Cash Is Not King

Lately, article after article has been telling investors to cash out. Stocks are falling and investors need to use some sense to save dollars and move into cash. While the market is headed for a downturn over the holiday season, cash is not king. Sure, put a little money in greenbacks and hide under the sofa. But this move to crypto, especially considering Tesla's TSLA announcement to accept Dogecoin as payment, could not represent a more glaring view of a future in which goods and services are paid for using a slew of cryptocurrencies. 

We Know Who Let the Doge Out 

Elon Musk, aka “The Dogefather", has tweeted about the "joke" currency many times, with each tweet sending the crypto coin higher. In his latest, he tweeted: 

“Tesla will make some merch buyable with Doge & see how it goes." And, like clockwork, Dogecoin DOGE/USD rose 30%. I have long wished that my stock trading platforms would include a setting that would enable me to buy anything automatically mentioned in an Elon Musk tweet. Forget stop losses and limits, how much easier would it be to make quick money if you scheduled a buy on a nod from Musk? Of course, that is pure fantasy. Ridiculous. Almost as ridiculous as the fact that, at a $30 billion market cap, Doge, even though it's far from its high, is currently more valuable than Delta DAL or SouthWest LUV and boasts more than $2 billion in market cap over Visa V. Doge: It's everywhere you shouldn't but can't help but be. 

Cash Out, But Also Cash In 

Again, equities are going to struggle but is cashing out into cash the answer? Well, many experts are sounding the horn, admonishing investors to get out and get back in when the timing is right. But these warnings have, for the most part, fallen off deaf ears. Americans are still heavily invested in stocks, with more than 56% of households owning equities, according to a Gallup Poll this year. That's up a percent from last year, though down from the early 2000s. Clearly, however, this does not consider crypto, a space in which so many retail investors, both new and old, have moved their money. 

Besides cash, other experts have been pushing for a move to defensive stocks or a flight to quality to soften risk brought on by inflationary and Fed and Omicron worries. 

But I say that, as we found out in the pandemic, defensive stocks are not the consumer staples and utilities and health care stocks of old. Sure, those are safe bets, but big tech stocks. despite a recent beat down, represent the new utilities. So, make sure not to give up on the Microsoft’s MSFT and Google's GOOG of the world. But while a flight to quality may be at hand, a flight to quirkiness is—f Elon Musk has any say—equally inevitable.