Last month the boring chart I kept stuffing in front your face was the spot copper five year price chart, mainly because it was flirting with breaking a three year support line. Here's how the chart stands today:
At the time, I was all "will she or won't she?" and decided not to bail on copper exposure unless the support was clearly broken. In fact it broke, and I got rid of CS.to, ARG.to and FCX and a couple of others (not PCU, because that's the LT portfolio and it's still there...different attitude there).Here's a close-up of the recent timescale with the events commented.
After selling, spot copper recovered on a spike, and I was all "sheesh, I panicked too soon...oh well, dem's da breaks...not going back". Then the marketed turned once and for all and here were are at Cu in the $2.60s (and Otto wiping his brow and saying phew a lot).So what's the point here? The point is that I still believe that this commods sell-off is total panic BS of the highest order. I still say fundamentals are saying a different thing than pricings. I still believe that demand for copper is very strong and supply is tighter than a duck's sphincter. However my belief was (and is) shown to be W.R.O.N.G. by the best judge out there, i.e. the market. The thing I did well was to admit that the market disagrees with my views and get the hell out of its way, because it is a very large elephant and I'm this leetle leetle ant.
Shaking your fist at the world while losing money may be gratifying on one level, but it's not for me. You cannot be right all of the time in this game. Period. Admitting errors is a very important part of being correct over the long-term. There is plenty of Zen in the market, but as in all Zen teachings they don't evangelize themselves at you. You have to find them, not the other way around.
So to sum up, with the recent copper price action even though I'm right, I was wrong. And by admitting I was wrong, I was right. Seems perfectly clear to me.....................................