Surviving Without Mutual Funds
By Steve Selengut, Thu Dec 8th

STOP! Do not read another word! Advance mouse toInvestopedia.com and look up advance/decline line. Do not passGO. Do not collect another prospectus.

The NYSE advance-decline line has been positive for nearly sixyears! (Contact the Author for the Spreadsheet.)

What is wrong with the averages? How sick are the Mutual Funds?Here are some questions you should be asking. 1) Is there"Investment Life" after Mutual Funds? 2) What is the averageinvestor/speculator to do? (3) Who can you trust? (4) Why arepeople still throwing money at the corrupt Mutual Funds? 5) Isthere a safe(r) alternative? 6) Can a financial professionalfunction without funds? (7) Did make YOU lose moneyover the past several years? (Answers below.)

Investing always involves more questions than answers, and theidea that Wall Street has those answers and that they areimbedded in the products that they market to the "moneyed"public, is simply part of the brainwashing of the Americaninvestor. So, too, is the myth that are a saferinvestment mechanism than a properly constructed portfolio ofindividual securities. Perhaps they should be, in concept. Inreality, they haven't been for decades.

Investors have always searched for a safe and easy way toprotect and to grow their portfolios. This used to beaccomplished by applying a combination of management andinvestment principles to the process. A diversified portfolio ofhigh quality, profitable companies, and an appropriate amount ofless volatile income producers was pretty easy to create, tomanage, and to monitor.

It still is, when you realize that investing is not acompetitive event. The original Mutual Fund managers actuallyknew how to do this, were paid to do it, and were not at allinfluenced by the incredible confluence of outside forces thatimpacts their decision making today. In their original form,Mutual Funds were Trustee directed within the retirement benefitcommunity, and a stepping-stone to a properly diversified,individual security portfolio on the personal level. Before thethree-ring Wall Street circus came to town, there were only two"classes" of securities, retirement programs were notself-directed, the DJIA was an economic indicator, investing wasa personal goal directed activity, and the Yankees won theAmerican league pennant most of the time.

Almost everything (except the Yankees) changed with theonslaught of the "new generation" of Mutual Fund marketeers andself-directed retirement vehicles. Wall Street invented marketprediction techniques and new subdivisions of securities;investment products were mass-produced in every shape, size,model, and color, with great financial planning success; salesliterature was sold as research/analysis, and financialinstitutions became indistinguishable from one another. Peoplepay extra not to collect current interest and loss-taking

THE NO LOAD MUTUAL FUND TRACKER
Do you have a question regarding your mutual fund investments? I will always give you my unbiased and honest opinion. How can you be sure? First, this is a free newsletter and it will not affect my renewal rates. Second, I am not running for office and do not have to hide my thoughts in evasive language designed to obscure what I really mean.

isseen as a good idea. Unproven team-player Mutual Fund managersreceive signing bonuses that would shock professional athletes,and 60-second sound bites on CNBC define today's investmentreality to the masses. A calendar year is now long-term, buyhigh/sell low a religion, and absolutely everyone, fromaccountants to wedding planners, can sell for extracash. Wall Street is Las Vegas in pinstripes and red suspenders.

Are today's late trading, market timing, and executive suitescandals going to change things dramatically? It's doubtful,simply because are so profitable for theinstitutions, so mindlessly easy to sell for financialprofessionals, AND the only available investment medium forhundreds of millions of employees throughout the country! But isthere a better way to invest safely and profitably in spite ofall the problems? You can’t afford to be lazy anymore. Learn howto manage a high quality, diversified portfolio of individualsecurities.

-------------------------------------------------- Answering thesix questions raised in the first paragraph, from the pages ofthe Business Best Seller: "The Brainwashing of the AmericanInvestor". Yes Virginia, there is investment life after MutualFunds. (2) Rediscover individual securities, after taking acrash course in the principles of investing. (3) Trust yourself,once you've taken the course. (4) Most investors have no choicebut to use Funds, the others learn their lessons slowly. (5)Yes, individual securities in a plain vanilla investment plancan be much safer. (6) Some planners have de-toxed from funds,but it's a lot more like work. Most won't try. (7) Nope, you'llhave to take the blame for the losses yourself.

About the author:Steve Selengut sanserve@aol.com steve@sancoservices.com800-245-0494 Professional Investment Portfolio Manager since1979, Unaffiliated with any Brokerage Firrm – Separate AccountsOnly, & No Open End BA Business, GettysburgCollege, MBA Professional Management, Pace U. Author of: "TheBrainwashing of the American Investor: The Book that Wall StreetDoes Not Want YOU to Read”, and “A Millionaire’s SecretInvestment Strategy”