Let's take a look at a couple of Moneytalk conversations that Brinker didn't allow on the air. 8^)
newslettercheat said....-
- jeffchristie said...
Hi Bob thanks for taking my call. In your monologue you gave Kudos to the White House for the appointment of Ben Bernanke last week. Later you said we are in the worst recession since the great depression. Do you agree with me that we were sure lucky to have a man like Ben Bernanke in place this time last year when it looked like the worlds entire financial system was about to collapse? If you do, the real Kudos should go to George W. Bush for finding this man and having him in place when we all needed him. I think his reappointment last week was a no brainer.
Getting back to your comment that we are in the worst recession since the great depression. I think the jury is still out on this one. Unemployment is still below 10%. In the recession in the early 1980's it peaked a 10.8% in November and December of 1982. In a 1 December 2008 report the National Bureau of Economic Research stated that we were in a recession that began in December of 2007. Mr. Brinker I think your listeners need to hear what you were saying, right here on Moneytalk, about people warning us of this recession back in May of 2008. Here it is:
RECESSION CASSANDRAS.... Brinker said: “What we have right in here now is evidence that the Cassandras, who earlier this year, were telling us we were in recession – right now they’ve basically – well I’ll be kind, basically, they look like fools right now. Because all that they’ve accomplished with their talk about recession…………all that they have to show for their efforts is that they scared the people who listened to them out of the stock market this past winter……….”
CORRECTION LOW AND TESTS.... Brinker said: “……..And probably a lot of those people got scared out near the correction lows...... The initial correction low in January, which was successfully tested in mid-March, before the market reversed and resumed its uptrend. And basically, if you were to total up all of the accomplishments of the Cassandras, that would be it – that they scared people out of the market during a stock market correction in the first quarter………..Because they have been unable to present any evidence of a recession."
LOST JOBS.... Brinker said: “And your questions to the Cassandras should be where are the millions of lost jobs that we would expect to see in a recession? In fact, in this economic slowdown, so far, we’ve only lost a few hundred thousand jobs total – dating back to the beginning of this year…………”
STOCK MARKET BEARS.... Brinker said: “So what we have here basically, is an example of false prophets and it’s sad. And the reason it’s sad is the damage done. Think of the people that are looking today at the market, S&P at 1400 and they’ve been scared out of the market in the first quarter by these bears………It’s just amazing and yet these people are out there, and these people are not happy, I’m sure, to find themselves out of a rising market since March. To find themselves looking for ever lower prices when in fact we’ve had the opposite......- ......We’ve had the market rising since mid-March. It’s rather significant when you stop to think about it. If you go back to mid-March and you take a look at the S&P 500 Index since mid-March, right now you have a total return, including cash dividends of about 10 1/2%............
- ..............So it’s fair for you to say to the Cassandras, where is that recession, where are those millions of lost jobs, where are the two quarters of negative real GDP growth? Where’s the bear market? …………The answer is, they blew it! That is the answer, they blew it. They got caught up in their own negativity and they pronounced that it was all over, it was going to spiral downward and there was no end in sight – and they got it completely backwards.. Truly amazing to see, and sad to see the people that are harmed by such unjustified negativity.”
Thanks Honey for the rundown on Brinker's current jive.
It would have been interesting to have had the woman caller slip out which portfolio of Brinker's she was switching from after losing money. He is pretty darn good at "managing callers" to prevent negative impressions of his business from being clear to radio listeners. [Honey EC: Newslettercheat is referring to caller Chris from last Sunday's Moneytalk, you can read about it in my Sunday Summary here]
Many think that Brinker is deaf or has lost some intellectual capacity when he answers a different question than a caller asks as in this case; but actually it is a game he has used for many years to advertise his brilliance and prevent anyone from seeing some of the absolutely stupid advice he has given.
Think of a good used car salesman. The customer says "That piece of junk has hail damage over every inch of the body." The salesman says. " That's what we here at "Buy this Jive Motors" call a hail resistant finish. You can go through a dozen hail storms and not be able to point out any damage to this car's finish. It is amazing and a unique proprietary finish only available through our work here".
So now as I understand it Brinker has ceased talking about his great ability to time the market over the long haul, but is bragging about short term timing and his ability to pick funds that have beaten the index over the last few months.
I've read that it seems that Brinker would have listeners believe that he only began timing the market in Jan 2009 when he said something in a very mistimed special bulletin to subscribers that he thought 2009 would be a good year to be in the market. He doesn't dwell much on the fact that he has been "in the market" and shouting BUY NOW throughout the bear market and rode it all the way down.
Like the car buyer if a subscriber, Mike would say. "Bob, I followed your recommendations since buying your newsletter in 2007 and have lost a third of the money I had at that time."
[Bob] "Look, I told you this was going to be a good year back in January. If you followed my advice you are up 15% this year! Wow, now that is great news caller. For callers not familiar with my work what Mike is saying is that by following my advice to be fully invested this year he has made 14% over those who were in cash. Way to go Mike"
"But Bob, I still am down three hundred thousand dollars since I began following...."
[Bob] "Looks like we lost Mike, another happy camper who took my advice in January this year and has a big ole watermelon smile on his face. Don't thank me Mike, you deserve all the credit. This is...."
September 2, 2009 5:46 AM