay attention to cycles, after all cycles in all sorts of things such as deer and wolves, coyotes and rabbits as well the cycle in wheat have been known about for a very long time. Wheat cycles have been recorded all the way back to the 1200s. The cycles in wheat also provide an excellent example of an unexpected event, Krakatoa - 1883, where wheat production was down for about 3 years world wide and temperatures did not return to "normal" until 1888.

Best,

Allen