Why I'm still in

Despite all of the negative news this morning and with the anticipation that the market is going to suck today, I have to question my sanity when I decide to stay fully invested. But that is what I'm going to do today (I'm actually planning on adding to my positions).

For encouragement I look to the past performance of the Zweig screen as determined by AAII. Although this screen is managed on a monthly basis rather than a weekly basis like mine, in 2002 (an awful year for the broad market--S&P 500 down 23%) the Zweig screen managed to make 16%.

It has always made sense to me that it is best to stay fully invested despite what the market is doing for a few reasons:

1. Even if the market in general sucks, there are always a few shining stars out there that make a lot of money.
2. If my goal is to trade while working full time, I really don't have time to monitor the market and make good timing decisions.
3. I've never been able to get the timing thing right. I don't know if I ever will.

Toward the end of the year I got off track and started listening to all the noise out there. Even though there were a lot of contradictory opinions, I felt that I could figure out a good way to judge when I should put money to work and when I shouldn't.

The jury is still out, but I've decided that it's easier for me to trust my system and take losses than it is to trust an indicator and miss out on gains. That's just me. Perhaps if I get punished enough, I'll reconsider.

Chris Perruna has a terrific article today on the futility of predicting market direction (or anything else).