I remember the good old days of Google’s ‘Don’t Be Evil’. We all just winked and went about our Gmail and search routines.

Today, technology giants are evil until proven innocent.

We were promised the swamp would be drained in 2017 but the swamp is overflowing.

No wonder volatility is back from 50 year lows…

The honeymoon with a complete disregard for the facts is over. Kudos to those that used the record low volatility year of 2017 to sell all their stocks and crypto and get into cash earning 2.5 percent today.

I will continue to tell those that ask that unless you are the bank or Buffett, wait until stocks get back above their 200 day moving averages. Makes sales calls, read books, call you mom.

Fred Wilson has a good post about what bear markets look like as Crypto continues to descend into the abyss.

The easiest way to avoid a bear market is to never invest, but we do invest and bear markets are inevitable.

A lot of money is pouring into cash and money markets. This is eventual fuel for the next bull market, we just don’t know what it will look like, what sector will ignite it, or when it will start. Maybe a lot of this money flows into startup investing and private markets instead of getting spent or back into public markets.

I imagine the worst scenario for markets is the money just gets sat on and saved, but I doubt it.

As for what is immediately ahead?

Literally every one of my favorite market technicians sees it as I do…STFR (sell the f*@king rips).

PS – There was a second Black Swan volatility event of 2018 a couple weeks back in the energy markets.

I walked myself into one back in February and wrote about it. It might be worth re reading.

This time, a lot of people are writing about the fund at Optionsellers and I really learned a lot from this version of the blowup. I recommend everyone read it.

For years leading up to 2018, I read about the risks from the compressed volatility. Those risks are starting to show themselves.