We need to be Robert Peston Free!

Won't it be nice when one day finance isn't one of the lead stories in the news?

At that time hopefully the markets will come back to some normality!

I think normality will only be resumed when there is no sign of Robert
Peston on the news for about a week. Then it could be safe to come out.

At the moment, the market is akin to one giant roulette table where the management rips you off and takes your cash. Which is probably while for the moment, for me, cash is still king with the odd bout of bargain hunting (and hoping).

I don't know about you but this up 300 pts in ten seconds and then down 300 the following ten seconds is doing my head in.

As one trader in the USA said: "300 is the new 30" and he is dead right.

I've never seen anything like it, not even during the last bear market in 2001.

The market right now is full of traders trying to make three points here, two points there. Everyone is trying to pile out and pile back in at the same time causing wild gyrations.

Fundamentals and any normal style of investment seem completely out of the window.

Because even if a company says it's doing well it'll still go down 50-70% and there is nothing you can do about it except hold for a year till it comes back or get out at a loss.

Of course everything is exaggerated to the downside - there are so many forced sellers around: so many have had margin calls, hedge funds have had to liquidate, etc it's not surprising.

Firms are all increasing margins again leaving even more sellers about.

At some point though the selling will be over and at these bargain prices I would hope private investors like me will eventually make some very good returns.

Most analysts think the recession will last about a year - and with the
markets looking nine months ahead I'd have thought a bottom will be formed at some point soon.

The problem is being aware not to get sucked in too much by the odd big rally. There is so much fear around many will just use rallies to sell out.

There is some good news for newer investors - those that get started in the next few months could see very good returns indeed and there will be some lucky new starters that by accident get in at the bottom!

I'm sure many of the companies who've had their shares massacred by 50% or more could easily go back up by the same amount.

In the end I'm going to wait and see rather than worry about missing some points to the upside.

Only when the market has shown at least a couple of weeks of stability again will I be tempted to part with my pot of cash.

In the meantime I'm shorting a little, and buying the odd hopeful "bargain" in small amounts.

I do wish all investors the best of luck in these current extremely
difficult markets.