re: Ouch, Market Taking a Beating

Yep.

TBT might be an interesting play as well. Almost this whole board (me included) was premature about jumping on the TBT bandwagon for five freaking years... but in the last 3 months it looks like it's finally started to take off.

Yeah, but you never want to go too far out on a limb in tying your own personal fate to guessing what the Fed is going to do, so maybe VIX would be a better idea. There will likely be a lot of back and forth in the next few years.

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Closest thing to arbitrage that I can see.

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TBT is a one-way bet. Might be a good bet.
But in terms of arbitrage, L/S positions, L/S funds and/or Structured Products seem better options to me.

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Just FYI, That $2K is not "left over money", I invest before I pay any bills, buy any food, or buy any toys. It's off the top, it's paying yourself first. NOBODY gets paid before I pay myself, Not the utility company, not the bank, not THE frickING IRS. Now, I still pay those bills, but my priority is to myself and everyone else can wait in line.

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That's a cute psychological game that you're playing with yourself

But let's be honest, you wouldn't be investing the money if you couldn't make the payments on your bills.

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It will pay off . . . In Spades, Vol!

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I've had success doing that - I set my retirement contributions and vowed to "increase it until it hurts". I went from $0 to $40k in less than 40 months by "paying myself first" - and I did debt reduction and other investments, too (although a lot of that was with "found money" - extra military training events, life insurance proceeds, etc.)

How did that happen?

Another thing I highly recommend is the automatic mortgage payment, tied to your paycheck. That is the greatest psychological boon I've ever discovered - although it technically hits the bank account, I never see it reflected in the available balance. So, in essence, I pay myself first (never goes into the bank), and the mortgage second - everything else is literally child's play to pay.

I like CVX less than 120....I have taken a beating the last few days. In fact, I have endured an ~9% slide in the last 30 days.

Ugh....

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It may be time to sell some puts...

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Or take my toys and go home!!! Still up for the year - get out and wait for the next panic....I dunno

I just get confused because he played the character Larry Sanders on The Larry Sanders Show.

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Obviously. And it is psychological. And it works. I'm not on a salary, my income fluctuates month to month, so I have to be disciplined. Back when I used to pay bills first, and then invest/save what was left over, I'd end up saving or investing very little. When I made my financial future a priority, I increased my investing 10 fold, and I have always had plenty left over to pay my bills and have fun with.

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Being successful in personal finance is probably 95% psychology. Knowledge of finance alone is pretty useless without the personal discipline to execute a long term plan, and any type of mental gymnastics that keep a person on track is usually a good thing.