When is the right time to buy stocks? Unfortunately there is no straightforward answer, irrespective of the amount of analysis thrown at the question. This blog post steps aside from the timing issue by simply considering what the chances would be of losing/making money on the stock market over different holding periods. The results make for interesting reading.

The past week witnessed a turnaround in sentiment as renewed recession fears dominated investors’ actions. Stock markets across the globe were subjected to selling pressure, while credit spreads scaled new highs. “What the market giveth [the previous week], it also taketh away [last week],” was Briefing.com's very apt description of events.

The latest edition of Newsweek blares out: "Road to Recession". What does this tell us as a contrarian indicator as far as magazine covers go?

The Chinese calendar proclaims this as the Year of the Rat. Based on the behavior of economies and financial markets over the past few months, investors would be forgiven for thinking that a plague has descended upon the financial system. But on occasion it is useful to step back from the day-to-day shenanigans of markets and take a bird's-eye view of events.