The stock market can only do three things; go up, go down, or stay flat. Those are pretty good odds for someone trying to make a prediction. Predicting that nothing happens isn’t very newsworthy so its usually “Dow 30,000” or “The end of the world is coming!” Its funny how so many “experts” have written books and not even come close. This is what I found on Amazon.com:

• Dow, 30,000 by 2008 – Why It’s Different This Time – by Robert Zuccaro CFA
• Dow 36,000: The New Strategy for Profiting from the Coming Rise in the Stock Market by James K. Glassman and Kevin A. Hassett
• Dow 40,000: Strategies for Profiting from the Greatest Bull Market in History by David Elias

These books were written in 2003, 1999 and 2000, respectively. Near record highs now, the Dow is only at 15,000 in June 2013. Suffice it to say, these are ridiculous titles that were made to sell books. When the most successful investor in the world, Warren Buffet, says he has no idea where the market is going and he doesn’t care, you should listen. He buys businesses that will succeed no matter what and he knows there will be good times and bad times. Its hard to convince clients that you are more qualified than the next guy because “you don’t know what will happen to the market next”. But if you say things with confidence and use a lot of fancy finance words, they will think you’re really smart and are good at what you do. People who go on television put out forecasts so that when they are right they can pretend they predicted it. And if they are wrong, well, they just won’t be asked on the program for a while.