QQQ at 723.03: If I’m Scared, It’s Probably a Buy

Written by: George from The Smartin Team

I’m sitting here, watching the QQQ climb 3.28% this week to 723.03, and I feel nothing but a cold, calculated dread. Why? Because I didn’t buy it. I spent Monday morning convinced the entire tech sector was a house of cards held together by spit and hopeful thinking. So, naturally, it soared. I should have known. If my lizard brain tells me it’s a bubble, it’s actually a diamond-encrusted titanium sphere.

The Inverse-George Indicator is Flashing Red

What is the deal with Palantir? PLTR is up 36.9% this week, hitting $172.01. I’ve seen rockets with less lift. I looked at the charts, I saw the hype, and I thought, “George, stay away. This is a fad. It’s spooky data magic.” And what happened? It gained nearly forty percent while I was busy worrying if my dry cleaner switched to a cheaper starch.

If you’re looking for growth at a reasonable price stocks, this isn’t it. This is growth at “I’ll sell my firstborn” prices. But since I’m the one saying it’s too expensive, it’ll probably hit $500 by Tuesday. That’s the “Post-Roast” strategy. I am now officially treating my own intuition like a prank phone call. If I think a stock is a “tenbagger,” I check the P/E ratio and realize I’m actually just looking at a company with a debt pile the size of the DIA—which, by the way, is up 1.58% at 539.62. Even the blue chips are mocking me.

Australia: The Land of Upward Momentum and Giant Spiders

I look at the global context to feel better, but there’s no relief. The ASX 200 in Australia is up 2.8%. How? Everything in that country is designed to kill you. They have birds that can open doors and spiders that eat birds. Their market should be in a permanent state of cardiac arrest. But no, they’re beating my portfolio. I’m being outperformed by a country where the toilets flush the wrong way.

Meanwhile, I actually had a “good” feeling about Peloton. PTON is down 11.9% to $5.68. Finally! My gut said, “The bike is just a very expensive laundry rack, George. It’s over.” And for once, my gut was right, which means I’ve clearly lost my edge at being wrong. If I’m right about a loser, I’m failing at my strategy of being wrong about winners. It’s a paradox! I’m trapped in a financial Moebius strip of my own making!

I’m even losing to CleanSpark. CLSK down 16.0% to $12.3. I didn’t buy that either, which technically makes me a winner, but I feel like a loser because I didn’t short it. I can’t win for losing, and I can’t lose for winning.

If you want to avoid my specific brand of psychological torture, you need a fundamental stock screener app that doesn’t base its picks on whether or not the waiter was rude to you at lunch. You have to look at the Peter Lynch fundamentals and ignore the screaming voice in your head that sounds suspiciously like me.

I’m going to go do the opposite of whatever I just thought. If I think I should have a bagel, I’m having a grapefruit. It’s the only way to survive this market. If the toilets in Australia are flushing up, I’m buying everything they hate.

Stop trusting your broken gut and get a 15-second fundamental reality check instead.