Author: Howard Lindzon
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Happy Sunday
I am already a bust on my 2022 resolutions. I drank a lot of water and my pee was white by the end of the day, but, we went for Chinese food and I slept like shit.
Surprisingly, a lot of people have loved the Wallstrip links I have been adding at the end of my posts recently. I will keep adding them here and there as I go back through and find my favorites. I have been getting asked to make more videos and at some point I do plan to make Wallstrip 2.0 but I have to create a ‘gap’ 6 months to a year to do it in the right way. The markets create the content and the behavior that helps write the material itself, but finding the people to help me make it fresh and modern is something I have not put much time into yet.
Onwards…
One of my blog readers read my resolutions yesterday Alec sent me a good article titled ‘100 Ways To Live To 100‘ which I scanned. I do about 50 of them so I guess I am doing well getting to 56! I do think I can get to about 80 of them so I will keep the list handy.
Next…
My 2021 predictions were mostly on the mark last year which made it almost impossible for me not to have my best ever investing year.
Blabbing about my winners is easy, so let’s start with my biggest mistake of 2021…
I owned a lot of the wrong tech stocks so $QQQ was just a way better idea and just continues to be until proven otherwise if you want technology diversified exposure including web 3.
I covered this a few weeks ago but because I am a trend follower, I was hit hard by the end of trends that came as some historic (in hindsight) runs came to an end in 2021. I also got cannabis wrong. The year started fantastic and was a miserable mess for the last 9 months.
I will always be wired to pick stocks but I plan to do much less of it going forward and index more myself. I am not enjoying the process as much so it makes the decision easier. Furthermore, my allocation to stocks continues to drop as well as I continue to invest in seed and emerging managers and get interested in real estate. As always, I carry a high cash level because of the low liquidity in my private investing.
To the predictions…
In December of last year I penned THREE prediction posts here and here and here (Daddy What’s A Bond And Everything is a Game).
The one I got most right was the following:
1. Increase in speculation and elevated volatility. So, my first prediction for 2021 is the intensity of speculation will increase. A bear market or crash will not stop this trend in 2021. People are armed with free trading, API’s, group chats up the wazoo, mentor networks and free time. The stock market has always been a game, but now tens of millions more people are in on the game.
The year 2021 brought us the meme stocks (AMC, Gamestop) as well as Elon Musk tweeting about Doge and of course crypto NFT degenerates so I will definitely take a bow.
While volatility only spiked a few times overall, there was incredible volatility within certain sectors like small caps and crypto.
The other big predictions I got right were ‘that people want to be Cathie Woood (and that would end badly for both here and people that chase) and that ‘supply is coming’:
I spent more time than I would like this year staring at the markets. Like sugar, it was addictive. Like sugar, I want to break the addiction. But, like sugar, most addicts will just stay hooked.
The markets as I mentioned in my predictions yesterday are in millions of new people’s head, bones and soul.
A whole new generation will want to ‘Be Cathie Wood‘ (please read Ben’s post and be careful of chasing returns).
I am a simple trend follower so as I stated at the end of 2019 with ‘Could 2020 Be As Good As 2019‘ (fintech and healthcare will continue to lead), I simply work off the premise that a lot of the trends that we see exiting 2020 will continue for years to come.
The only real market prediction I can safely make in 2021 is SUPPLY IS COMING. It will be up to you to figure out when that supply leads to a market downdraft.
SPAC’s, IPO’s, Direct Listings will continue in a relentless fashion because stocks are going up.
The ‘Daddy What’s A Bond and Everything Is A Game’ themes/predictions will continue to have the greatest impact on markets and growth. If rates do rise, all bets are off as to what really happens to equities and Venture, but I am not a guy that will make the timing bet on that trend change.
AS for other predictions, I will share two smart people’s predictions that I always read and share…
1. Tom Tunguz – Fiver Predictions For 2022
2. Scott Belsky – ‘10 Forecasts For The Near Future of Tech‘
PS – After CBS acquired Wallstrip, I created a short run of shows called ‘Naked Putz’. Here is one episode of me walking the streets of New York looking to change a $20 Canadian bill.