THE SELL DECISION

Will Rogers said that it's easy to make money in the stock market: you buy a stock and hold it until it goes up, then sell it. But “if it don't go up, don't buy it.” Towards the end of last year the stock market as measured by the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) was at an all time high of 2691.49. Investment professionals of all levels of experience and points of view — as well as retail clients — were asking themselves on a daily basis, “how high is up?” On the assumption that the astute readers of this column made their buying decisions in July 1982, when the DJIA was languishing around 750 and before the bull market began its surge on August 13, 1982, we will consider the sell decision.