Does anyone remember back to Monday?  Apparently the sky was falling – the markets closed at a six month low,  the Aussie dollar was down and a weak GDP data was expected.  It was spread across the news and the front page of the papers (shown below).

Since Monday, a lot has changed. The 76 points that the share market dropped are back up again – in fact yesterday saw an increase in all ASX sectors  (seen in Thursday’s 07/06/2012 Herald Sun below), we have had an interest rate cut on Tuesday,  Wednesday shows the Aussie dollar up at a two week high and GDP data shows the economy grew by 1.3% for the first 3 months of 2012   Although these articles were in the newspapers, they definitely did not feature on the front page news of Monday’s market close!

Instead, yesterdays Herald Sun front page was a great fluff story about a baby called Dustin Martin and today – guess what?, Nick D’Arcy the Australian swimmer has done something stupid – again…. Good market news obviously doesn’t sell as many papers.

I have said it before –If you listen to these headlines, and buy and sell as a result, you are no longer an investor but playing a speculative game.  Focus on a long term investing strategy, focus on dividends for a brighter future , and don’t make moves based on the headlines!!

By David Ramsay