funny that....

[ProblemAgain]

i've been noticing the big ad push for people to get into stocks ...and real estate  (one ad even touts the ARM mortgage to get you to buy...) yowsuh, haven't  we been down this garden path just a little while ago? and meanwhile back at the ranch....

BofA: Our Biggest Clients Haven't Unloaded This Much Stock Since 2008

By Matthew Boesler | Business Insider – 10 hours ago

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Every week, the BofA Merrill Lynch equity strategy team breaks out data on how much stock clients are buying and selling.

Last week, we highlighted how BAML's big institutional clients have been rotating out of stocks all year, while retail investors continue to buy into the market.

According to this week's data, the amount of selling by institutional clients over the past four weeks has hit the highest level on record.

" Net sales by this group were the largest since March, and the sixth-largest in our data history (since 2008)," writes BAML strategist Savita Subramanian in a note to clients. "And on a four-week week average basis, outflows by institutional clients are the largest in our data history."

Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Meanwhile, retail investors are still buying.

[exedir]

Nothing funny here, the usual pattern is if a market is getting "tired", that is a sign the pros are getting out and the retail buyers are trying to front run the market after it is too late....

The usually wisdom is buy on the dips and sell on the highs, and that is what the pros do.  

The real question is where to invest?  There remains a huge pile of cash that has to go somewhere and if not the stock market, where?  One of the problems is even though the market is at all time highs, the US economy is not.  As to the rest of the world, same story not much happening.  The only short trend is the Euro zone is a play, with the Euro rising against the $.  However, Europe is still a sick child in that their unemployment rates are even worse than the US.

As to BRIC, not so good.  Growth is down and that hits commodities which is what Russia, Brazil and Australia sell.

The unexplained play is oil with parity of WTI with Brent, and as to how this could be, in that, both are in oversupply as to demand. Refining issues seems to be a reason but not the cause, some say the sustainable price is a drop of 30% or more on the price of crude.  In the meantime, the cost of fuel is a drag on the overall world economy and just be a speculation bump using Egypt and the usual suspects as the reasons, and not unusual for crude market.

The worse headwinds are coming from Washington with the debt ceiling struggle, the federal budget fight and the T-word from the Fed, all coming in September after the August recess.