It sure is hard to avoid all of the popular press on market valuation. We're into first quarter earnings season and things don't sound quite as bad as the pundits have been shouting. True, company after company is issuing cautious guidance for 2015, but most of the flat earnings I see in the big multinational companies are more related to currency issues than actual failure of the core business activity of the companies. There seems to be trouble everywhere; Russia, middle east, soft conditions in Asia, Europe and still, American corporations manage to post growth in volume of goods and services delivered, even if the profits aren't showing it.
The only reason I can think of to hold cash is in the expectation that conditions will be better for investing at some point in the future. I don't see any way to accurately determine that. What's more, I don't have a big bolus of new money anyway. I'd have to raise cash by shutting off the DRIP. It would take me a year under those conditions to build a 3% cash cushion. That hardly makes sense, in my opinion. I'm still better off making the total portfolio bet, given my level of skill in evaluating the overall market and each equity within it.
Wise voices continue to say; the holding period is forever, the best strategy is to sit on one's hands.
I think I'll keep sitting on them for now. I'll worry about what to do with new money when it arrives.
I'm seeing plenty of strong companies with forward P/E's in the 15-16 range now; I think there will be reasonable options when that time comes.
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