What Happened to the H1N1 Pandemic? a Stock Trader's Perspective

What happened to the H1N1 pandemic that was supposed to wipe out tens of millions of people worldwide? Why are there now truckloads of unused vaccine and H1N1 ads that look like they will run into July? What about the greater than the great depression we were going into in 2008 and the end of capitalism as we know it that made us vote in "fundamental" change in Washington? The $400/barrel oil as we ran out of it? The global warming that now is beginning to look more and more like global cooling?

I see a PATTERN:

- These market panics come and go with amazing regularity;

- Very few of them (if any) ever amount to anything;

- The crowd just goes from one panic to the next without ever looking back.

Not bringing in politics or attempting to analyze human behavior - just looking at things from an investing perspective: following the money, like the FBI. Who benefits from these panics?

H1N1 - the WHO as they begged for additional funds; and the drug companies that make the vaccine. Doctors administering the shots were a distant second. The great depression scare: the socialists that grabbed power; and the brokers who live off trading commissions. The $400 oil: commodity traders and hedge funds. Global warming: lefties salivating at the prospect of new taxes on business; and entrepreneurs pushing new "green" technologies. And so forth. I would go so far as to say that if no one stands to benefit from a scare, it will never amount to much, no matter how strong the underlying causes.

How does the small investor make money off these scares? Sometimes it's easy. H1N1: buy stocks of companies that (supposedly) have the vaccine, like SVA, or that make protective face masks, like APT. The $400 oil: buy oil or solar stocks.

But I think the most important thing is to recognize that these scares eventually pass. You don't want to argue with them while they sweep the crowd - ask those who decided to tough out the 2008 selloff because it was irrational; but if you really buy into them, so to speak, you won't be able to recognize the turning point and act on it. For example, oil peaked around $175. But if you'd really believed that it was going to $400 (or at least $200) because we were running out of it, you would have failed to act when the trend reversed.