Live data from Hacker News

Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

e.nikkei.com

41–50 of 137 posts

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#41
It seems like everybody in this thread is saying "No duh, invest in Japan right now!"

The assumption is that the market will turn around, and anybody who buys into Japanese companies stands to make a lot of money. If this is the case, then why are the prices going down at all? Are other investors really that ignorant?

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#42
post #29

This will trigger deleveraging around the world. Specifically, this will impact the venture capital in silicon valley. We'll likely start to see some angel/vc investors start to panic and withdraw from the market, shutting down startups, etc.

Wouldn't the money pulled out of Japanese markets be invested in other markets?

Many Japanese investors will be pulling out of other countries' markets, by necessity. Of course this is too complex to be summed up in a few sentences, but obviously demand patterns will undergo a major shift.

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#43
post #41

It seems like everybody in this thread is saying "No duh, invest in Japan right now!" The assumption is that the market will turn around, and anybody who buys into Japanese companies stands to make a lot of money. If this is the case, then why are the prices going down at all? Are other investors really that ignorant?

I think the general belief is that they are being irrationally over-pessimistic due to panic over the daiichi situation, and that this can be exploited by people whose distance affords them a more cool-headed approach.

The market as a whole may be rational, but individuals in the middle of a tense situation probably won't be.

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#44
post #41

It seems like everybody in this thread is saying "No duh, invest in Japan right now!" The assumption is that the market will turn around, and anybody who buys into Japanese companies stands to make a lot of money. If this is the case, then why are the prices going down at all? Are other investors really that ignorant?

I think part of the assumption is that people tend to trade less than perfectly when they think a radioactive cloud might be heading their way.

Right now a lot of the losses are due to uncertainty, people are factoring in risks of the unknown, potential worst case scenarios etc. If you buy in expecting the market to go back up, you are essentially betting the situation won't end up as bad as feared right now.

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#45
post #37
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it's not... it's not even at a 2 year low.[1] [1] http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=^N225+Interactive#chart2:...

The Nikkei 300 is, you're linking to the nikkei 225. The nikkei 300 index is "The Nikkei 300 is a market value-weighted index of the 300 major issues on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE). The Nikkei 300 uses a weighted average based on market capitalizations of component firms to reflect movements in the overall value of first section stocks. This contrasts with the widely followed Nikkei Stock Aver…

Nikkei 300 is not widely used. Without qualification, "Nikkei" is taken to mean "Nikkei 225".

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#46
post #12

There's no better time to buy stocks than during a market panic. Japan is a wealthy country. The Japanese work ethic is unbeatable. Now is a great time to buy Japanese stocks.

Be careful. Good work ethic doesn't always mean business success. The two are correlated, but that doesn't suggest that tossing money at any Japanese company is the way to go. Still do your due diligence and only invest in solid companies. This is certainly an opportunity, but not a reason to be irresponsible.

Here's a list of companies "from or based in Japan": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_of_Japan

Sony, Toyota, Honda, Nintendo, etc. Japanese companies like these that were a great investment a week ago are still a great investment. Only now the stock is less expensive because of a temporary panic. Smart money is buying up all the stock possible for these companies before they can rebound.

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#47
post #29

This will trigger deleveraging around the world. Specifically, this will impact the venture capital in silicon valley. We'll likely start to see some angel/vc investors start to panic and withdraw from the market, shutting down startups, etc.

Wouldn't the money pulled out of Japanese markets be invested in other markets?

Not necessarily. For every dollar being pulled out there also a lot of lost value due to the declining prices. Many investors follow a "basket" strategy where if one market goes down they will allocate more money to buying there and pull it out of other areas such as private investments.

This _has_ been seen in prior US public market downturns - if a pension fund is allocating 90% to public market investments and 10% to private investments, and the public market drops 33%, their fund is now split 60/10 instead of 90/10. So to rebalance back to 90/10, they'll need to liquidate 33% of their private investment allocation and move it to public investments. (This is an oversimplification but you get the idea.)

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#48
post #10

Careful. Japan's debt level, when compared to GDP, is higher than US: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2011/03/sovereig...

and they just lost ~1 trillion ++ worth of infrastructure... I believe they have a 10 year rebuild in front of them.

This is assuming that we have hit bottom on the catastrophe over there now and that we can contain the Daiichi plant.

It would be very interesting though, if things turn south and some massive takeovers occur in the next 12 months.

Imagine companies like Fujitsu, Hitachi or others (my mind is blank) being bought up by the IBMs Apples or even Google or GASP facebooks (those who have a lot of cash to buy tech houses in Japan and picot into HW?)

Pure fantasy sure - but so was the SCIFI scenario we are now looking at today, just last week.

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#49
post #41

It seems like everybody in this thread is saying "No duh, invest in Japan right now!" The assumption is that the market will turn around, and anybody who buys into Japanese companies stands to make a lot of money. If this is the case, then why are the prices going down at all? Are other investors really that ignorant?

Exactly. People who make fortunes off these markets are selling. Either they're wrong or posters here are. Guess which option is more likely.

I think the LessWrong post Markets are Anti-Inductive explains it well: http://lesswrong.com/lw/yv/markets_are_antiinductive/

Re: Bottom just fell out of Nikkei

#50
post #7
post #2

Time to start buying. Bet Buffet is taking a look at all those wonderful Japanese companies who moats are wide, have good fundamentals, and produce reasonable free-cash flow. Hope his "itchy trigger finger" found a few targets. My IRA could use a boost after the last few years.

any recommendations? Toyota?

You're going to want to look for a company with the least exposure to Japanese demand. You also want to see which company's plants were most disrupted by the crisis. I had the data before, I no longer look at the car industry in Japan but do some research and you'll know. Not sure if this is the time to buy any Japanese equity right now though, it's a flight away from risk and investors are indiscriminate with their funds.
Post reply on HN