top of page
Writer's pictureChloe Lin

Greed VS Fear Index - How To Use It?

The market can become quite noisy with numerous tools available to gauge market sentiment, including the Greed VS Fear Index.


At Buffett Online School, we believe in investing in great companies you understand, and utilizing Free Investing Resources to kickstart your investment journey is one of the best ways to learn.


What is Greed VS Fear Index?


If you are wondering what is this about, the Greed VS Fear Index is a way to gauge stock market movements and whether stocks are fairly priced. The theory is based on the logic that excessive fear tends to drive down share prices, and too much greed tends to have the opposite effect.


The current market sentiment is quite greedy. So in theory, investors should exercise caution and refrain from investing.


While these tools can be beneficial in the short term, they often prove to be ineffective in the long run. But why?


In February 1993, Howard Marks wrote to Oaktree clients, "The average annual return on equities from 1926 to 1987 was 9.44 percent. However, missing the best 50 out of those 744 months by going to cash would mean missing all the returns. This suggests that attempts at market timing pose a risk, rather than providing protection."


Gautam Baid, the author of "The Joys Of Compounding" also highlighted that a significant percentage of the total gain from a bull market usually occurs during the initial market recovery phase. "Investors missing this phase are likely to miss a substantial portion of the gains."


Hence, investors shouldn't fixate on high-frequency macro indicators. Instead, they should concentrate on individual businesses and their industry developments. Gautam emphasized, "That's the best one can do—nothing more. Always remain humble and intellectually honest."

By the way, I highly recommend you to go and read "The Joys Of Compounding". It's one of the best and most insightful investment books I have ever read.


Ultimately, focusing on fundamentals has consistently made investors significantly wealthy over time, as demonstrated by Warren Buffett.


Buffett once remarked, "Fear is the foe of the faddist, but the friend of the fundamentalist. In the next 30 years, major shocks are bound to happen. We won't attempt to predict or profit from them. Identifying businesses akin to our past purchases will minimize the impact of external surprises on our long-term results."



Join Our Free 2-Day BOS Value Investing MBA


At the Buffett Online School, we believe in learning the right investing mindset and system to start cultivating emotional detachment and grow our wealth safely and substantially in the long run.


Our next 2-day BOS MBA Value Investing Online Bootcamp is happening soon! We will teach you how to use Warren Buffett's proven investing method to maximize your portfolio.


Remember, you can cultivate the right investing mindset and unlock your potential to build wealth through intelligent investing. Together, we can create a network of educated investors who make informed decisions and contribute to their financial well-being!


In the meantime, check out some of our blog posts to continue your learning. You can also join our BOS Telegram channel for more investing insights.

586 views0 comments

Comments


bottom of page