Nature Knows Where the Stock Market Is Headed

Andy Snyder|August 10, 2020

Gold is up… bonds are up… and stocks are up.

Sounds like we were right. Diversification is dead.

It turns out that when we let things run wild… the wild does funny things.

It’s true in stocks and life.

We had a professional ballroom dancer stop by the farm last week. “It’s hard to dance when we’re not allowed within 6 feet of each other,” she told us. “And even if we could, we can’t get an audience.”

So she’s doing the next best thing for a person with a master’s degree in dance… She’s foraging for food.

I’ll Eat That

That’s right. She wants to use our place as a bit of a living classroom, gathering a handful of curious folks and teaching them what’s good and what’s not.

It’s a popular thing these days.

We’re all about it.

Like us, she and her students are worried about the system. It’s getting too big for its legs.

“Everybody nowadays wants just one big thing,” she said. “One big grocery store. One big hardware store. One big online beast that does it all. That’s scary.”

We nodded along, bent over and showed her a patch of lamb’s-quarters.

It’s a superfood that grows like a weed in our southernmost pasture. The natives used to thrive on the stuff. It’s packed with protein. But now, the “natives” pull the foil off a factory-made Clif Bar and never think of the system behind it.

“I’m not teaching folks how to forage because I expect to have to use the skills,” our dancing weed eater told us. “I’m doing it because folks want to know they can. This is knowledge that we can’t let die.”

We see it as a win-win partnership.

She gets to teach a useful craft… and somebody pays us to pick our weeds.

We may even get a good meal out of it.

Slashing the (Market) Weeds

But there’s a bigger idea here.

You see, we think our foraging friend would be a good investor.

She knows this whole mess is tied together.

“Oh wow,” she jumped. “Look at all that wild grape.”

We hate the stuff.

“It’s choking out that walnut tree,” she said as if she already knew why we’ve declared war on it. “But look, it’s making way for this native spicebush.”

She grabbed a fistful of leaves and stuck them under our nose.

Spicy.

And so it went as we strolled from meadow to pasture to woodlot. Everything is connected… invasives fighting noninvasives… A weed to us was the main course for her.

She danced when she found a patch of lady’s thumb… and we blushed because the leaves grew so tall between mowings.

That’s the way things are supposed to be… a tug-of-war between the forces. One wants to grow it; the other wants to mow it.

But we’ve gotten away from that. “Let my customers come in here, and we’ll keep it under control,” she said. “It’s a win for all of us.”

That’s the idea that takes us back to the top.

Stocks are up. Gold is up. Bonds are up.

The only thing that’s down… is morale.

It’s funny how that works.

A Failing Ecosystem

That’s what happens when we let things grow without mowing them down.

Worse yet, that’s what happens when we toss on trillions of dollars’ worth of doped up fertilizer. Things get out of hand.

The vines grow and grow and grow… until eventually the ecosystem is just one big plant that can’t sustain itself.

In the end, the foragers come in and eat what’s left.

Our culture and our leaders refuse to cut back the weeds. We let the big grow bigger, and we prop up the deadwood so it doesn’t fall and make an ugly mess.

Nature doesn’t like that sort of thing.

There will be consequences.

But don’t hide from nature’s power. You’ll get grown over if you do.

Invest. Don’t get left behind.

Just be prepared for what comes next.

Foraging is a good skill to learn.

How are you feeling about investing in this market? Tell us about it at mailbag@manwardpress.com.