If Mick says it is time to sell, sell!

• Author: Atkins, Michael

I don't know if you've noticed, but capitalism in a crashing market is not as much fun as capitalism on the way up. It can be hard on manners, mood and general decorum as you watch those Pina Colada's melt away with each new bar graph.

Fortunately, I have never been burdened with sufficient surplus funds to get me into any kind of real trouble. My brief, almost accidental forays into the market have been so absurdly unsuccessful, it is a natural safety harness. I prefer to lose my money making bets on actually buying or starting new companies, than trying to figure out how well someone else is going to do in their business.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

That doesn't mean I don't get to live on this roller coaster with the rest of you. The psychology of the markets always trickles down to the rest of us civilians and that is happening now.

I have this little investment that is getting littler by the minute called March Networks. I got the shares as part of the consideration for a business I sold some years ago. A couple of years after the transaction, the shares were worthless. I didn't feel badly about the value at the time because I knew the risk, which is why I sold the business in the first place. Then the company changed management, got a life, and went public at $11 a share. This was a miracle and I was thankful.

I was so thankful I sold half those shares immediately and the next day the shares started to make an inexorable climb to $39.

I found it hard to feel good about the 11 dollars a share, which was a gift from heaven after witnessing the 39 dollars a share I was missing on the half I had sold.

When it got to $39, I knew it was time to sell. I called to give the sell order to my stockbroker and he said hang on. You don't need to sell he said and you should always have some speculation in your portfolio. I neglected to tell him I had no portfolio. I just said there is no way the stock is worth $39 or would be in my life time again and then took his advice and kept it. There is no solace in being right.

The other day as it slid down past $8.50 (probably five bucks by the time you read this), I declined to calculate how much I had left on the table, but as you can imagine for a man of modest means it was not inconsiderable. I've decided to ride it as low as she goes because...