As you likely noticed, today was a blow-out day in the markets. The Dow was up 1.5% and Toronto was up 1%.
This, of course , was due to the FED’s announcement of additional stimulus consisting of printing money to try to lower interest rates (even though they are already insanely low…)
Notable winners from our stock picks included
Bank of America up 4.8%, Wells Fargo up 3.5% and Berkshire Hathaway up 2.1%.
Will this last? I don’t know… It certainly is no guarantee that it will last.
I considered taking some profits today, probably should have. It would be prudent for me since I am almost 100% invested in equities. But most or all of the stocks I own still seem reasonably priced and so I hesitate to sell. Perhasp just greed wanting more… It’s easy to feel fat and happy after all the recent gains.
Yesterday I was not able to post any comment because my ancient FrontPage software refused to open the site. I got it open today by creating a new copy of the site. I hope to move the site to a more modern software before too long. FrontPage has been out of production for years. But it still met my needs. I have no interest in loading this site up with very fancy components which tend to be slow to load. I keep the site plain and readable. Still it looks like FrontPage has to be replaced.
I believe a highlight of yesterday was Toll Brothers was up again.
So the FED is going to try to lower mortgage interest rates again. I think the safest bet around is that the price of U.S. houses is going to rise. If you know a way to invest in that through the market, let me know. (Toll Brothers might be okay, but I would prefer to find a company that is buying up a load of U.S. houses to rent and later sell and which is doing so with a strong balance sheet.). If you are in a position to buy a house in the U.S. (say you are retired and want to use the house four months of the year or more, then I don’t think you can go far wrong buying now). For most of us Canadians who are still working the idea of buying a house in the U.S. to try to rent out is not particularly feasible. It would probably work out but requires a lot of accounting and you would need to put it with a property management company and you would need to buy for cash if you are a Canadian.
Americans in a position to get into rental houses should probably jump at the chance. It looks like a generational opportunity in many cities.