re: Why is stock market going up when there is so much bad news? Please help

"If you are in it for the long haul, are you changing your thinking from being mostly in cash and going more for equities. What is going on? Do you think we are headed for a bear market? Do you think we reached the lows of the stock market and headed up for good?"

Mr. Fader, you sure ask a lot of questions for someone from New Jersey!

If you are not retiring in the next five years, I would not make any changes until the bear market is over, whether it's next week or five years from now. Your portfolio should be designed to allow you to rest easily during a down market. Making decisions during in a bear market, when you are emotional, usually leads to regrettable decisions. I missed a lot of upside during the last several years by slowly moving into some fixed income options, and now I am missing a lot of volatility. I would still be better off financially if I had been more aggressive during the past five years, but I also knew that I could live with a 50% stock decline. You sound as though you might be too young to have been an investor during the dot com and financial crisis, and way too young to catch the Roseanne Roseannadanna reference.